*if you don’t follow Rebecca Solnit on social media – why don’t you? She is one of the clearest-eyed and clearest period communicators on feminism, politics, the environment, and the intersection of all of these, and more. This is yet another example of her good work synthesizing issues that matter to women and men, and yes, subscribing to The New Yorker is also a schmart move, lovies!! thanks for being here, and reading. And, checking J.D. Vance’s bullshit matters; I for one cannot wait until that guy – and the crazy conman at the top of the GOP ticket – both go TF away. #VoteBlue
A piece in the New Yorker fact-checks anti-divorce dude JD Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy (and finds out his grandmother filed for divorce in the 1950s and his grandfather did so in 1981; the couple ended up legally separated) but the really important takeaway for me was: “As no-fault divorce became the norm in state after state, domestic-violence rates dropped by some thirty per cent, suicides among women dropped by as much as sixteen per cent, and the number of women murdered by their partners dropped by ten per cent.”
In other words, feminism saves lives (including men’s; a significant portion of women’s spousal homicide is self-defense). Providing better recourse/escape routes benefits everyone, as does delegitimizing domestic violence, recognizing coercive control, and establishing that men and women are equal under the law and in every other way–in other words, that he has no right to do it.
It’s feminism that did a lot of the work to bring us no-fault divorce. Here’s a 1992 profile of one such woman:
“In her nearly 32 years as a professor at the University of California at Berkeley’s School of Law (Boalt Hall), she has cajoled, wheedled, lobbied and persuaded in her mission to use the law to end sex-based discrimination, by reputation combining clear-eyed logic and flawless legal research with impeccable manners.
“How to make trouble without being a troublemaker, that describes my style,” Ms. Kay said in an interview this week. “I think that if you are going to help build an institution, you have to be careful not to destroy it in the process.”
“Now, long after many people say they expected her to get the job, Ms. Kay, 57 years old, has been named dean of Boalt Hall, the first woman to hold the position. For the female lawyers and law professors who were her students or who know her through her book and other writings on sex discrimination, Professor Kay is a “patron saint” and “godmother,” and her appointment is a sweet victory.
“Over the years, Ms. Kay has become a leading scholar in family law and was an author of no-fault divorce legislation that has been adopted in California and other states. She has been a major force in bringing women into law schools and sending them out on graduation to use law to achieve social change.
“After graduating magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Southern Methodist University, Ms. Kay entered the University of Chicago Law School. She graduated in 1959, one of three women in a class of 109 students.”
Which is also a reminder of how profoundly feminism remade the law and how much Vance and the Republican Party preach regression to almost every form of inequality.
But we still need more feminism because as a recent editorial in the Washington Post states: “One U.S. study found women are twice as likely as men to be convicted of a crime after claiming self-defense; the odds are even worse for a woman of color.”
Likewise, restraining orders are a weak tool often not enforced against homicidal spouses intent on punishing women for leaving. Spouses who’ve often committed earlier violence that went unpunished. Feminism’s work continues.