Feminist Vacation Part 2: Tell Me What a Feminist Looks Like!

Erin Fenner

Erin Fenner, Jackie Reynolds (co-chairs of Feminist Alliance at UI) and Mary Walsh from the University of Southern California

“This is what a feminist looks like” buttons and t-shirts made the participants of the National Young Feminist Leadership Conference easily identifiable.

“A revolution is never permanent unless you make it so,” Congresswoman for the District of Columbia Eleanor Holmes Norton said.

She was the first speaker at the conference, and called on young feminists to take their turn and hold the ground that earlier feminists fought for.

“You come to Washington at a defining moment for women,” Norton said, “The new majority (in the House of Representatives) has not merely focused on those of us who protect and promote feminist policies…they have aimed their attack…on every American woman.”

GOP attacks labor unions: Coverage/Opinion

photo © 2011 Cindy | more info (via: Wylio)Kristen Carey
Wisconsin was the first state to emerge in outrage as its Congress attempted to shut down labor unions, with legislators claiming it as a necessary action to fix the state’s budget. The legislative move, backed by GOP Congress members and the newly elected Tea Party, Republican governor Scott Walker, infuriated the liberal Congress members to the point that they didn’t show up to vote on the measure.
Leaders of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) told the Chicago Tribune that they are encouraging the protesters to continue picketing and fighting the measure. The protests have become a unifying force for union workers across the nation, which is good news for large labor organizations.
While the Midwest and its presence of large industry may seem irrelevant to the Pacific Northwest’s often more agricultural foundations, this is still a great concern for Idaho.

Spotlight: Heather Shea Gasser

Director of the UI Women’s Center, Heather Shea Gasser. Photo by Kristen Carey

Kristen Carey

Heather Shea Gasser is one of those faces you see everywhere on campus.  The Director of the University of Idaho’s Women’s Center seems to always be buzzing from one campus event to another: always well-equipped with a smile on her face. I have known her personally through not only the Women’s Center but also her role as faculty advisor for Feminist Alliance.  I got the opportunity to sit down with her and ask her a few questions about the Women’s Center.

I asked Gasser to supply me with a brief history of the University of Idaho’s Women Center.  What I assumed was going to be the usual “The Center was founded in the year of blank by someone by the name of blank”  ended up being a captivating anecdote about civil rights.

Gasser said that a group called the Women’s Caucus had to meet in secrecy, and that the university President advised them that legal action was the only way to establish such a group on campus.  The group took his advice and served the university with a lawsuit.  Instead of going to court, the university and the group successfully negotiated, and the University of Idaho Women’s Center was established on March 8, 1974, which happens to be International Women’s Day.

Gasser’s full history of the Women’s Center and the terms of the agreement: