A Quintet of Pivotal Events in the Assault on the Rights of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
A year ago, groups dedicated to gender equality were anticipating a return of Donald Trump to office. Hardly anyone anticipated. The volume and speed of executive orders issued from the White House were viewed as a premeditated approach to paralyze through overload. In many ways it worked – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as networks struggled to address the shortfall left by a sudden aid suspension. But this was only the precursor.
The US administration has been the main instigator, aided by vigorous campaigning by deeply conservative factions capitalizing on the climate to strengthen global ties with sympathetic regimes.
The movement against gender equality denotes an international coalition of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that aim to roll back progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This covers reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They achieve this through advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.
We analyze five junctures that impacted the protection, honor, and existence of girls and women.
The Dismantling of USAID
In March, six weeks after a major US aid agency is halted, causing international chaos, a top American diplomat reveals that a vast majority of the body's projects will be terminated. US diplomats, past leaders and aid and medical specialists condemn the news, stating that fatalities will ensue. Activists say that the dismantling of this institution is not just a financial shortfall, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and birth control and maternal healthcare. Numerous groups say females will bear the brunt by shrinking assistance, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, statistics reveal how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with many more millions at risk. Two other major donor nations initiate similar reductions. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a move to appease a political ally.
Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a biannual gathering held alongside the annual UN Women gathering. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in buoyant mood as they celebrate new Washington directives on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the global conference with a grave caution that “the poison of patriarchy” is resurgent, after a study indicates that anti-rights actors are systematically eroding historic agreements on key women’s rights issues around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the summer, a cluster of meetings in Africa centered on the traditional family and national sovereignty sparks alarm among rights advocates. In early May, a national leader and spouse open a large assembly to push back on what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A shortly thereafter, another continental gathering on family values is held. Both events are graced by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker calls on African NGOs to resist “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of international organizations. In the following month, a global faith group hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in West Africa, an event that health activists say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Advocates remark that the extent of foreign involvement has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are running out of contraceptives, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in July plans to incinerate a vast stockpile of birth control held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their incineration will prevent a huge female population from access to birth control, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an dogmatic choice “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains at a standstill as host nation officials are blocking the destruction of viable medicines.
‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the rule was reinstated in the first month of the year. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in October, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. Further specifics about the expansion of the rule are anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says extending the reach will have “devastating consequences”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being arranged with states on the continent will become dependent on agreeing to the new, wider policy.
