What’s Next in Criminalizing Intimate Partner Violence

by Jess GallagherNo Comments
By Staff Writer Zeqi Chen In March 2022, the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), was reauthorized for the fourth time, albeit after a four-year delay. First enacted in 1994, VAWA is the federal legislative milestone against domestic violence that provides protections for individuals who have suffered gender-based harm.  VAWA’s most iconic achievement was the establishment of criminalization as a way to combat intimate partner violence and advance the criminalization of intimate partner violence. This approach, which allocates most of its funding to law enforcement to address domestic violence, was opposed by anti-violence activists as early as 1994 when VAWA was passed. They warned that criminalizing domestic violence would disproportionately target communities of color and punish survivors.  With the death of George Floyd to the “Black Lives Matter” movement, the breakdown of trust between the public and police has led to increasing challenges to the traditional role of law enforcement and debates around the effectiveness of its powers in social justice. The assumption that...
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It Is Feminist, So It Is Good: Feminist Jail Is Not Feminist

by Jess GallagherNo Comments
By Staff Writer Zeqi Chen In May 2022, a proposal titled The Women’s Center for Justice: A Nation-Leading Approach on Women & Gender-Expansive People in Jail, respondedresponds to concerns about New York City’s current plans to close Rikers Island by 2027. The current alternative to Rose M. Singer Center, the women’s jail on Rikers Island, is to build a new facility for women and gender-expansive people as part of a larger men’s jail in Kew Gardens, Queens. But the proposal states that “​​New York City should transform the closed Lincoln Correctional Facility at West 110th Street into a Women’s Center for Justice. ” According to the proposal, this approach is designed to highlight the unique needs for trauma-informed care, family reunification and skill building that female inmates need as mothers and victims of intimate partner violence or domestic violence. Rose M. Singer Center, which Proposal claims is the site of nearly all female and gender-expansive populations in New York City jails,...
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Complicating Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Legacy Through the Lens of White Feminism, Race, and Indigenous Rights

Complicating Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Legacy Through the Lens of White Feminism, Race, and Indigenous Rights

by Nay Alhelou1 Comment
By Rowena Kosher, Co-Editor of RightsViews and student at Columbia's School of General Studies majoring in Human Rights with a Concentration in Gender & Sexuality Studies. On September 18, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died at 87, after serving on the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) for 27 years. Ginsburg, popularly known as RBG, and in her most recent fame “The Notorious RBG,” is a feminist icon. This is for good reason—she accomplished a number of “firsts” in her lifetime and her work contributed to groundbreaking progressive legal changes, particularly regarding gender.  Ginsburg graduated top of her Columbia class and became the first woman to be appointed as full professor at Columbia Law. As Director of the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project, she litigated over 300 sex discrimination cases before working on the D.C Court of Appeals for 13 years. Ginsburg joined SCOTUS in 1993, where she served until her death. During this time, Ginsburg rose to mainstream fame, becoming well known...
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Failing to Protect Human Rights: The United States and the Asylum Cooperation Agreements

Failing to Protect Human Rights: The United States and the Asylum Cooperation Agreements

by Nay AlhelouNo Comments
By: Jacquelyn Sieck, RightsViews Staff Writer  In 2019, the United States forced countries in the Northern Triangle – a region composed of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras – to sign Asylum Cooperation Agreements by withholding over $500 Million in aid. These threats of aid suspension echo Cold War-Era proxy war interventions in Central America, during which the United States blocked the Guatemalan government from receiving “much-needed” development loans from the World Bank because it did not approve of the Arévalo Government. During these proxy wars, the United States offered “support for a coup in Guatemala, brutal government forces in El Salvador, and right-wing rebels based in Honduras known as the Contras.” This U.S. support led to gross human rights abuses, and demonstrated to the region that the United States is willing to act on threats and suspend aid to governments in need in order to further its foreign policy objectives. This sentiment and realization forced the Northern Triangle to respond swiftly...
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