Five Critical Crucial Incidents in the Assault on the Rights of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
In the previous year, feminist advocacy groups were bracing themselves for a return of Donald Trump to office. Hardly anyone anticipated. The flood and velocity of executive orders coming out of the White House were seen as a deliberate tactic to cause confusion and fear. In many ways it worked – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as organisations scrambled to plug the hole left by a freeze on international development funds. But the situation was about to worsen.
The Trump administration has been the key driver, aided by vigorous campaigning by ultra-conservative groups exploiting the situation to forge international alliances with political allies.
Often termed the anti-gender movement signifies a transnational grouping of policymakers, doctrinal establishments, and activist outfits as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that work to dismantle gains in a variety of areas. These include abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.
They pursue this agenda via advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to push for parity, disseminating propaganda, and supporting ideologically-matched groups.
We examine five instances that influenced the protection, honor, and existence of females globally.
USAID Dismantled
In the month of March, a month and a half following a prominent humanitarian funder is suspended, causing widespread distress, a top American diplomat announces that the lion's share of the organization's initiatives will be axed. US diplomats, past leaders and relief and public health authorities decry the decision, stating that people will die as a result. Activists say that the dismantling of this institution is more than a funding crisis, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Many organisations say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by shrinking assistance, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, reports confirm how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with millions more to come. Another pair of leading funders announce their own austerity measures. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In the same month, several Christian-right organisations meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a strategic summit held in parallel with the international conference on women's rights. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they welcome changes in American foreign policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the women’s summit with a grave caution that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is resurgent, after a study indicates that opponents of gender equality are systematically eroding longstanding consensus on key women’s rights issues around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa themed around the conventional household and state autonomy sparks alarm among equality campaigners. In May, a head of state and partner open a significant conference to push back on what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A soon after, another Pan-African conference on traditional morals is held. Both events are participated in by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including heads of influential networks. One speaker calls on African NGOs to stand up to “international liberal agenda” of multilateral bodies. In the following month, a major religious institution hosts a family strengthening conference in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Campaigners note that the scale of their presence has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are facing shortages of birth control, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in July plans to incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a warehouse in Europe. A major reproductive health federation states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from contraceptive supplies, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about imposing an anti-rights agenda on the entire world” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “heartless and dangerous”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains unresolved as local authorities will not allow the destruction of viable medicines.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Bringing back the anti-abortion funding ban, which prohibits Washington's support for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the rule was reinstated in the first month of the year. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. But in October, the US announces it intends to broaden the scope of the policy to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. More details on the broader enforcement are anticipated next year. A expert in child welfare says widening the scope will have “catastrophic impacts”. Pro-choice activists fear that fresh American assistance deals being discussed with African nations will become dependent on agreeing to the broadened restrictions.
