NEWS

Young workers at small vegetable farm sorting freshly harvested green spring onions. Photo credit: Shutterstock.

By Rickey Gard Diamond
Women, Money & Democracy Committee

June 2023

The US Farm Bill is huge in size and effect. It’s only renewed every five years and this year, 2023, is when the old one expires. Advocate organizations, like Women, Food, and Agriculture Network (WFAN) and National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC), have been working to educate the public about what’s at stake.

In the March eNews, we reported on the Farm Bill’s importance to WILPF’s issue committees, Earth Democracy and Women, Money & Democracy—though really, it is important to all women and people who eat. Men of corporate, industrial America have traditionally crafted the Farm Bill to better serve the biggest corporations who seek the biggest global profits.

Illegitimate corporate power and systemic racism and sexism have long been a central concern for WILPF's Women, Money & Democracy committee, and these issues matter to young and diverse farmers, too. Earth Democracy can point to the role of past farm bills in soil depletion and the subsidized use of harmful chemicals like glyphosate and paraquat.

With an aging farm population and a trend toward bigger land grabs, we are concerned about food security and good livelihoods for small farmers who grow fruits and vegetables, not just corn for ethanol and grain for export. You can learn more from my article at Ms. Magazine, “As the US Looks to Revamp the Farm Bill, Women Must Be at the Table!

Current Draft of Farm Bill Is a Step Backward

I recently asked Juliannn Salinas, who heads WFAN, for an update, after having seen that Biden’s USDA is pushing for “bipartisanship” and is calling the Farm Bill a “jobs bill.” She said there have been many closed-door meetings. They and other advocates were recently surprised by release of a US House subcommittee markup of 2024 agricultural appropriations, not expected until July.

Why closed doors and a rush? Salinas said, “The idea that the bill is now a ‘jobs bill' is so absurd it’s almost funny.” She noted the markup cut the very items that networks have been calling for. Mike Lavender at NSAC responded: “In its current form, this bill represents a consequential step backward for market access, fair competition, climate resilience, equity, and food security.”

The Senate Ag Committee is headed by Debbie Stabenow (D-Mi), the second woman ever to have this role, while the House Ag Committee is headed by MAGA election-denier Glenn Thompson (R-Pa). Talk to your local small farmer and tell your representatives what YOU want to see in the upcoming Farm Bill. The House Ag Committee has opened a public portal for feedback, as well as a portal for your member of congress to share priorities.

Need to learn more first? WFAN will be hosting “Lunch and Learn webinars” from 12-1:30 pm (Central time) in June and July. Here’s what’s coming:

• June 13 – Farm Bill and Farmworker Rights
• June 28 – Farm Bill Advocacy and Action
• July 11 – Conservation and the Farm Bill
• July 25 – Soil Health and the Farm Bill

The registration page for these webinars will going up later this week.

The WFAN website “powered by women” is a rich learning resource that An Economy of Our Own and WILPF's W$D Committee highly recommend.

by Margo Schulter
DPoW Committee

June 2023

“Peace begins at home” is the theme and motto of a new issue committee formed in the WILPF US section for survivors of domestic abuse and all WILPF members who want to join with us in sisterhood and allyship.

The new committee was authorized by the WILPF US Board on June 20, 2022. Since then it has been growing and developing its mission, offering a presentation to the general membership of WILPF US last October. Currently the focus is on the situation of domestic abuse in the United States, to set our own national house in order, so to speak; but we welcome an international comparing of notes at some point when it may be most helpful and informative for our international organization.

At the Intersection of Nonviolence and Feminism

The DPoW Committee grew out of the struggles of survivors of domestic abuse to rebuild their lives, and their experience giving a new meaning to the truth that “peace begins at home.” Ironically, literal prisoners of war treated according to the Geneva Conventions live under conditions that might seem idyllic to domestic abuse survivors, including children. The Geneva Convention calls for prisoners of war to be “humanely treated” at all times, and to be “protected , particularly against acts of violence or intimidation and against insults and public curiosity.” Neither of these conditions exist in situations of domestic abuse.

For domestic abuse survivors, a hostage crisis might provide a closer if grimmer analogy. The Stockholm Syndrome refers to the curious attachment that some hostages experience toward their captors, but sadly an analogous bond between domestic abuser and abused can hinder a survivor from escaping a dangerous as well as degrading home environment.

As favored by the international program of WILPF, DPoW takes an intersectional perspective on domestic abuse, taking into account how patriarchal oppression interacts with factors of race, class, and disability. Thus we follow bell hooks in not underestimating sexism as a source of oppression, while George Friday, a member of the committee, is focusing on how racism affects Black women survivors.

Two Tasks: Network-building and Legal Reform

As DPoW sees it, survivors face two obstacles: the lack of adequate supports; and patriarchal laws that engage in victim-blaming, inflicting new injuries on survivors by often stigmatizing them and criminalizing them when they engage in desperate acts of self-defense. This situation is comparable to that faced by sexual assault survivors before the feminist wave of rape law reform that swept the US in the 1970's and 1980's.

That is why two of our goals are to build networks among survivors and allies, and to advocate for legal reform.

Our Ethos: “The Survivor Is the Expert”

While DPoW welcomes all WILPF US members, the group is knit together by a shared understanding that survivors are the experts on domestic abuse, and they own their unique stories.

At the DPoW presentation in October, a moving moment brought this lesson home when a survivor found it difficult to begin her presentation because recounting her chosen topic triggered recollections of the abuse she had endured. It is a costly expertise that survivors gain, and forming a circle of learning and action around this expertise is the purpose of the committee.

An Invitation to Knowledge and Action

After less than a year of official recognition as an issue committee in WILPF US, DPoW invites interested members of our section to join our dynamic sisterhood. We are seeking to gain a more complete picture of domestic abuse in the US, not limited to the prevailing patriarchal patterns: we recognize that men are among abuse survivors, as are women in lesbian relationships. Domestic abuse in the LGBT community is one area of our inquiry. One of our general goals is to be a catalyst in mobilizing our branches to support legal reform and also to help build support networks.

An important theme in peacework is how “militarized masculinities” affect everyday life. Focusing on this intersection between feminism, nonviolence, and the dangerous and degrading conditions that some of our members and others face at home is the paramount purpose of DPoW. The work of our committee is central to the values that have inspired and found actualization in the 108-year quest of WILPF for peace in the wider world.

ICAN Poster advertising their G7 Youth Summit Global Day of Action against nuclear weapons.

by Cherrill Spencer and Ellen Thomas
Co-chairs, DISARM/End Wars Issue Committee

June 2023

The anti-nuclear weapons international community took many actions to influence the political leaders who held their G7 meeting in Hiroshima May 19-21, 2023, and the Japanese Prime Minister, who was the host, had made it one of his goals for the G7 meeting participants to consider their next steps on nuclear disarmament. And the outcome?: The G7 statement, posted here, was most disappointing. 

It mentions the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) but omits taking action on its Article VI which obliges states to enter into serious negotiations leading to global nuclear disarmament. The last paragraph “…welcomes other initiatives that support the full, equal, and meaningful participation of women in addition to the engagement of civil society in disarmament and non-proliferation processes.” But there is no mention of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), or their G7 youth summit held in Hiroshima, or the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which was largely driven by women’s participation. No mention of the hibakusha the G7 leaders met in Hiroshima. A very shortsighted vision we say; it is just a restatement of the status quo.

All the more reason for WILPF members to work harder on getting more co-sponsors for H.R.2775 which states “To direct the United States to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and convert nuclear weapons industry resources and personnel to purposes relating to addressing the climate crisis, and for other purposes.” We are a member of the coalition called “Localities and Legislators” (L&L) which focuses on legislation about nuclear weapons, and we welcome WILPF members to join us on its planning committee. Write to disarmchair@wilpfus.org if you would like to join L&L or any of the several ongoing DISARM campaigns.

Maine WILPFers picket with other groups each Friday in the center of Portland.

by Martha Spiess
Maine Branch

June 2023

Maine WILPFers picket collaboratively with other groups each Friday in the center of Portland, Maine. This month we deployed both of our most active banners together to emphasize how important diplomacy is, given the threat of all things nuclear, especially nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants.

A failure of diplomacy led to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Today, diplomacy is urgently needed to end the war. Having attended the recent Warheads to Windmills Webinar, we asked our legislators to support the Norton Bill H.R. 2775 (Nuclear Weapons Abolition Bill) and H.Res.77. This resolution calls on President Biden to embrace the goals and provisions of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and make nuclear disarmament the centerpiece of US national security policy. It also calls on the United States to lead a global effort to move the world back from the nuclear brink and to prevent nuclear war.

Additionally, we thanked Maine’s US Representative Chellie Pingree for recently co-sponsoring H.Res 77. The Disarm Committee keeps us informed, involved, and enthusiastic.