Evening, Meteor readers,

Remember a few newsletters ago when I promised I’d stop hammering everyone with my basketball opinions? I lied!

In today’s newsletter, we’re giving Angel Reese her flowers. Plus Rebecca Carroll talks to model Cameron Russell about her new book and impossible beauty standards.

Untruthfully yours,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

Bigger than basketball: Watkins. Clark. Bueckers. Reese. Over the last month, these women have been at the center of conversation about the future of women’s basketball and just how bright and exciting it is. They’ve been called icons, broken scoring records, and, in the case of Angel Reese and her LSU Tigers teammates, derided as villains.

Reese, a 21-year-old Black woman from Baltimore, Maryland, announced in Vogue yesterday—after LSU’s exit from the tournament Monday—that she's entering the 2024 WNBA draft. Reese is one of college basketball’s best players, but despite that, she has been made out to be this year’s Big Bad, partly due to her media-invented rivalry with Caitlin Clark. (Monday’s rematch between Clark and Reese brought in over 12.3 million viewers)

Reese has been subject to scrutiny that goes beyond her in-game performance—every word she utters is overanalyzed—and sometimes overshadows her role in LSU's climb to the Elite 8. There is a palpable hatred that follows her—one that she says has resulted in death threats that began in 2023 when the Tigers won the NCAA Championship.

Why are so many people hostile towards this young basketball player? I’ll explain it in the simplest terms possible: They hate her 'cause they ain't her.

Angel Reese is talented; she’s a workhorse; and pardon my French, but she is so fucking entertaining to watch. She is an artist. She is a showman. But Reese is not hated for those traits. People hate her because she knows she is good and is unapologetic about it. Ahead of the Iowa game, Reese placed her signature crown on the bench for all to see and crowned herself when stepped on the court. Boss shit. She is a Black woman who does not dull her shine and people simply cannot abide by that energy.

ICONIC. (VIA GETTY IMAGES)

The day after LSU’s loss, sportscaster Emmanuel Acho delivered an entire monologue about Reese crying at the post-game conference, saying on air, “In sports, you can’t act like the big bad wolf, then cry like Courage the Cowardly Dog.” He followed it up with a tweet saying his analysis was meant to be “gender neutral and racially indifferent.”

But the premise of that argument is that Reese is a “self-proclaimed” villain who switched up her persona because she lost. It’s an argument without legs. Her villain persona was entirely invented by the media—specifically the LA Times article that referred to LSU as “dirty debutantes” and America’s “basketball villains.” (The reporter has since apologized for the article.) Once that article came out and Reese was being peppered with questions about it she said, “If that’s what you want me to be, I guess I’ll take that.” Acquiescence is not self-proclamation. Moreover, Acho willfully ignored everything behind Reese’s tears: The loss, the year of death threats, the end of her college career—all of that had to be bottled up simply because “villains don’t get empathy.”

The hatred and language aimed at Angel Reese cannot be divorced from her race or gender simply because it’s more convenient to view her as a character. Especially because sports media wouldn’t apply that same language to Caitlin Clark who is just as brash and unapologetically talented as Reese. Black women have always been subject to a different degree of scrutiny than white women playing the same sport. Reese already explained this to us last year: “I don’t fit the box that y’all want me to be in. I’m too hood. I’m too ghetto. Y’all told me that all year…So this is for the girls that look like me. For those that want to speak up for what they believe in. It’s unapologetically you.” And two years before that, even Paige Bueckers (who is white) spoke up about the mistreatment of Black women by sports media.

Sports villains are not uncommon or inherently evil, it’s normally just part of the storytelling. Kobe, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan—they all had a villain era. But Reese’s treatment goes beyond just Villain of the Day. It is shaped by the same assumptions that are made about Black women and women of color in any field they excel in—constantly having people belittle your greatness to make you easier to stomach.

Despite the racism and misogynoir they’ve faced, though, the women of this year’s NCAA Tournament have given us an incredible month and I’m sure this weekend’s Final Four and Championship games will be appointment television. And when it’s all over, and the confetti clears, we’ll be turning our eyes to the WNBA draft (April 15th!), where Angel Reese is projected to be a top-ten pick. I hope when she’s chosen she brings her crown and that million-dollar smile.

AND:

• A new lawsuit has been filed against Kanye West by a former employee at the California school he opened, Donda Academy. The employee alleges that West told two students at Donda he wanted to lock them in cages and shave their heads; the suit also accuses West of racial discrimination and spouting homophobic rhetoric in earshot of young students.

• Palestinian photojournalist Samar Abu Elouf has been awarded the International Women’s Media Foundation’s Anja Niedringhaus Courage in Photojournalism Award for her work in Gaza. As the IWMF’s executive director said of Elouf, “Samar was separated from her children, her relatives were killed, and she slept in cars and on floors to keep reporting. Battling a lung infection and surviving on one meal a day, all to bring us the truth, Samar is the epitome of dedication, professionalism and courage.” You can view some of her work here.

• The Washington Post debuted a new tracker this morning that shows which states are “restricting or requiring lessons on race, sex, and gender.” So far, Texas, Florida, and Tennessee are in a heated battle for first.

• For the first time in its history, the U.S. Census will offer “Latino” as an option in the race category. I guess I can finally stop checking “Other.”

IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER

Reclaiming Our Beauty

One model's coming of age in a broken system

BY REBECCA CARROLL

CAMERON RUSSELL (VIA GETTY IMAGES)

We live in a beauty-obsessed culture—and nowhere has that been made more clear than in the modeling industry, which for decades promoted the image of thin, white women as the definitive standard. But behind every image is an actual person navigating a workplace where objectification is a part of the job.

Cameron Russell started modeling when she was a teenager. After a few years, she saw tremendous success—booking campaigns with Victoria’s Secret and H&M and doing runway work for Prada and Chanel. She began to use her voice early on with a widely publicized TED talk in 2013. Then, in 2016, Russell and Chinese-English model Áine Rose Campbell co-founded the Model Mafia, a collective of models whose unifying mission is to create “a more equitable, just and sustainable fashion industry and world.” Russell’s work with the collective would prove to be preparation for her role in the #MeToo movement. After allegations of sexual assault emerged against Harvey Weinstein in 2017, a model friend texted Russell about her own experience of sexual abuse on the job. Russell offered to post her friend’s text on Instagram without identifying details—and that post launched a domino effect, as hundreds of similar stories from fellow models flooded Russell’s DMs and inbox. She posted many of them under the hashtag #MyJobShouldNotIncludeAbuse, and, almost overnight, became an outfacing public envoy for a reckoning in fashion.

Soon after, she resolved to write her own story.  In her new memoir, How to Make Herself Agreeable to Everyone, Russell reflects on her deeply personal evolution in the industry and her choice to get loud about its all too often seedy underbelly.

Rebecca Carroll: I want to start with an experience you write about after one of your first modeling jobs as a teen. Your mom asks you how it went and then says, “Were you your charismatic, confident self?” I wonder what that meant to you then and what it means to you now?

Cameron Russell: I grew up feeling—and I only identified this retroactively as a feminine labor—that being charismatic and likable was a necessary skill that [my mom] wanted me to have. As a child, I felt very much connected to voice—my ability to tell stories and to be in conversation with people. When I started modeling, no one really wanted to hear me talk. You go to a casting and they’re like, “No, actually, we don’t really want to hear about your day.” A lot of women’s work—which I include charisma, agreeability, and grace—is supposed to be something that we are and not something that we do.

Your story is also very much about a social consciousness awakening. In your TED Talk, you talk about how hard it was to unpack “a legacy of gender and racial oppression.” When did that unpacking begin for you?

I was a fairly thoughtful, politicized, and aware teenager when I arrived in this industry. The awakening or the consciousness shift that happened was to come into an understanding of how change is made and also move away from being heavily invested in certain ideas of success.

In the book, you talk about reading memoirs by other models because you wanted to see what happens when a model finds herself and is no longer “a doe-eyed teen.” As a transracial adoptee, this reminded me of what we call “the fog,” which is the moment we realize for the first time that we have been deprived of our origin culture and community. It’s both enraging and freeing and a call to action. What were the most liberating and intentional actions you took after finding yourself?

One piece that felt so liberating was reading Iman's memoir and just finding this very clear, concise, and complex read of her own position in fashion as complicit, as harmed, as racialized, as colonized—all these really complex things that she articulates very simply. The narrative that I had been fed for many years was that every casting agent and every media outlet would say, “Oh, you're so exceptional. You have beauty and brains,” which actually serves to make you very lonely and reinforces a winner-take-all system that is reliant upon gendered exploitation of labor from top to bottom. In reading Iman’s memoir, I was able to see I'm not alone.

Your husband is Black, and so your children are Black. One of your kids is a daughter who is going to grow up to become a Black woman, and she will face the white standard of beauty, and the white gaze that was and is so pervasive in the modeling industry. How do you hope to help her think about these things?

Femininity, as I have experienced it, [is] complicated. It has been so commercialized, I always [think], “Ugh, that performance of gender feels so yucky to me.” But actually, why? It can be beautiful. It can be beautiful to be adorned; it can be beautiful to be all the different things that we associate with feminine beauty when they're not in the context that I learned them. And so I hold that for her. She's only two and a half. We were at Target the other day, and all she wanted to do was to be in the bow aisle. So she wanted the beads for her hair, she wanted the rainbow elastics. We got home, and she said, “I want 10 bows. I want four blue beads.” And so, I am adoring her adoration of her own body, beauty, and expression.

That’s really lovely. And finally, towards the end of the book, you say that you need to believe that you are better than the conditions that made your success possible. What does that belief look and feel like for you on a daily basis?

The question is how we can be in a trusted community with each other at this moment. We need to make decisions to move with less urgency, to move with community, with care, and to put attention, focus, and resources on projects and relationships that feel generative and that are present solutions.

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Evening, Meteor readers,

Last night was an incredible spectacle of athleticism and sportsmanship. Of course I’m talking about the most anticipated rematch of the year: LSU vs. Iowa. Both teams fought to the bitter end, but unfortunately for LSU (and baller-turned-meme Hailey Van Lith), Caitlin Clark’s three-pointers could not be stopped.

NOTE HAILEY IN THE BACKGROUND, MARVELING AT ANGEL REESE LIKE THE REST OF US. (VIA GETTY IMAGES)

In today’s newsletter, reporter Susan Rinkunas talks to abortion provider Dr. Ghazaleh Moayedi. Plus, a look at the new abortion ban coming out of Florida and a little good news for Olympics fans.

From my busted bracket,

Shannon Melero

ACROSS STATE LINES

“I’m Here As Long As I Can Be”

Texas abortion provider Ghazaleh Moayedi, D.O., provides care for her neighbors—but she has to leave the state to do it

BY SUSAN RINKUNAS

A TRAVELING HERO (IMAGE COURTESY OF DR. MAOYEDI)

After Ghazaleh Moayedi graduated college, she got a job working on the administrative side of Whole Woman’s Health, an abortion clinic in Austin, Texas. She respected the providers who chose the work—many of whom had witnessed illegal abortions before Roe v. Wade—but also thought the patients deserved doctors who looked like them. “I didn't have the language for it at the time,” she says “But I noticed these doctors, older white men, didn't reflect the people that we were taking care of. I knew that we needed new doctors.”

So, she went to med school and became an OB/GYN and complex family planning specialist in Dallas in 2018. Less than two years later, Texas lawmakers enacted abortion bans, first during the height of the pandemic, and then via the 2021 bounty hunter law known as Senate Bill 8. A few months later, Roe fell, and now Moayedi travels to Kansas to provide abortions—often to other Texans. I talked to her about what she’s doing to care for people after they return home, and her message for people living in Democratic-led states who think they’re safe from abortion bans.

Susan Rinkunas: When did you start traveling to provide abortion care? 

Ghazaleh Moayedi: I started traveling to Oklahoma in 2020 [after] Gov. Greg Abbott shut down abortion care in our state under the guise of COVID restrictions. Abortion doctors traveling is common—but never from a state like Texas to somewhere else. That is the novel piece over the last few years. It's always a doctor who lives on one of the coasts traveling to a restrictive state. That was a moment where I was like, ‘Oh, crap. In order to take care of Texans, I'm gonna have to start traveling.’ I started working at a couple of clinics there, in addition to the clinics I was working at in Dallas, and did that until Oklahoma shut down—it was about a month or so before Dobbs. Now, I am traveling to Kansas and working in a clinic there.

You’ve said it’s surreal to be a Texan leaving the state to care for other Texans leaving the state. Are you commiserating with patients? Do they know you're from Texas?

I usually ask people when I make small talk when I'm doing an ultrasound. Like, “Where are you coming in from?” And people usually say Texas, then I ask where. “Oh, where in Dallas? I'm from Dallas, too, that's why I'm asking.” I can just see people's faces change. When I say, “Did you eat at that place? That place is really good,” I can see the light coming from people. It's a moment for us both. We're like, “Yeah, this is bullshit. It's totally bullshit that we're both here.” I had a patient who was like, “I wish you could have just done my abortion in the closet at this restaurant that we both knew.”

During a fall trip to Kansas, two of my patients were on the same flight I took. I've still been really processing that in and of itself, that we're all on this flight together, how just stupid, pointless, [and] inhumane this is.

WHAT'S GOING ON

Sunshine state of mind: Oh, Florida, you never miss an opportunity for mess. Yesterday, the state’s Supreme Court upheld a six-week abortion ban, which will go into effect on May 1. Abortion seekers in the South who have used Florida as a sort of abortion haven over the last two years will now be thrown into a greater state of chaos and desperation than ever before. Last year, 84,052 abortions were performed in Florida—about 7,000 of which were for out-of-state patients.

The sliver of good news: The Supreme Court also ruled in favor of allowing Floridians to vote on Amendment 4 in November; that amendment would protect abortion rights through the state’s constitution, voiding the six-week ban entirely. And although Florida will always find a way to Florida, abortion does have a stellar track record when it comes to the ballot box. (Cue DJ Khaled’s “All I Do is Win.”)

If you’re reading this from your Golden Girls-esque lanai in Florida, learn more about Amendment 4 here.

AND:

• Despite the United Nations vote last month calling for a ceasefire, the Israeli military conducted a strike on a World Central Kitchen aid convoy which was traveling in a “deconflicted zone” between Northern and Southern Gaza yesterday. Seven workers from WCK were killed, and the organization is now pausing its efforts in Gaza out of safety concerns. Over one million people are experiencing famine conditions in Gaza right now.

ONE OF THE TARGETED VEHICLES FROM WORLD CENTRAL KITCHEN. (VIA GETTY IMAGES)

• Thousands of Black patients awaiting kidney transplants are now discovering that they were the victims of racially biased medical testing which “overestimated how well Black people’s kidneys were functioning,” according to AP. The specific race-based calculation that skewed the test has now been removed, and the more updated test found that approximately 14,000 Black patients were not added to the transplant list as swiftly as they should have been.

• We are just a few months away from the Paris Olympics, and as the city of lights prepares to welcome the world’s greatest athletes, they’re doing so with sustainability in mind. Organizers are working to cut the Games’ carbon emissions in half by reusing historic buildings (like a pool venue used in the 1924 Olympics) and putting solar panels in the Seine. C’est bon!

• Elder millennial Latine, I summon thee! Aventura released new music.

• Beyoncé’s much-anticipated COWBOY CARTER dropped at midnight last Thursday, leading to many sleepless nights and a yeehaw weekend. Critics are arguing over whether the album is a great contribution to the pantheon of Southern music or a revenge album aimed at the awards she’s been snubbed of—but whatever you think of it, Beyoncé’s foray into country has shone a bright light on a handful of Black country artists.

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Buona sera, Meteor readers,

It is the official start of Easter weekend, with today being Holy Thursday for Christians and Thirsty Thursday for everyone else. Either way, wine is encouraged. No matter what the next few days bring you, we hope this weekend is a great one.

In today’s newsletter, we take a look at how the media continues to fail trans people. Plus, a little bit of good news and our weekend reading list.

Xoxo,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

Panic! at the Times Disco: A new report from Media Matters and GLAAD has found that over the last year, The New York Times “excluded the perspectives of trans people”—referencing a failure to quote them—“from two-thirds of its stories about anti-trans legislation.” The study comes more than a year after Times leadership received two separate letters from staff members and LGBTQ advocates and organizations charging the paper with contributing to “a deadly anti-LGBTQ culture war.”

According to the report, 66% of the articles covering the aggressive anti-LGBTQ legislation sweeping the nation did not quote a single trans or gender non-conforming person, but 18% of those same articles did cite misinformation from anti-trans activists “without adequate fact-checking or additional context.” Media Matters cited as an example this piece on North Dakota banning trans girls from girls’ sports teams, which didn’t ask any of the banned players how they’d been affected.

The issue, of course, isn’t just about the Times’s journalism; it’s about the too-common framing of trans people as politically controversial entities rather than as members of communities everywhere. And those community members are under attack like never before: Last year, according to the ACLU, 510 anti-LGBTQ bills were introduced by legislators in nearly every state. (The only states which did not see bills introduced were New York, Delaware, and Illinois.) Of those bills, 84 were signed into law, doing everything from restricting bathroom use to eliminating gender-affirming care. Against that backdrop, reporting on anti-trans laws while omitting the people and families who know first-hand what they do is a dangerous act of dehumanization.

You can read the full report here.

AND:

• In other news, a positive LGBTQ+ bill: Washington state has passed a new law  requiring public schools to teach “histories, contributions, and perspectives of marginalized groups, including people of color, disabled people, and LGBTQ+ people.” The updated curriculum goes into effect this October.

• Attempts to airdrop humanitarian aid into Gaza are continuing to prove fatal for Gazans. Initially, aid packages hurtled to the ground when their parachutes failed to deploy properly; this week, 12 people drowned trying to retrieve aid packages that had fallen into the Mediterranean Sea.

AID PACKAGES FALLING FROM THE SKY IN SOUTHERN GAZA. (IMAGE VIA GETTY)

• Marilyn Lands, a Democrat running on a pro-abortion platform, flipped an Alabama House seat in a special election on Tuesday. “Voters want something different,” said Lands, “and I think they are tired of women’s freedoms and reproductive health care not being addressed.” Reminder: Abortion wins elections!

• Public health officials in Puerto Rico have declared a state of emergency after an abnormal rise in cases of dengue fever—a virus carried by mosquitoes. Meanwhile, the island is still suffering from the aftermath of the last two hurricanes and a crumbling healthcare infrastructure, both of which are exacerbating the situation. Consider contributing to grassroots recovery efforts by donating to a local organization here.

• Apparently, we have all lived long enough to witness the fall of influencer culture! We are now in the era of the De-influencer—who appears to be an influencer who wants to convince you not to buy the things other influencers are selling. Is this the future George Orwell warned us about?

• Congratulations to basketball phenom Caitlin Clark, who earlier today was selected for the U.S. women’s basketball training camp roster. But the competition to make the starting line-up is tough: Clark will be in the company of legends like Brittany Griner, Kelsey Plum, Sabrina Ionescu, and the undisputed 🐐 Diana Taurasi.

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WEEKEND READING 📚

On the road: In an effort to woo environmentally conscious voters, both Republicans and Democrats are talking more about electric cars. But climate journalist Emily Atkin says we’re in for a wild ride of EV misinformation. (Heated)

On education: Who the heck is Baby Olivia, and why is she in our classrooms? (The 19th)

On “self-creation”: Photographer Rahim Fortune has beautifully executed the daunting task of capturing the lives, landscape, and character of the rural south. (The Atlantic)

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Evening, Meteor readers,

It was a brilliant weekend for basketball but not so brilliant for my bracket. Congratulations to this week’s top three participants in the Meteor’s March Madness bracket challenge: Marsha, Em, and my husband.

In today’s newsletter, Samhita Mukhopadhyay speaks to Dr. Beverly Winikoff and Dr. Lisa Haddad of the Population Council, a research nonprofit with a special relationship to the Supreme Court’s mifepristone case—oral arguments for which were heard today.  Plus we congratulate a history-making Englishwoman and check in on Diddy.

Crossing my fingers for The Sweet 16,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

• Yesterday, the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution calling for a “lasting” ceasefire in Gaza—but really only lasting until the end of Ramadan (which is over in two weeks). The vote on the resolution was nearly unanimous, with the United States choosing to abstain. The resolution also calls for the release of all hostages and access to humanitarian aid for the thousands of civilians currently facing famine in Gaza.

• Over the weekend, Homeland Security raided homes in Miami and Los Angeles linked to Sean Diddy Combs and his company Bad Boy Films Production. Law enforcement has not announced the exact reason for the raids, but they are part of a sweeping sex trafficking inquiry. There are currently several active lawsuits against Combs and his associates, including allegations of rape and sexual assault.

• A bridge in Baltimore collapsed Tuesday morning after one of its supports was hit by a passing cargo ship. Two people were rescued from the wreckage and search parties were deployed for any remaining survivors. Bridge experts say they’re “unsurprised” by the bridge’s destruction.

• The Utah women’s basketball team, who until last night were competing in the NCAA Tournament, experienced what Coach Lynne Roberts described as a “series of racial hate crimes” while in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. As the team was entering a restaurant a man in a truck revved his engine to frighten them, and shouted the N-word. The incident happened again as the team was leaving, this time with more strangers in more vehicles repeating the racial slur. The NCAA worked to find the Utes a new hotel for their safety, but the school’s athletic director made the point that the team never should have been in Idaho in the first place. Why were they there? Because hotels in Spokane, Washington, where the early rounds of the tournament are taking place, had been filled to capacity by teams and support staff playing in the men’s tournament, along with a youth volleyball tournament.

• On Friday, British ultramarathoner Jasmin Paris became the first woman ever to complete the Barkley Marathons, which, if you don’t know, is a mysterious and grueling race through steep terrain that participants are given 60 hours to complete. Paris finished the race with only a minute and 30 seconds left on the clock.

TODAY AT SCOTUS

The Abortion Pill on Trial

One of its key researchers says Mifepristone was tested "with three times or more rigor" than other drugs.

BY SAMHITA MUKHOPADHYAY

ACTIVISTS OUTSIDE OF THE SUPREME COURT LAST SPRING IN SUPPORT OF THE ABORTION PILL. (VIA GETTY IMAGES)

Today, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the first abortion case to come before the court since it overturned Roe v. Wade. The case, brought by the extremist group Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine (AHM), is challenging the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)—specifically the FDA’s 2016-2021 policies, which expanded access to the safe and effective abortion drug mifepristone, initially approved in 2000 and now the most common abortion method across the country. AHM’s main argument? That the FDA did not adequately study mifepristone’s safety risks. (We explain it more in-depth here.)

The implications of this decision could be disastrous. As Fatima Goss Graves, President and CEO at the National Women’s Law Center, told us, “Banning mifepristone would upend abortion care not just in the conservative states that have been racing to ban it—but in all 50 states, no matter their laws.”

But the case itself is farfetched, argues Dr. Lisa Haddad, the medical director for the Population Council’s Center for Biomedical Research, the nonprofit research center that led clinical testing on mifepristone more than two decades ago. In fact, she points out, over 5 million people have successfully used it since then.

With the case now before the court, we spoke to Dr. Haddad and Dr. Beverly Winikoff, who worked at the Population Council for 25 years, where she was Program Director for Reproductive Health and Senior Medical Associate at the Council, which was the team that led clinical trials on mifepristone overseas. Now she serves as president of Gynuity Health Projects.

Samhita Mukhopadhyay: You worked with the organization that facilitated the FDA approval of mifepristone—what are you feeling right now?

Dr. Beverly Winikoff: I feel like I'm charging into the skirmish. I'm getting girded up. Can't these people ever go away? But it is very, very encouraging to see how everyday people understand that this is a highly political, not a scientific discussion.

Dr. Lisa Haddad: I feel very frustrated and a little bit beaten up. And while I’m inspired by some of the voices speaking up in support of mifepristone, I see this trend in reducing access for women, and I'm scared that the science and the excellent evidence that supports this as a way to improve health outcomes will be overlooked and minimized. It's a slippery slope.

BW: I think in the end, it'll be okay because of the politics—the FDA is there to do a job, and it has always done it quite well in protecting the public. And this is an attack on the FDA. When you look at it that way, there are many people who are on our side, including big pharma—because if this happens, they have no [incentive] to be able to put money into new drugs because somebody could come up and decide that they don't like that drug and they can [sue to] override the FDA, and that would be chaotic in the pharmaceutical world. It's not just abortion; it's every drug that gets approved. I think the politics of it is much bigger than abortion.

That’s a good point. Can you walk us through what we need to know about the FDA approval of mifepristone? Was it the standard approval process or was it a long, hard-fought win?

BW: It was cover-your-ass time the whole way along by the FDA. That was it. That was the theme. So, every single thing was done with three times or more rigor than any other drug I've ever heard of. But that's okay because the drug is very good and very safe. We also got the FDA staff to be very excited about it. People were really very interested in making sure it got through.

When we did the final studies, we had several thousand people, and it performed very, very well. We were very attached to this product because it seemed safer and more effective than you could expect. So people were very excited about it because it had the potential to be a workaround for some of the political stuff of having to go to a clinic. You were doing it at home.

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Yeehaw, Meteor readers,

I assume we have all seen Beyoncé’s cover art for her next album, “Cowboy Carter,” which drops on March 29. As a country music lover myself, I can’t wait. In the meantime, may I entertain you with a song from Tanner Adell, another country artist whose music really spins my spurs?

In today’s newsletter, we introduce you to disability rights activist and Ford Foundation officer Rebecca Cokley, who is shedding light on the forced sterilization of disabled people—a practice that’s still legal in many states. Plus, the death of a gaming icon, Joe Biden cancels more student loan debt (not mine 😞), and a weekend reading list.

Your wannabe buckle bunny,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

• You may not know the name Lisa Lane, but if you’re among the millions of people who watched the Netflix series Queen’s Gambit, you saw a glimpse of her reality. While Lane was not the direct inspiration for Beth Harmon, the show’s protagonist (played by Anya Taylor-Joy), their lives were incredibly similar: Lane was an ambitious, short-tempered 1950s chess champion turned media darling and equal pay advocate. When she retired from the limelight, she became an environmentalist and a small business owner. Lane died of cancer just last month at 90, and despite the popularity of Queen’s Gambit, no one thought to write a thorough retelling of her extraordinary, trailblazing life—until just yesterday, when Slate gave the chess icon her due.

• President Biden has issued another student debt cancellation, erasing $6 billion worth of student loans for public service workers. (I am gobsmacked to learn that newsletter writing is not considered a public service.) I never thought I’d be this person, but Joseph, I beg you, next time: Pick me. Choose me. Love me. I’ll be at McGovern’s tonight, so if you do decide to sign the papers, meet me there.

• A “cascade” of misinformation on social media is convincing women to get off of birth control—a terrifying trend, given the current state of anything and everything having to do with abortion and childbearing.

• An “epidemic of rape” has engulfed several countries in Africa—most recently Ethiopia and Tigray, which were locked in civil war until 2022. An estimated 100,000 women in Tigray endured “conflict-related” sexual violence during the war and in the years following.

• Yesterday, Alabama’s governor signed a bill banning state funding for DEI initiatives in public schools, universities, and state agencies. What does that actually mean? The bill has eight main (wordy) prohibitions, including one that states the institutions cannot “require people to attend or participate in any diversity, equity, and inclusion program or any training, orientation, or course work that advocates for or requires assent to a divisive concept.” When did learning about inclusion in school become a “divisive concept”?

• Hey, Upper East Siders: Did you know people in your school district were trying to restrict transgender girls from participating in sports?

"AN UNEQUIVOCAL RIGHT TO BODILY AUTONOMY"

Reproductive Justice for All of Us

Rebecca Cokley on how to stop the violence disabled people experience

BY SHANNON MELERO

PARADE GOERS AT NEW YORK’S FIFTH ANNUAL DISABILITY PRIDE PARADE. (PHOTO BY ERIC MCGREGOR VIA GETTY IMAGES)

“It is better for all the world if…society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind.”

That sentence, written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes in 1927, was the defining sentiment behind the seminal Supreme Court decision Buck v. Bell—a case which allowed states to continue the practice of forcibly sterilizing those it deemed unfit to reproduce, namely people of color, the physically disabled, and those considered to have mental “deficiencies.”  In the specific situation behind Buck v. Bell, the plaintiff was Carrie Buck, a young white woman in Virginia who was forcibly sterilized for her “feeble-mindedness” under that state’s Eugenical Sterilization Act.

It would be easy to dismiss that ruling and Holmes’ words as a relic from another time if the practice of forced sterilization hadn’t lingered so long after that case. Over the course of the twentieth century, roughly 70,000 Americans (mostly women of color) were forcibly sterilized—a practice activist Fannie Lou Hamer famously labeled the “Mississippi appendectomy.” And while the work of activists like Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias, founder of the Committee to End Sterilization Abuse, brought some change in the 1970s, forced sterilization is still a painful reality: As of 2022, there are 31 states where the practice can be authorized by a judge and/or performed on a disabled person without their consent.

Rebecca Cokley—the preeminent activist and program officer of disability rights at the Ford Foundation—encountered this situation firsthand while giving birth to her daughter in 2013, and she shared the story onstage at Free Future 2023. As she was undergoing a C-section, Cokley recalled, her anesthesiologist said to her OBGYN, “While you’re down there, why don’t you go ahead and tie her tubes? Because kids like her don’t need to have kids.” Cokley’s OBGYN refused and, as Cokley put it, almost “jumped over the drape to beat him to a pulp.”

But for many disabled people in America, that kind of support is non-existent. Instead, they’re left at the mercy of a medical system that, by design, excludes them. A 2023 study published in The Lancet found that “32% of health care professionals hold explicit preferences for non-disabled people over disabled people.” And as Cokley explains, the practice of forced sterilization is part of a larger pattern of disabled people—”especially women and girls”—being denied bodily autonomy:  "You’re never told your body is yours and you have the right to say no,” she points out. “You’re never given ownership over your body.”

Other advances have helped safeguard the rights of disabled people in certain areas—from the educational reforms of Thomas H. Gallaudet in 1817 to the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990. Cokley and others want to ensure that reproductive justice, and the rights of all people with disabilities to have children how and when they want, is on the table, too. “We have an unequivocal right to bodily autonomy, and to make these choices,” she says.

Cokley also notes, “Every policy recommendation moving forward on reproductive health, rights, justice, must include a disability lens. So when hearing about people having to travel across multiple states to access [abortion] care, I want the public to think. ‘So what would that mean if you're disabled and say, don't have access to accessible transportation, or need other assistance?’"

You can watch Cokley onstage at Free Future 2023, in conversation with Catalina Devandas, the UN’s first Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and human rights advocate Maryangel Garcia-Ramos, here. (Their session begins at 2:25:25.)

This series is a collaboration between the Gender, Ethic, and Racial Justice - International program at the Ford Foundation and The Meteor.

WEEKEND READING 📚

On the ground: Over a thousand Gazan children have survived unfathomable violence and been medically evacuated to surrounding countries where they live as refugees and amputees. One reporter asks: What will the rest of their lives look like? (The New Yorker)

On rising stars: USC’s Juju Watkins is ready to steal the spotlight during this year’s NCAA Tournament. As the kids say, she’s got the rizz. (The Washington Post)

On family trees: The unexpected way some people are discovering the prevalence of incest. (The Atlantic)

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Greetings, Meteor readers,

It’s last call for any of you wanting to participate in our March Madness challenge! Just click the button below to join our group and share your women’s bracket. And don’t forget, the best way to support women’s sports is to watch: Most games will be available on ESPN2 or ESPNU, but UConn v. Jackson State and Iowa v. Holy Cross—featuring Paige Bueckers and Caitlin Clark, of course—will be on ABC.

In today’s newsletter, I promise not to speak further of basketball. Instead, Samhita Mukhopadhyay walks us through Oprah’s weight loss special. Plus, a new book for your TBR pile and a princess sighting.

Ball is life,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

Oprah is done with the fat shaming…again: ICYMI, Oprah has another special out about weight shame and drugs like Ozempic. Released yesterday on the heels of her decision to step down from the Weight Watchers board and share with the public that she herself is on a semaglutide (the much talked about class of drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro), the show was an effort at busting common myths around obesity. As someone who’s written about the topic, I thought I’d break down the good and less-good coverage:

The good: She emphasized one of the most groundbreaking shifts in thinking that has come thanks to the popularity of these new “obesity meds”—the understanding that weight gain is not solely connected to your willpower. People often discriminate against and hate fat bodies because they believe fat people lack the personal control not to be fat, and, for this reason, deserve the shame and admonishment we as a society dole out to them. In developing drugs that address physiological components, science is confirming what fat activists have long said: Some of our bodies are just different, and the only path forward is to accept that.

But here’s where the special missed the mark: Rather than rethink what our hatred of fat bodies means for society and medical institutions—something that would be groundbreaking for Oprah to do—she purports that one of the only ways to eradicate this stigma is to become unfat, most notably through the help of this new class of drugs. (The special features several weight loss “success” stories of people whose lives changed dramatically by taking a semaglutide). But why is being fat something that needs to be solved? It’s great that Oprah is undoing the shame we feel around our decision to take these drugs—but perhaps it’s also okay to just be fat. (FWIW, I believe Oprah knows this truth; it’s just not an easy one to get across in primetime.) The only people who should really feel shame are those who continue to perpetuate the idea that the only way to live a healthy, happy life is to be thin.

For more on how Oprah has contributed to how we talk and think about weight loss, check out this episode of In Retrospect about her lifelong, public battle with her weight and what it’s meant for the culture. At the top of her special, Oprah admits she gave in to the pressure to apologize for her weight and refuses to do so anymore. I’m happy for her. But what would it look like to embrace such an attitude without also recentering thinness?

AND: 

• A new report from the United Nations World Food Programme has determined that a famine is “imminent” in northern Gaza. “The speed at which this man-made hunger and malnutrition crisis has ripped through Gaza is terrifying,” said the WFP’s executive director. “There is a very small window left to prevent an outright famine, and to do that, we need immediate and full access to the north. If we wait until famine has been declared, it’s too late.” While the WFP notes that getting food trucks into Gaza as a core issue, just last month, a food convoy that did make it across became the scene of a massacre, as more than 100 Palestinians were killed when Israeli soldiers opened fire into a crowd trying to get flour.

• Since its creation in 2020, the Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Leadership Award has honored women of note. This year, however, the group who presents the award is switching things up by giving the award to (you will not believe this list): Elon Musk, Sylvester Stallone, Martha Stewart, Michael Milken, and Rupert Murdoch. To no one’s surprise, RBG’s family was astounded at these choices and came out strongly against them, saying, “the decision to bestow upon them the particular honor of the RBG Award is a striking betrayal of the Justice's legacy.”

• Speaking of the Robed Ones, Christine Blasey Ford’s memoir, One Way Back, hit shelves today. In it, she traces the arc of her life before, during, and after her groundbreaking testimony in front of the 2018 Senate Judiciary Committee, to whom she described being assaulted by Justice Brett Kavanaugh. In one of the most powerful sections, she tallies the emotional and financial costs of testifying (she has needed security detail due to years of death threats). “If I, with all my privileges, could barely afford to speak out,” she writes, “what did that mean for so many other women?” (For background, listen to her groundbreaking conversation with Anita Hill in our Because of Anita podcast.)

• Spotted: Catherine, Princess of Wales, walking through a market admiring bread loaves in Windsor. Nothing suspicious about a member of the royal family doing their own grocery shopping, right? The footage of the Princess was confirmed as authentic by TMZ, but I’m still left wondering how there’s only one video of the most looked-for woman in the world right now taking a jaunt about town. Can we get the Swifties on this?

ONE WOMAN'S FIGHT

“This Isn't Speedy or Fair”

Lauren Smith’s waited over four years for her day in court. 

BY NEDA TOLOUI-SEMNANI

LAUREN SMITH HAS BEEN SEPARATED FROM HER YOUNGEST CHILD FOR FIVE YEARS. (IMAGE VIA THE METEOR)

Four months ago, I wrote in this space about Lauren Smith, a 32-year-old mother who lost custody of her youngest child in 2019 after she and her infant tested positive for THC, a cannabinoid substance, at delivery. Smith was arrested six months later and charged with felony child neglect for using marijuana while pregnant—a charge which, in Greenville, South Carolina, carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison.

When we published the article, Smith’s trial date was set for the week of February 19, 2024, which was, rather poetically, five years nearly to the day after she had delivered and lost custody of her youngest daughter. The child has been living with her paternal grandmother since she was three days old.

But weeks before the trial was set to start, Smith learned her court date would be pushed for a third time. It is now scheduled for the week of April 22.

“Isn't everybody due a speedy, fair trial?” Smith told me earlier this month. “This isn't speedy or fair.”

The latest holdup comes after the Greenville County solicitor's office entered more than 125 pages of new documentation into discovery. This is called a “document dump,” a legal maneuver in which one side enters hundreds, sometimes thousands, of pages of new documentation within weeks of trial in an effort to overwhelm the opposing side. (This is the second time the prosecution has used this delay tactic. The first was last May when they entered several hundred additional pages of documentation as discovery.)

Despite the U.S. Constitution guaranteeing the right to a fast trial, Stuart Sarratt, a former Greenville County public defender familiar with the Smith case, says, “South Carolina essentially does not have any kind of right to speedy trial.”

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Evening Meteor readers,

My child has been making little paintings of animals for the last few days, and I’ve decided to retire as a writer and live off of what is sure to be her prolific career as an artist. So I guess this is goodbye. I’ll remember to invite all of you to her opening night at The Met.

"THE LAST PENGUIN" BY THE ARTIST KNOWN ONLY AS V

In today’s newsletter, we congratulate all the people who told Gallup they were queer. Plus, how Olivia Rodrigo is setting the standard for politically minded artists, and our weekend reading list.

Ce n'est pas un pingouin,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

We’re here, we’re queer: Yesterday, Gallup released the findings of a major 12,000-person 2023 survey on sexual orientation and gender identity, revealing a sharp increase in young adults identifying as queer over the last few years. “LGBTQ+ identification in the U.S. continues to grow, with 7.6% of U.S. adults now identifying as…some other sexual orientation besides heterosexual.” This is a notable uptick from just four years ago, when just 5.6% of adults identified as LGBTQ+.

So: Who’s most likely to say they’re LGBTQ+? First of all, young people. According to the data, Gen Z and millennials are twice as likely to identify as LGBTQ+ than older generations.

And the rise is also being driven by women. Among Gen Z respondents—the group who most self-identified as LGBTQ+—women were almost three times as likely as men to do so (28.5% of them did, vs 10.6% of men). The report also includes an important note: “The gender differences reported…do not account for the nonbinary population.” We’ll have to wait for further surveys to understand how the roughly 1% of Americans who consider themselves nonbinary identify.

This is exactly the kind of data that rankles conservative lawmakers, and they’re likely to use it as a prime example of the degradation of core American values (life, liberty, and the pursuit of heteronormativity). But given the documented consequences of being unable to live life on your own terms—from depression and loneliness to suicide—the fact that so many young (and youngish) people are identifying as LGBTQ+ suggests tremendous progress in how comfortable they feel. Previous research suggests Gen Z is better equipped with “a language of gender” and peer support than previous generations were.

So while extremists might see these numbers as proof of the “gay agenda,” they can also be seen as proof of societal progress—which couldn’t come at a more urgent time, considering the dark cloud of violence towards LGBTQ+ teenagers stoked by fearmongering adults like Moms for Liberty, Libs of Tiktok, and more. And the death of Nex Benedict, a transgender teenager in Oklahoma who died in February after a physical altercation at his school, shows just how fatal that violence can be. (An early autopsy report has ruled Benedict’s death a suicide, an outcome that is all too common among transgender youth—no doubt connected to the rise of anti-LGBTQ legislation, schools that don’t punish bullies, and more)

Against that backdrop, a question for all of us: Now that we know so many young people are queer, what are we doing to protect them?

If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal thoughts you can reach a counselor via The Trevor Project by clicking here or texting 678-678.  

AND:

• Singer Olivia Rodrigo’s concerts have the best merchandise: On Tuesday, in St. Louis, local advocacy groups and the Missouri Abortion Fund handed out free condoms and Plan B to attendees.

• Chat GPT offers a new service called Black Female Therapist. Actual Black female therapists are skeptical but also not worried about being replaced by an AI bot. As one therapist told Refinery29, “Well, humans need humans. And to me, therapy is a relational relationship.”

• Environmental researchers have determined that toxic air in Louisiana is responsible for pre-term and low-weight births—in some cases going back generations.

• The Mexican government is suing American gun manufacturers and distributors for the influx of guns in the country and the subsequent violence it has caused. Wow, a government going head-to-head with gunmakers! Can you imagine?

• As the U.S. flirts with a ban on TikTok, those who use it most explain how it has changed their lives.

• Reign FC, the soccer team that was once the home of Megan Rapinoe, will be retiring the star’s jersey this summer. The team’s general manager said in a statement, “The number 15 jersey will forever be remembered for not only the person who wore it but for everything and everyone she represented along her journey with the club.” Rapinoe’s jersey will have its send-off at Lumen Field in Seattle on August 25th, and I hope my boss already knows that I will not be at work that day.

FRIENDLY REMINDER! 

As I mentioned on Tuesday some of us at The Meteor will be cobbling together our limited knowledge of the inner workings of women’s college basketball and making official NCAA brackets. But wouldn’t it be more fun to do it with our readers?

Selection Sunday is THIS weekend so put your women's bracket together and send a PDF of it to [email protected]. As the tournament progresses, I’ll track everyone’s picks until there’s only one bracketologist left standing. That lucky duck (get it? DUCK! Yes, I am placing Oregon high on my bracket don't judge me.) will get a fabulous Meteor tote and bragging rights. The cut-off for sending in your brackets is the evening of March 20, we're closing up the party after that. May the three-pointers be ever in your favor.

ME TO MY COWORKERS IF I WIN THIS THING

WEEKEND READING 📚

On not calling the cops: In 2020, a young girl in New Orleans reported that she had been raped by a friend and then pressured to complete a rape kit. But shortly after that horrific day she was sexually assaulted again and this time her assailant was the police officer who escorted her to the hospital for that first rape kit. (The Washington Post)

On the lookout: The internet wildfire surrounding Catherine, Princess of Wales, has shed light on a larger issue of how the general public can feel such strong ownership over one woman’s body. (The Atlantic)

On knowing thyself: “The moral case for letting trans kids change their bodies.” (Intelligencer)

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Greetings, Meteor readers,

This weekend, while all the cool kids were watching the Oscars, I was baking bread. Not to brag (she says before bragging), but it is the best loaf I’ve made since I started learning how to bake bread a week ago. Maybe those “tradwives” were on to something? Just kidding! Katie Britt is still our collective sleep paralysis demon.

In today’s newsletter, we connect a few dots between the gender pay gap and abortion access. Plus, an update on Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law and, of course, that “missing” princess.

Live from my kitchen,

Shannon Melero

P.S. This Sunday is Selection Sunday for the Women’s March Madness tournament, and if you’re making a bracket this year, there’s a fun challenge for you at the end of this newsletter.

WHAT'S GOING ON

There are no coincidences: Today is Equal Pay Day, the date that marks how far into the next year a woman will have to work to make as much money as a man in a similar position made the previous year. On average, for every dollar a non-Hispanic white man makes, a woman will earn 84 cents. Other factors that lower this number include race, parental status, full-time versus part-time employment, and geography.

And when you go state by state, a pattern emerges. Take, for example, the five states with the largest pay gaps: Utah (73 cents), Louisiana, Alabama, New Hampshire (all at 75 cents), and Idaho (76 cents). What else do all of these states have in common? If you guessed abortion restrictions, then you are correct. Louisiana, Alabama, and Idaho have total bans, while Utah imposes extreme restrictions, and New Hampshire criminalizes abortion after the 24th week of pregnancy.

Coincidence? I think not. But there are a few ways that the rollback of bodily autonomy plays into the larger economic status of women across the country.

It’s partly simple cause and effect. The ability to have children when and how you want feeds financial independence: In the 1970s, when birth control became more accessible, women were able to slowly ascend the ranks of the workforce and get into higher-paying jobs; our paid labor now accounts for a quarter of America’s GDP. Of course, many other factors contribute to the wage gap, too—including the amount of time women spend on unpaid labor, institutional racism, the lack of social safety nets for parents, and the conservative backlash to women entering the workforce. But those factors are often worsened by the same conservative state legislatures passing abortion bans: In other words, the people passing the bans are often the same people refusing to lift the minimum wage for working families who do have babies. Still with us? And when governments are unable to see reproductive rights as a factor in economic stability, they’re willfully ignoring the financial hurdles that millions of women face and facilitating a return to the 1950s ideal of housewives and heteronormative families.

Anne Boleyn once said of her stepdaughter, “She is my death and I am hers.” And that’s how it is with reproductive justice and economic progress—the death of one is the death of the other. As policy analyst and researcher Asha Banerjee wrote in a report for the Economic Policy Institute, “The states banning abortion rights have, over decades, intentionally constructed an economic policy architecture defined by weak labor standards, underfunded and purposefully dysfunctional public services, and high levels of incarceration…we find that, generally, the states enacting abortion bans are the same ones that are economically disempowering workers through other channels.”

AND:

• Parents, students, and advocacy groups who sued the State of Florida over its “Don’t Say Gay” laws have reached a settlement. Students and teachers will be allowed to discuss gender and sexual orientation as long as those subjects are not part of “formal classroom instruction.” So everyone can technically say gay as long as you don’t teach on it.

• Catherine, Princess of Wales—or Kate Middleton, as we peasants call her—has been out of the public eye for weeks, ever since she was admitted to the hospital for an abdominal surgery in January. She recently resurfaced in what was revealed to be an edited family photo. And for reasons that surpass understanding, this phenomenon has birthed a new breed of internet people: Kate Middleton Truthers.

• Abuse of parishioners by Catholic priests is long documented, but one group of abuse survivors says there’s something missing from the Church’s long overdue reckoning: attention for those abused by nuns.

• Last week, a fact-finding mission by the United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner concluded that the Iranian government is responsible for the violent death of Mahsa Amini in 2022. The two-year investigation also determined that “security forces used unnecessary and disproportionate force which resulted in the unlawful killing and injuries of protestors. A pattern of extensive injuries to protesters’ eyes caused the blinding of scores of women, men and children, branding them for life.”

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FRIENDLY COMPETITION 🏀

So about that fun challenge I mentioned up top! Like countless others this weekend, I will be cobbling together my limited knowledge of the inner workings of women’s college basketball and making an official NCAA bracket. But wouldn’t it be more fun to do it together? It would!

Here’s how we’ll be doing our Meteor community March Madness. Put your bracket together, and send a PDF of it to [email protected]. As the tournament progresses, I’ll track everyone’s progress until there’s only one bracketologist left standing. That lucky duck will get a fabulous Meteor tote and bragging rights. The tournament begins March 20, so you’ve got until midnight that evening to send me your brackets. May the three-pointers be ever in your favor.

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Evening, Meteor readers,

This weekend is a busy one: we’ve got the Oscars, Daylight Savings, and the start of Ramadan. So remember to set your DVRs, turn your clocks, and buy your dates (the fruit, that is).

In today’s newsletter, we’re excited to share that our recent show In Love and Struggle Vol. III is now available for your listening pleasure on Audible. Below, Rebecca Carroll explains the genesis of the groundbreaking series and talks to some of this year’s cast. Plus a look at how far we haven’t come when it comes to on-screen representation.

Loving and struggling,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

The white carpet: As Hollywood gears up to pat itself on the back for another successful year of movie-making, the perennial question comes to mind: #Oscarssowhite or nah? Well, according to a study from USC Annenberg’s Inclusion Initiative, the answer—not just about the Oscars but about filmmaking in the last few years—is still a resounding yah.

The study is far-reaching, looking at 1700 of the top-grossing films between 2007-2023. But the findings for 2023 are of particular concern, because they show that despite all the promises studios have been doling out about diverse storytelling, the trends prove otherwise. Of the 100 top-grossing films last year, only 37 featured a lead or co-lead of color with only 14 of them being women of color. (Those films, in case you want to watch them, are: The Little Mermaid, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Elemental, Scream VI ¹, Wish, The Color Purple, Talk to Me, Missing, Magic Mike's Last Dance ², Ruby Gillman Teenage Kraken, Joy Ride, Bottoms, Suzume, and Past Lives.)

The study also found a direct correlation between the race and gender of a film lead to that of the film’s director. Of the 37 films that featured a lead or co-lead of color, 19 of them were directed by a person of color. Meanwhile, for the remaining 63 top-grossing films of 2023 that featured white leads, 57 of them were helmed by white directors. “Undoubtedly, when the

number of top films starring girls and women drops, so too do opportunities for women directors...As with gender, the [racial] identity of the lead is connected to the identity of the director.” Yikes.

While on-screen representation may feel like a trivial issue, the stories we watch help shape what we believe is possible for ourselves and our communities. If the stories we see onscreen continue to center white narratives and Euro-centric storytelling, it only reinforces that our stories aren’t important. Moreover, if the success of projects like Black Panther, Moonlight, Roma, and Encanto are any indication, this continued lack of representation isn’t just harmful to the broader culture—it’s also just bad business.

And the study’s authors make a final point about what this low representation says about Hollywood: “The numbers this year will likely be particularly shocking to those who anticipated a banner year for women, given the success of Barbie,” they write. What a well-worded reminder that one pink tide will not lift all boats.

1. The Latina lead of this film, Melissa Barrera, was fired from appearing in any future films in the franchise due to her support for Palestine. Just something to know.
2. If like me, you were confused to see this movie on the list, it's because Salma Hayek is billed as a lead rather than the usual army of magical Mikes.

AND:

• In response to the Alabama Supreme Court ruling that labeled embryos created during the IVF process as “extrauterine children” with the same rights as actual children, a new law has gone into effect in Alabama. The legislation will protect IVF patients and healthcare providers from being criminally prosecuted for disposing of lab-generated embryos. This will allow IVF procedures to resume in the state—but, as advocates pointed out, it does not address the other far-reaching implications of the Supreme Court’s fetal personhood ruling.

• Midwives are suing the state of Hawaii after the passage of the Midwifery Restriction Law, which they say has effectively criminalized the work of “Native birthwork practitioners”—midwives who study and practice centuries-long indigenous traditions of birthing.

• Tomorrow is International Women’s Day. So, what’s going on with women internationally? At present, women and girls are facing extreme violence in Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gaza, Afghanistan, South Africa, and much of Latin America. Globally, we are nowhere near closing the gender gap in the workplace. So happy International Women’s Day to the activists, advocates, and legislators working tirelessly to change our current reality. You are so needed.

ON STAGE WITH THE METEOR

“A Perfect Example of Active Sistering”

The voices behind this year's In Love and Struggle are ready to be heard.

BY REBECCA CARROLL

OUR BRILLIANT CAST (PHOTO BY JP YIM VIA GETTY IMAGES

Nearly 25 years ago, I met Alice Walker at a bookstore in San Francisco. She inscribed her book to me, “For Rebecca, In love and struggle, Alice Walker.” The phrase, which I later discovered had its roots in the work of Chinese American activist Grace Lee Boggs, struck a particular chord in me.

Many years after, and with Walker’s blessing—a live event and audio series were born. The In Love and Struggle series celebrates and amplifies the experiences of Black women and nonbinary folks through a mosaic of monologues, music, and comedy. The Meteor launched the first iteration of the series in 2020 at the Minetta Lane Theater in Manhattan, just days before the pandemic hit, featuring performances by Anita Hill, Sasheer Zamata, and Brittany Packnett Cunningham. It was a bright and beautiful blessing to carry with us into such an uncertain time.

We’ve been producing In Love and Struggle ever since, and last December, In Love and Struggle V3: The Future is Around Us was presented live again at the Minetta Lane Theatre. As the subtitle hints, it’s a powerful tribute to the ways in which Black women actively imagine the worlds we want. Inspired by the work of Octavia Butler and other Afrofuturists, the performers were asked to create their own original short piece about a futurist or alternate world of their own making.

With In Love and Struggle V3 out today on Audible, I asked the performers to reflect on their experience participating in the show.

In this installment, the performers include: Cree Summer, Zainab Johnson,  adrienne maree brown, Maria Bauman, Amanda Seales, Nona Hendryx, Sami Schalk, Sol, and Mahogany L. Browne.

MADAME PRESIDENT ZAINAB JOHNSON, MASHALLAH. (PHOTO BY JP YIM VIA GETTY IMAGES)

Comedian Zainab Johnson, whose “Black Muslim woman president” had the crowd gagging, said, “It is a gift to be able to be a part of something with an essence that both surprises you and captivates you.”

Writer and activist adrienne maree brown, who sang a beautiful meditation on the symbolism of walls in Octavia Butler’s work, shared that “the prompt allowed me to tune in to what Octavia was offering now, and how I could let that flow through me.”

Mahogany L. Browne performed a poem called The Future of We and said of performing it alongside the other creators, “In Love and Struggle is a perfect example of active sistering. The women who create cause ripples that course-correct our internal compass—the monologues, dance, vibrations, psalms, and sound always lead us safely home.”

MAHOGANY L. BROWNE PERFORMING THE FUTURE OF WE. (PHOTO BY JP YIM VIA GETTY IMAGES)

And Dr. Sami Schalk, fresh off twerking onstage with Janelle Monáe, told the story of her experience swimming in the Luminous Lagoon in Jamaica. On telling it to an audience, she said,  “Despite my nerves, the experience was transformative, a true manifestation of the imaginary world we collectively created with our writing.”

You can listen to the show in its entirety, here.

WEEKEND READS 📚

On THAT conversation: Only read this if you’ve seen the wedding episode of Love Is Blind and need some perspective on the thing that happened with you know who and his you know whats. (Andscape)

On your TBR list: You can never have too many books and these titles penned by women athletes turned authors will keep you glued to your reading corner. (Togethxr)

On deepfakes: Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is on a mission to end deepfake porn. (Rolling Stone)

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Greetings, Meteor readers,

Many of you know that I am a football girlie. And while I am not now, nor have I ever been, an Eagles fan (the only bird I recognize is the mighty Seahawk), I did ugly-cry at Jason Kelce’s retirement speech. You don’t need to watch the whole thing, but this portion about Kelce and his brother achieving their dreams together made me want to call my sister (who is also a writer) and openly weep. But that would be weird!

Anywho, today is Super Tuesday, and if your state has a primary, you know what to do. Most polling locations are open until 9 PM, but you can always confirm that over at vote.org. In today’s newsletter, we learn about the Comstock Act, congratulate the French, and despair over a new gender equality report from the World Bank.

Cry Eagles Cry,

Shannon Melero

WHAT'S GOING ON

Moving backwards: In December, journalist Susan Rinkunas warned us about “zombie law” revival becoming the go-to move for Republicans looking to restrict abortion access in states where it’s still nominally legal. Now, that prediction is coming true in some of the worst ways. Writing for Jezebel, Rinkunas lays out what voters need to know when it comes to the potential return of the Comstock Act of 1873—and how 145 Republicans in Congress are asking the Supreme Court (via an amicus brief) to use Comstock as legal precedent to ban the mailing of mifepristone nationwide.

What is the Comstock Act? In short, it’s an incredibly conservative “chastity law” that made the dissemination of contraceptives, birth control, or any materials related to abortion a federal offense. (In the mid-1900s, some states doubled down on Comstock and enacted local laws that criminalized the use of birth control for married couples as well as single women.) The strength of the outdated law was whittled away over time, though not completely: “In 1971, lawmakers repealed the portions related to birth control and, in 1996, a bipartisan group of House members tried and failed to repeal the provision about mailing abortion materials,” Rinkunas writes.

But once again, Comstock is rearing its ugly head. In both the SCOTUS brief and elsewhere, Republicans have touted the bill as a way to restrict the mailing of abortion pills nationwide. Senator Elizabeth Warren is having none of this. Speaking to Jezebel via a spokesperson, Warren posits that, as currently written, Comstock “does not prevent the mailing of medication abortion.” But something as trivial as accurate legal interpretation may not be enough to stop the court (which hears its mifepristone case on March 26) or a future Republican Congress enabled by a Republican president.

We’ve already heard endless horror stories about what restricting access to abortion is doing to pregnant people around the country. And as of now, more than half of all abortions in the U.S. are performed using mifepristone. Should this (demonstrably safe) method be made inaccessible, by Comstock or any other means, those horror stories will only pile up.

So what can be done? Congress can…you know, do its job and repeal Comstock altogether. Even if the repeal doesn’t go through, bringing it to a vote will force Republicans to make clear where they stand (and get voted out if they’re standing in the wrong spot).

AND:

• Speaking of birth control, for the first time in the U.S., you will soon be able to purchase an over-the-counter oral contraceptive without a prescription at your local drugstore. The O-Pill will be stocked in the next few weeks right next to the condoms and lube; make sure to pick some of those up, too. Safety (and sufficient lubrication) first!

• In an overwhelming parliamentary vote (780-72), the French government has voted to enshrine the right to abortion in its constitution—a first in the world. The “guaranteed freedom” to have an abortion is now the 25th Amendment to France’s constitution. Félicitations!

FRENCH PROTESTORS OUTSIDE THE SORBONNE AHEAD OF THE VOTE TO ENSHRINE ABORTION RIGHTS. (VIA GETTY IMAGES)

• A state initiative in Arizona is set to erase the medical debt of one million residents, a move intended to provide financial relief and positively impact the credit scores of Arizonans who’ve fallen into insurmountable debt. Can someone send this plan to New Jersey’s Governor Murphy? Asking for a friend…

• The World Bank has released a new report finding that the global gender gap is even bigger than we knew. What’s particularly unique about this report is that, for the first time, two new factors were included: Safety and Childcare. “Deficiencies in these areas discourage women from entering the global workforce,” says the report. “When these additional indicators are taken into consideration, no country provides equal opportunity for women.”

• Friends, I’m working on starting a movement in this newsletter called Who Asked for This? I humbly submit my first item: a sequel to the 2003 film Freaky Friday. That was PEAK Lohan-era cinema, and you cannot craft perfection twice—it’s scientifically and cinematically impossible. Just ask everyone who suffered through the Mean Girls movie musical.

WHAT YOU TOLD US ABOUT PROJECT 2025—AND THE ELECTION

Last month, we wrote about Project 2025—the massive conservative Republican plan detailing what that party aims to do should they win the presidency this fall. (There’s a lot in it, from banning abortion nationwide to eliminating the Department of Education.) And when the story went up on our Instagram, it quickly became one of our most-commented posts of the season, with healthy (and generally respectful; we love you for that) debates around what these proposals mean and how they’ll influence your vote. 

Some of the disagreements were about how real the risk of Project 2025 is: “Please stop with the fearmongering,” wrote one commenter; “don’t give that group credit,” posted another. But as we mentioned in our original coverage, The Heritage Foundation are Washington insiders. As Emerge America head Ashanti Gholar (@ashantigholar) commented: “ They are not a tiny fringe group, they are the largest conservative think tank. They are responsible for…many of the horrible policies we see across the country starting with Reagan’s in the 80s.”

But the most vigorous debates were the ones in response to the headline of our story: “Life under the next Republican president won’t be pretty.” As Alana Hadid (@lanzybear) posted, “Life under the current president isn’t either…It takes a huge amount of privilege as an American to worry more about what happens to us than how the rest of the world suffers under us. If Democrats don’t win that's because of what they have done to the rest of the world.” Another commenter put it this way: “I could never vote for Biden after his administration’s current immigration policy, their…[refusal] to stand against fossil fuel expansion….their outright material support for genocide.” Others stated their plan to undervote, or to put energy into fighting for a multi-party system.

Many of you disagreed, responding that “there is one party on record that is trying to help all, and there is another party that isn’t,” and charging that “half of these comments clearly don’t know the difference between what is controlled by Congress versus the POTUS….Or gerrymandering. Or how things were stacked in the courts from the last administration.” Kelly Will (@misswillful) noted, “These comments about giving up are tragic! COME ON! We finally all agree [things] need to change. Let’s vote for a decade straight like our lives depend on it, because they do.”

So—why are we resurfacing all this? Because your comments capture a conversation that’s happening all over the country. (And at The Meteor, too: Shannon has been yelling about Project 2025 like Paul Revere on a December night.) And with eight months till an election that Donald Trump could genuinely win, dismissing one another’s concerns isn’t the answer; hearing each other out is.

So let’s keep doing it. We want to know: How are you feeling about the upcoming election? Which issues are heaviest on your mind right now? Does Project 2025 scare you into action, and if not, why not? And what kind of reporting and coverage would you like to see from us at The Meteor? Our ears and inboxes are open, and your feedback will help us shape our work for the next eight months and beyond. You can write directly to us at hello@wearethemeteor.com or, if email isn’t your thing, DM us on Instagram.

—The Meteor Team

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