It Still Takes a Village: 2021 in the Rearview from A Case for Women to You

This year was epic right out of the box with an attempted political coup on January 6. Our team, however, decided to give politics a wide lane unless it touched/touches human rights, as in Afghanistan (“When It Keeps You Awake, Do This”) or more intimate corners of our readers’ lives (“Broken”).

We first looked in January at sex trafficking (“The Hidden Evil”) and learned this ugly sub-subculture permeates every crevice of society, and 99% of human trafficking victims are female. Also in January we began our ongoing coverage of sex assault in various contexts, though we know it’s everywhere, too: assault in the workplace (“It’s Not Part of the Job”) and, most rampant, on U.S. college campuses like LSU and Brown University (“This Time It’s Brown”).

In April we highlighted a draconian sex assault law in Minnesota ruling that victims of rape should be virtually invisible in a dispute if they had a voluntary drink before the incident (“Screwing a Rape Victim”). These archaic assault measures favor perpetrators over victims and they are enacted in a good percentage of states. In June we covered controversial legislation in New York state on assault (“Adult Survivors Act Waylaid…”).

September celebrated Labor Day, but the Texas abortion ruling on September 2 put us in thrall because it began-to-endanger Roe v. Wade, which we are now seeing—however impossible it seems (“Why Pro-Lifers Need to Be Upset, Too”). In October we remembered Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s constant eagerness to uphold girls and women (“A Year in the Death”).

Perhaps the biggest focus of the year was in November when we began hearing about the plight of mothers whose preemies developed necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), a gastrointestinal disorder, and sometimes died after being fed baby formula made with cow’s milk (“Mom Alert!”). Then we showed you a mother’s perspective on the subject: “That’s the most messed up thing about this entire situation: THIS WAS COMPLETELY PREVENTABLE” (“Safe For Preemies?”).

In December we discovered that women are, in fact, participating more in clinical trials historically monopolized by men, only now that more precise data is available, it isn’t being analyzed (“That Doesn’t Mean the Studies are Studied”).

In between, off the top of my head without looking, I can recall who we said hello to (Simone Biles), who we said good-bye to (Gabby Petito) and who we remembered (Sojourner Truth, the mother of feminism). We celebrated your daughters’ empowerment and reminded you to get a mammogram. We warned you about defective IUDs and high-risk herbicides and baby formula made with cow’s milk.

Then we cheered virtually with you at the Tokyo Olympics after celebrating and regretting Mother’s Day with Covid, really for the second time. We rattled Washington, D.C., when our country failed on the international index of family-raising behind Bulgaria and Chile, according to The New York Times. We lobbied against gun violence, and for climate change. We cringed over laws that aren’t observed or don’t protect.

Along the way we started a “brother” company called A Case for Justice to address not only our concerns, but also the concerns of the men we care about. A Case for Justice’s first focus is on a high-risk herbicide and its link to Parkinson’s disease.

Several times this year I’ve alluded to motherhood, a couple of times to my own experience. I have just spent a glorious week with my loved ones in a pretty place. Two hours away in the air, what’s on my mind is them and  all of you. You matter to me, to us, to our team. It’s the best part of my job.

1. – Susan