The cast of Hidden Figures gave a touching tribute to the historical women responsible for launching American astronauts into space.

White Privilege: Being offended about a movie addressing systemic racism instead of actually being offended by systemic racism.

That article where a law professor argues that battered women are morally entitled to kill their abusers has an interesting quote:

“Men can kill women with their bare hands, and they do. Women almost never kill men that way. They can’t. […] While very few women kill abusive men who are asleep or passed out, it’s “unfair” to charge them with first degree murder, Sheehy argues. “It’s not fair to characterize it as the most heinous form of murder, because it may be their own route to survival.”

There have probably been feminist analyses of this already, but it’s worth discussing how the concept of self-defence, especially in domestic violence cases, was designed by men to benefit men. In my country at least, your attack is only considered “legitimate self-defence” if it is a) necessary, b) immediate, c) proportionate. 

A concept of self-defence that only applies if you hurt or kill someone while they are attacking you, and if you hurt or kill them using the same weapons as them (your bare hands, if that’s what they are using) only benefits people who are likely to be attacked by people of similar size and physical strength, and is utterly useless to women.

When a bigger, stronger male beats up his much smaller wife, it’s almost impossible for her to kill him in self-defence (immediately and proportionately ie with nothing but her fists), and yet it’s the scenario through which she can hope to be acquitted or get a light sentence. That’s not a coincidence. The other two scenarios (and she will be despised if she picks either) are for her to 1) kill him later (when he can’t use his physical advantage, eg when he’s asleep or has his back turned on her), but it won’t be self-defence because it won’t be immediate. (In the Jacqueline Sauvage case, one of the main arguments against her was that she shot her husband in the back at a time when he wasn’t actively beating her up) or 2) use a weapon, but it won’t be self-defence because it won’t be proportionate. Obviously this condition also benefits men, because when a woman gets punched by her husband and she punches him back, it’s seen as a proportionate response but it shouldn’t be, because her punch (typically) won’t do nearly as much damage as his. Anything else she does (like use a weapon) to try and hurt him as much as he hurt her will be considered a disproportionate response and will mean it wasn’t self-defence.