Recent Event Highlights: Changes to Employment Rights Act 1996, Gender Equity Education Act (Taiwan), Reed v. Reed, Civil Rights Act, and 11 more...
Created by pkhuu on Oct 3, 2008
Last updated: 11/12/09 at 12:31 AM
Starting in April 2007 in Britain, the established employment rights act was updated to give pregnant mothers more benefits than the already established rights enacted under the employment rights act of 1996. With this new act, women are given more pay, although at the same right, over a longer period of time, are able to request different work schedules, etc. This is significant because it gives women more rights while employed because it curbs employment around pregnancy. Specifically, not only do women get longer leaves and more compensation, their return to work is easier as well and employers can not potentially place women in hazardous or harmful working conditions before, during, or immediately after having a child. This primary source website is created by the Equality and Human Rights Commission of Great Britain and Wales. The specific page located for this information does not give bias but only a comparison of the 1996 act and the current one in place. Source: “Changes from April 2007.” Equality and Human Rights Commission. 2007. 29 Sept. 2008 .
Sarah Palin was announced as John McCain’s running mate in 2008. She is the first woman to do so on the republican side as the traditional vice presidents have always been men. Though this is not directly related to maternity leave an equal rights, it can be viewed as a great accomplishment by a woman to set the stage for others to come. Not only does her nomination show that women are capable of holding high offices but it also asserts a better image of equality in the political realm, which typically does not include women. This website is a secondary source that provides a relatively non-biased view of Palin, although there is a discrete sense of support for Palin within the text. Source:“Sarah Palin.” Biography. 2008. 3 Oct. 2008 .
This recent law enacted in Taiwan attempts to abolish the lower education standards usually enforced on girls in educational institutions. Typically, in East Asian countries, girls receive less education and learn different material than boys because of societal constraints and views of woman in the workforce. With this law, however, Taiwan hopes to promote more equal educational opportunities for girls in all sectors and to alleviate the sexual discrimination against girls in schools. Though the United States has attempted to adopt many gender equality acts, other countries, particularly those in Asia, have not followed. Therefore, this law is important because it paves the pathway and sets an example for other Asian countries to promote equal education so that girls are not only educated in certain fields or at certain schools but are given the opportunity and choices boys are given. The website is a primary source by Taiwan’s government and it gives only legal information about the act so it is non-biased. Source: Gender Equity Act. Laws and Regulations Database of the Republic of China. 3 Oct. 2008 < http://law.moj.gov.tw/Eng/Fnews/FnewsContent.asp?msgid=2178&msgType=en&keyword=Gender+Equity+Education+Act>.
California is one of the most recent states to adopt a law that tries to aid workingwomen who want to breastfeed their children. Under this law, employers are suggested to provide women with private areas for breast-feeding and to also give women unpaid work breaks to breastfeed. It is noted, however, that this law is similar and employers have rights to refuse these accommodations. These types of laws are important because although they do not ensure women breast-feeding accommodations, they give many employers the incentive to provide reasonable measures of care and services to working mothers. This is an advantage for women because it goes above and beyond equality in the work area since men do not have needs similar to these and also because maternity leaves are already covered in other laws that allow for time off. At the same time, though, this also means that the government views breast-feeding accommodations as unequal and would fall under the discriminatory actions in women’s favor. This journal article, a secondary source, claims to provide a legal analysis of the court cases dealing with breast-feeding and sexual discrimination but is somewhat biased. It seems as if they authors are supporters of workplace accommodations for working mothers and are surprised at the fact that the cases were ruled as nondiscriminatory or related to the equal rights act. Source: Petersen, Donald and Harvey Boller. “A Legal Analysis of Breast-feeding Accommodation Requirements in the Workplace.” Public Personal Management 32.3 (2003): 383-395. .
This meeting was held to promote the advancement of women all over the world in various aspects such as poverty, education, and violence against women. This meeting really helped to promote gender mainstreaming because it is backed up by the United Nations, a coalition that many countries are apart of, and because its goals were universal and not country specific. Furthermore, these types of large-scale meetings generate a lot of media coverage which helps to continue the spreading of the women’s right cause. This source is a secondary source which gives information about the writings of a compilation made by Mary Burke. Though the actual articles themselves are not given, a description of the conferences leading up to the 1995 Beijing meeting as well as those following it is written. Source: “Mary P. Burke. U.N. Women’s Conference Collection, 1975-1995: A Finding Aid. Suffolk University Archives.” 3 Oct. 2008 < http://www.suffolk.edu/files/Archives/MS105_Finding_Aid.pdf>.
FMLA was a federal act that enabled parents to take a maximum of 12 weeks off, under unpaid leave, in order to care for a newborn or sick family member. This act is important because it enables women to take time off after having a child without the worries of being forced to quit their job or losing their current position to one of a lower level. This in turn promotes a more equal job setting between men and women in the workforce since men do not have to deal with the aftermath of lifestyle changes that accompanies child bearing. This website, a primary source, does not seem biased because it is written and published by the United States government. It simply states the act, its goals, and its potential positive impacts after the initiation of the act. Source: United States Department of Labor. Employment Standards Administration. The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993. 1 Oct. 2008 < http://www.dol.gov/esa/whd/regs/statutes/fmla.htm>.
This act became an additional section of the Title VII after the Supreme Court ruled that disability plans that do not cover aspects such as pregnancy are not sexually discriminatory in the GE v. Gilbert case. The act, and thus the reversal of the GE v. Gilbert decision, forced employers to recognize maternal matters on the same lines as other issues of leave such as family emergency medical leave, which allowed pregnant women to receive health benefits and insurance plans. Prior to this act, employers had the option of choosing health plans that did not cover labor costs. However, with this act companies were forced to give women maternal care compensation, not just leave without pay, so that women are not forced to put of having a child while, something men do not have to worry about. This article is a secondary source that is seemingly promoting rights for pregnant women. The uses of words such as “curious” and the statistics given look down upon the little, if any, changes employers made to accommodate women. Source: Bejarano, Patricia. “Labor Pains: The Rights of the Pregnant Employee.” Labor Law Journal (1992): ( 780-90). < http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdf?vid=11&hid=103&sid=06634f83-300b-4d11-981b-e5e92b6e910a%40sessionmgr108>.
This Supreme Court ruled that abortion is legal due to the fact that it is a constitutional right of the citizen to be entitled to private matters, abortion being one of them. Thanks to this ruling, pregnant women are able to legally terminate their fetus until the point of viability, sometime around 7 months. This court case is extremely important for women because without this ruling, woman who were raped or found with medical conditions that rival the pregnancy had to illegally terminate their pregnancy or suffer the possibility of death. This case, however, legally places the decision in the hands of women so that they can choose what to do with their bodies, not what the government, men, or physicians say they should do. This article, a secondary source, gives a little insight in to the history of the case as well as the ongoing debate of the issue. The other parts of the article use adjectives that support and highlight the positive aspects of the ruling. Source: Mears, William and Bob Franken. “30 years after ruling, ambiguity, anxiety surround the abortion debate.” CNN. 22 Jan. 2003. 3 Oct. 2008 .
These amendments essentially prohibited educational institutions from cutting women sports when budgets were low and also from giving men sports preference in financial aid. Before Title IX, women were known to not have a large percentage of participation in sports activities. It was concluded that sports attention should be focused on solely on men. Women participation in sports actually rose after these amendments were enacted because there was a new health focus and lifestyle view for women. Furthermore, the number of sports and activities available to women increased and thus women had more opportunities to engage in these activities. This primary source website is government based. While it gives an interpretation of the policy, it still lays down the fundamentals without much bias. Source: “A Policy Interpretation: Title IX and Intercollegiate Athletics.” Office for Civil Rights. 14 Mar. 2005. 29 Sept. 2008 .
A state court ruling was overturned by the Supreme Court on the basis that the court’s decision, preference of males as estate administrators, was unconstitutional. Under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment, states could not deny people of equal rights. This case upheld the written documents of the country and served as the first prohibition of discrimination based on sex case in the United States in real life. This case assured society, particularly women, that equals rights could and would be enforced. This website gives the texts to a book written about the history of court decisions and women’s rights, which makes it a secondary source. The information gathered from the introduction gives a sense of biasness from the author based on her review of hardships experienced by women. According to the author, women have often been restricted in many areas of society such as political say and access or acceptance in educational institutions. Source: Wexler, Natalie. “Sex Discrimination-The Search for a Standard.” Supreme Court Decisions and Women’s Rights. Congressional Quarterly. 2000. 30 Sept. 2008 < http://www.supremecourthistory.org/05_learning/subs/05_e.html>.
This law was originally enacted to curtail and abolish segregation and discrimination against African Americans. Under this act, however, women’s rights are protected as well because there is specific reference to the prohibition of sexual discrimination as well as racial, religious, ethnicity, etc. Despite the original claims of only inserting sexual discrimination to the act as a degrading of the civil rights amendment, the repercussions of the act proved beneficial to women who, before this time, had no mention in legislative documents and were considered as second-class citizens with few rights as white men. With this act, though, women took one step closer to being first-class citizens because they were able to gain jobs they previously were rejected from due to gender and they could also sue for equal rights when they were still denied employment based on sex. This site has been set up by an established history teacher, which makes it a secondary source, and seems to have strong opinions within the text. Descriptions and adjectives about people are not unbiased but the overall information concerning the act does not seem to be affected. Source: Simkin, John. “1964 Civil Rights Act.” Spartacus Educational. 3 Oct. 2008 .
This act is geared toward ridding wage differences based on sex due to the issues that arise because of unfair pay. Basically, employers are not to give any sex lower or higher wages for the same job or jobs with similar work conditions and requirements. Before this act was officially established, women were working under same or harsher conditions than men for only a small fraction of the amount men were receiving when occupying the same job. With this act, however, there was a dramatic increase in pay rates for women, although still not equal to that of men’s income. This helped women tremendously because it further enforced equality by making it unconstitutional to not only deny women of employment but to deny them pay equal to that of men. This is another government-sponsored source, thus making it primary, which lays down what the act covers. Source: “The Equal Pay Act of 1963.” U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. 15 Jan. 1997. 2 Oct. 2008 .
Founded by Margaret Sanger, this association helped promote education on birth control contraceptives, a previously taboo issue that was seen as wrong and often not discussed publicly. The establishment of this league is important because it one of the first leagues to create clinics and medical centers for women to receive birth control, something they could not obtain at many medical centers at that time. This in turn gave women more options and the ability to choose when they would be pregnant, rather than having accidental procreations or engaging in continuous procreation. The information on the website is a secondary source biography of Margaret Sanger. Not much biasness can be found in the article; it is a typical biography. Source: “Social Issues Margaret Sanger 1879-1966.” Travel and History. 3 Oct. 2008 < http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1676.html>.
Because of the women’s suffrage movement, women gained the right to officially vote in the United States when the 19th amendment was introduced. Women living before and up until 1920 had little say in government policies, legislations, and laws that were created or enforced. With the right to vote, however, women were able to assert their opinions in politics and rightfully so as they were a large population affected by laws that abided by but never had a say in. This amendment marks the beginning of a large participation on women’s behalf government and law and thus the widespread diversity and ability of women to engage in political matters. This book, as a secondary source, really focuses on the sufferings of women and thus has a biased tone. The book, itself discusses the hardships that women face, even in modern societies today. Source: Lockwood, Bert, ed. Women’s Rights: a Human Rights Quarterly Reader. Baltimore: John Hopkins, 2006.
This association was created in the late 1800s to promote the voting rights of women. This is one of the first examples of women associations created purely to establish women’s rights to vote and was viewed largely as a radical association with which real women did not associate themselves. The formation of this association is important because it marks the beginning of women grouping together to obtain equal rights, despite societal views of them. Their eventual merge and formation of the National American Women’s Suffrage Association only goes to show how successful their tactics were. This is a secondary source of collections of articles concerning women’s suffrage. The use of information for this timeline did not promote biasness, just historical information. Source: The National American Woman Suffrage Association. The Library of Congress. 19 Oct. 1998. 29 Sept. 2008 < http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/naw/nawsa.html>.
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