Women’s Suffrage: The Sequel

In the 19^th century, women began their fight for political involvement in the form of a secured electoral vote. Fast forward to 2019, and women are still fighting a similar fight. A fight that I like to call, Women’s Suffrage Part II: equal representation.

According to the world classification of women in parliament, the United States is currently ranked 76^th in the world in female representation with only 26 percent of its legislature composed of women. China ranks 72^nd, the United Kingdom 39^th, and New Zealand 15^th with a whopping 40% percent of its parliament composed of women. So, what does it take to be in the world’s top 20 for women in parliament? What is New Zealand doing right? Well, what if I told you New Zealand’s electoral system was engineered to favor women?

An electoral system is a set of rules that determine how elections are carried out and how the results of these elections are determined. Electoral systems act as the instruments that generate the make-up of our legislatures. Too many men? Too few women? Not enough minority groups or political parties? Look to your electoral system for change. In this article, we take a quick dive into New Zealand’s electoral system and explain why female representation in parliament is dramatically increasing for the small island country.

New Zealand’s Proportional Electoral System

In 1996, New Zealand made a big change to its electoral system that increased its female representation in parliament by 30 percent! Before 1996, New Zealand experienced a divided parliament with only two major parties holding power. These parties were elected through an electoral system where voters could only choose one representative for each of their districts. Does this winner-takes-all system sound familiar? It should, because the United States has a similar electoral system in place.

The 1996 election in New Zealand ushered in the country’s first election where voters were given two votes. The first vote was for a preferred party and the second vote was a list of party members which voters could preferentially rank from one to four. The proportion of seats in parliament were determined by the percentage of votes received by the party in the first vote, while the politicians sitting in those seats was determined by the ranked vote. New Zealand saw immediate change in its parliament with an increase of parliament seats, an increase in represented political parties, and of course, an increase in female representation. You might be asking, how? How did a small change in the rules of the election game increase New Zealand’s female representation to 40 percent?

How it works

First, a factor contributing to New Zealand’s female representation is the higher number of seats and parties in their parliament. An increase in seats increases female access to parliament and can help women gain access to positions of political power by providing more elected positions to be filled.

Additionally, an increase in political parties can do two things. First, it can incentivize parties to want their majority power back, and therefore, broaden their influences on different populations. To do this, parties assemble a party list that includes diverse politicians with hopes that more people from outside their party would be interested in seeing a female or maybe even a minority elected. Second, more parties in parliament sometimes results in the existence of smaller liberal-left parties in parliament concerned with gender equality. These parties are likely to act on leftist ideology and increase female representation.

Next, the number of politician’s voters can elect, or district magnitude, is contributing to the increase in female representation in New Zealand’s parliament. In political battles where voters elect only one politician, men are known to take on the role of “party bosses” or “gladiators” and become more attractive party winners than women. The opposite is true in New Zealand’s two vote system where voters might be more favorable to voting for a female candidate as one out of many candidates. In this type of electoral system, women increase their chances of obtaining seats in parliament.

Third, ticket balancing is contributing to the increase in female representation in New Zealand’s parliament. Ticket balancing is adjusting party lists to consider gender, race, sexual orientation, or location. When party lists include a balance of males, females, minorities, and majorities, voters have more of a diverse selection when casting their second vote. As a result, the party seats in parliament are more likely to be filled by more women and minorities. After the 1996 adoption of the New Zealand’s new electoral system, party lists were adjusted to include the Maori ethnic minority and women, making it easier to further the demands for representation of women and ethnic groups in parliament.

The world’s top 20 countries for women in parliament is a sign of hope that equal representation can in fact be achieved. There are many different ways to increase female access to political positions within parliament. From focused recruiting and shifted gender stereotypes and norms, to a change in the rules of the electoral game, anyone can join in on the fight for equal representation.

Cheyenne Rivera is a senior at Brigham Young University studying political science and Spanish studies.

Epstein’s Death: More Than a Meme

Epstein’s Death: More Than a Meme

Since Jeffrey Epstein’s shocking death on August 10, 2019, news coverage of the apparent suicide has not diminished.  If anything, it has ramped up.  From a deluge of “Epstein didn’t kill himself” memes to a member of the royal family stepping down from official duties, the Epstein scandal has caused a ripple effect across the world.

Politicians have made statements about finding justice for the victims and the President of the United States even retweeted a conspiracy theory that the Clintons were involved in the death. A former Navy SEAL ended his Fox News interview on live television with the phrase “Epstein didn’t kill himself.”

With all this unusual media attention, there is still concern for the victims. Does making his death a punchline, cheapen the pain and trauma of victims? Or does this benefit them by keeping the story alive? And is there a better way to handle future scandals than turning it into a meme?

Are Epstein Memes Changing Politics?

Since the rise of the internet, memes have been used as a way of sharing ideas in a clever or funny way. Memes are also a fast way to spread ideas or movements over social media. What we’re seeing with the Epstein scandal is that memes can be weaponized to spread awareness to the public.

The goal of the Epstein meme is to sneak the phrase “Epstein didn’t kill himself” into things where people least expect it. While it might seem like a punchline, it has also been an effective way to keep people from forgetting about a sex trafficker who had connections with world leaders.  

There was a recent NPR interview with Don Caldwell, the editor-in-chief of Know Your Memes, who tried to explain the Epstein meme phenomena. He said, “conspiracy theories spread in a memetic fashion that have real-world consequences” and that is what we are seeing with Epstein. What started out as a conspiracy theory meme has turned into mass concerted effort to bring justice to the victims.

What Do Americans Really Think Happened?  

The Epstein conspiracy theories and memes seem to have actually led to an increase in public belief that he was murdered. A poll done by Emerson Polling not long after his death in August asked respondents, "Do you think Jeffrey Epstein was murdered or committed suicide?" The results were that 34 percent believed he was murdered, 33 percent believed he died by suicide, and 32 percent were unsure.

Business Insider conducted a new survey between November 22-23rd asking the exact same question to 1,017 respondents. This time 45 percent believed he was murdered, 16 percent believed he died by suicide, and 39 percent were unsure. Those are significant number increases over a few short months.  

If these polls are accurate, it suggests that half of the people that believe he killed himself shortly after his death no longer believe that. While there may be some errors in data, there still is strong evidence to show that less of the public believe he died by suicide. Although widespread belief does not affect the truth of these rumors, it does affect the public pressure needed to move the investigation forward.

If Epstein didn’t kill himself, then who did?

At a time when Americans are divided on almost every issue, there seems to be one thing uniting the country— that "Epstein didn’t kill himself.” The conspiracy theories go across party lines like not many things have. This might be one of the few times in last few years that Republicans and Democrats have come together on a shared belief. People in both parties have spoken out about their doubts of his suicide.

If Epstein didn’t kill himself, then who did? Well, this seems to be the question that brings the most debate. The main division between the parties is who is more connected to Epstein and who is more likely to have killed him. Republican conspiracy theorists think the Clintons killed Epstein and Democrats conspiracy theorists think Trump did it. Then there are a few conspiracy theorists who think that the royal family did.

The Prince Andrew Connection

A BBC Newsnight interview with United Kingdom’s Prince Andrew has brought new sparks to the whole scandal. The interview was supposed to showcase the prince's innocence but it left viewers with more doubt than before. Prince Andrew was even forced to step down from official royal duties following backlash from the interview and his former friendship with Epstein.

Below is the now infamous photograph of Prince Andrew with 17-year-old sex trafficking victim Virginia Roberts, who he claims to have never met. Virginia Roberts claims that she serviced Prince Andrew on three different occasion at Epstein’s behest.

Photograph: Prince Andrew, Virginia Roberts, and Epstein’s girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell.

 Prince Andrew does not deny that is him in the photo but he said in his interview that there is no way to prove that is his hand on her waist. He did contradict himself later by arguing that he could not have been in the photo because it was taken upstairs in Ghislaine and Jeffrey’s home—a part of the house he claims to have never been.

Suicide Investigation

After his death, New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand  made a call for a full investigation. Her investigation has led to some action and this week two guards were charged in falsifying prison records and information regarding Epstein.

Epstein’s lawyers have consistently questioned the legitimacy of the suicide ruling.  There have been disagreements between Dr. Michael Baden the forensic pathologist they hired and the New York City Medical Examiner Barbara Sampson who made the ruling.  Dr. Baden thinks the broken bones were more consistent with a forced strangulation and not a suicide. On the other hand, Barbara Sampson argues that they are also consistent with an elderly suicide—which it was.

Whether Jeffrey Epstein killed himself or not will probably be questioned for a long time to come. It seems likely that people will not stop sharing the memes until there is sufficient evidence or until more people are held accountable for their involvement. Epstein may or may not have killed himself but one thing is sure—he didn’t act alone.

Jeni Baker is a senior and a political science major at Brigham Young University.

Will Mandated Gender Diversity in California Make a Difference?

On September 20, 2018, Senate Bill (SB) 826 was signed into California law by Governor Jerry Brown. SB 826, which was introduced by Senators Jackson, Atkins and Leyva mandates that each publicly held company that is headquartered in California must have at least one female member on its board of directors by December 31, 2019. It also requires that if a corporation has six or more directors, then a minimum of three must be female, and if there are five directors, then a minimum of two must be female by December 31, 2021.

If a company doesn’t comply then they could be looking at a $100,000 to $300,000 fine. Similar diversity-focused laws have been proposed with mixed reactions, some questioning the ethics of such a law. SB 826 will have a huge impact on California corporations, including Facebook, Apple, and Adobe. The law will also affect over 400 other California-headquartered companies, a quarter of which don’t have any female board directors. It is important to understand the research and reasoning backing up a policy that is requiring such as change, as well as why it may not work the way its creators had intended.

 SB 826 states that having more women on a board of directors will create a better, more profitable company. The bill cites research done in 2016 by McKinsey & Company that showed corporations with female directors tend to outperform those that don’t. Specifically, the research showed that “corporations where women are strongly represented at board or top-management levels are also businesses that perform the best, in profitability, productivity, innovation, governance, better performance and workplace engagement.” 

Additional research found that only 15.5% of the board seats of Californian companies were held by women. This is below the national average; 16.2% of Russell 3000 board seats and 19.9% of Fortune 1000 board seats are held by women. 

To Senators Jackson, Atkins and Leyva this is not enough. The summary of the bill states, “California is the 5^th largest economy in the world and, as such, sets an example for responsible businesses globally. Therefore, California has a responsibility to ensure that women are included in the discussions and decisions that affect corporate actions and profitability.” This bill is not just about increasing the profitability of a company, though it may be framed that way. Truthfully, this bill is about sending a message about the worth of women, and the pursuit of equality.

The intent behind this bill is a step in a positive direction. However, other studies show this bill may not give much more voice to corporate women. The most important phrase from the results of the McKinsey & Company study is “corporations where women are strongly represented.” It is not enough for women to simply be represented by a few or even a single female director.

A study done by Tali Mendelberg, Christopher Karpowitz, and J. Baxter Oliphant looked at the experiences of women during deliberation. Deliberation refers to making a decision through discourse where options are discussed among multiple people. Their study focused on how often women spoke and how often they were interrupted during two types of deliberation: majority rule, where the greater number exercises the greater power, and consensus, where the whole group must agree. 

The experiment had varying numbers of women in a group, from 0-5, for each type of deliberation. The study found that within consensus decision making, the women spoke as much as the men regardless of how many women there were. However, majority rule deliberation had more negative results. Overall, women were frequently negatively interrupted, meaning a man would talk over the woman to steal the floor. Women don’t speak as often when they are the minority and they don’t often speak on the topics they want to. In fact, it wasn’t until there were 4 women in the group of 5 that the women spoke as much as the single man. 

Ultimately, the study found that the worst condition for women’s participation and influence is the one most prevalent in the world—majority rule with few women. This is the deliberation condition that will be found on the board of directors for these companies; meaning that a woman’s voice may still not be heard despite having women on the board.

SB 826 was passed in the hopes of not only creating more productive companies but in creating a vision of a society where a woman's voice is as important as a man's. Hopefully, we can reach a point where that doesn't have to be mandated by the law. 

The Tampon Tax: A Glimpse into the Continued Struggle for Female Representation in Politics

What is the Tampon Tax?

On November 20th of this year, law school students around the country purchased tampons and sent in tax refund claims to their tax agencies in protest of the luxury tampon tax that is in place in most states in the U.S. They did this in conjunction with “Tax Free. Period.” which is an advocacy group lobbying for the elimination of the tampon tax.

As of November of 2019, there are 33 states in the U.S. that have a “tampon tax”. A tampon tax means that tampons and other women’s essentials are classified as “luxury goods” rather than “necessities” and are not exempt from sales tax, unlike groceries and many health products, including Viagra.

The frustration behind the tampon tax is much more than a fiscal argument about government taxes, but rather a problem rooted deeper in our political realm. When an item that is very much a necessity for 50 percent of the U.S. population is being referred to as a "luxury" by lawmakers, the demand for more symbolic and substantive representation of women in state politics is illuminated.

Tampons are available "sales-tax-free" in only 17 states, which includes states with no sales tax at all.

The Politics Behind Tampon Taxes

One of the main reasons for the disparity in tax exemptions among states is that the United States does not have a federal sales tax, so it can be up to states, and sometimes even cities, to decide what is and is not tax-exempt. In more conservative states with fewer women representation in politics, there is a much higher chance that a tampon tax will be in place. While 22 states introduced bills to eliminate the tampon tax this year, only two succeeded while the bills in Arizona, Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, Ohio, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Washington, and West Virginia never even advanced past the State House after introduced. 

The tampon tax, and periods in general, are strangely a political subject on a more increasingly polarized political climate in the United States. When Representative Sean Patrick Maloney (D-NY) attempted to expense tampons for bathrooms for his staff, the Republican House Administration Committee told him that he could no longer use funds to buy tampons.

While many may hope that an issue that affects each woman would allow for a bipartisan move toward progress, the elimination of the tampon tax has been undoubtedly spearheaded by Democrats. The states that have abolished the tampon tax include the most traditionally blue states such as Illinois, New York, and most states in the New England region.

These states also happen to be the states with... you guessed it... the largest proportion of women in state legislature. Each state in New England has between a 25-50 percent proportion of women in their state legislature. Additionally, Nevada, a state which has also repealed its tampon tax, is the only state with over 50 percent woman representation in its state government.

Implications of the Tampon Tax

While this tax may seem minuscule to some people looking at it on a purchase-by-purchase basis, the tampon tax alone costs Californians $20.2 million total per year. These costs are disproportionally being paid by women in states where pixies sticks, donuts, tattoos, and rodeo tickets go untaxed.

Periods are not optional and tampons are very much a necessity for any woman. Aside from the financial implications, many people believe this tax shows a willingness by predominantly male legislators to ignore the needs of women when deciding how to implement and introduce public policy, as a survey conducted by the marketing research company OnePoll on behalf of a menstrual cup manufacturing company showed that 67 percent of women go as far as to say that the tampon tax is "sexist".

According to the precedented trends by other states, the hopes for the abolition of the tampon tax will rely on an increase in representation of women in politics, either substantively or symbolically. Because states reserve the right to declare their own tax policy, this change will have to happen state-by-state rather than federally. This will certainly prove to be a challenge in many conservative states such as West Virginia and Mississippi, where less than 14 percent of the state legislature is women.

It is clear that the tampon tax represents much more than an extra fee tacked onto a hygienic product. The tax is in many ways indicative of the progress we have made in our political representation, and an illustration of how much farther we need to strive to ensure our citizens will be heard equally.

--Jack VonSosen is a Political Science student at Brigham Young University in Provo striving to become a Juris Doctorate candidate at UCLA.

Setting the Record Straight on Title IX

When you hear Title IX, what do you immediately think of?

For many Americans, there is a wide array of responses you will get. Does Title IX have to do with sports? Sexual assault? Do you think of college campuses? Or do you even think of the women’s clothing brand?

Since Title IX’s creation and implementation in 1972 it has been seen through many different lenses of what its purpose is and what it does and does not help. I think the topic of Title IX is especially relevant for students on BYU’s campus as there has been much talk of sexual assault and then reporting things to the Honor Code office and/or Title IX office.

The beginnings of and what Title IX’s main purpose is also gets skewed in today’s world where women’s rights are once again in the spotlight in America.

So, lets set the record straight and look further into what Title IX is…in it’s pure and simple form.

Let’s first talk about what Title IX is.

Title IX is defined by the Department of Justice by: Passed by Congress on June 23, 1972, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 bars sex discrimination in education programs and activities offered by entities receiving federal financial assistance.

So, what was life like for women before Title IX’s existence?

Before, women were often excluded from or didn’t have much access to educational programs. Some colleges and universities set quotas on women’s admission’s or didn’t even allow women admission at all. And those schools that did admit women, they were often held to higher standards of test scores and grades.

Once in an academic setting, women had less access to scholarships, excluded from male programs and faced more restrictive rules (such as curfew). Women professors had a harder time gaining tenure, were required to take pregnancy and maternity leaves and some couldn’t enter faculty clubs.

In 1970, only 8 percent of women were college graduates while 14 percent of men were.

All these things were of course leading to the creation of Title IX.

But, what was exactly the tipping point of getting the 1972 title passed in congress?

Edith Green, a congress woman from Portland, began working on Title IX in the early 1970’s. She saw the injustices girls and women faced in an academic setting and soon joined with other female politicians to spear head this effort and after only a few years of hard work and convincing several men that this was an importance issue, in 1973, Title IX was born.

So, why is Title IX so closely related to/associated with athletics?

As a part of Title IX, it states that athletic programs are a part of educational programs and activities…which means Title IX covers it.

That means that high school sports and NCAA sports must comply with 1) participation, 2) scholarships several other benefits.

Participation: Women and men must be provided equitable opportunities to participate in athletics. So that means for every men’s sport team, there must be a women’s sport team. Not the same sport necessarily but just another sports team to keep male/female athletic teams equal.

Scholarships: Title IX requires that male and female athletes get athletic scholarships that are dollar proportional to their participation.

Other benefits: equipment and supplies, scheduling of games and practice times, travel and other expenses, tutoring access, coaching, locker rooms and facilities, medical training, housing and dining, publicity and promotions and support services must all be equal for all men’s and women’s sports in each high school, university etc.

If you are currently in involved in any sort of academic setting right now, you may or may not know that there will be a Title IX office at your institution. So, what purpose does that serve on campus’?

Title IX and it’s campus offices’ around the country do not just deal with athletics or college admissions, they also are the umbrella that covers issues such as sexual harassment and sexual violence among other related issues.

Title IX says that every school must have a Title IX coordinator who manages complaints whether they be an individual or are part of a larger Title IX office within the institution.

For example, on BYU campus, the Title IX office’s website explains their role outside of athletics saying, “If a school knows or reasonably should know about any form of Sexual Misconduct or sex discrimination, Title IX requires the school to take immediate action to eliminate the misconduct/discrimination, prevent its recurrence, and address its effects. Additionally, the Office for Civil Rights expects schools to take proactive measures to prevent Sexual Misconduct and sex discrimination. Pursuant to the Violence Against Women Act, a school has extensive obligations to provide programs to prevent dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking.”

What are consequences for violating Title IX?

Schools are legally required to respond to remedy any hostile educational environments involving women. Failure to do so is a violation of Title IX and can result in the school losing its federal funding.

Do you feel like you understand and know a little bit more about Title IX now? Whether you are an expert or a novice at the ins and outs of Title IX, there is something we can all do to further this legislation and make any and all institutions we are a part of a stronger and safer place, all because of what Title IX paved the way to do for your sisters, daughters and loved ones over 40 years ago.