Five Defining Key Moments in the Attack on the Rights of Females in This Past Year.
This time last year, groups dedicated to gender equality were bracing themselves for a second Trump term. Scarcely anyone expected. The volume and speed of executive orders emanating from the White House were seen as a deliberate tactic to cause confusion and fear. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was disarray, outrage, and weariness as organisations scrambled to compensate for the loss left by a freeze on international development funds. But the situation was about to worsen.
The Washington leadership has been the main instigator, aided by fervent lobbying efforts by deeply conservative factions capitalizing on the climate to solidify transnational relationships with sympathetic regimes.
This opposition to progressive rights signifies a transnational grouping of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as affluent financiers and clans that work to dismantle advances on numerous fronts. These include reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They pursue this agenda via advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to push for parity, disseminating propaganda, and supporting ideologically-matched groups.
We look at five instances that influenced the welfare, autonomy, and survival of girls and women.
USAID Dismantled
In the month of March, six weeks after a key American development organization is frozen, causing global disruption, a senior US official reveals that nearly all of the institution's work will be scrapped. Career diplomats, past leaders and relief and public health authorities denounce the action, predicting that mortality will increase. Activists say that the dismantling of this institution is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a savage attack on human rights and birth control and maternal healthcare. Numerous groups say the impact on girls and women will be severe by diminishing aid, especially in war zones. As the year ends, statistics reveal how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with millions more to come. Additional key contributing countries follow with their own cuts. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a choice to reduce international development funding is an attempt to placate a powerful partner.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a biannual gathering held in parallel with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to oppose what they term a UN overreach. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they welcome shifts in US policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the global conference with a somber alert that “the venom of male dominance” is resurgent, after a report shows that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening historic agreements on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the summer, a sequence of gatherings in Africa themed around the traditional family and national sovereignty triggers anxiety among rights advocates. In early May, a head of state and partner open a large assembly to combat what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A shortly thereafter, another regional summit on conservative ethics is held. Both events are attended by leading American and European conservative activists, including heads of influential networks. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to stand up to “radical global social engineering” of global institutions. In June, a major religious institution hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Advocates remark that the level of external participation has increased markedly.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are running out of contraceptives, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in July plans to incinerate millions of dollars worth of contraceptives held in a European depot. A leading family planning organization states that their destruction will deny countless females from contraceptive supplies, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about imposing an anti-rights agenda on the entire world” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “callous and reckless”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can reach their intended destinations, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains at a standstill as host nation officials are blocking perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded
Bringing back the anti-abortion funding ban, which cuts American funding for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the ban was reimposed in the first month of the year. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in October, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. More details on the policy's widened application are expected in early 2026. A expert in child welfare says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that new US aid packages being arranged with states on the continent will become conditional on accepting the new, wider policy.
