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CURRENT ISSUE
Winter 2010
FROM THE PUBLISHER: The Courage of No
Justice for Aung San Suu Kyi: End Male Power Structures
Convictions to Action: Lessons from Margaret Sanger
MAHIN HASSIBI: Visionary Ideas, Thinking Out Loud
In The Act Alone: German Resistance to the Nazi Movement
Film Review: Liberian Women Forge a Real-Life Lysistrata
Our Genders, Our Rights- From the Editors
Women are still boxed in, but gender identity is shaking the frame
From the Publisher: Selecting The Same Sex
- by Merle Hoffman
Making a world where females are as welcome as males inside the womb •Art by Fran Forman
Busting Bogus Biology and Beliefs - by Mahin Hassibi
Power, myth and dogma tell more about sex roles than XX and XY •Art by Ming-Yi Sung Zaleski
Trans Health Care Is A Life and Death Matter- by Eleanor J. Bader
A feminist clinic offers Southern comfort for trans-specific healthcare •Art by Ella Dreyfus; Video
How A Feminist Found Her Sexism - by Helen Boyd
When hubby becomes wife, bubbles of expectation burst open •Art by Gavin Rouille
American Taliban: Sect Controls Women’s Destinies - by Carolyn Jessop and Laura Palmer
Help is needed for women brainwashed by male religious authoritarians
Book Reviews
- Edited by Christine E. Hutchins
A Human Finds Robot Love: New Jeanette Winterson Book - Review by Cameron Kelsall
A writer known for challenging feminine stereotypes takes on sci-fi
How Media Portrayals Affect Women Seeking Abortions
- Review by Heather MacGibbon
Old narratives that terrorize patients are starting to change
Crossing The Gender Rack - by Joel Vig
A fabulous pink suit does not make the woman alone … but it’s a start
Asylum Pitfalls May Await the Transgender Applicant- by Victoria Neilson
Persecution and death can face individuals returned to homelands •Art by Clarissa Sligh
The Art Perspective- Curated by Linda Stein
Featuring the Art of Tammy Rae Carland: An artist tests identity by performing her father and mother
The Poet's Eye - From Poetry Co-Editor Judith Arcana
Poets Julie Enszer, Judith Barrington and Toi Derricotte explore tender areas of gender roles
Elizabeth Sackler Gives Hope, but Artistic Venues Are Slim for Women - by Linda Stein
A feminist center emerges from a passion for art
Art World Insiders Struggle to Address Disparity
What's in a name? Everything - by Thea Hillman
Why “Intersex” matters, and what to call it anyhow •Art by Sca Shilova
Virtual Switching, or Playing Games? - by Georgia Kral
Online identities let fantasies fly, but even cybergirls are typecast •Art by Sca Shilova; Video
It all started with Adam and Eve - compiled by Mary Lou Greenberg
Looking at men and women the "Right" way
From the On The Issues Print Archive
Designing Sex
Playing God, Have Doctors Gone Too Far?
by Mahin Hassibi, M.D.
On The Issues Magazine
Summer 1998
My name is Michael Ross. I'm a condemned man on Connecticut's death row," began the unsolicited manuscript entitled "Reflections from Death Row" in On The Issues' mail. "I'm the worst of the worst, a serial killer and sexual sadist," it continued, "who is responsible for the rape and murder of eight women in three different states, who has assaulted several other women, and who has stalked and frightened many more. I have never denied what I did, and fully confessed to my crimes. The only issue in my case, from the beginning, has been my mental condition. For years I have been trying to prove that I am suffering from a mental illness that drove me to rape and kill, and that this mental illness made me physically unable to control my actions. I have met with little success."
From Our Files:
Gender Always On The Agenda
The question of gender has been an ongoing theme in On the Issues Magazine – Gender roles, gender identity and self-identity, societal and personal gender expectations.
In an article published 11 years ago, The Tyranny of the Esthetic: Surgery's Most Intimate Violation (Summer 1998), Martha Coventry describes her devastating personal experience in having her clitoris cut as a child so she would look “normal." Interviewing others also forced at the point of a knife to conform to so-called societal standards of what “boys" and “girls" must look like, Coventry discusses the deep psychological problems often accompanying such surgery and concludes: “It is not the bodies of these children that are wrong, it is the way people see them." Thea Hillman reviews Coventry’s material in this edition of On The Issues Magazine and finds it surprisingly relevant, even as new issues about language and Intersex identity are causing waves.