This is HUGE (and four other stories)

Five reads to end (or start) your week.

The World Cup is over, Argentina has won, and a new week is beginning once more. I am writing this post from a mercifully warm and sunny Tel Aviv, where I arrived yesterday to visit family. In Israel, Sunday is like Monday (as in it is the first day of the working week) so these five reads on gender (in) equality and feminism are very much starting my week here:

1. Huge news from the UK: Childcare to be treated as infrastructure

The UK government will treat childcare as infrastructure following a victory for feminist progress this week. This is a huge shift, and a major step forward for gender equality. The UK is facing a childcare crisis (among the most expensive in the OECD and the sector is imploding). Lack of affordable childcare disproportionately impacts women because (in heterosexual couples) it tends to be mothers, not fathers, who sacrifice their work in order to look after the kids. The amendment was brought by a woman MP, Labour’s Stella Creasy. This is a handy reminder of why diversity and representation in policy matter. By comparison, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt did not mention childcare at all in his Autumn Statement, even though the early years sector is in crisis.

For those who want the nerdier details: This change has come about via Creasy’s amendment to the government’s levelling up and regeneration bill. Here’s more from Huffpost:

[The amendment places a] duty on developers to ensure there is sufficient childcare provision when carrying out building projects. It means that the provision of subsidised or free childcare for those in school up to the age of 11 will be included under the bill’s definition of infrastructure. Councils will be able to draw on the community infrastructure levy, a charge that councils can apply to new developments, to raise funds for local services and facilities.

2. The UN comes out in support of Scotland’s gender recognition bill

This week, members of Scotland’s parliament vote on controversial reforms to how transgender people change their legal sex. Ahead of this, Victor Madrigal-Borloz, the UN’s independent expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, published a legal opinion that backs the reforms. Tweeting the document, he said that “legal recognition of gender identity is a human right & self-identification is the appropriate standard for it.” A spokesperson for the UN high commissioner for human rights, backed Madrigal-Borloz. Gender self-ID is a major sticking point in the feminist split over trans rights. This BBC article has quite a lot of detail on the Bill, and the arguments for and against it. I wrote this recently about how the Women’s Equality Party, the UK’s only feminist political party, has come out in favour of gender self-ID.

3. Gender inequality is being overlooked in policy responses to food insecurity

New analysis by CARE looks at how food insecurity impacts men and women differently, and how policies to tackle hunger do not address gender inequality as a factor. This is from a summary on reliefweb:

In Somalia, a recent CARE assessment found that women skip and restrict meals 25 per cent more frequently than men. CARE surveys in Afghanistan revealed that women have less access to food and balanced diets, evidenced by results that showed men were three times more likely to report having a balanced diet than women. Globally, 150 million more women experience food insecurity than men, meaning women are 27 per cent more likely to be food insecure.

4. British politicians accused of engaging in sex tourism on official trips

Politico has this story about British MPs and peers procuring sex while on official visits abroad:

A female member of several country [All-Party Parliamentary Groups] APPGs said the groups were traditionally dominated by “Labour backbenchers and Tory backbenchers coordinating with each other — the male ones, usually — to control the all-party groups that went to nice places.”

While the gender balance had improved over the last decade, she added, many APPGs still bear the legacy of the “stitch-up” between like-minded male MPs.

5. A new study links anti-feminist attitudes to Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy

From the piece in Psy Post:

Those with a higher level of Machiavellianism, narcissism, and/or psychopathy were more likely to embrace anti-feminist attitudes. The magnitude of these effects, however, was stronger for men than for women.

And in case you missed it: British broadcaster Jeremy Clarkson has written an article for The Sun outlining his hatred “on a cellular level” of Meghan Markle. The segment I have linked to here is a shocking read, seething with violent misogyny. One wonders how it made it past his editors. Since publishing it, Clarkson’s comments have been roundly condemned. The fact that he managed to publish the piece shows how common and normalised the hatred of women, and the expression of it, still is. Arguably, it is also evidence of the backlash to feminist progress, which this newsletter is dedicated to covering.

P.s. I have had such encouraging and generous responses to The Backlash since launching it. Thanks to everyone who has subscribed, shared it, and generally been nice.