Photo via The Hindu

Written by Jackson Bird. 

We celebrated our third birthday this week! We want to give a big thanks all of our speakers, reFRESH readers, and collaborators who support our work. Here’s to many more years fighting for inclusion of more diverse voices in public spaces. And speaking of…

What we’re checking out…

While the hashtag #MeToo went viral this week with over twelve million women sharing their experiences with sexual assault, let’s not forget it was originally started by Tarana Burke ten years ago.

On that note, Jessica Valenti points out in The Guardian, “we’ve done this so many times before.” As empowering as it is to share these experiences, we need to also take action against the perpetrators.

Liz Plank took this to the next level by flipping the narrative with #HimThough, which asks men to take responsibility for their actions. #HimThough, as well as #IDid, challenge men to post about times they harassed women or failed to intervene — and pledge to do better. As Plank says, “Who decided it was women’s job to fix men?… I’m done pretending sexual assault is a woman’s issue. Your shame is not ours. No sir.”

Following the Men Are Terrible theme, President Trump has once again insulted Gold Star families and veterans everywhere by his uncouth attempt at sending condolences to widows. In addition to telling Sgt. La. David Johnson’s widow that Johnson, “knew what he signed up for,” he also appeared to forget Johnson and his widow’s names. All this after accusing every other president ever of not calling servicemembers’ families.

In a more uplifting story, our reFRESHing Talk of the Week comes from Paul Tasner sharing his story of becoming a first-time entrepreneur at 66 years old.

The latest from our speakers…

As a nice birthday surprise, FRESH had a lovely mention in Slate about how to fix the all-male panel problem that’s plaguing conferences.

It was a big podcast week for our speakers. Jamil Smith appeared on Crooked Media’s Friends Like These to discuss Puerto Rico and Ann Friedman joined Samhita Mukhopadhyay’s new podcast Feminasty.

You can also listen to regular episodes of Ann Friedman’s podcast, Call Your Girlfriend, as well as podcasts from our other speakers like Miriam Zoila Pérez’s Tonic and Jackson Bird’s Transmission.

Samhita Mukhopadhyay has been making the rounds as she promotes her new book, Nasty Women, with co-author Kate Harding. They got a glowing shout-out in the A/V Club and this fantastic write-up in Vox.

Ayana Elizabeth Johnson’s latest piece for Scientific American tackles our addiction to plastic.

The latest Tiffany’s Epiphanies from Tiffany Dufu taught us how to turn our guilt into healthy prioritization.

Weighing in on the Harvey Weinstein news, Jamil Smith urges companies to evaluate where their money is going – particularly those companies  refunding Weinstein’s contributions, which were earmarked for good causes. A few celebrities like Kevin Smith are already putting their money where their mouth is and donating all future residuals from Weinstein-backed films to causes like Women In Film.

If all the news and stories being shared about sexual assault are bringing up difficult feelings, Emily May has put out a new guide from The People’s Supper on collective care in response to #MeToo.

Linda Sarsour joined others this week in protesting the latest incarnation of the Muslim ban and was featured in a powerful video from MoveOn.

After launching a new line of feminine hygiene products, Zubaida Bai’s azyh received coverage on their overall work from Virgin’s blog.

Alaa Murabit was profiled in Wired this week for her work on global health security. A tidbit: “Ultimately, we need to start looking at health as a basic human right, and we don’t.” *slow clap*

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