Feminist Weekly: Ending #FBRape, Bye-Bye Michele Bachmann, Obama's (Possibly) Transphobic Graduation Speech?

Impact

Editor's Note: Every Thursday, I'll be rounding up my favorite pieces from the past week so that PolicyMic Pundits can more easily read and comment on the great content being written about sex, sexuality, gender, and race in politics and culture, in addition to updates from our community and GIFs galore! You can subscribe to get updates delivered straight to your inbox. 

Highlights This Week:

In May, we tackled the question of college graduation. Now that it’s (nearly) June, a lot of recent college grads (and not-so-recent college grads) are grappling with an even bigger question: What now?

In June, PolicyMic will be hosting a week-long discussion on entering the workforce, with a particular emphasis on race, sex, sexuality, and a host of other social justice issues, tentatively scheduled for the week of 6/23 – 6/29. If you have ideas for what we should cover, or who we should invite to join the discussion, email or Tweet at me: @sameier12

Commencement speech season is coming to a close, and so it seems appropriate to close with a quote from President Drew Gilpin Faust’s baccalaureate service for the class of 2013 at my own alma mater:

'Running toward' is a way of being, an attitude, a capacity for courage, a kind of grace, as Governor Patrick put it at the post-Marathon Service — ‘the best of who we are.’ As one runner said who crossed the finish line just as the bombs went off, ‘You go from feeling personal satisfaction to suddenly [knowing] it’s not about [you] at all.’

Living a life of running toward is what a liberal arts education has helped prepare you to do. It may seem counterintuitive. So much of your education has been about the next question, the critical stance, the discerning and skeptical eye. But it has also been about taking risks, daring to commit … The best kind of learning does not train you to win. It teaches you to ask what winning might mean. It cultivates curiosity and courage and boldness — whether you’re tracking an elusive gene or boarding a bus in Mumbai — and it gives you a new capacity to act, despite the risks.

Updates From Our Pundits:

Congratulations to PolicyMic Pundits Alyssa Broda, Brittany Oliver, Claire Tighe, D’Laney Gielow, Gabi Chepurny, Hannah Brown, Judith Ayers, Suzanna Bobadilla, and William Yang on their graduations!

Renee Davidson’s piece “Disney Needs to Start Waving Around a Rainbow Flag” will be re-posted at Bitch Media. 

Two big email wins: Amy Auguston’s piece on the pending DOMA ruling made it into the internal Clinton Foundation newsletter, delivered straight to former President Clinton, and Carly Pildis’s piece on World Hunger Day was featured in the Gates Foundation daily press roundup.

Last week, I reported on PolicyMic’s Soraya Chemaly’s campaign with Women, Action and the Media to get Facebook to take down pages which constitute gender-based hate speech.  After activists and representatives from over 100 women’s movement and social justice organizations sent 60,000+ Tweets and 5,000+ emails, Facebook responded that they will be rolling out new systems to prevent gender-based hate speech on the website, in coordination with members of the coalition. Great work!

What did you do last week? I’ll share any outstanding writing achievements in our community, and highlight the great work that all of our Pundits do offline as well. If you have anything you’d like for me to include about yourself or a fellow PM writer, please send it along!

Must Reads From Last Week: