It’s still a mystery why after all the strides we’ve managed to make through the decades, how a privileged rich old white man with practically zero presidential or political experience who advocates to “grab her by the pussy” became the 45^th President of the United States. It’s really devastating to read articles about bright, ambitious individuals who were interested to coming to America change their minds after seeing the current state of US affairs. It’s no doubt that we still had a long way to go in terms of political, economic and social rights before, but now the government is pretty much the butt of every joke. Seriously, it’s kind of difficult to go a day without getting a notification about some deplorable executive order or proposed law.

In case you know someone who lives in a cave or plugs their ears with their fingers and violently screams, “LA LA LA” when addressing the deteriorating equal rights of genders, here are some sources to site when arguing why we need feminism more than ever.

1. Brock Turner and Rape Culture

Yeah, I’m pretty sure we were all tired of seeing his ugly frazzled mug every five seconds when scrolling through any social or news feed for a time. Brock Turner the rapist Standford swimmer who escaped his crime with a slap of the wrist, maybe less than a slap—like a tap or a pinch, of raping an unconscious girl behind a dumpster. Classy, right? His father penned a letter to the judge asking leniency for his crime, defending that his life will never be the same and that jail time would be “a steep price to pay for 20 minutes of action…” Maybe sir you should have simply taught your son not to abuse women but if you see your son’s heinous crime as “action” maybe someone should have taught you. It’s 2017 and sadly rape culture is still a thing.

2. Abortions and Planned Parenthood

The Trump administration’s mission statement, besides ruining America, is to take reproductive rights away from women. If it were the other way around, pregnant men would be able to find abortion clinics every other block like a Starbucks. Sadly that’s not the case and Trump is seeking to defund Planned Parenthood and ban abortion. The fight for the rights to control our own bodies is still very much real.

3. Wage Gap

Women are often paid less than their male counterparts for the same work. Not because they are less qualified, but because they are women. According to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, in 2015, females only made 80 cents or every dollar that a man made, meaning men are paid 20% more. The gap gets worse when you’re a woman of color, ranging from 50-60 cents instead of 80.

4. Gender Identity and Bathrooms

On February 22, Trump rescinded laws that allowed transgender students to use bathrooms of their gender identity. Seriously? You can’t even let people use the bathroom safely? The truth is, trans students risk harassment when forced to use restrooms assigned to their birth gender. It should be a basic human right to be able to use the bathroom safely and comfortably.

 

5. Trump

Just, everything about Trump and his misogyny is deplorable. He treats women as objects, even his daughter in a pretty disgusting ambiguously incestial fashion. From calling Alicia Machado names such as “Miss Piggy” and “Miss Housekeeping” to his infamous “grab her by the pussy” video, his sexist attacks leave me dumbfounded to say the least. Donald Trump has feuds with countless strong women personalities, one of them being Meryl Streep, who called him out on making fun of someone with disabilities.

So, if you know someone who thinks feminist issues are a thing of the past, here’s a small list of the many things that are going wrong at the moment.