Clement Gibson
Editor-in-Chief
Participant Media and Mississippi women leaders gather at Malco Grandview Cinema in Madison, Miss. on Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2019 to address equity policies on the state level.
The event was held to screen the highly anticipated film, “On the Basis of Sex,” and converse with the community on the importance of supporting Mississippi women inside and outside of the workplace.
Zakiya Summers, director of communications and advocacy for the ACLU of Mississippi opened the event by addressing Mississippi’s dire situation.
“Women in Mississippi are in a dire situation, and it’s going to take all of us elevating our voices and taking action to achieve gender equity now and into the future,” said Summers.
She continued, “Mississippi has one of the largest wage gaps in the country, and the gap is even wider for women of color. Women in Mississippi are paid 76 cents for every dollar paid to men. Black women are paid 56 cents for every dollar paid to white men.”
Summers then went on to introduce the moderator and panelist who would be conversing with the community.
Retired Colonel of the United States Army, Attorney and Executive Director of the ACLU of Mississippi, Jennifer Riley Collins served as the moderator.
The panel included Arekia Bennett, executive director of Mississippi Votes and co-founder of GIRL.
Felicia Brown-Williams who serves as Mississippi state director for Planned Parenthood southeast.
Cassandra Welchlin, the co-convener and lead organizer of the Mississippi Black Women’s Roundtable and co-founder and director of the Mississippi women’s economic security initiative.
Senator Tammy Witherspoon who represents Adams, Amite, Pike, Walthall, and Wilkinson counties in the Mississippi senate.
Brown-Williams opened the discussion with what she feels is the most important issue to women in Mississippi today.
“Every issue impacts, women, family and children, but one of the issues we are fighting are a number of different abortion bans at the capitol. We have three different bans for abortion at six weeks,” said Brown-Williams.
Welchlin spoke on women engagement and their participation in Mississippi when it comes to voting.
“Particularly for black women, Mississippi has the highest voter turnout than anywhere else in the country…But usually it is only during the presidential elections,” said Welchlin.
She continued, “If we can increase the participation at every election, that would make a difference. All they needed was to be touched, called and that’s what we tried to do…call them and knock on doors.”
Women are losing over 20 thousand a year in wages. By the time she’s done with her 40-year career, she would have lost 800 thousand dollars.
52 percent of Mississippi’s population consists of women, but they do not have full protections from discrimination.
In fact, no one does. That’s because Mississippi does not provide comprehensive state civil rights protections.
Most family households in Mississippi are headed by women, and about 40-percent of those families have incomes that fall below the poverty level.
Following the discussion, the film “On the Basis of Sex” was shown and received a resounding response from the audience.
This film is inspired by the true story of a young Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who faced adversity and numerous obstacles in her fight for equal rights throughout her career.
Witherspoon closed the event by motivating everyone, especially women to learn more and take action in Mississippi.
“We have men at the capitol that just don’t get it. We have to do this, we have to keep the fight, we have to keep it going because if we don’t, the men won’t do it.”
