Feminist Campus: Quad Talk is your platform to share bold opinions, fresh takes, and thoughtful reflections on the world we’re navigating. Whether you’re tackling the latest social issue or cracking a joke about the chaos, this is where your voice matters. Submit your piece (500 words or less please!) to be part of the weekly collection on the Feminist Campus Website of young people’s perspectives on the political and social issues shaping our lives today. Let’s talk about it—your way.
As States Crack Down on Reproductive Healthcare, Colleges Can Make a Difference
Ava Slocum, Columbia University
Back in 2022, I had just finished my freshman year of college when the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade with the Dobbs decision. Since then, I’ve still been able to live in two states where abortion is legal; I’m from California, and I go to school in New York.
But now, as a senior about to graduate this spring, I’m thinking about my peers in other states—women who started college at the same time that I did, but have watched their access to reproductive healthcare drastically shift over the last four years while they’ve been students.
Nearly six million students currently attend college in states where abortion is banned or severely restricted.
More than half of college students in the United States are women, and many states with some of the highest student populations—like Texas, Indiana and Florida—have made abortion completely or mostly illegal.
As we’ve seen from a number of tragic recent cases, abortion bans are deadly. While we watch abortion restrictions unfold nationwide, is there anything colleges can do to help their women students?
Right now, 14 states have total abortion bans. But in the 36 where abortion is still at least partially legal, colleges can offer abortion through their student health services.
By offering abortion—especially medication abortion—on campus, schools can remove many barriers for students. Even in states where abortion is legal, college students are an especially vulnerable population, often lacking the time, money and resources needed to research abortion options and travel to find care. Thanks to post-Dobbs legislation, some large public university systems, such as in California and New York, now offer abortion care through campus health.
My own college, Columbia, started offering medication abortion on campus in 2024. In the fall, I interviewed a group of students at our affiliated sister school, Barnard College, who are working to make abortion available there too.
New York, like other blue states, has become a destination state for abortion-related travel after Dobbs. Higher traffic from out-of-state patients can increase demand and wait times at abortion clinics. By offering abortion on campus, colleges can not only help their own students but also support overworked, understaffed local clinics.
In states with abortion bans, colleges can help students access emergency contraception (also called EC, the “morning after pill” or the brand name, Plan B). EC access on campus makes it easier for students to prevent pregnancy in the first place, reducing the need for stressful and costly out-of-state travel for abortion care.
The organization Emergency Contraception 4 Every Campus (EC4EC) helps stock EC in vending machines on college campuses around the U.S. It also works with student groups to create peer-to-peer EC distribution services at schools where EC is hard to acquire through the college itself.
Less than two months into the new Trump administration, we’ve been seeing reproductive rights under attack at the national level. As more and more young people flee states with abortion restrictions, colleges can let their students know that help is still available.
Sit Still, Look Pretty: The Hollowing Out of Feminist Storytelling
Mary Smith, East Carolina University
March 20, 2025
I recently saw an on-campus production of Wild Heart, a brand-new jukebox musical about the Saint of New Orleans herself, Joan of Arc. The odd nature of the musical and its handling of such an influential female figure compelled me to share my thoughts. If you’re unfamiliar, a jukebox musical is a show built around non-original, contemporary songs. Unsurprisingly, the creators of Wild Heart chose cringey early 2000s pop to fill the musical segments. Before I even saw the show, I had a feeling this was an inappropriate choice for such a grand and solemn piece of history.
Unfortunately, I was right. The show kicks off with the upbeat song Sit Still, Look Pretty, sung by a young Joan as she expresses her desire to be more than just a wife. This moment introduces the audience to a bland form of digestible corporate feminism—the kind that sells empowerment as an aesthetic rather than an action. The song completely downplays the severity of her circumstances—growing up in the midst of the Hundred Years’ War—and trivializes the plight of women in fifteenth-century Europe. While the lyrics touch on themes of breaking free from gender norms, the sugary pop delivery feels plastic and disingenuous, reducing a deeply historical struggle to a catchy, shallow anthem.
This trend continues throughout the musical, with characters casually mentioning the struggles of women as a throwaway “gotcha” moment, only to gloss over them without any deeper exploration. The show completely sidesteps Joan’s assault and abuse, the role of the saints who guided her, and the broader suffering of women in that era. Instead of dedicating any serious songs to these issues, it chooses to skate past them with surface-level nods to female empowerment.
On top of all this, the musical completely neglects Joan as a character. She remains flat and underdeveloped, given maybe five minutes of doubt in a show that runs over two hours. Unlike other historical musicals that take time to explore their protagonists’ complexities, Wild Heart offers Joan little room for introspection. When she does express herself, it’s through unserious, ill-fitting songs like Fight Song. And in the most egregious offense of all—while she is BURNING ALIVE—she sings Gotta Get Up and Try. This is Joan of Arc we’re talking about! The saint of New Orleans, the Maiden, the savior of France—and this is how her legacy is portrayed? Reduced to a hollow, corporate “girl boss” caricature?
Wild Heart had the opportunity to be a powerful, moving tribute to one of history’s most extraordinary women. Instead, it opted for a cheap, soulless spectacle that fails Joan, fails history, and fails its audience. This is yet another example of how women’s stories—especially those of radical, history-making figures—are diluted and commercialized to fit a marketable mold. If we truly want to honor women like Joan of Arc, we need to tell their stories with the complexity, nuance, and respect they deserve—not just slap on a pop song and call it empowerment.
Hands Off Our Bodies, Our Futures, Our Rights
Stella Adams, American University
March 5, 2025
If you’re a woman in America right now, you can feel it. Rights that generations before us fought for — our right to make decisions about our own bodies, our place in workplaces and schools, our safety from discrimination — are under attack.
With Trump back in the spotlight and extremist policies gaining traction, we’re watching reproductive rights be stripped away, diversity and inclusion efforts dismantled, and rhetoric that devalues women become even louder. It’s not just frustrating, it’s terrifying. The overturning of Roe v. Wade was just the beginning. Now, policies limiting abortion access both in the U.S. and abroad are being reinforced, and DEI programs meant to ensure equal opportunities are being slashed from federal agencies.
This isn’t just politics. This is about control. It’s about who gets control over our bodies, whose voices matter, and whose futures are prioritized. And if history has taught us anything, it’s that when power swings in this direction, women always pay the price.
Women have never backed down quietly. We’ve marched, we’ve organized, we’ve fought and we’ve won. This is a time to stay loud, to stay informed, and to push back.
Fear and Resistance: Students Respond to Immigration Crackdown
Sarah Hamidi, American University
February 14, 2025
For many college students, the stress of exams, tuition, and deadlines is enough to keep us awake at night. However, for many students with undocumented family members or who come from immigrant communities, the current political climate has introduced an additional layer of fear. With Trump’s recent executive order, Protecting the American People Against Invasion, and the rise in aggressive immigration enforcement, many students are now worried about their families and communities, and outraged with the lack of sympathy for the immigrants who make this country great.
Across campus, the new administration’s swift establishment of numerous executive orders targeted at immigration has shifted the conversation from coursework and class registration, to concern for our communities and confusion on the constitutionality of the newly established presidential orders that contradict what we learn in class.
Many students fear that the influx of ICE raids will target their hometowns next, with frequent warnings popping up in various communities regarding sightings of immigration officers. The online and social media communities have been flooded with an influx of infographics and informative posts to help people understand their rights and how to protect themselves at this stressful time which has fostered a sense of both solidarity and anxiety among students across the US.
In response, student activism is gaining momentum. Campuses are seeing an increase in “Know Your Rights” workshops, petitions for sanctuary campus status, as well as an increase in protests across affected areas such as Texas and southern California.
Student-led organizations are also mobilizing to provide legal resources and safe spaces for those affected. However, activism carries risks, particularly for undocumented students and those from mixed-status families, who fear drawing attention to their communities.
Still, despite the fear and uncertainty, one thing remains clear: the resilience of immigrant communities and their allies is unwavering. Students are continuing to show up for one another, amplify voices that need to be heard, share essential information to protect their communities, and refusing to let fear dictate the future. Even as the political landscape grows more volatile, the message on campuses remains strong—immigrants are a vital part of this country, and they are not alone in this fight.
Right?
Emily Bronson, East Carolina University
February 7, 2025
“Don’t Say Gay” —We all know it. We’ve all heard about it. We laughed at first because we saw it as a ridiculous attempt at doing what we thought was impossible–ignoring the existence of millions of Americans. It sounds ridiculous, the institutionalization of homophobia at a state level. To be sure, no one would let this pass? Right?
We saw it as a comically ridiculous waste of legislative time, but little did we expect it to actually pass, that Florida House Bill 1557 in 2022. I think that was the first time that I remember thinking, “They can’t just get rid of words, get rid of people.” Right?
We thought Roe was secure. We heard whispers of it going back to the bench, but it was a constitutional right. Right?
Dobbs v. Jackson was decided in June 2022. Roe did go back to the court. Roe did fall to right-wing policy.
As much as they beat into us the role of the Supreme Court is to not be political, can someone tell me why conservative justices are still being appointed and approved to the bench?
We aren’t going back. We can’t go back? Yeah right.
But now, the Spanish language version of the White House website is gone. Reproductive and contraceptive info websites are dark. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion efforts everywhere are being rolled back. I won’t say that we are moving in the wrong direction, because I think we are being pushed against our best efforts to fight back.
We have rallied, we have fundraised, we have done grassroots work on a national scale. But yet “Don’t Say Gay” has turned into “Don’t say…
- “Women”
- “Gender”
- “Science”
- “Ethnicity”
- “Hate Speech”
- “Inequality”
- “Minority”
- “Racially”
Words that we have fought to bring light to institutionally and socially for decades, wiped out with a single Executive Order. For what? Making this country great? Well guess who does that. Women, Black people, gay people, lesbian people, transgender people, queer people, indigenous people, immigrants, minorities, qualified people. Right?
“Nothing changes instantaneously: in a gradually heating bathtub you’d be boiled to death before you knew it.” -Margaret Atwood in The Handmaid’s Tale
My advice for my fellow pissed-off Americans: Recognize that the water is heating up. Do everything in your power to stop it. Am I right?