Gender Equality and the First Amendment: Foreword

Gender equality demands equal opportunity to speak and be heard. Yet, in recent years, the clash between equality and free speech in the context of gender has intensified—in the media, the workplace, college campuses, and the political arena, both online and offline. The internet has given rise to novel First Amendment issues that particularly affect women, such as nonconsensual pornography, online harassment, and online privacy. On November 1–2, 2018, the Fordham Law Review brought together scholars and practicing lawyers from around the nation to address many of the pressing challenges facing feminists and free speech advocates today. The Symposium was a fitting topic to mark the occasion of 100 years of women at Fordham Law School. Over twenty scholars, practitioners, and writers participated in the two-day conference, along with Sylvia A. Law, Elizabeth K. Dollard Professor of Law, Medicine, and Psychiatry Emerita of N.Y.U. School of Law, who delivered the Robert L. Levine Lecture. Conference panels considered campus speech issues, including trigger warnings, safe spaces, and hostile classrooms; pornography, including nonconsensual pornography (or “revenge porn”); being female online and how the internet affects women’s reputations, self-expression, and privacy; words, images, misogyny, and the First Amendment; and how gender representation in the media and politics impact political outcomes and reproductive rights. This issue of the Fordham Law Review includes papers from six of the Symposium participants, in addition to Professor Law’s Levine Lecture