Why do girls feel empowered to engage in sexual activity but not to enjoy it? For three years, author Peggy Orenstein interviewed girls ages 15 to 20 about their attitudes toward and experiences of sex. She discusses the pleasure that's largely missing from their sexual encounters and calls on us to close the "orgasm gap" by talking candidly with our girls from an early age about sex, bodies, pleasure and intimacy.

I don’t think a woman should need to be viewed as someone’s wife or mom to be treated with decency and respect.

In recent years, campaigns like Emma Sulkowicz' Columbia thesis "Carry That Weight" — in which Sulkowitz carried the dorm mattress on which she was allegedly raped around campus — and "Unacceptable Acceptance Letters" — videos and ads of fake college acceptance letters warning high school seniors about the realities of college sexual assault — have increased awareness about rape culture at colleges and universities. But rape culture doesn't begin in college, and its earlier iterations are discussed far less frequently.

There's a story in the news this week about how a well-meaning father took pictures with his arms around his daughter's Homecoming date, mimicking the couple's pose. A comment was later added, and the picture posted on social media.

Enough with online hate speech, sexual harassment and threats of violence against women and marginalized groups. It's time to take the global crisis of online abuse seriously. In this searching, powerful talk, Ashley Judd recounts her ongoing experience of being terrorized on social media for her unwavering activism and calls on citizens of the internet, the tech community, law enforcement and legislators to recognize the offline harm of online harassment.

In a matter of just a few years, Unilever’s Axe has gone from unabashedly (and often crassly) celebrating male stereotypes to forcefully opposing them. And its new campaign, from 72andSunny Amsterdam, represents its boldest step yet in combating what it’s now calling “toxic masculinity” and its debilitating effects on young men.

In American classrooms, where black children are never granted the luxury of being thinkers, brainy dreamers and nerdy eccentrics, invulnerability becomes their default mode and safe space; protective armor from the criminalizing gaze of school police, administrators and teachers.  Inundated with racist pop culture images of violent black masculinity and hyper-sexualized black femininity, black boys in particular often struggle to define manhood in ways that aren’t based on hardness and controlling black girls and women. Black male feminist allies like Kevin Powell, Byron Hurt and Mark Anthony Neal have long championed linking anti-violence work on sexual assault, intimate partner violence and misogynoir with civil rights and social justice activism.  Powell calls for a progressive men’s movement to deprogram men and boys.  Yet, making sexual violence relevant to young men of color is hampered by legacies of anti-feminist “gender warfare”, epitomized by scorched earth attacks against forerunning womanist/feminists like Alice Walker, Michele Wallace and bell hooks. As a result, it is a persistent challenge to connect young black men to this work in their schools, communities and everyday lives.

When it comes to crimes like rape and sexual assault, the focus is shifting from prosecution and punishment to prevention. That means finding the cause of the problem and tackling it early on.

We teach girls that they can have ambition, but not too much ... to be successful, but not too successful, or they'll threaten men, says author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. In this classic talk that started a worldwide conversation about feminism, Adichie asks that we begin to dream about and plan for a different, fairer world — of happier men and women who are truer to themselves.

At TEDWomen, Tony Porter makes a call to men everywhere: Don't "act like a man." Telling powerful stories from his own life, he shows how this mentality, drummed into so many men and boys, can lead men to disrespect, mistreat and abuse women and each other. His solution: Break free of the "man box."

Gutsy girls skateboard, climb trees, clamber around, fall down, scrape their knees, get right back up — and grow up to be brave women. Learn how to spark a little productive risk-taking and raise confident girls with stories and advice from firefighter, paraglider and all-around adventurer Caroline Paul.

A few years ago, Chimamanda Adichie received a message from a childhood friend asking for advice: She wanted to know how to raise her newborn daughter to be a feminist. For Adichie — a best-selling author who has also made a name for herself as a leading feminist voice — the question was a bit daunting, but she wrote a long letter back to her friend. Now, that letter has been published as a book. It's called Dear Ijeawele, or A Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions, and it talks about everything from how to choose toys to teaching self-reliance to challenging traditional gender roles.

Most parents who ask their kids about their middle school projects probably get an earful on dioramas of the planetary system or poster boards on Charlemagne―but not Tessa Hill's or Lia Valente's parents. Instead, they learned about how their 13-year-old daughters were busy making a documentary about rape culture for an eighth grade assignment.

Consent is everything! Here are some helpful tips--a LOT of them-- for kids ages 1-21! Check it out...