Recently in Sexism Category

Exposure to sexist jokes can lead to hostility towards women, according to a recent study . In one experiment, a group of male participants were more likely to cut funding for a (hypothetical) women's center after viewing a sexist comedy clip, than a control group, whose comedy clip was neutral. Thomas E. Ford, who conducted the experiment, explained:

Sexist humor...can affect men’s perceptions of their immediate social surroundings and allow them to feel comfortable with behavioral expressions of sexism without the fear of disapproval of their peers. Specifically, we propose that sexist humor acts as a 'releaser' of prejudice.

In other words, men with a high level of sexism are more likely to see their views as socially acceptable, if they're exposed to these jokes. In an identical social situation, where these jokes don't come up, the person's latent sexism is less likely to be aroused, for fear of ostracization or shaming.

Is this surprising to you? How often have you noticed that sexism seems to become more acceptable in your peer group after, say, watching Family Guy? Have you ever noticed how the atmosphere changes after someone in your group of friends makes a derogatory comment? Perhaps this is also true for women in ethnic and religious minorities? What do you think?

On a lighter note, there's a 'Smart Blonde' joke, to make you laugh, after the jump.

The assertion that women’s bodies are inherently beautiful, while men’s bodies are strange and ugly is frequently invoked by straight, cisgendered men. It is used as a justification for the objectification of women, and as a reason for the idea that straight women should enjoy going to strip clubs with their partners. It justifies the expectation that straight women “experiment” with other women, while simultaneously excusing homophobia. Many straight men believe there is something intrinsically alluring and sensual about the female form. More importantly, they think that this sensual quality is inherently lacking from the male form. They tend to state this stance openly, and take it for granted as fact rather than as subjective preference. That this viewpoint blatantly excludes the possibility of trans, intersex, or other non-gender conforming bodies is self-evident and highly problematic.   Furthermore, it systematically marginalizes every concept of sexuality that does not exist from the straight, cisgendered male perspective.

Of course I’ll include the usual disclaimer: this does not apply to all straight, cis men. There are exceptions. But the general trend and the cultural acceptance of it as a “norm” remain problematic, despite the individual men who oppose this way of thinking. Dirty Silver also has a recent post (NSFW) on this topic.

It seems simple. Heterosexual men, by definition, find the nude female form more sexually stimulating than the male. It stands to reason that the inverse of that statement applies to straight women and gay men. The widely accepted straight male viewpoint that “naked women=beautiful, naked men=funny lookin’ “ is dripping with privilege. I find it amazing that it has never occurred to men who share this belief that their personal perspective does not necessarily constitute a reality for those with other sexual orientations. This should be common sense. Some people are physically attracted to women. Others are physically attracted to men. Some are attracted to both. None of this has any logical bearing on the inherent attractiveness of any body, or of any primary or secondary sex characteristics.

This notion is deeply damaging to women. Not only does it excuse blatant objectification under the guise of “admiring the female form,” but it also promotes the age-old double standard against female sexuality. Female bodies are viewed as public property. They are consumed visually through misogynistic porn and lad mags, and they are the perpetual targets of rape and sexual harassment. With the opinion that female bodies are intrinsically irresistible, however, qualities innate to the female form become the acknowledged cause of these problems—not the actions of the men who devour them. The male perpetrators are thereby absolved of responsibility, and women are expected to take violence, harassment, and objectification as some kind of compliment.

I work retail. So do a lot of other people, in a lot of other ways, but I don't think I'd be out of line if I said that retail sales is not a position of great prestige. People don't consider it a career, they don't consider it a skill-based trade, and they certainly tend not to consider the feelings of the people serving them.

All that being said, I like my job . I graduated from college in May and needed time off after burning myself out in undergrad. I wanted a position that let me work with people and books, so a job as a retail bookseller for a successful bookstore was perfect for my year off. I'm applying now for PhD programs and, not to toot my own horn, but it's going pretty well. You see, I'm smart. And lucky. And was blessed with a private, liberal arts education. Plus I worked hard, graduating summa cum laude as the valedictorian and the outstanding graduate in my major. Nonetheless, I like my job. And you know what? I'm good at it, because a fancy degree in english lit means one thing: I really dig books. So customers tend to take my recommendations seriously, getting that I'm coming at them from a place of true interest and passion. So even though it's not my career, I enjoy my time at work and I take pride in what I do.

When a woman or girl talks about "dangerous" men, be it a realistic band member or biker, or the fictional vampire boyfriend, it's often because they want something exciting to happen. I don't think there's anything problematic with desiring this type of man in itself, but I do think that the underlying problem is that this implies women can't have their own excitement.

The implication seems to be that women are boring, that we lead droll little lives that can only be brightened up by an exciting action man, who will lead us off on adventures. No, we can't have adventures, but we can tag along for the wonderful new world he's going to show us. And then have his babies and make him dinner after.

I think that the goal shouldn't be to eliminate this type of manliness, but to change "wouldn't it be cool to date a magical guy?" to "wouldn't it be cool to be magical?" To change "I'd like to date a guy in a band" to "I'd like to start a band."

Women and girls aren't encouraged enough to draw on themselves for fulfillment and adventure, and it's high time that changed. Ladies, live your dreams.

I don't watch the show Eastwick, which was just canceled by ABC, but I do read EW.com daily. EW columnist Michael Ausiello had interviewed Eastwick's executive producer, Maggie Friedman, and let her know that fans were "furious" about the cancellation. She replied, "I'm pretty furious, too." You can see the rest of her comments here.

Today, however, she has retracted her statement. As can be read here, she contacted Ausiello and said that she chose her words poorly, and that she's not angry, and that ABC treated her well and she had fun making the show.

At first glance, I didn't think too much about it, but then I started thinking about how society pressures women to be nice. I thought about how Katherine Heigl and Megan Fox have been demonized by the media for daring to express discontent with aspects of their jobs (even when in a flippant joke on a late night talk show), while similar comments by male actors went by unnoticed.

I thought about the choice words Joss Whedon had for the CW and Fox when his shows Angel and Firefly were canceled. I thought about how the male star of Southland recently laid the smackdown on NBC for axing his show (see his comments, which are filled with snark, here) and was cheered by fans in the comments. Contrast that to the comments on Maggie Friedman's retraction, where some people admonish her for biting the hand that feeds her and for burning bridges.

Why can Southland's Michael Cudlitz be "pissed off" when his show gets axed, but Maggie Friedman can't be "furious" when hers is? Why did she feel the need to retract? Would a male executive producer ever be admonished for biting the hand that feeds him after expressing how he felt after losing his show?

I am a member of an internet forum of an academic bent where people discuss all manner of issues from political to scientific to philosophical to ethical. One day, I posted a thread asking other female users whether they had experienced sexism on the forum (because I felt I had), and whether sexism in the field of academia/science was an issue for them. It was an innocent and fair enough question, or so I thought.

I was not prepared for the negative reaction that followed. I expected a few disgruntled anti-feminist comments from men, as are common whenever sexism is brought up, and sure enough I got plenty. I did not expect to receive hostile responses from women. That is what I got, however. 

I was on the receiving end of a surprising amount of hostility from female users (not all, but a significant number) who accused me of (among other things) 'whining' and 'overreacting'. They denied that there was any sexism on the forum itself, and when confronted with examples, said that they found such things funny and I should 'lighten up'. It wasn't just what they said that shocked me, it was how they said it - so aggressively at times that I was left under no illusion that they did not appreciate me bringing the subject up.

  I am a student at DePaul University and I am very proud to have Dr. Melissa Bradshaw as a professor this year.  I am in a Women's Studies Course where twice a week I get to engage in an important ongoing feminist dialogue about race, class, gender, and all of the issues women face today.  When I first heard about Professor Bradshaw's tenure denial I was in shock.  Then I began reading and hearing more about it, and began to notice the reasoning behind this decision.  The full article from today's Chicago Tribune can be found here which describes what has been going on with Dr. Bradshaw's case as well as the other female professors who have been denied tenure.  They are all bringing this to court and accusing DePaul University of gender discrimination.  This is a very serious accusation and I hope you all read this article and begin a dialogue about this.  Do your universities have similar cases? Are you a female professor who has felt gender discrimination at your university?  I would love to hear more stories and start a conversation.  I am hoping to go to law school after I get my BA and work with brave women who are fighting for what is theirs.

I saw this commercial on TV last night for Stella Artois beer:

In the past, I've felt that Stella Artois had some really different and quite interesting advertising. Many of their past ads did not fall into that same boring formula of too many beer ads: parties, young men drinking beer, and those young men being surrounded by attractive young women.

This last commercial from Stella really rubs me the wrong way. They are basically comparing a glass of beer to a woman and saying that both are "a thing of beauty". Thoughts?

Several years ago I took a management course needed for my major. With the book was some extra material that explained situations that come up in the work place that managers have to resolve. In the videos the situation is explained from multiple points of view, and then the interactive program asks the class what the final answer should be. Keep them? Fire them? Move them to another Department? Those are just generic answers.

One particular video really bothered me. It dealt with sexual harassment. Woman worker used to date Man worker. They broke it off. However, he still loomed around and touched her inapproriately. She asked that he be moved to a different department because she felt uncomfortable. However, other co-workers provided information why it wasn't harassment. They had pictures (you got to see them) of him touching her leg with her smiling. According to the workers, it was taken a few days ago. Another employee supplied an email about the woman sending lies and gossip about the man. The man's testimony was basically "She still has the hots for me". The woman's testimony to why she was smiling in the picture "It's hard when you are being harassed. Especially if they have seniority and can buddy their way into management to get you fired." After all of this, the class was to weigh in on the verdict. The class chose it wssn't harassment because a.) what gossip was going around and b.) they had a previous relationship. The video confirmed that as the correct answer as to why it was a fruitless claim. The final video that explained what happened afterwards was that she was fired.

This bothers me on two levels. That sexual harassment is null if there is a previous relationship (we often see this as an excuse used in sexual assault cases). And two, all women turn into nasty gossipers when a relationship turns sour.

I didn't let this video bother me for years. I wrote it off with an eye roll. The professor was sexist anyways towards women, categorizing us as shampoo and hair-loving individuals who all want lots of babies. He didn't even help women when they wanted help in class. He likely ordered it because it mirrored his own views.

Thanks to my influence from feminists blogs such as this, I now see it is as wrong. I fear this is how not only the school views women (for ordering this book) but how McGraw-Hill views women as well. It's been two years since I have taken the class, but I still fear the newer editions likely use the same crap.

What are your thoughts?

Yes, the Dana Milbank from the Washington Post who made the awful "Mad Bitch Beer" joke.  He wrote a column today pointing out recent instances of paternalism and patriarchy in both Republican and Democratic leaders:

The old boys are back in town.

Item: President Obama hosts a basketball game at the White House on Thursday evening for Cabinet secretaries and members of Congress. Of the 15 participants whose names are put out by the White House, not one is a woman -- even though Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was a college basketball player and U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, who was in town for the afternoon, played high school ball.

Item: On Thursday morning, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is asked about a news release, issued by the National Republican Congressional Committee, that expressed the party's hope that Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, would put Pelosi "in her place." Says the speaker of the House: "That language is something I haven't even heard in decades."

Item: In the White House driveway on Wednesday afternoon, Pelosi is addressing reporters when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, seeking to inject a point, puts a paternalistic arm around her shoulder. Pelosi recoils, making a pained grin and inching away from Reid. As Reid delivers his message, Pelosi raises her eyebrows -- some call it an eye roll -- to signal her disagreement.

I'm sharing this because a) regardless of the author, this is a good column in and of itself and b) I am a Milbank fan and was bummed at how much shit he caught caught for the Mad Bitch joke. Yes, it was in incredibly poor taste and he should have been called out on it, but I feel Milbank's good journalism outweighs the one, idiotic comedic Fail.

Granted the kids are in Sweden, but it made me smile to see that even kids are recognizing that they don't have to conform to gender roles/stereotypes about play.

The claim came from Swedish-based consumer advocacy group Reklamombudsmannen, after a sixth grade class in Stockholm appealed to them as part of a project. The class examined the toy catalog, which showed boys playing in "action-filled environments" as superheroes, while girls are shown "sitting or standing in passive poses" dressed up in princess costumes. The kids felt that the scenes depicted reinforced a subjective idea of normal play, and filed a complaint against Toys'R'Us for gender discrimination.

The rest of the article can be found here

I wish this was part of regular study for 6th graders here in the states.

I feel deeply sorry to have offended anyone with the use of the word "whore" in my previous post "Halloween Costume Nightmare." I realize how hurtful that word can be and would edit that posting immediately if I knew how. The post was meant to be a funny look at how silly and sexist the selection of women's costumes are at Halloween Superstores and how those selections negatively influence young girls. Perhaps I got a little carried away. I was not implying that women who wear skimpy Halloween costumes are whores in any way, shape, or form. I was not trying to victim-blame or imply that women who dress in those particular costumes are "asking for it." I feel disappointed in myself for not being more considerate. I apologize to all that were offended.

Have you seen this "Get Mommed" campaign by Kleenex?

You can try out a virtual mom to help you pick out tisuies... what? Yeah, in my opinion this is sexist advertising at it's worst.

Here is one of the commercials:

Blech.

So i'm currently doing postgrad physics, in a small university, and my class is very small (10 in my year) so everyone in it i see quite a lot. I really like these people, and can have a good conversation with all of them.

But there is this one guy, T, who gets on my nerves a lot. He's white, from a richish family, straight, male. So he comes from a position of a lot of privilege, which he is very unaware of. He's also quite arrogant, which everyone is aware of and puts up with. I have a class with him and two others so certainly cannot avoid him.

But he makes me so angry sometimes. The first thing that really got me was awhile ago when he posted as his facebook status something about how he wishes he was a non-white disabled foreign woman so he could get some scholarships. Luckily a lot of people were replying to this with a bit of anger. I think I told him if he wanted scholarships he could try getting some better marks and that not being a citizen was the best way to be disqualified from scholarships.

He has brought this issue up again, when i was with him in person, while in a group of friends. The same sort of complaint. I was seeing red. I told him 'I've never gotten a scholarship because I'm a woman, it was always solely on my grades' Now, I don't think this was the best possible response. I don't think there's anything wrong with scholarships for woman, and i think a good defence could have been made about that. But it was all I could come up with at the time, and i hope was better than nothing.

There's other stuff the worst of which was when i was talking to one of the other members of my class (also female) and him, and he was complaining about the assignment. We have a female lecturer for that class, and T didn't like her. But then he said to us 'so we worked out the makr distribution: you get an A+ cause you actually know whats going on and are female, L (my female friend), gets an A, cause she's female, and me and S (male classmate) will get A-'s.'

I was too shocked to say anything. Haven't really talked to him since. I just don't want to get into a conversation that makes me angry for the rest of the day. Another classmate told me he thought i was ignoring him and didn't understand why. Is there anyway i can let him see whats angering me without making me seem like i'm the one being stupid in the eyes of my classmates? is there anyway i could make him stop?

The other thing is that given he's coming from a privileged position, and he gets ok marks, and is doing a subject that makes people automatically think you're a genius (yes, i get that a lot. It's kinda creepy), i know he'll end up in a position of power of women and people of colour and other less privileged people eventually.

I would like to state, for the record, that I know what people are talking about when they say feminists are no fun. Personally, I think I’m a hoot. But I do have moments when I think “Man! This would be a lot more fun if I didn’t believe the things I believe, know the things I know, and generally look at life from a feminist perspective.” Over and over again I look at what is around me and am probably overly offended. Aaaand what I am about to write about is no exception.

The other day I took a quiz on Facebook called “What body part are you?” and was proud and not altogether shocked to have been told I was a vagina. Ah, yes. A vagina. The part of my body that gives me so much pleasure. That has the power to send a human out into the world. That gives me orgasms and puts me in line with the celebrated cycle of the moon when I have my period. Oh, glorious, glorious vagina! What shall this facebook quiz have to say about your wonder?

Meow!

Thats right.You're a pussy.Otherwise known as the vagina,snatch,gash,poon,love socket,fleshy taco. You may not be the prettiest of body parts,especially when you let your beard grow uncontrollably,but you make men feel warm and safe.Most of the time.There are a few days a month when,well,lets face it,you make us see red and you walk around surrounded by a bitch all the time.

I came across this bit of news today and it reminded me of the posts on Feministing not too long ago about "Java Jugs," the chain of coffee houses in the Pacific Northwest where the baristas wear bikinis to work. It seems that at a similar coffee house in Washington state, some women were accused of prostitution for charging customers to feel their breasts and asses, and to strip down and/or lick whipped cream off of each other.

I think the most interesting thing about this is that none of the customers were charged or arrested in this investigation, which involved undercover officers posing as patrons. Of course the women would be blamed and painted as whores who would do anything to make a buck, even though they are working in a place that is clearly promoting the exploitation of their sexuality to an absurd degree. The cycle of sexism is so powerful, isn't it? Also, I think it is hilarious that it's considered perfectly okay for places of business to operate on the concept of flaunting women's bodies in order to make money, but that the owner said about the controversy that "anyone caught doing anything illegal would be fired." Thoughts?

This is from my blog, Radical Lorraine .

This new PSA is disturbing.

First, this offends MEN by saying they are not smart enough to grasp the gravity of breast cancer unless it is related to sex. That is messed up.

Second, it offends WOMEN by objectifying a woman in order to  raise awareness of a serious illness. That is also messed up.

Men, I trust that you are smart enough to comprehend breast cancer without equating a PSA to a Hooters ad. Cancer is a scary thing and this PSA tries to make light of a disease that takes the lives of thousands.

Disgusting.

Being one of only two women in a office of men leads to some interesting discussions. 

We got on to the topic of women-only gyms and insurance. The men all felt this was completely sexist and discriminatory. I don't know how I really feel about this. I had a look through the Feministing archives to see what sort of things have been said about it in the past.

On one hand there are many women who don't feel safe and would prefer to just get on with their workout in peace and without worry. One of the men in the office, who nearly lost his life to black male who hijacked him, said that this traumatic event meant he didn't feel safe when a black person walked down his road as he has no way of telling whether this person is a criminal or not. Would it be okay to simply make his street a whites only area so he could feel safe and not have to worry? Or could he form a straight men only gym if he feels ogled by gay men in the changing room of his current gym? Although they are completely different issues, the logic is technically the same.

On the other hand this seems to be an easy-out to a problem that would be better addressed head on. Wouldn't it be better to have a co-ed gym where women (or men) were given practical ways to deal with unwanted attention? But will this be enough to ensure their protection?

Are the differences between gender enough of a reason to promote things like segregated gyms, even if the logic it uses can't be applied to other areas? Most places still have segregated bathrooms based on the similar issues as to why people might want segregated gyms.

As for the insurance issue, I did point out that all insurance companies will discriminate based on various categories a person falls into - age for example. 

I'm interested to hear what other people think about this topic. It may be more progressive not to segregate, but what about safety? Is gender enough to advocate for certain types of segregation when other types based on age or race are considered inappropriate?

So, I go into my local Guiter Center a few days ago with my male friend. We're immediately approached by a male staff member. Well, when I say "we" I mean my male friend. Now, I'm usually a pretty reasonable person, but this male staff member completely ignored me. No eye contact. He asks my guy friend his name. HE DOES NOT ASK FOR MY NAME.

We're passed onto a second male staff member ("This [name], he's looking for an acoustic guitar") who continues the conversation with my guy friend. Then the staff guy finally asks my male friend, "What kind of guitar are you looking for?" At that point, my friend tells him the guitar is for "her." (me)

Ah, then the light goes on. However, the second male staff name STILL does not ask my name (eye contact check). In fact, throughout the whole process they did not learn my name.

So, I'd like to say to dear Guitar Center, I know it's shocking, it's revolutionary but---Girls ARE interested in guitars too!

P.S. No, I did not buy anything.

P.S.S. And, no, I'm NOT accepting any Alpha-Male-Not-Looking-At-Your-Girlfriend Crap excuse for Sales Guy #1.

P.P.S.S. Is the piano a "girly" instrument???

I often have a difficult time explaining sexism. Certainly you can piont to the thousands of ads that show naked, near naked, or sexualized women and girls, but plenty of ads with men in such states exist to rebuff your argument. The claim "well sex sells," is hard to combat because, we all know it does. As a lesbian I also have a hard time convincing men that these types of ads are offensive because (while I obviously take no pleasure in the demeaning of my fellow women and sisters) I have to agree with them when they say things like, "come on, tell me you don't like seeing hot, naked women."

The key is that each individual act of sexualization is trely not significant. It is the combined effect- which does not sexualize this woman, or this girl, but instead sexualizes the very state of being female, that is the issue. And a far-reaching, highly detrimental issue, at that.

Recently, I went on google images for a quick clip-art type of thing that could represent actresses. I noticed that on the first page for the key word "actress" about 6 or 7 (of the 30) pictures were of actresses posing naked and sexed up, presumably for a Maxim-like photoshoot. Another 3 or 4 were pictures of porn.

I was intrigued. The key word "actor" turned up a total 30 pictures of- well, actors! Not naked actors, not porn stars, not dicks. Just men who make a career of performing on stage or on screen. It says something about our culture that actress does not carry a similar definition, but must be sexualized simply because it involves the female sex.

I've found that this google-image experiment works with absolutely any word combined with the word woman, girl, or female. Go ahead and try "pure girl" "food girl" "work female" or even "self-esteem girl". Literally anythign will yeild similar results. It also works with feminine words like actress, waitress, and heiress. Mother yeilds only one porn image on the first page (all of these will provide porn on the first page 99% of the time, and the second page the other 1%) while daughter was mostly porn. That was one of the most disturbing things I found while conducting thse mini-social experiments for doubtful friends.

Now, when I try to explain this particular facet of sexism, I just commandeer the nearest laptop, and the evidence is just right in front of me.

For all you women out there tired of being called to task for "female hormones," see here.

With all the hoopla surrounding the way Serena Williams lost the U.S. Open comes the comments and reactions from officials, media and the public. Not surprisingly, a majority of comments and poll results indicate disapproval of Williams' outburst. What's behind the public reaction, however, is a long history of discomfort toward, and objectification of, an African-American tennis dynasty.

Relatively few people will make outright racist or sexist comments about the Williams sisters concerning their tennis performance, or their behaviour. However, comments regarding how "masculine" Serena Williams is drip with stereotypical assumptions. She's not a size 00, therefore, her outburst must be "'roid rage". Her anger at a very close call, at a crucial point in the match, is considered evidence of what is interpreted as unwarranted "arrogance", as if, even in being the best in the world, she somehow doesn't deserve to contest anything, or disagree with anyone. In losing the match, she "got what was coming to her".

Perhaps indeed unsportsmanlike conduct must be discouraged, but there is a level of personal vitriol directed against Williams in this situation which appears to go far beyond the issue of sportsmanship. The word "uppity" is the invisible elephant-word in the living room.

When it comes to looking at Serena Williams off the court, things get a lot worse. Her thighs, posterior and breasts, whether observed with lust or disgust, are the subject of the rudest possible comments on sports blogs. And I'm quite sure I didn't read the worst of them.

This is to all women who have ever gotten any "compliments" that they either wanted or didn't want concerning their appearance, and especially, to those who had to pay far too high a price to hear them. So as you can see, the net is cast pretty wide and has nothing to do with whatever is on the cover of Cosmo or Vanity Fair (none of which is real given the Photoshopping, in any case, so they might as well start using cartoonists). If I address myself to young women, however this is defined, it's because the young are more often more vulnerable. I know I was, and I wish someone had written this for me to read, since I did not get the chance to take my own advice.

By now, you have certainly been ogled and cat-called at least once. You have probably been harassed several times at school and at work, perhaps even groped or otherwise assaulted.

Odds are that these experiences did not make you feel happy about being attractive. You are probably angry, instead. And you are angry because all your life, society kept telling you how important it was to be beautiful, and as soon as you appear to achieve this mystical golden status, you are punished for it. Of course, you are not supposed to think this is the case at all. No: you are supposed to feel you have the right to be beautiful, that this is empowering, but somehow, the voices in your head and the messages from men on all those bulletin boards after a rape story gets published online tell you otherwise. Every single time, they tell you that by being beautiful, you are inviting abuse.

My opinion of my father has been sinking lower and lower as we both get older and my father exposes more of his misogyny. Not that he'd think he was a misogynist.

Last night a news report on Jaycee Lee Dugard described how she had been 'a sex slave' to Phillip Garrido... which I heard my father comment

'Oh yeah baby'

In a raunchy voice.

I've told him multiple times how when he groans or comments on the attractiveness (or unattractiveness) of say a female character on star trek that it bothers me. Now he's making a joke about the kidnapping and torture of a woman being sexy.

And I want to move out all over again.

It's almost six am and I still can't sleep. For someone who takes good nights' sleep as seriously as I, there must be an explanation, right? I'm scared to fall asleep. My dad is gone for the weekend and my sisters are back at school and I'm all alone. 

Basically, I'm scared that somehow, some psychopath discovered that I was going to be home alone tonight and is either lurking out in the woods or is already somewhere in my house, waiting to torture me for hours and then kill me. Yea, I feel like an idiot writing that. I even have two dogs! Nevertheless, I know I'm not the only woman who is freaked out by sleeping alone (being in a big house in the woods with an absurdly active imagination doesn't help).

I watch too much TV, right? And too many movies. And I see too many commercials, too many advertisements, hear too many songs, read too many books, flip through too many magazines, and witness too many human interactions that tell me that women constantly need to be protected. We're told that when women are left unprotected, our physical weakness and vulnerability blatantly exposed, the result is unfortunate or tragic. Horror movies and crime detective shows make their money off this premise. In the real world, however, we can't have a sidekick trained in martial arts with us at all times. So, we find ways to protect ourselves. In fact, we're expected to, and have fingers wagged at us if we don't. For example, Broadview security has a couple commercials that vividly demonstrate that in order to live alone and be safe from abusive ex-boyfriends or any random person from breaking in, we need extensive alarm systems that automatically contact emergency assistance. Explicitly tapping into women's deepest fears? Now THAT'S effective advertising.

First I want to start by saying that I absolutely love and adore my group of friends. They have stood by me through thick and thin and overall they are a great bunch of people. I love and respect them and their opinions very much and even when we don't agree about something we make sure to take their feelings into account before responding against their argument. However something happened last night that really got on my nerves on multiple levels. My inner core group of friends (which consist of myself and three others) all have boyfriends except me. I am single by choice because I have my own issues to deal with before I can handle taking on a relationship. There is a single guy in our extended group who really gets along well with me. We are really good friends. We chase everyone out of the kitchen, cook, and talk about feminism. But that is the extent of it. We aren't attracted to one another and neither one of us likes the other in that way. A relationship between the two of us would never work. But all of our friends come to find out have been scheming to find ways to get us alone together, and to get us together as a couple. Yesterday one of my best friends decided to tell me that "You should marry Bob*" Not even I should date Bob, no I should marry him. I do not appreciate that at all. I do not like being told who to marry. That decision rests soly between me and future mr. right. After that in response to this madness he posts on facebook as his status that a relationship between the two of us was equal to i/0. For all of you non-math people i is a representative irrational number (sort of like pi) and you cannot divide by zero. We go to a science university so everyone we are friends with understood the sentiment behind it, plus there are inside jokes behind the i that I won't get into. Anyways though, we were bombarded with questions about the whole thing and told that it wasn't true and we secretly both really like the other person and don't want to admit it ect. But what really got to me is that when I pointed out beyond the fact that neither one of us is attracted to the other, that I did not want to be in a relationship, I was attacked and informed that because I was female that it was absolutely impossible to feel that way about a relationship and that I always want to be in one unless I already am and then I always want to bring that relationship closer. That really pissed me off because its going to that gender binary that says I am female therefore I must fill in the blank here.I don't like that in any way at all. I don't appreciate the absolute sexism or the questioning of what I want for myself. It was also implied. I am so frustrated at them right now for this. It really pisses me off to think about it simply because they knew that saying something like that would really push my buttons. I don't want to be in a relationship and they cannot accept that. Why does that have to be my problem? What do the rest of you happily single ladies (or guys) do when your friends just won't leave you alone about this?

*not his real name, protecting his identity here

I am a 17-year old feminist. I have been dating a boy for about 9 months, and have never explicitly told him my feminist beliefs. It isn't usually an issue, but sometimes he says something that is completely against my values and really gets me angered. He thinks women making out is hot, uses "rape" and "faggot" conversationally, etc. Not the ideal feminist boyfriend. However, I feel like he could potentially understand my point of view if I talked to him about it and made it really clear.

I'm really nervous about doing this. Does anybody have any pointers about how to talk to him?

American Apparel ad banned in the UK for potentially sexualizing a person who appeared under 16.

Check out the link- she does certainly look to be more near 12.

Now, of course, we all know American Apparel has alot of sexualizing and exploitative ads, like this one, this one (nudity), this one, this one... list goes one. Look some more up if you want.

But wait! you say. Lets not jump to conclusions, shall we? Of course not. Maybe this company is just trying to ignore the prudish avoidance from sex and nudity in the media, right? Lets find some of their male ads.

The following editoral was forwarded to me. It's about Elizabeth Gilbert's second book, "Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace With Marriage": http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204731804574389030071359044.html

I have not read either of Gilbert's books, but I would venture a guess that "Committed" is not about giving up feminist ideals to snag a man. It seems that Charlotte Hays perceives that getting married and being a feminist are mututally exclusive - an idea that our own Jessica has shown to be false. I would argue that getting married in and of itself is not antifeminist, but not taking the time to learn which parts of a wedding are patriarchal is. Taking the time to understand the history of weddings, and subverting or turning on their heads the patriarchal elements is in my opinion, a feminist thing to do. Also, getting married doesn't mean giving up sisterhood, as Hays seems to think. Women do not stop being feminists or believing in equality and sisterhood once they've found someone they want to share their lives with.

"[name withheld]can not wait till I have a wife of my own, and kids of my own, but unfortunately I could not afford them if I had them....

This was recently posted by a friend from high school to a message board I belong to and it immediately struck me. The guy posting this is white, christian and just finished college. It wasn't that the post was unexpected by this friend, what shocked me was how much he believed in it.

I found THIS lovely article where research has shown the women are able to make men stupid simply by pretty.

The research shows men who spend even a few minutes in the company of an attractive woman perform less well in tests designed to measure brain function than those who chat to someone they do not find attractive

Hello all, this is Keegan (a new blogger) standing in for Rebekah today, as we discovered a website with the single most misogynistic article on women that I have ever read. I am writing this for Rebekah at her request, due to her current incapacitation by the mind-blowingly chauvinistic piece I am about to relate.

The article in question, I suppose, is best understood if you read it, so I will quote it below:

Women are ultra-impressionable beings, and therefore are easily controlled by aliens and the elite. The main purpose of women on Earth (that is, what aliens have programmed them to do) is to enslave men via relationships. Women are obsessed with relationships and love (due to alien programming), and don't care about anything else in life. They would have men believe that being in a relationship is one of the most important things in existence, not realizing that men couldn't care less about being in a relationship--and rightly so. Furthermore, women force men to waste their precious time and resources on them. This demonic charade (i.e., relationships) has gone on for far too long and obviously has no end in sight. Thus, you can blame women for the downfall and utter hopelessness of humanity.

So. Looks like someone had a bad fight with his girl-friend, right? I mean, holy cow . I...I don't even know where to begin. Well, first let's say this: I first came across this site several years ago, and that part was not there. The guy didn't even have a section about women before; this is a recent development, peeps. So, this is what I think happened. EITHER he had a bad fight with his girl-friend (ie she asked him to put his dirty laundry in the hamper, rather than all over the floor; or denied him sex because he is a chauvinist FUCK; or something of that nature), and he had himself a beer and a pity-fest, and decided to update his web-page of madness; OR he had a run in with what he would undoubtedly call – you guessed it – a “feminazi” and, not enjoying the experience, decided to buy a feminist book, read it, and then write an article that exemplified everything a feminist, or for that mater a rational, decent human being, would find to be repulsive and shit-headed. Or a combination of the two.

So yeah. Just thought we'd bring that one to everyone's attention, because it's just great for the lols, right? (Pardon my sarcasm.) SO! Peace out, have a good night, and remember: relationships are for enslaving men.

Greetings, all! I saw Julie & Julia this weekend and absolutely loved it, but I'm not here to give a review of the movie. Instead, I wanted to share about the experience of a sexist asshole movie theater employee.

He was taking our tickets and commented to my fiancee on our movie choice, "Ah, J&J, don't expect her to cook like they do in the movie!" To which my fiancee responds that I already do.

No problem, we get in to the theater and settle down. Before they start the previews, the real fun began.

The same usher comes to the front of the theater and gets everyone's attention. He starts by surveying the crowd and saying, "Oh, this might be a record, there's, one, two, three...twelve...A lot of men in the audience."

Here we go, I thought. It was a full house and here I was thinking that he was going to say to people to fill up the seats between you and everything.

He goes on, "My experience is that with men coming to movies like this, it's for three reasons, 1) Their wives dragged them here 2) They're going to the movie JUST TO GET LUCKY LATER and 3)..." I couldn't even remember the last one because I could feel my blood boiling.

I couldn't help myself, guys, and actually found myself shouting out over the laughter of my fellow patrons, "OR MAYBE THEY JUST LIKE THE MOVIE". *Sigh* Sometimes I can't help but have such an inflammatory reaction to shit like this. I can't believe this guy had the audacity to say something so ignorant to a crowd of people waiting to watch a movie!

Just a great example of the patriarchy at work, trying to shame men for wanting to see a 'woman movie'. And if you have seen J&J it isn't remotely like, say, Sex and the City or other more hyper-romcom fare.

It also made me think about how my feminism empowers me to try and address these types of issues vocally instead of just letting things slide. Yes, my outburst in the theater was certainly not going to change minds, but I've made it a policy of mine to address sexism, rape culture, victim-blaming, etc out loud. My little way of activism, I guess. And I will not apologize for it. How are people going to know what they're saying is wrong unless they're called out on their shit?

I can't fucking take it anymore.

I keep reading posts about how everyone has all these wonderful feminist friends and how they've taken such a long time to carve out this amazing niche of people just like them. Well, congratulations. Let's just throw you a party. Most people have to take what they get.

If someone shows at least the slightest indication that they don't completely hate me -- not exactly a common occurrence -- I have to hang on them for dear life. I have a deeply vested interest in not pissing it off. But I can't take it anymore. The people I know make rape jokes at a rate of roughly one per hour, for instance, and they haven't stopped no matter how many times I tell them to, explain why they suck, etc. It's to the point where it is legitimately pissing them off and driving them away. The rest of their attitudes toward women are much the same. My coworkers are no better.

But I don't have anyone to take their place. And don't tell me to meet new people. It isn't as if I haven't been trying this for over two decades. My question is, what do you do when your two choices are anti-feminist friends or no friends at all?

I have spent far too much time removed from the company of mid-west middle-aged women in the last few years. In no way do I mean that I ought to fully immerse myself in that culture, but rather that my tolerance, my immunity to such prattle, is far below the standards required for prolonged social encounters.

I want to be clear: I am not referring to every middle-aged woman living in the mid-west. I am referring to a very specific set of creatures that I have encountered in abundance during my recent and extended experiences in the mid-west. They have all happened with women of a certain age (middle), with a certain family situation (in a heterosexual marriage with somewhat-grown children), and some sort of job (varies from part-time to full and from unskilled to highly degreed). For these reasons I have lumped together a group in my mind, though to be fair, this group is not exclusive and could include any variety of self-hating people from anywhere.

I have had lunch with a group of these women all week, and the number of times we have discussed dieting makes me want to rush out and buy all of them a copy of Kate Harding’s Lessons from the Fatosphere . If I weren’t absolutely broke (and absolutely a chicken) then I might do just that. Instead, I made a few unnoticed comments about eating what one wanted in balance and left the rest of the conversation to those who preferred its repetitive tracks.

When I'm standing in line at the grocery store, I usually can't help but notice the covers of the magazines on the stand. Most are the standard photoshopped pictures of female celebrities with attached slogans like: "Lose 10 pounds NOW," "Get a beach belly by summer," or "Tone those abbs" etc. For a long time I thought to myself that it was only women doing this to each other, some perception of what we think is beautiful, and so we strive for it, because the few men I had been with in my life couldn't care less if I went a few days without shaving, or just threw on some sweats and threw my hair back in a pony tail. Then I discovered the LoveSystems forum.

The PUA world that Sodini lived in truly bothers me. I don't why I have let it bother me so much, but it has touched someplace deep in me, and hit me hard. I'd spent some time in the Love Systems forums just reading every thread I could come across, because I really wanted to get into these guys heads (don't ask me why, but I had time on my hands, so I did). At first I was almost convinced that maybe they are just nice guys who became socially awkward due to a reclusive lifestyle. And some of them are. But the more I read these threads, the more apparent it became that these are the "player" types of men who just want as many notches in their belt as they can get. This is why they don't pay for the sex. To them, it is all about the conquering. It's extremely evident in the language that they use: Score, Game,Closing in, The number scale, etc.

Crossposted on www.the-F-word.org

We frequently get door-to-door salespeople shilling everything from home security systems to cable TV to Jesus. I was working in my home office last week when came a sharp rat-a-tat-tat at the door.  I covertly peeked out the Roman shade to see standing at the door a spry man in his 50s with a shiny bald head anchored by greying fringe.  There was an incident not too long ago a few streets over in which someone claiming to be fundraising door-to-door hit an elderly man upside the head with a crowbar and proceeded to rob him.  I am not the kind of person who regularly engages in fits of histrionic paranoia, but considering that I work from home and am a magnet for social aberrations, I generally don't answer the door to people I don't know when alone.  I was unfortunately spotted, however and reluctantly opened the door to a door-to-door vacuum salesmen for Kirby, who kindly complimented the biosphere that is my front yard and explained that he was just signing people up for a $1,000 drawing.  The eight months of sheer boredom and anguish I spent as a desperate 16-year-old trying to sell windows on commission to raise money for driver's ed flitted across my mind and so I obliged him.  I seriously did not intend to mindfuck him with my feminist wiles, but, well, read on...

I am a new college student. Adjusting to college life has not been easy for me in any way. I was used to being one of the best students in my school, which was very small and very liberal. We held v-day ceremonies, and our school administration supported and funded our day of silence, including asking for guest speakers to come to the breaking the silence ceremony at the end of the day. Things are not like that at the college I now attend.

The blatant sexism is absolutely astounding. Young women are hounded by the male students about going out/hooking up with them, to the point where many agree just to stop the harassment. Guys run up and down the halls screaming I am going to rape you at the top of their lungs. The other day I finally had it and decided to speak up when two of the guys were sitting there and making rape jokes over and over again. I am a rape survivor. I find anything that makes light of what I went through extremely insulting and appalling. I didn't attack them personally, although I wanted to, but I did make it clear that what they were saying was not an acceptable thing to be joking about, and I put it to them in a way that I thought would make them realize what they were saying was extremely hurtful and delving into sensitive topics.

Well I am apparently now persona non grata in my dorm because its apparently not okay to say that someone telling rape jokes is hurtful and wrong. Was I wrong in speaking up? Should I just left the room when they started saying things like that so that I didn't have to hear it? Is there a more appropriate way to approach this? What ways have some of you dealt with this kind of thing? I'd also like to say that the school has a 6 to 1 guy to girl ratio so there aren't a lot of girls there to back me up, and while I've always been "one of the guys" I've never been around guys who act like this. Call me sheltered but I truly thought that guys like that were the minority and most guys were just ignorant of what the patriarchy has done to them. I'm just really at a loss of what to do and I'd like to know some ways to cope with this kind of thing.

I think one of the biggest and most widely believed myths about heterosexual women is that women and girls don't get rejected. I've heard that only men get rejected, and that's a common bond that they can all bond over (and apparently in this world, only straight cis people exist, but that's another story). And every time I hear that, I think about all the guys I've been rejected by.

Seriously, who made that up? I can think of at least six guys offhand that turned me down in my lifetime. Some of them "just thought of me as a friend," a few already had a girlfriend and I just didn't know it, and I have had the pleasure of falling for a gay guy (not knowing he was gay).

It's not just a guy thing, and I think it's important that we remember that. I'm female. I've been rejected by guys I had feelings for. And you know what? That's fine, because EVERYONE, regardless of gender or preference, gets rejected at some point. That's just life.

I welcome everyone to shout out their own rejection stories, because it's NOT just a straight guys only thing (although straight guys are welcome to post)- it's a dating thing, and it happens to all of us.

I've noticed that too often, I will complain to someone of some sort of ailment, and their first thought is that I am probably pregnant. Seriously, anything-- "my stomach feels a little off," "I'm tired," "my head hurts." While of course being pregnant is technically a possibility, I find it sexist that people's immediate thought is that whatever I'm experiencing must be based in something female-specific. Like, "well, you're female and you have a headache, therefore the headache must be related to being female." It's especially stupid because while it's true that my listed ailments could potentially be symptoms of pregnancy (this is really lazy thinking, by the way-- pregnancy symptoms are so varied from woman to woman that you could make a lazy case for pretty much anything being a symptom of pregnancy), they are such common aches or pains that they could be caused by any number of factors. Couldn't my headache or tiredness could have to do with my being a college student? Or with job stress? Or my nightly downing of 13 beers in periods of 3 hours or less?

The pregnancy assumption is Othering, and is just one more way that people equate women with some sort of baby-producing machine. "Anything women do or experience is related to having babies."

Has anyone else experienced this?

I hate to kick a brotha while he’s down.

But the actor/rapper/singer Drake, who lies in the fetal position above after falling at a concert late last week, looks how I feel about his music videos. And it’s not just run-of-the-mill misogyny in his music videos that has me down. Its articles and interviews boasting how much say Drake has over his musical content and his career.

The story goes: far, far away in music land, low-income black men were swept off street corners by record execs in suits who could provide economic security for their families and friends in exchange for a little shucking and rhyming. Because of this, many black feminists went to the mat for black men challenging the mostly white male executive boards of Universal Music Group, Time Warner and Viacom. These execs globally distributed humiliating portrayals of women and people of color and became billionaire rich while black people, the innovators of hip hop, remained poor. But it’s not just these power -driven, money-hungry white men who were ruining hip hop for the rest of us. Hip hop has developed a good ol’ boys club of its own — of brothas. And the likelihood that new recruits will buck at their mentors is slim.

Hey Everyone

Thanks for all your feedback, even that from those of you who feel I have offended you. Firstly I want to apologize for using this second post as a response to all your feedback, but I honestly didn’t imagine there would be so many comments so quickly. I will try to respond to what I feel you were all getting at in the comments.

I would also like to take a quick second to explain myself to the people who felt my post was inappropriate and ignorant. For me, when I am interested in learning about an issue or organization or anything for that matter, I like to get first hand stories and experiences from people who have an understanding of whatever it is I am trying to learn about. Rather then read a collection of academic journals and essays on a topic, I like to see how it affects people and more importantly, how people who believe in it understand and interpret it? I figured a blog is probably the most likely place to find a good collection of personal interpretations. So I typed feminist blog into google and feministing came up. I am sorry if you believe my way of trying to learn about something is wrong but I find I get the best understand of ideas in this manner. To make an absolutely horrible but effective analogy on my methods of learning; consider I want to know if a film is any good or not. Rather then check the critics response to it I like to check a bunch of everyday peoples reviews on a place like imdb.com, I find it both better relates to me and the people I know and gives a clearer picture of what I’m trying to understand.

I get that there are still plenty of people who still feel I’m going at this wrong… maybe I am, and I respect that you all know a hell of a lot more about feminism then I do so I will still take in what your saying and hopefully learn from my mistakes in this matter.

I will say, however that I feel you kinda jumped at me for a question I didn’t feel I was demanding you to answer. Maybe I wasn’t clear enough to all of you but I didn’t mean to say that there was harmful and non-harmful sexism I was trying to ask if people could relate direct experiences to academic examples of sexism in that when you read about modern sexism it speaks in generalizations and I was only hoping to get a picture of how the accumulated stories and examples of sexism in the masses relates to the amount and variety of sexism one experiences as an individual. I am sure, do to my ignorance or something else, I am only digging myself deeper for some of you and I’m not sure how I can help it until I learn what it is I’m doing wrong. I’m getting through the links a lot of you posted and I am learning a ton so thanks for those.

Thank you again to everyone who shared their experiences and helped me better understand sexisms current state… though I clearly still have a lot to learn. I look forward to continue browsing around feministing to see what else there is around.

Lastly just a request, not a demand, but there’s something to be said about just being nice to people, and some of those comments bordered on hurtful. Next time maybe step back from the issues being discussed and just treat anyone, male or female, ignorant or educated, kindly.

Hey all,

So I have a question regarding sexism today and would really appreciated what you out there in the feministing community thought about it. Its a fairly simple question though i feel it may sound restrictive upon further explanation.

My question is, as a woman, what sort of sexism do you experience on a day to day or week to week basis?

To expand let me clarify what i mean. I mean on a daily or weekly or consistently regular basis what sort of things happen that make you consciously pause and think (or say) "god that was/is sexist". Furthermore I'm looking for examples that effect you in a negative manner, that is to say, not necessarily including things that don't bother you and are 'inconsequential'.

I hope I'm coming off clear and not sounding utterly vague and scattered. The reason I'm asking this is, as a man, i do not have the unique perspective to recognize the less obvious aspects of sexism. Furthermore I honestly, and i know this will cause an uproar, don't seem to see many examples of harmful sexism perpetrated on women in western society these days. I suppose i should have made that clear that i am specifically interested in sexism in western society, as it becomes much more apparent as you look into other communities across the world.

So if you feel like giving me a lesson in current sexism i would much appreciate the chance to hear how women feel they are still being mistreated/misrepresented in western society, and specifically how it affects them on a regular basis.

Thanks for all the future comments

My husband works with 99% women during his week, at home during conversations with me, he refers to the co-workers as "the ladies" at work.

I have a problem with that and tell him it's a sexist comment and he is looking at the people he works with as females instead of staff, co-workers, or the earned titles that they have earned and deserve.

What do you think?

I stumbled upon this article and video this morning on Yahoo about Anna Rawson.

I don't follow golf, but this article interested me because it's basically about how Anna Rawson wants to up the viewership of women's golf because she is concerned that the media doesn't give women's golf the same kind of coverage that they do to men's golf. This is a valid point, and something worth addressing and exploring. However...it appears that most of Anna's ideas for bringing in new viewership are quite sexist. Anna is not new to sexist advertising as she was declared Maxim's "sexiest athlete", and she is also a spokesperson for GoDaddy (a company notorious for their constant overtly sexist advertising). So it would appear that Anna has no concerns about being objectified.

The video implies that Anna wants to make women's golf "sexier" as a way to bring more people to the sport. In the video, an interviewer asks Anna "Are you selling professional golf or a sexual stereotype?". Anna's response to this question is simply "It's just more about getting eyeballs". Which doesn't actually answer the question in any way.

It would seem that Anna's attempts to bring in more viewership may be doing more harm than good. A few years ago, Anna was being interviewed by an Australian radio host about the lack of media coverage of the women's game and made the following statement: "...the mentality unfortunately has not changed among the media and the industry. They still think we're 25 years ago where the tour was full of a lot of dykes and unattractive females. No one wanted to watch and it's totally changed".

So basically what Anna is saying is that golf is not something anyone would want to watch unless it's filled with attractive, heterosexual females. Yeah, that's not sexist at all. Kristie Kerr, a fellow golfer made the following comment about Anna's interview: "She tried to address it in her own way but didn't think before she spoke so she almost put us back another 20 years with that comment".

I completely understand the frustration of women's sports not getting appropriate viewership, however I don't think that Anna's ideas are the answer that the sport needs. Granted, she has some non-sexist ideas as well such as running the womenss tournaments at the same time as the mens as a means of more media exposure. However I find Anna's mentality to be very disturbing: If we are low on viewers, then we must show more skin and make the sport "sexier". It almost seems as if the actual skill of the game is not even remotely important....it only matters if there is enough eye candy available for the viewers.

Again and again on feministing, members leaving comments that are critical of an individual woman (usually someone in the public sphere) are critised for being anti feminist. Does being a feminist really mean that we should never criticise another woman for the way she lives her life or the choices she makes?

Of course many criticisms of woman in the public sphere are anti feminist. But I don't believe that this means that all criticisms of individual woman are anti feminist.

I'm sure many women on here are familiar with the sexism currently present in the gaming community. I'm many of you, myself included, have been on the recieving end of sexism being both a gamer an female; everything from people assuming you are less apt and not a "ture gamer" to downright objectification and harrassment.

At this years Comic-Con, EA decided to up the ante, to bring sexism to a whole new level, by offering booth babes up as prizes in a competition. The competition , titled "Sin-To-Win", asks congoers to take a photograph of themselves performing an "act of lust" with a booth babe, to win a sinful night with two of the women.

And it isn't just their booth babes who are being offered. The competition applies to any booth babes from any vendor. Not only is EA encouraging people to sexually harrass their employees, their encouraging people to sexually harrass other company's employees.

They have since apologised , and said that it was meant to be a fun little competition, all tongue-in-cheek. Now, if the competition was just "have your photo taken with a booth babe" I would be fine with it, but their wording is appalling. It is also very heteronormative, and, yes, sexist.

A booth babe, "iola" has weighed in on the whole affair here , but beware reading that thread. There is a lot of victim-blaming going on.

A recent article by Heather Chaplin of National Public Radio discussed a new video game for PC and Mac called The Path. In it, the author calls the game "nothing so much as a rumination on the vulnerabilities of girlhood" with co-designer Auria Harvey chiming in, "...this [game] is about the various stages of life a girl has to go through in order to become a woman" and "the vulnerabilities of girls -- it's something that people don't deal with much in this particular format,"

Right. So, what is it, exactly, that is so goddamned vulnerable?

Yes, females of our species are not as strong, pound for pound, as males, but other than that, seriously, what is the difference?

Let me illustrate using two powerful animals as examples: The American Black Bear and the Cougar. The bear is twice as heavy and almost three times as strong, and despite its bulky appearance, surprisingly fast and agile. But when confronted, cougars (even females!) have been known to severely injure and even kill black bears to protect themselves, their territory, their kills, or their cubs. Sometimes they even start the fight. Just because cougars are not as strong as bears does not mean they pose no threat to bears.

The difference in size and strength is far less notable between human men and women. This in mind, you would think cautionary tales insisting "you're just a FEMALE child, don't talk to strangers; they might RAPE you!" really could do without the gender specificity thrown in there. Little boys are every bit as vulnerable to peer pressure, drugs, "stranger-danger" and physical abuse by authority figures as little girls are. Statistics notwithstanding; I'm talking biological differences, here. There is almost nothing so physically or mentally different between young/tweeny girls and boys that makes one more able to protect themselves (or make more reasonable decisions) than the other side.

Every game, book, movie, or song I've ever come across that claims to be about "what it means" to grow up female and "what it takes" to "become a woman" strikes me as just another artistic/commercial reflection of a mentality whose sole purpose is to reinforce the "second-rate human" status quo: you're a girl, so there are special dangers for you; males are out to molest you, better watch out; but better watch those pounds, or no one will want anything to do with you when you're actually looking for a mate. Conversely, vilifying men is just as damaging; kids so often grow up to be what they're told they are.

That said, the game itself is utterly beside the supposed point. Taking note of the gameplay, the screenshots, the dialogue, if you can call it that...the whole time, I'm thinking, "I'm supposed to relate to this? What are they talking about? I have nothing in common with this girl. This isn't about me, this is about someone else."

There's no commentary on femininity, here. It's a game inspired by someone's bad dream of a life.

Which is fine; I guess it's not the game itself I have so much of a problem with. That it's being treated here as some kind of window into A Day In the Life of the female gender is what raises my hackles. It feels insulting because what they're saying is that playing this game will somehow make someone understand me better. I beg your fucking pardon.

Oh , Elle (MacPherson).  Thank you for reminding me yet again of why we still need feminism.  In an interview today with The Guardian, the Australian fashion-model-turned-designer said:

Are you a feminist?

I'm somebody who truly honours femininity. And I believe in individuality, and uniqueness, and that's all I'm going to say on that.

But you shy away from the word "feminism"?

It's one of those coined phrases that has a lot of innuendo and not much meaning these days. There's a stereotypical perception that a feminist is somebody who believes in equal rights for men and women. Well, I believe men and women are different and they have different needs, therefore the concept of equal rights doesn't really sit with me in many ways.

Newsflash to Elle: It’s not a "stereotypical perception"; it’s what feminism is . And it’s thanks to all those “stereotypical” feminists who fought for equal –not different– rights for women that you have been at all able to become the successful model and businesswoman you are today.  You’re welcome.

This and other gems from Elle's interview are cross-posted on www.the-F-word.org

I have been working in the legal/compliance dept. of a small investment advising firm in Manhattan for two and a half years.  I began as a temp., then was offered a full-time position as a legal assistant.  In February, I asked for and received a promotion.  I've risen quickly, despite my incongruent educational bg (MS in Art History) and and work experience (mainly civil litigation).  I also founded the staff newsletter and serve as its Editor in Chief.  No one at my firm would dare call me lazy or stupid, but I still receive plenty of marginalizing and xenophobia, mainly for my creativity and especially because of my gender.  Here's a prime example...

Thursday was my first time sitting in an investment meeting. Naturally, I was stoked. Since I have zero to say about investment decisions (I just regulate), I thought to sit on the outskirts of the room rather than at the table. Another woman--the only other woman in the room--did the same, as she heads Client Services. In hindsight, we looked meek. From now on, I will always step up to the table like I belong. 

Oh dear. It looks like I'm a relative latecomer to an unfortunate tale of sexism and co-option in the open source software development world.

It started with Richard M Stallman, founder of the Free Software movement that eventually produced stuff like Linux, making some sexist remarks, and a blogger calling him on it. (This isn't particularly surprising, unfortunately - he's well known to be both sexist and unpleasant.) Now, the blogger criticizing him for it is a good thing, right? Well, I thought so at first, but then I smelt a rat.

You see, one of the other things RMS did in his speech was strongly criticize Mono, a very controversial piece of software. Though he attempts to pretend otherwise, the author of the blog, David "Lefty" Schlesinger, is a strong Mono supporter. In fact, his previous blog post is a fairly vicious attack on both a specific anti-Mono individual and on everyone who's anti-Mono. This is an area where Stallman's views have some actual influence, mainly because he has an annoying habit of being right about this type of thing. Oh, and Lefty hasn't shown any interest in the issue of sexism in the open source world before, but is suddenly launching a campaign against it (main target: RMS). Finally, it appears he may have form when it comes to trolling.

So, I'm confused. On the one hand, sexism is a big problem (particularly in software development, which is heavily male). On the other hand, it feels like this is less about fighting sexism and more about destroying someone's reputation to win an entirely unrelated dispute, which makes me more than a little alarmed. I'm not even sure if using it as a political weapon in this way is good or bad for the fight against sexism. (I suspect Stallman is not the place to start; he's a slightly eccentric irrelevance for the most part.)

Any thoughts? When does fighting sexism justify joining the campaign of someone whose motives are less than pure?

I just listened to this story on NPR. It discusses how women (mainly older women) are removing their birth year because one woman realized that the ads she saw everyday on the social networking site were solely base on her age. As the author points out, "To them, I was just a fat, walking wrinkle waiting to be fixed."

I think this is brilliant because once their ages were removed, they were targeted by advertisers for key words in their profile, like an interest in science fiction.

I was wondering what people thought about this. Also, do guys experience the same kind of advertising stereotypes? If so, to what degree? Has the ability to vote on Facebook ads increased peoples ability to fight these stereotypes? What would happen if we all removed information that could easily stereotype us?

I started a new job yesterday and was aghast to read that the dress code required me to wear pantyhose if I was going to wear a dress.  Admittedly, I am young (24) and I have never thought of pantyhose as something that someone would willing torture themselves with.  My first experience with pantyhose left me completely disillusioned; i was 12 and was ecstatic to wear my first pair; because I thought they made me grown up.  Twenty  minutes later, in the blistering New Orleans heat, I went into the bathroom and took them off.  Never again.   

I know that men must wear ties, and I think that's pretty silly too.  In fact, I can promise that if I were a man I would wear clip on ties.  But at lease there is such a thing!  I have heard of "spray on pantyhose", but I am fairly certain my employer would not consider that the real thing.  I do not know the reasons why men decided to tie fabric around their necks and call it professional, but I do know that making your legs look better is the main reason that women wear pantyhose.  What is wrong with my legs that I need to cover them in nylon?  Maybe men should be made to wear pantyhose over their faces because I decide that their natural face is disgusting.  

The more I think on this matter, the  more I angry I become.  It is sexist, but not just to women.  Why can't a man wear a skirt if he wants to?  Why can't a man wear earrings when I can?  Even if the dress code did allow me to wear a skirt sans pantyhose, it would still be sexist.  In fact, all dress codes are sexist because they dictate my dress based on my gender; i think this should be contentious for both men and women.  To me, this is a matter of blatant discrimination, and I am surprised that this is not a matter that receives more attention.  

(crossposted at Amplify Your Voice )

By now I'm sure all of you reading Feministing have seen Carl's Jr./Hardee's disgusting campaign called "Hot Chicks Eating Burgers". They are asking scantly clad young women to submit videos of themselves eating a burger. Preferably while they stare at the camera and suck on their fingers, like the video on their campaign's website:

You might wonder: how in the world did such a shameless, sexist, offensive, misogynyst campaign actually get approved by a nationwide fast-food chain? Well, take a look at the entire management team at CKE Restaurants , which owns Carl's Jr. and Hardee's.

Notice anything similar with them? Yea, me too. These are the white men who'll be going through all of the videos of young women wearing next to nothing, rubbing burgers all over themselves in order to be famous. Creepy and disgusting, no?

Young women already have to deal with too much misogyny in today's society, and they don't need the men who run Carl's Jr. and Hardee's acting like sleazy porn hustlers or Joe Francis (Girls Gone Wild).

Well, we've got the emails of the all-male CKE management team , so....

I urge you to send this email out to the upper management of CKE Restaurants and tell them that they need to discontinue this campaign immediately.

(you can edit the email to them if you want to send them your own personal message )

They are free to choose how they run their company, but they should know that if their business model is based on the degradation and exploitation of young women, we certainly won't buy their products. And I'm sure we're not alone.

cross-posted from jspot.org

No, not in the good way.

I consider myself a feminist. A proud and public one. Most who know me would emphatically agree. I also consider myself good at confrontation. It feels awkward to use the word "good," but it's the right one. While I don't revel in them, typically , I manage difficult conversations very well.

So why oh why, is it so ridiculously hard for me to tell a creep on the subway that the way he is invading my space is inappropriate and unacceptable? Bloody hell, it's next to impossible for me to turn to the person beside me and say, hey you, stopping touching me.

Is it just me? I know it's not. I've had this conversation with friends and co-workers. And I know I'm not the first woman to make the brilliant observation that men often take up more than their fair share of space.

Last night, I'm on my way home. Riding on one of the new NYC subway trains with the long blue seats. I'm sitting at the far right, next to the handrail. The train isn't very crowded. After a few stops, a young, thin guy sits down next to me. For no legitimate reason, he could fit a soccer ball between his legs.

Has anyone else been reading the "Living" section of the CNN website? A few days ago, there was an article about nagging. I'm disappointed with the sexist language of the article and the comments. The main thing seemed to be that women should "shut up" and do it themselves and stop emasculating men.

I have my homepage on my internet browser set to popurls.com. Basically it is just a website generator for news and random snippets of weird stuff. There is one section everyday that features the most popular pictures from Flickr. Being interested in photography, I usually look through these pictures. Today there were the usual pictures of flowers and sunsets, etc and then a random picture of a pretty girl. The photography wasn't exactly breathtaking so I wondered why the picture was popular. I clicked on the link and went through the comments. 

Turns out the picture is the girlfriend of the guy who took the picture and the comments are congratulating the guy on having such a hot date. Gross. I think my favorite comment is "dang tig ol bitties!". Because, you know, if you switch the letters b and t, you just sound so much cooler.

Cross posted at The-F-Word.org

I'm a teetotaler for various reasons* -- at 30, I've never ever been drunk if you can believe that -- but even if I were the most raging of party girls, Bacardi's new "Get an ugly girlfriend" ad campaign wouldn't convince me to buy its line of fruity Breezers.

In yet another prime example of how women are pitted against each other, the campaign suggests that women -- that is, attractive women -- accessorize themselves with an "ugly girlfriend" in order to make themselves look better at the mall, the beach and other social situations. The four "ugly girlfriends" featured on the campaign's minisite are equal-opportunity offensive, including fat, thin and disabled women. Consider taking along the horse-like Wendy, with the "noticeable limp" and "super-active sweat glands" to the next pool party. Or take a beach stroll with Sally, whose "lumpy rolls" will make you "look your best in a bikini, without ever visiting a gym." Watching your weight? Attend a BBQ with Daisy, whose "pimpled shoulders" will make your appetite disappear. And Lucy's "rubbing thighs," "sticking out jaw," and "drooping breasts" is the perfect "freckled pile of cellulite" to take along shopping. The accompanying images showing clearly Photoshopped and otherwise radiant and blissfully unaware women makes the campaign all that more nauseating.

The ads were produced by Israeli ad agency McCann Digital and launched in Hebrew and English along with a Hebrew-only Facebook page . Tell Bacardi what you think of their sexist ad campaign here .

Jezebel: Bacardi ad uses misogyny to sell alcohol to women

Copyranter: Bacardi says the hottest accessory this summer is an "ugly girlfriend"

* 1) I don't like the taste of most alcoholic drinks. 2) I'm Buddhist and find alcohol consumption inconsistent with my spiritual beliefs. 3) My husband's father has a minor alcohol addiction and while he has never been abusive, my husband suffered through many an embarrassing public display as a kid, which has turned him off alcohol. I support him in this through non-consumption.

When my now-husband and I began renting our townhouse, we were not yet married and I handled everything.  I found the place, contacted the landlady, arranged the meetings, handled the details of the contract, did the inspection, so on and so forth.  She always sent everything to me in my name.  My name was the first on the lease.  It just made sense, since she really only ever dealt with me.

Earlier this year, however, I married... and things changed.

When she sent us the contract renewal for another year's lease, she had changed the order of the names.  Suddenly, dear husband's name was before mine.  Furthermore, she began addressing everything she mailed to us with his name as well.  Not even Mr. and Mrs. So-and-So.  Just Mr. Man.

Considering my landlady still never, ever deals with my husband, I found this to be extremely offensive.  Am I suddenly unimportant because I married?  Is he supposed to be the man of the house or something?  It would make sense for my husband to be receiving everything if he handled the business end of things, but he doesn't.  That's my role in our relationship.  As a subtle nudge, I continued emailing her about a couple issues around the house.  I thought she would notice that she's still not dealing with my husband.  Even so, she continues to address everything to him first, and me second-- if at all.

What the heck?

This absolutely infuriates me.  I already know I need to send her a nice letter reminding her to continue addressing everything to me, since dear husband doesn't look at any of that, but I'm waiting to calm down before writing it.  Aside from this really lovely show of sexism, she's been a great landlady.  She sent us a wedding gift and a Christmas card.  As angry as I am now, I don't want to offend her.

Unfortunately, I'm not cooling down since I'm receiving no sympathy from anyone I know.  Hubby is new to feminism and still doesn't really understand it.  He knows it's important to me and he respects that, but he seems to think that telling me, "She's in a really traditional marriage," is going to be soothing.  (It's not.)  The rest of my friends and family just think I'm being oversensitive, and by this point, I'm starting to feel like maybe I really am.  I just can't shake the feeling that this is very, very wrong .

I could use a little help from people with a cooler head.  How would you phrase a polite letter to a landlady requesting that she continue addressing me?  I'm worried she's just going to think I'm crazy, too.

This is so stupid. I have no words on how they think people can believe that shit.

I work at the City Museum in Saint Louis.
It is independently owned by Bob Cassily. On Tuesday, June 9th, 2009, Bob demoted two of the women managers for floor staff, and the woman manager in Art City. So, 3 women got demoted on the same day. This means they lose health benefits, full time status, and get a $4 pay cut, at least. Their spots were then filled with men, who Bob is more friendly with. The women trained the men for the positions, because they are competent, if not great, at their jobs. Under the Title VII of the Civil Rights act of 1964 this is illegal. There is also no HR person working there right now, because they were fired. I have now heard that Missouri is a right to fire state and therefore they can do this? Unfortunately, these women need their jobs and I don't know if they are going to stand up. It is a cool place and the idea of it is wonderful, unfortunately the owner is enforcing sexist changes and hurting his women staff, who have been loyal to the museum.

A Newsweek article addresses a change from the virginal bride to a more "independent," sexy trend.  I don't claim to know enough about bridal trends to really assess that aspect of the article.  This article explores how women are choosing more skin-baring dresses with sheer panels, low fronts and backs, and sexy photo shoots as gifts for the groom, all of which are contrasted against the former traditions that revolved around purity and innocent femininity.  The majority of the piece focuses on just evaluating factors that may have influenced the changes (premarital sex, cohabitation, etc.), but I found the suddenly-judgmental conclusion of the article more bothersome.

While most sociologists agree that women admitting to lust and wanting to be sexually empowered is a good thing, they see a problem with making exhibitionism the centerpiece of the wedding ceremony: it might crowd out other aspects of the marriage. "You're highlighting what should just be a piece of the relationship," says Stephanie Coontz, a social historian and the author of Marriage, a History: How Love Conquered Marriage, which looks at how recent the idea of marrying for love is. "I worry that it can take over. The message you're sending about your appearance can override other conversations you should be having about your future." 

Now let it just be said that I don't really "get" the wedding hoop-la myself anyhow.  Out of context, this might seem fairly benign, but within the larger piece it's referring more so to women's choice to a) wear what they want at their wedding and b) take sexy photos for their fiancees/husbands.  In other words, it reverts back to the idea of any display of female sexuality, however discrete (backless dresses) or private (photos for a significant other), is a shameful exhibition, a violation of some sacred female modesty.  

While chatting on IRC on a channel called #psychology over on dalnet I met a man with the nick name Zendroid who clamed to be a psychiatrist working in New Zealand. We were talking about problems dating and I mentioned the problem of girly girls who want to be protected and provided for like children.

He didn't agree with this at all and went into along dissertation on relations between the sexes saying that a woman expects a man to come and "claim" her. I couldn't believe what I was reading and said I wanted no part of "claiming" a woman that women were not objects they were people. This clown spun the word claim into being assertive or some such thing but than went on to say women want to be "taken." I'm like wtf?

Again I disagreed and he said again that he was speaking of being assertive though he didn't exactly use those words. I said" why not just say assertive why use words like "take" and "claim"" He than got around to saying that you had to be assertive that women wanted to be "conquered" I said "I'm sorry but that's just sick." He took offence at this of course but insisted that women in his practice tell him that and that I had no business telling women what they should like. I said It is my responsibility not to take part in something immoral and said I knew of a lot of women who would totally disagree with him. He got kind of but hurt and eventually kicked me off the channel.

Of course it's only an IRC chat and there is no proof he's actually a psychiatrist. But the whole thing really gave me the creeps. What if he really IS a psychiatrist? And how many more like him might be in practice? Definitely creeped me out ,no wonder women on here are militant , cursing and have the mud flap girl giving the finger. Psychiatrist or not, this guy is a reminder that we live in a sick world with some sick shit going on in it.

Apparently, David Letterman thinks it's funny to describe Sarah Palin as 'a slutty flight attendant' and make jokes about her daughter getting 'knocked up.'

'The Alaskan governor was there for a baseball game and to be honoured by a special needs group, accompanied by Willow, 14.

"One awkward moment for Sarah Palin at the Yankee game," Letterman then quipped on-air.

"During the seventh inning, her daughter was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez."'

Once more, from the top: it's not okay to make rape jokes about someone just because they happen to be right-wing.

I'm British, and don't particularly like Palin, or know Letterman at all, but this still pissed me off. His defense is that he was 'talking about Bristol, not Willow.' But even so, it's still a pretty bad joke.

Cross-posted on www.the-F-word.org

Earlier this spring I was on a mission to find a relatively inexpensive chainsaw but with enough gumption to tear into decades-old honeysuckle trees while still yet light weight enough so that it wouldn't come tumbling down upon my head in a chainsaw self-massacre.  The hunt took me to six different stores, including four where I had to ask (male) store clerks to point out their elusive chainsaw aisles.  The reactions I received ranged from a bug-eyed jaw drop to a puzzled furrow of the brow to a plaintive "Did you say 'chainsaw '?"  One nonplussed clerk wryly replied "Oh, you don't look like a psychopath."

My husband and I both are avid do-it-yourselfers and over the past four years we've done quite a bit of improvements to our historic turn-of-the-century Craftsman home.  We're the perfect complement to each other: I have the vision and the design savvy (and ADD) and Brandon reads the directions and measures to ensure it's done right.  We usually work on projects together, except for plumbing and electrical work, which is Brandon's domain, and the outdoors, which is mine (with the occasional manual labor from Brandon).  And when I say the outdoors, I don't simply mean that I plant pansies and petunias -- I've built a massive front yard cottage garden, stained our deck and painted the porch, built stone retaining walls, have plans to build brick pathways this summer, am about to embark on a massive retaining wall project in the backyard and if money and material permitted, I'd paint the whole house.

Over the weekend, I was looking up paint sprayers after discovering a brand of paint specifically for asphalt roof shingles (I hate the color of our roof, but it doesn't need replacing).  The sprayers are pricey, so I checked on the cost of renting one from Home Depot.  The tool rental section of the website is divided into "professional contractor" tools as pitched by a man and "do-it-yourselfer" tools as pitched by a woman.  The gendered division was irksome -- especially since the man is allowed to be softer in body and older with graying hair while the woman is young, reed-thin and perfectly-manicured -- but certainly not surprising.  After all, the ubiquity of hardware stores is one of the ways in which one major snack food company measures manliness .  Still, I was curious, so I looked up Home Depot's other how-to videos to see if the theme continued.  It did. 

I know this topic has come up before, both in posts and comments I've read on this site. I'm feeling the need to share an anecdote that's age old, and to hear some feedback from ya'll.

So here's the story: I'm heading to nursing school in the fall, and am taking an anatomy and physiology course now so that I don't have to once I get there. In said course we're currently covering the reproductive system. My professor is a white man who's been teaching this large survey class for a couple decades. I was mildly offended, yet prepared for and thus not surprised when he covered the male system first, then spent his [much more brief] time on the female system describing its various parts as "analogous" to male parts (ie: the clitoris is analogous to the glans penis). Classic, right? Great pedagogical technique. I rolled my eyes, decided not to pick this battle, and reminded myself that when it's my turn to be a health educator and care provider, I'll be trying to mess with the patriarchy in everything I do.

However, he then went on to describe menstruation in a way that I haven't heard before. He described menstruation as "an abnormal physiological event," stating that once women reach reproductive maturity, we are designed to be "either pregnant or lactating." Yes, he said that. He then went on to talk about how those two states (pregnancy and lactation) aren't designed to happen at the same time, since they are both extremely metabolically costly. He then breezed on to some other portion of his lecture, though I honestly don't remember what it was because I was trying to come up with some sort of appropriate response. While the design of the lecture (male system before female, analogies, etc) seemed like something I could let go, I just could not let the lecture end without challenging the way he talked about menstruation and the "natural" female state of being pregnant or lactating for the entire course of our reproductive lives.

And this is where my question to you all comes in: how would you have handled it? Have you had to handle something like this in the past?

True story: my sophomore year in college, my friend Jason and I were walking back to my residence hall when we passed two guys attempting to change a tire. I say "attempting" because at that point they'd managed to dig out the owner's manual and the jack, and were at a loss as to what to do next. When we offered to help, one of the guys looked at Jason and asked, "Do you know what a v-notch is?"

Jason did not, at which point I explained that the v-notch (where the jack is supposed to go) can be found on the underside of the car about 18 inches from the wheel well. This spot is reinforced in order to hold the weight of the car; put the jack somewhere else and you'll likely rip the side off your car (since we don't really do uni-body anymore... OK, I'll stop).

I even ran my hand along the car until I felt the notch, and then I set up the jack myself. At which point the two guys looked at Jason and said, "Thank you!" *Sigh*

So when I read the title of this New York Times piece, I had middling to high hopes.

Yeah, those didn't last long.

According to the author of this piece, the essence of being a woman is having hot flashes, being unable to resist fatty foods, crying, drinking Diet Coke and listening to acoustic folk music. In other words, being a woman means being "hormonal and mysterious" and liable to either "burst into tears at the drop of a dinner plate or turn on you like a rabid pit bull."

Now, never having been menopausal, I don't know what the symptoms are like. But would it have been too much to ask to frame it that way, instead of as a "This is what women are like! I've been there, men, and you don't want to go there!" farce? Of course it would. Because that wouldn't get into stereotypes, and we can't have that.

As per usual, don't read the comments if you don't want to become suicidal.

Here is a copy of an e-mail that I sent to GameTrailers.com earlier today:

----------

Dear GameTrailers staff,

I've been a regular user of your website since 2007, and I can tell you it's one of my favorite gaming websites on the web. I always resort to your reviews when I'm thinking about buying a game, and I tend to have a lot of fun with your countdown videos, retrospectives and ScrewAttack content.

However, today as I browsed the E3 coverage videos, I had the displeasure of finding a clip named "E3 09: Booth Babe Safari", described as "We get intimate with the fauna at E3 2009".

While I do have some problems with the whole "booth babe" tradition, I understand it's part of gaming convention's appeal. But I have to point that the video's title and description are rather sexist. As it's already been pointed in the video's comment section, it's really demeaning to refer to women as "fauna", specially in a "safari" context, that unfortunately implies that women are animals to be hunted and leered at.

Perez Hilton recently posted some snippets from an upcoming Good Housekeeping article featuring an interview with Denise Jonas and her famous sons the Jonas Brothers. Some of the article sounds great, Denise is presented as a mother who keeps her sons grounded by making them treat each hotel room as if it were their own home (chores, cleanliness, ect). Then enters 'the purity myth'.

One of the Jonas Brothers answers the question, 'What's a girl have to do to get your attention? ' to which he says, ' Be a good mom'. Creepy. Is he referring to a teenage mom or a mother of a more mature age? I mean if they are attracted to an empower woman who has raised children and they find said experience sexy, well gosh darn it, good for them. Or are the Jonas Brothers referring to something much more implicitly destructive to actual womanhood. Are they telling all the young girls who are obsessed with them that they must only be caregivers, homemakers, and baby makers? Let me be clear, motherhood/parenthood is an amazing, wonderful, and admirable job for any of those who chose to take on that mantle of responsibility but when the teen heartthrobs of the day are saying they are into 'moms' does that not strike anyone else as more than a little odd?

There was an article by the Press Association about Kerry Katona's appearance on a breakfast TV show in the UK this morning.

The article chose to focus on the top Kerry was wearing, which they describe as being "dangerously low-cut ".

So, since when has a top been dangerous? And isn't this woman's career, success, family, fame and handling of bipolar disorder worth more of a mention??

Such interest in Kerry’s breasts rather than her success is simply sexism and far from professional, balanced journalism.  Furthermore, the derrogatory and mocking tone of the article does nothing to encourage education, tolerance and understanding of mental illness.

Particularly worrying is the fact Kerry Katona has been made to feel it is better to skip her medication which may cause her to slur than “appear to be drunk” on TV because of the criticisms she has received in the past.  This decision and the misplaced importance given to her style of dress over her health may influence others with similar conditions, who, until some advance is made in their treatment, are able to lead much fuller, safer lives by regularly taking their medication.

What happened to professional journalism??!

In case you don't know, Twitter recently added Trending Topics to its home page (it used to be viewable from its search page.) It aggregates what people are tweeting, or posting, about. And since it's got a prime spot on the main page, it just tends to concentrate topics.

Well, as of the time I posted it (late Tuesday night) one of the top hashtags? #liesgirlstell. Featuring all the sexist goodness you'd ever want, in a bite-size 140-character form! It's remarkable how unoriginal this stuff is, and how irritating.

Now, this isn't Twitter's fault. Someone independent started the hashtag, and thousands of people clearly thought and think it's a great idea to follow suit. It's one of those small symptoms of a big problem. Note the lack of a #liesboystell - or, for that matter, a #lieswomentell. No, there's clearly a high demand for casual misogyny. And this is absolutely important. Something like this being on Twitter just highlights just how prevalent it is - all these people in real time!

Obviously, posting about it on Twitter would just keep it on the list. But I think that if it's still up there by the time this posts (a distinct possibility; the "three words" tags are irritatingly long-loved) people with Twitters should hijack it and post stuff like "Isn't casual sexism awesome? #liesgirlstell" or "Women are the only people who lie, ever! #liesgirlstell" or, for that matter, go for broke and just tack the hashtag onto something like "This is fucking ridiculous." 

Because this is fucking ridiculous.

So I'm with friends the other night at a popular new hangout in my town. In between the musical acts a comic gets up to keep people entertained. I'm hanging out with friends, barely listening to comic when all of a sudden I catch the very tail end of his joke about how "...women just need to understand that all men are rapists". Not funny in my book AT ALL. So I say something (I am maybe 10 ft away from the dude). Nothing outrageous just "No, that isn't funny at all" to which he replies "well it isn't everybody's humor but I did hear some chuckles so obviously it is funny". A couple more times I say no that is obtuse and does he really think rape is funny? As I am saying these last words two male acquaintances reach over the couch and mutter words to try to get me to be quiet. I promptly get up and leave.

Being a victim of sexual abuse I am willing to say perhaps I am more offended. And these male "friends" had no clue what has happened to me in my past so maybe that is why they felt that it was okay to laugh at a joke like that and then try to get me to be silent. I felt so shitty; when I was abused I had no voice, no words to describe the injustice and now years later I am silenced all over again by people who I thought were decent. I am a fierce believer that when actions or words are wrong (meaning they violate the respect all humans deserve)the person needs to be called out right then and there. I do not wait for some crappy legislation to be passed before the next generation maybe starts to get the idea. And I feel that it is so important for men to call out other men in this way; for my male friends to silence me made it okay for others to write me off as bitchy or humorless.

Just curious, would I be considered humorless if I didn't laugh at a joke that "...black people just need to understand that all whites are ready to lynch blacks"?

Long term reader, first time poster but have been writing and re-writing posts over and over to get the perfect one - I'm just going to go for it this time!

I really needed to rant and also to ask, how do the rest of you cope? I try to be idealistic but sometimes (including tonight after a long and fruitless argument with some supposedly liberal men) I feel as if ending misogyny  and sexism is hopeless. Does anybody else feel like this? What do you do to cope with it? There are times when I just don't know how I'm supposed to live in a world that is so set up against women.

I have had debate after debate with my boyfriend (who identifies as a liberal progressive democrat) about rape and victim blaming. He spews many of the victim blaming myths and no matter what evidence I offer to show how rape is always the fault of the perpetrator, he won't back down. This is the same for all of his friends. I don't understand how  people who can be so liberal in some areas are so sexist (and often downright misogynist) in others.

Men's rights organisations are another group that take away my hope. How can we end the problems of gender stereotyping and patriarchy when these groups are constantly reinforcing them and fighting us?

I'm sorry that I'm not going into much detail. I'm upset after having yet another argument about women's rights and having my view destroyed and belittled because I am a woman. I'm so frustrated and feel like I can't cope living in a world where I have to constantly fight and work harder then men to be taken equally seriously.

Another example of corporations using sexism as a "reliable" predictor of sales, rather than fact.

**On a personal note, the pill makes me miserable, and I know many women who have the same problem. Yet, for us, there are no options for our male partners, who could potentially not be affected by the same mood-destroying side effects. So, if you are with a man, it's condoms or nothing, even in a long-term relationship. I wonder how many women who have the same problem as myself sacrifice and take a birth control that gives them perma-PMS, because there is nothing for their male partners to try instead. I wonder how many have sex with condoms for years in a committed relationship, and, of those, I wonder how many have trouble attaining vaginally-induced orgasm with a long-term partner because condoms are drying and uncomfortable for them. And I wonder how many use nothing.

Someone get me my god-damn man pill.

(Crossposted at The Feminist Texican )

Okay, I’m a bit late on posting this because it’s been a crazy week. That being said…like hell I’m letting this one go. I went to a carriage horse protest in Central Park on Mother’s Day. In addition to my human rights and feminist activism, I’m also into animal rights activism.

It started out pretty tame. We silently lined up along the sidewalk next to the carriage horses with our signs and banners, but we weren’t calling things out to carriage horse customers; the only people we were speaking to were the ones who were asking us questions.

The carriage drivers weren’t too happy, and immediately called the police over. Within half an hour, a stable owner came by with his camera, getting in our faces and trying to get a rise out of us, at which point, we started chanting simply for the sake of drowning him out. Their union leader showed up not too long after, and he quickly started calling things out to us as well.

It didn’t take too long for the other drivers to start harassing us, too. They eventually got the police to put a barricade around us, claiming we were harassing their customers. At one point, there were 10 officers surrounding us—a group of maybe 20?—even though the horse drivers were the ones getting in our faces, calling out offensive crap.

One of the carriage drivers had been arrested a couple of years ago for hitting a female protester with his whip after he saw her checking to see if the horses had water. He still has his job and was working that day, and when confronted about his arrest, he grinned widely said it had “felt great.”

And of course, what would a Mother’s Day protest be without the heavy dose of sexism? With the exception of one woman, all the carriage drivers that day were male. Though they were calling things out to the entire group, they were laying the sexism on thick with the younger female protesters. Even after the protest was over and I walked home, one of the drivers and their union leader were calling out for me to “get a boyfriend, get pregnant, pop out some kids, and stay home,” so that I could make myself useful on Mother’s Day.

How people could get on a carriage horse with drivers screaming shit like that at women for 2 hours straight completely blows my mind. Even if I had no problem whatsoever with the carriage horse industry, there is NO FUCKING WAY I would give my cash to some asshole who has no problem basically announcing that all we simple-minded womenfolk need is a good fuck to get set straight.

A romantic tradition in Central Park, indeed.  Assholes.

Its in the media all the time that some woman broke up a man's relationship. She is labeled a "Homewrecker" while he generally is let off the hook because he "is a man who couldn't help himself". I don't and will not understand why the woman is the only one that gets blamed.

Yes the woman is a little to blame because she did partake in the events that occurred, but does the Wife/Partner not see that the man made the choice to cheat. He was the married/committed and chose to step outside of that and be with someone else.

Women blaming women is not what we should be doing. I understand that hurt and anger come when you are cheated on, but we must remember that it is not our fault nor is it really the other persons fault. It is the man who chose to cheats fault. He should be the one who gets the label of homewrecker!

It recently came to my attention that most people are under the assumptions that men and women have highly different sexual desires. That debate alone could fill up umpteen threads, but more specifically, many people whose opinions I otherwise respect, are saying that if a woman is not willing to make an attempt to be hot and kinky in bed, then her boyfriend/husband will inevitably cheat. Let me repeat, even though he might love his girlfriend/wife, if he isn't getting to try any new fantasies as he pleases, he can't help but to look for sex in other places. I think this is highly offensive to both men and women. Men do have self-restraint, and women do *shocker!* get horny. In other words, men have cause to cheat, and it is a woman's fault if he does*that bitch!*. Along these same lines we might imply that women have no cause to cheat, and are whores if they do.

This has turned into a huge debate with those closest to me. I feel like this whole idea is selling men short, but surprisingly many of my friends seem to think this is true. Men can't help but cheat.

One friend even went so far as to tell me "I respect you opinions, and you are always strong in your beliefs, but you won't have success or happiness if you keep thinking that way."

Silly me, I was under the impression that I was already happy and successful.

Anyway, I wanted to post this as just a conversation starter to see what other men and women think about all of this.

Am I being unreasonable, or do my friends need a huge reality check?

This has been popping up in my news reading for the last couple of weeks, and it keeps pissing me off.

Sixt (an international car-rental company) has been running dumbass sexist ads on Le Monde and Le Post websites featuring innovatedly crashed cars and the slogan "oui, nous louons aussi aux femmes" (yes, we also rent to women)

To see the ads, check out the site.

On their website they condition this with "***bien sur, Sixt loue aussi aux femmes, voire de preference aux femmes, en effet elles ont statistiquement 3,5 fois moins d'accidents graves que les hommes" (Of course Sixt rents to women, indeed with preference for women, in fact they have statistically 3.5 times fewer serious accidents then men). This disclaimer isn't ever seen in the ads on Le Monda or Le Post.

In an article with Le Post, Konstantin Sixt (Sixt's online manager) says that Sixt went too far, but really, it's our fault for not getting it. The ads were supposed to provoke people into clicking on them, where Sixt's disclaimer 'erases' any sort of sexism. Nevermind that when I see offensive shit on the internet I don't follow it. Nevermind they're still perpetuating sexist stereotypes, even with their disclaimer. Nevermind that despite "having gone too far" the ads are still up.

Stop blaming readers for being offended. Now you're calling everyone stupid on top of your sexist campaign. I'm not sympathetic to people that call me stupid. Insulting people is only a legitimite form of advertising if you want to get paid in head butts.

Le Post article

This is kind of awesome - I came across an article describing a new male contraceptive that could be available in a few years. It's a once-a-month shot (in the ass, unfortunately) that so far has had a 99% prevention rate. I personally think it's great to see that we can start to share the birth control responsibility with men, especially as many hetero couples either don't use condoms and/or think that the woman should be the one taking care of everything.

Female contraceptive + male contraceptive + condom = the potential for triple protection!

Last summer, my dad was laid off from his auto-industry related job. While he looked around for a job, he really enjoyed his time off. It was the first time in my 23 years that I saw my dad taking my little sister to her dentist appointment and doing little things like going to the library with us. While my mom was not at all happy about being the only person working to support our family, she did appreciate that for the first time, he was beginning to have dinner ready when she got home from work.

In this segment that aired last night on ABC's nightly news (go here), one of the most memorable comments came from a woman whose story did not seem to be told as well as the others. She said she lost respect for her husband when she came home and saw him in the kitchen in her apron.

While perhaps the answer is buying him his own apron (I doubt it), I have to wonder why it's not "respectable" for a man who is unable to provide for his family financially in these times to provide for his family through service. I know gender roles have effects on men and women, but serously?!

I actually gained a lot of respect for my dad when I saw him take on more responsiblities at home. Not only did he take up some domestic duties, but he also began to change some of his ways. For instance, he stopped going out of his weekly "guys night" to help the family save money (a first!).

It does seem that younger couples are sticking to the "traditional gender roles" a lot less. Is anybody's parents experiencing the shifting gender roles for the first time in this economy? How are they handling it?

Now, I'll admit your current 'Nikon bigger pixels=bigger boobs' post was delish, but I'd like you to take a lulz filled gander at this gem of an advertising campaign.

Ran across this at the AdScam/The Horror! site:

An ad campaign from Madison Avenue Cookware, has outraged a lot of Bruce's and Sheila's all over Australia. The ads show high-end kitchenware accompanied by headlines like “The only thing that cooks better is a woman”, “Enjoy your time out of the bedroom” and “A woman’s best friend”.

Oh, my, just makes the heart go all pitty pat, doesn't it just?

Now, going to Madison Product's website and seeing the MadMen television show/music score blah de blah, you might be tempted to think, "Oh, well of course!  They are just playing off  retro misogyny!", Oh dear, think again.  The CEO of the company, one delightful Roger Hudson, really thinks this way.  He was quoted thusly:

Women respond well to traditional values. If we ignore hairy-legged feminists research has told us that women do actually love cooking and they do actually love keeping their man happy. It’s in their DNA.”

Ahh, of course.  That explains it, yes?  And lest you might think he'd be put to rights if someone simply and plainly attempted an explanation of, ahem, why this sort of campaign might be less than welcomed? 

Woman Rights Activist Cathy Davis commented that the ads are “absolutely despicable. They devalue women by implying that cooking is our most important role in society… It is archaic, misogynistic and sexist”. Mr Hudson's erudite response was “Settle down tootsie.”

Makes you just want to run out and buy up some Madison Avenue Cookware, doesn't it?

(hat-tip to George Parker of AdScam/The Horror!)

I don't have a lot to say, and my apologies for having blogged so frequently, but this got to me.

Ever wonder why women continue to be sexually assaulted in the military? Equality cannot be achieved until one sees women as equals. Yet, another example of institutionalized misogyny and masculinity.

Last week one of my boyfriend's buddies forwarded an article for his reading enjoyment.  This friend is a bit of a neo-con and sometimes likes to send reading materials he knows will raise heckles (usually mine).  But he's generally a good person, and I enjoy a good debate.  So the BF passed me the article and I took a read.  It's from MACLEANS magazine, here in Canada, and it's about how Bono (of U2 fame) has moved some of his/the band's assets to another country with a more favourable tax regime.  Somewhat dull so far, I agree.  The author, Mark Steyn, essentially argues that it is hypocritical of Bono to do this when the tax revenue he would have paid in his native country would have gone a long way to providing aid to other countries, which is something Bono strongly advocates for.  While there are probably arguments against Mr. Steyn's tax-related reasoning, I'm no tax expert, so I won't bore anyone with those issues here.

My comment on the article relates to one very small portion (on the second page).  Mr. Steyn cites an author and economist named Dambisa Moyo .  Ms. Moyo has recently published a book (which I have not read) but which seems to be generating a good deal of controvercy because she argues against aid for African counries.  Mr. Steyn seems to rely on her work to support some of his own conclusions.  But here is the line that bothers me so much.  When he first introduces her, Mr. Steyn writes:

"In her new book, the Zambian economist (actually, more of an econo-babe) Dambisa Moyo takes aim at Sir Bob and Sir Bono beginning with the very title: Dead Aid."

Econo-babe???  Did I read that correctly?  According to her website, Ms. Moyo holds four post-secondary degrees: a BA in Chemistry, an MBA in Finance, an Masters degree from Harvard, and a PhD in Economics from Oxford.  I won't begin to disucss her professional experience - there isn't enough space.  I've seen her on TV - she is exceptionally eloquent.  But Mr. Steyn's approach ensures that, even though he is relying on her opinion and expertise to prop up his own arguments, he needs to first, quickly, reduce her to a sex object.  Seriously?  I'm all for a good, no-holds-barred, intellectual debate on complicated issues, and it seems like a conversation about aid to Africa would be a good discussion to have, but if you feel the need to diminish the female participants in the debate by first reducing them to their bodies, then we have a long way to go yet.  Sheesh.

This afternoon, my boyfriend and I were waiting in line for tickets to see today’s taping of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. When we got to the studio and realized that we were going to be in line for the next two hours, my boyfriend went around the corner in search of sustenance and caffeine. As I held our place in the line, I checked my email and read the latest headlines, and I also couldn’t help overhearing the conversation that was going on between the young man and the young woman in line directly behind me.

Both students at prestigious Manhattan college, they talked about their dorm rooms and their buildings, and soon the talk turned to specific people who lived on their respective hallways. One girl’s name – I’ll call her Jessie – came up, and the pair started comparing stories they’d heard about the young woman.

What followed was one of the most spectacular examples of slut-shaming, and one of the most gender stereotype-filled conversations I’ve heard in a long time. It was, in many ways, a how-to for people who are interested in learning how to shame women for having sex. Here’s a reconstruction of the conversation, aided by the notes that I was taking on my BlackBerry as it happened (they’re toolish, but they’re darn useful, too):

Seriously, this is annoying.

Why do we equate the term "pussy" with "wimp"?

We hear this all the time, on the street, online, in Judd Apatow films... The vagina is continually used as metaphor for weakness and wimpiness.

"Don't be such a pussy."

"Don't let the door hit you in the vagina on your way out."

"Pittsburgh Penguins star Sidney Crosby to miss his fourth straight game because of a sore vagina"

This is really starting to annoy me because this slang can only be attributed to one thing: misogyny.

I'm not saying that everyone who uses that term is a misogynist, I'm saying that there's subliminal girl-hate within that use of the word. Because, if you think about it in realistic terms, it makes absolutely no sense for "vagina" to mean pathetic.

As so succinctly stated on a message board I frequent, the Noblegarden annual event in World of Warcraft amounts to, “Click on eggs before anyone else clicks on eggs to win!” Timed and themed analagous to Easter in the real world, the event's mind-numbing at best.

Apparently, the game's developers rightly realized that hours of staring at one spot on your computer's monitor and clicking blue orbs isn't appealing enough for its public. Their solution: Let's introduce sexism! Hey, it makes all other media content popular, and no women play online games anyway, right?

Here's a little background for those who aren't familiar with the game. Late last year, taking a cue from the Xbox Live service, Blizzard introduced the 'achievements' system. Perform a novel, difficult or repetitive action in the game, and you get 10 achievement points, which at this time, are used for nothing. Several, after achieving them, give you “cosmetic” items, such as clothing, that don't affect gameplay. One of the few exceptions to the gameplay rule, out of the more than 750 achievements, grants the fastest mount in the game.

Recently, Noblegarden (formerly a day-long event) was extended to a week, and numerous achievements related to it were added to the game. Most are pretty banal (eat 100 chocolates!), a few are cute (find a rabbit a suitable mating companion,) and one is unconscionable: Shake Your Bunny-Maker.

How this works: In the course of participating in Noblegarden, the player will receive an item that will cause bunny ears to sprout from the head of any one player the character chooses that's in close proximity to them. The achievement is gained by doing this to female characters only of all playable races. Combined with the title of the achievement, it's a pretty unsubtle reference to Playboy. As an additional attempt to be cute, a side requirement is that the character be at least 18th level. (18th level = 18 years old. Get it? Hilarious!)

Now, the player being “bunnied,” as it were, doesn't have a choice in the matter. There's no way to prevent having these bunny ears pop onto your head until after the action's already been performed. I've personally witnessed a female real-life player be made very uncomfortable by the notion, and there's a very real scenario that some female players are avoiding social spaces, which are the entire point of playing these types of online games. 

The bumbling man and/or dad---if you've watched a sitcom chances are you know him.  He almost always does something wrong during any given episode; his most common offenses include lying, forgetting, breaking, ruining dinner, or saying the wrong thing.  The wife or woman is often smart as a tack, well-balanced and all-knowing.  She comes through the door with kids in tow and groceries in hand to find that "dad" couldn't even handle the simple task of putting the lasagna in the oven to heat up (the stupid male let it sit out on the counter, fed it to the dog, used it as a chair cushion---the more absurdly moronic the better).  He is chided, belittled, and given a kiss---she still loves her husband even if he is a stupid man.

Now of course, I'm generalizing.  There are sitcoms out there where the man isn't a complete moron, or the wife is a bit dumb as well.  But I see a disturbing proclivity of men who simply cannot handle a task if it doesn't involve sports or drinking.  This is a direct reciprocal of the stereotype that women can't handle anything that is outside of fashion or caring for the home.  The airhead wife has been replaced by the bumbling dad.  And the problem isn't restricted to the realm of sitcoms.

Last night I was watching an episode of the tv show "Dexter". I quite enjoy this show a lot and find it to be very intelligently written. However, last night I saw an episode with a segment that rubbed me the wrong way. In this particular episode, the main character, Dexter, is getting married and the token pervert at his work (not his best man) throws a Bachelor Party for him. In the show, it was just a given that there had to be strippers there. None of the men at this party were even that close to Dexter, and it was clear that this really wasn't what he wanted anyway. There were a couple things that rubbed me the wrong way though. Mainly it was the female character's reaction to the party. The party involved a lot of strippers (maybe 10?) in a room just standing around topless and giving lap dances to all the men in the room.

As I was surfing the internet today I ran across this video on the front page of Yahoo.

Listen to what the three V's for being a "man" are according to Janis Spindel (a highly sought after matchmaker).

It's a good thing I stumbled into this video so I can be told that I should be focused on how women look and how superficially shallow I am. How silly of me to consider woman as anything but objects.

We need a movement for a new form of masculinity. This video is not only degrading to women, but it reinforces the abysmal, society driven, degrating form of the "masculinity" of today. As a feminist male, this clip sickens me.

Hey, I've posted once before quite some time ago.  I'm a 14 year old student, who is having difficulty in History class.  We are currently studying the women's rights movement, and since I'm an avid history lover and feminist, took as very keen interest.  Everytime we talk about important feminist figures (Most of whom I've already read about), one boy in particular seems happy with making jokes and being sexist.  Now, I love sexist jokes.  I love making fun of men with my guy friends, so I love it when they make fun of women in jest too.  I'd be a sexist hypocrite if I got mad, besides, it's usually funny.  But the extent this particular person (Whose had pretty supermacist tendencies in the past not just to women) has gone to is downright horrfic.  From laughing at women's abuse and the maiming of children in factories, to making jokes about beating his own future girlfriend, I'm starting to see him as a sadist.

I am a third-year college student, and am running for Vice-President at my school's Student Government Association. I'm a political science major, and I've been involved for a couple of years, so I know how nasty elections can get. However, this really pisses me off. 

For the link-squeamish, I'll summarize. It's a blog by the editor of a online campus magazine, who was invited to moderate the debate for all the executive candidates for our yearly election.

In this blog, she is complaining about the lack of attendance at the debate, blames SGA, and launches into a tirade about how much SGA "sucks" and gives us "suggestions" on how to get more students involved.

Those suggestions are to set up tables in various places (one of which is outside the local bars) and hire "attractive" and "popular" people to run the tables, and dress them scantily. Because "sex sells."

This not only implies that current, FEMALE members of the organization are not attractive nor popular enough nor scantily clad enough (and that they should be), but also implies that all blame for lack of student involvement is placed solely on the female members. "Scantily clad" is not a term used to refer to males, not even were they to strip down; it is historically and currently used to refer to the clothing choices of women.

It's one thing to offer suggestions on how our organization can reach out to more students, past what we already do. It's ENTIRELY another to throw potshots at the women in our organization, focusing on their sexuality and physical features, and blaming the student apathy on our lack of offering our sexuality in return for involvement.

I've begun reading a wonderful book called Still Failing at Fairness: How Gender Bias Cheats Girls and Boys in School and What We Can Do About It, a revised and updated edition of Failing at Fairness. I'm only a little ways into it, but this paragraph really caught me up short:

"When adolescent boys and girls were asked what it would be like to be born a member of the other sex, how do you think they responded? As you might suspect, girls saw some enticing possibilities if they were born male: wealth, strength, political power, and athleticism. Boys were repulsed at even the idea of being born a female, or living in a female body, or facing female life choices. A significant percentage of the boys said they would kill themselves, that they would rather be dead than female."

Maybe when men beat and kill their wives and girlfriends, they think they're doing us a favor...

The title says it all: Putting on make-up 'could help prevent accidents'

Enjoy.

Here's the deal. I am flying out to Miami at the end of the month to meet a guy that I have been online/phone chatting with for the past 7 years. He is originally from my home town in New England, and we have mutual acquaintances, but have never actually met each other. I have been very excited about this upcoming meeting/vacation, but there is a problem.

This is a post I've been thinking about writing for the longest time, but was always held back by anxieties in regards to openly discussing my disability. Reading Renee's wonderful post on disability at Womanist Musings inspired me to take a stab at this particular part of my life and how it's shaped my feminist views.

I'll start off with this simple fact: I have Asperger Syndrome, a mild form of autism, which usually manifests itself into a narrow range of interests, limited social abilities, and, most relevant to this post, difficulty expressing emotions, for me, empathy and sympathy are exteremely difficult to articulate. Asperger Syndrome/autism is typically more common among males than females, though some believe this may be due more to misdiagnosis and ignorance on female behavior than anything.

With that preamble over with, I must admit that females on the Austistic spectrum face unique challenges that our male counterparts do not deal with, owing to society's expectations of women. Many times, I have been accused of being "insensitive" "rude" "cold" "heartless" "bitchy" and other unsavory adjectives, because I have difficulty displaying empathy, I dislike being hugged, and I am far from the "nurturing" type. I thought it was simply a part of the emotional baggage of having Asperger Syndrome, but upon questioning my male peers with Asperger Syndrome, I discovered this treatment was unique to me. Men with Asperger Syndrome told me that their behavior, while standoffish and socially awkward, was regarded as the norm for men when dealing with a difficult situation. But I, as a woman, was expected to emotionally plunge myself in with the people who were experiencing the situation, and offer myself as a beacon of comfort and sympathy.

My reaction to this is to want to bang my head against the desk and scream. My vagina does not mean that I am your soft pillow to cry against during your moments of anguish! This is probably applicable to neurotypical women as well, I'm sure many of you have felt this desire to tell someone the same. It appears that women have been handed the unfair expectation to be people's shoulder to cry on. For me, this is simply unrealistic, I cannot properly read body language, facial expressions, or tell when people's tone of voice is meant to reflect anger, sadness, or happiness. For me to be someone's "rock" is to expect too much out of me, or any woman, either with or without an Autistic Spectrum Disorder.

Realizing how different I was being treated based on being female was the reason I began calling myself a feminist. People on the autistic spectrum often have to fight tooth-and-nail to be treated as respectable adults, and for the rare handful of us who are females with Asperger Syndrome or Autism, we have to work twice as hard to prove we are capable, grown people who can make our own decisions about our lives. There are many issues besides the sympathetic/comforting mother hen expectation which I would like to address some day, but for now, I hope that my post helps people realize that these unfair expectations women are supposed to shoulder are wrong on many levels, and should be reconsidered for the better of both women on the autistic spectrum and neurotypical women.

I googled recession, an article about more unemployed women turning to stripping to make money popped up. I realize times are tough, but what I find disturbing is men making profit off of womens bodies. Yes, its nothing new, but its sad this makes top headlines. Don't see anything about men turning to stripping.

I was at my English lit class yesterday morning, and since it really isn't very big, we were having a discussion on the final few chapters of 'To Kill a Mockingbird'

My Professor asked us what Scout meant by saying that she had finally learned what it meant to be a woman, and the guy next to me raised his hand, and said "Cause she finally stopped acting like a dude."

I, of course, took immediate offense to that, and called it out as sexist, reasoning being that there is no set way to be a woman, or a man. He of course, turned to me with a shocked look on his face and yelled "I am not sexist!"

Then my friend Sam and I got into a huge argument with him over why expecting females and males to act in certain fashions was sexist, not really stopping until he ammended his comment by saying "She finally started acting like what a lady did, back then "

As I left and hour or so later he screamed at my retreating form "I am not sexist!"

Yeah, which is why you try to build up your muscles in order to seem more 'manly' and get seriously offended if someone breaks the traditional gender roles. (Including marrying/dating those of the same sex, which is a completely different topic)

By Rachel Myers, ACLU

Yesterday, the ACLU of Pennsylvania filed a lawsuit against Wyoming County (PA) district attorney George Skumanick, Jr., for threatening three high school girls with child pornography charges over digital photos of themselves in which they appear topless or in their underwear. Skumanick asserted that the girls were accomplices to the production of child pornography because they allowed themselves to be photographed . The threatened charges of sexual abuse of a minor could come with jail time and registration as sex offenders

These threats seem even more extreme when you consider that Skumanick has not threatened to charge the individuals who distributed the photos in the first place. It also seems a little counter-intuitive, since child pornography laws are meant to protect children from being exploited, where as charging them with a felony and potentially subjecting them to being on a sex offender registry hardly seems protective.

Neither of the two photos in question depicts sexual activity or reveals anything below the waist.

One is a picture taken two years ago at a slumber party showing Marissa Miller (now 15) and her friend Grace Kelly from the waist up, both wearing white bras. The other depicts Nancy Doe (a pseudonym used to protect the girl’s real identity) standing outside a shower with a bath towel wrapped around her body beneath her breasts.

Skumanick actually offered the girls a deal. If they didn’t want to face charges, they could be placed on probation, subject to random drug testing, and attend a six- to nine-month re-education program dealing with pornography and sexual violence. The D.A. explained the objectives of that program in a letter he sent home to the parents. They include gaining “an understanding of what it means to be a girl in today’s society, both advantages and disadvantages,” and identifying “non-traditional societal and job roles.”

While our clients recognized the D.A.’s actions as a violation of their First and Fourth Amendment rights and turned to the ACLU for legal assistance, they were not the only ones offered this “choice” by Skumanick. Seventeen other students, 13 girls and four boys, accepted the deal from the D.A., including one girl who was shown in pictures in a bikini . Her parents asked the D.A. why on earth that would be child porn, and he said it was because she was "posed provocatively."

Vic Walczak, Legal Director for the ACLU of Pennsylvania, said in a statement :

Kids should be taught that sharing digitized images of themselves in embarrassing or compromised positions can have bad consequences, but prosecutors should not be using heavy artillery like child-pornography charges to teach them that lesson…These are just kids being irresponsible and careless; they are not criminals and they certainly haven't committed child pornography.

In the lawsuit, the ACLU charges that Skumanick is misusing his authority by threatening to bring baseless child-pornography charges in order to coerce parents into sending their children to the re-education program and putting them on probation. It also claims this is a form of unconstitutional retaliation against the parents and children who assert their right not to be bullied into participation. The ACLU is asking the federal court to issue an order prohibiting the district attorney from filing criminal charges against the girls.

In a hearing Thursday in the U.S. District Court in Scranton, Judge James Munley gave D.A. Skumanick until Friday, March 27, to file a brief.

There has been quite a lot of discussion in the community lately about pornography, although this has mostly been personal stories about the merits or disadvantages it causes. In exploring the issue myself i came across the website which presents some fairly persuasive feminist-oriented arguments for the negative effects of porn.

In particular, these two studies caught my eye. Now I don't know the background of these studies. I don't know whether they were conducted correctly. However, I would be interested to hear a what others think, as they seem to paint a pretty bleak picture of the effects of stereotypical misogynistic porn.

On BBC America, the show "100 Men Own My Breasts" follows women who are members on a website called MyFreeImplants.com. Interesting name right?

The idea behind this is that there are many women in the world who are dying to get breast implants and (apparently) there are many men who are willing to help pay for these new breasts. Unsurprisingly, this site was created by two men from California. Women post pictures and information about themselves and then communicate with the men in order to build relationships in order to get money. Basically less clothing equals more money.

The owners claim that no women have ever been turned away for being too ugly or too fat, but that it's "survival of the fittest" on the sight. Because, of course, the whole motivation behind the sight was to improve women's self-esteem and confidence. Right.

Maybe these women wouldn't consider themselves so inadequate if they didn't feel so much pressure to fit society's perfect mold of beauty. Some may say it's an easy way to fund implants, but to me it's a sick way to exploit women as sexual objects that they are not.

I know the title sounds like a possible misquote but, taken direct from the Army Times, the reality of how the military is mishandling sexual assault in its ranks couldn't be clearer. Nor could the detrimental effect this misconduct has on the military and its members be any clearer or the need to address, prevent and treat it be any more timely.

The official DoD SAPRO FY2008 (SAPRO is the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office,  press release does not fare much better. Statistics are used to misrepresent the situation.

The press release, which can be seen here, uses selective reporting to make it seem as though 38% of reported cases go to court martial (how many are convicted is a statistic that is not tallied by the DoD, oddly enough).

Taken directly from the press release:

In fiscal 2008, the department received a total of 2,908 reports of sexual assault involving service members, representing an eight percent increase from fiscal 2007. There were 753 restricted reports filed in fiscal 2008. The restricted reporting option allows a military member to obtain care confidentially without initiating an investigation. This year 110 victims converted their report from restricted to unrestricted.

The report also showed that court-martial actions substantially increased from 30 percent in fiscal 2007 to 38 percent in fiscal 2008, meaning that military commanders referred eight percent more cases to trial.

If one takes the time to read the numbers, or first find them in the 83 pages of the full report, the number of court martials is 317. I don't believe the military has mathematicians that are unable to calculate percentages, but 317 is NOT 38% of 2908. It actually is 38% of the 832 cases that were found to be substantiated. A similar proportion, 247, received non judicial punishment even though most civilians would certainly feel this was an inappropriate form of punishment. The military mindset will often say this is so the commander can take appropriate action but in the civilian world an outside body, with no conflict of interest, decides how one is punished. This is for a reason.

About 1079 cases were unsubstantiated, a large portion of the 1339 cases that were not fully investigated. Anyone who has listened to the stories of sexually assaulted service members is fully aware of the pressures involved in reporting assault, especially when ones report is publicized in their unit, all too often a source of much secondary harassment, an situation that leads to both under reporting as well as withdrawal of reports.

There is also a strange silence on the report from many veterans service organizations, failing once again to see the importance of understanding, treating and preventing sexual assault for the health and well being of service members and veterans. I often joke with other female veterans that we are presented with the pap smear as what we need rather than real understanding and justice, but this silence makes the joke not so funny.

Please take the time to read the whole report and see for yourself.

Also, please email any veterans organization that has not covered this issue and request that they live up to their name of VETERANS organization, and not leave any vets behind.

Reposted from.

This story happened a couple of weeks ago, and it's been sort of bothering me since then, so I thought Feministing would be a good place for me to vent.

I'm sixteen, and in my high school I take a guitar class called Advanced Guitar. I am the only girl in it. I enjoy the class, but ever since the first day I've felt rather alienated. Guys in the class have this whole attitude that only boys can play the guitar well (which is utterly ridiculous, obviously). Most of them completely ignore that I'm even in the class. A couple boys that I sit with are slightly better, but they still make "jokes" about my taste in music, my band, what I wear, and how I speak. They do not do this to any of the boys in the class.

This is aggravating by itself as you could imagine. But the whole class situation became even worse in my mind after the incident from a few weeks ago:

The class is very informal so I was just sitting with the usual group of boys, hanging out and sort-of practicing guitar. It was a bit chilly in the room because some windows were open, so I said I was going to get up and close them. The teacher, who's a woman, was in the room and said that was fine. But one of the boys I sit with disapproved. He told me to leave the windows shut. I respected his wish, but I still argued that it was VERY cold in the room and he had an extra jacket he could remove if he was warm. He then said to me, "Well, maybe if you didn't dress like such a fucking whore you wouldn't be cold." Taken aback, I looked up at our teacher, waiting for her to yell at him or send him to our principal's office. But all she did was chuckled and said, "Whoa, [guy's name]." She clearly found his statment to be funny. I even said to her, "Aren't you going to send him to [Principal's name]'s office?" But she basically turned her back and ignored my question.

The comment that the boy made was terrible and insulting and all that, but it really wasn't that which made me upset that day. The fact that an adult, a TEACHER, heard a boy call me a slut and did nothing about it, and even LAUGHED about it, strikes me as so wrong. It's adults like these that are one reason that boys feel that it is totally okay for them to talk to women that way. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do or how I'm supposed to feel.

I'm a very highly educated woman earning less than the national average across all categories. I'm also very butch-looking, with no makeup, no heels, etc. And I don't demure. Ever. Lately, I've become curious about whether my "acting like a man" (expecting equality and respect, especially) raised any hackles and kept me down in various workplaces.

Since I had a hard time finding any reliable studies on this, I looked at transgendered male-to-females to see if there might be something there. That is to say, I assumed that pre-op male-to-females would "think like men" in terms of taking their rights as men for granted, or not quite be aware of how much more they had than women, and that perhaps completing their transition as females would give them a bit of a shock in that respect.

It appears my assumptions were correct. Male-to-females experience a 30 percent drop in income after their transition, while female-to-males get an increase of 1.5 %. It appears MTFs experience increased discrimination even when they change jobs and get employers who have no idea they were men beforehand.

Here are some links:

http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2008/10/if_women_were_more_like_men.html

and

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1847194,00.html

One of the other feministing bloggers passed on a website earlier today, and I thought I'd jump on board with this story.

So, apparently, women are supposed to have rights, and can have such rights, but in the process of becoming fully-functional human beings, they're also supposed to dress more "feminine" as to be visually pleasing to men.

Or, at least that's what you're lead to believe if you read the following post.

Have you ever read anything so condescending, especially coming from a man who claims to believe in equal rights? The whole "you ladies" thing rubbed me the wrong way - and I don't know about you, but I don't think women should give a shit what this asshole "prefers" when it comes to how they dress.

Moreover, the lessons of feminism is apparently lost on this guy. Women want to be like man, and thus feminism is defined by showing off one's manliness? What world does this kid live in?

When it comes down to it, take a woman for what she feels like wearing or shut the fuck up. It's not difficult to remember that women aren't there to visually please them, and thus, can wear whatever they want, regardless of whether they approve or not.

But this brings up an interesting point: that the personal isn't always political, and vice-versa. That, while there are many so-called progressives who support the equal rights movement, those same progressives can turn out to be some of the most misogynistic, sexist motherfuckers when it comes to their personal interactions with women.

While I am a liberal feminist and the majority of my work is within the worlds of politics and policies, it seems as though lately I've been more involved in personal feminism. The question is: when it comes to personal feminism, where is a man's place in such, and how far is too far? After all, just as women do not need to do things to please patriarchy, they certainly don't need patriarchy's help in defeating itself, either

I'm undecided as to what to make of this ad currently showing on British TV. There's certainly been some consternation amongst YouTube viewers, with comments including 'If this were about a woman it would have been instantly banned ' and "a typical male bashing commercial. The safe and acceptable target.... men ".

I hear these concerns, and as an advocate of gender equality, I don't see how this kind of advert helps anyone. The (male) makers of the ad actually defended it on YouTube as 'tongue in cheek', in light of the fact it's still women who shoulder the majority of the burden of housework. I asked my partner if he found the ad offensive, and he replied that he couldn't care less. I asked a man at work (having described the ad to him) and he actually said 'anything that makes housework simpler for men has got to be a good thing - saves us from getting bollocked by our wives when we get something wrong!'. He then went on to relay an instance of him spraying a polished wood table with oven cleaner under the mistaken impression it was wood polish 'because the cans had identical-coloured lids' - the table was of course ruined. I had to chuckle at that one.

Perhaps guys can feel more secure that piss-taking adverts aren't going to harm them or anyone's perception of them (although after my colleague's tale, I'm wondering if there is some gender division regarding ability to read labels on cleaning products...!). It just genuinely didn't seem to occur to either guys I asked to regard the ads as anything but trivial. However a lot of guys on YouTube are getting up in arms and calling for ASA to pull the ad - I'm just wondering if, in the interest of fairness, I should be doing the same? Your thoughts please...

[Reported by Thinkprogress.org]

Last night, Sen. John McCain's (R-AZ) daughter, Meghan McCain, appeared on Rachel Maddow's MSNBC show, where she continued to criticize Ann Coulter. On her radio show today, Laura Ingraham responded to McCain's critique of far right conservatives, saying that she is "just another Valley Girl gone awry." In a mocking faux-Valley Girl voice, Ingraham made fun of McCain's body, joking that she didn't get a "role in the Real World" because "they don't like plus-sized models":

MCCAIN (on MSNBC): And I think there's an extreme on both parties and I hate extreme. I don't understand. I have friends that are the most radically conservative and radically liberal people possibly ever and we all get along. We can find a middle ground.

INGRAHAM (mocking): Ok, I was really hoping that I was going to get that role in the Real World, but then I realized that, well, they don't like plus-sized models. They only like the women who look a certain way. And on this 50th anniversary of Barbie, I really have something to say.

Listen here:

In the past, McCain has said that she is "proud" of her body. Last summer, she told Glamour, "I got to a point where I was like, I just don't care. You think I'm fat? Fine. I don't care how much you weigh."

Transcript after the jump.

I'm currently planning a wedding for my partner and myself and I'm trying to make it gender neutral, which means cutting out a lot of traditional (in my opinion) crap. I find that instead of being supported in this decision, I am constantly met with criticism and a phrase that is beginning to make me want to punch people in the face: "It's just tradition."

First of all, let's look at that phrase. The word "just" suggests that being a "tradition" is nothing. This makes very little sense since the word "tradition" itself means that something has been passed down through several generations. A tradition is a big deal, with lots of people involved, it isn't "just" a little thing.

Secondly, where did these traditions come from? Oh, that's right, from when women were property and were passed from their fathers to their husbands.

Just because it is "tradition," doesn't mean that it is the right thing to do. But I'm happy to take judgmental words like "right" and "wrong" out of the equation. Some people want a "traditional" wedding. That's fine. But then let's talk about how brides are treated during the wedding planning process.

To “celebrate” its television debut on Gossip Girl on March 16th, the Park Avenue Winter on the Upper East Side will treat “girls of any age in a school uniform” to a complimentary dinner, with two free drinks thrown in for patrons over the legal drinking age.

Ugh. Let’s begin with the obvious: the schoolgirl uniform fetish relies on the sexualization of girls who are too young to legally consent to sex - more commonly called pedophilia. Real young women who wear the uniforms to school face consistent street harassment from men who are old enough to be their fathers when the uniform itself should be a big OFF LIMITS sign.

But, those young women are probably not the target age-group for this upscale publicity stunt. I can just imagine where Park Avenue Winter’s marketers were going with this one: lure scantily clad women into the restaurant, give them two free drinks and dinner and middle-aged men with a schoolgirl fetish will be right there to buy them that third drink. Perfect, since objectification seems to be recession proof.

Of course, the ad specifies a woman (of any age, but no points for not being ageist while being incredibly sexist) must wear the uniform; I wonder how the management would receive men or gender non-conforming persons willing to wriggle into a plaid skirt for free dinner and drinks?

Why don’t we ask them?

You know how Burger King seems to be pandering to a demographic of horny frat boys ? Combos seems to have taken notice. As part of a marketing rollout for the snack food brand, Portland-based Sperling’s Best Places ranked the “manliest” cities in America.

How does one measure manhood? It’s simple, really. You simply calculate the number of major league sports teams, hardware stores, barbeque restaurants, and yes, the frequency of Nascar and monster truck rallies. Cities lost ranking points for emasculating frou-frous like the abundance of home furnishing stores, high minivan sales and subscription rates to beauty magazines.

According to a press release issued by Mars Snackfood, maker of Combos:

The manliest ranking comes as COMBOS(R) launches its Ultimate Man Zone Sweepstakes, an opportunity for guys to improve their favorite hangouts and win prize packages to upgrade their tailgating, grilling, home theater or gaming "zones." And also thanks to COMBOS(R), women now know where to find the manliest men around.

My hometown of Cincinnati came in fourth in the study. Whew, thanks Mars and Combos! I was worried I lived in a city of pussies!

Nashville, Tenn. came out on top in the study, followed by Charlotte, N.C., Oklahoma City, Cincinnati, and then Denver. New York City, presumably, is home to a bunch of sissies -- it finished last out of the 50 of the U.S. largest metropolitan areas. Check the press release to find out where to find your own manliest man around.

In other news, BusinessWeek ranked the Queen City No. 9 on a list of America’s unhappiest cities. Those rankings were based on such factors as depression and suicide rates, divorce rates, unemployment and job loss, crime and weather, but I’m sure it’s because all of Cincinnati’s pro-sports-loving, power-tool-wielding, barbecue-craving monster truck fans are in despair because their precious Bengals are just a bunch of losingest namby-pamby girly-men.

Cross-posted on www.the-F-word.org

In an update to my previous post on the subject, here is the video for the new Burger King "Burger Shots" that I found so offensive. I'm not taking it too seriously, but it is annoying.

Thoughts?

I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this. On the one hand, I am a big fan of the Obamas, and yes, I've noticed that they're a relatively young, attractive couple. But, on the other hand, I'm annoyed that this is the most interesting thing CNN could find to write about Michelle Obama. Case in point:

"Those toned arms are becoming a trademark. And a source of inspiration for some women."

Really? I hadn't noticed. Yes, first ladies often set the trends in fashion; just think of Jackie Kennedy. But is it really neccesary to reduce Michelle Obama to 'nice arms"?

There's also the fact that people even notice, and feel the need to comment on, her physical appearance. Does it matter what the first lady looks like? Will her choice of attire influence policy? Will her body shape affect the difference she can make in the world? I think not. It's not really that important.

Should I be annoyed at this? Or am I just being too wary of sexism?

I can see already the Facebook is providing various causes for concern when we see sexist notes/comments/profiles on our friends' pages. However, what do you do when you see your friend's friends, who you may not know, post some misogynist garbage on their page? It's OK to take you friends to task, but someone you don't know, whose activity you can only see because it's linked to you friend? Hmmm.

My friend posted on her status that she had 'had an epiphany.'

This was one of the responses of her guy friends.

"Laura, I thought I gave you the epiphany today...knock out all of your teeth, have the government pay to have some 24k gold teef put in, then one by one, yank them out and sell them to CashforGold for thousands...sure you won't have any teef left, but hey, that could be a plus in the guy department... "

I really found that vile and misogynistic, and kind of want to tell her to delete this moron off her friends list and keep away from him. Obviously not my call to make, so I just posted a further comment, saying '[insert friend's name], you have some really classy male friends.' It was as far as I felt able to go, but I wanted to go so much further and a) tell her to ditch this wanker, and b) tell him he was a vile twat. What d you think?

(I apologize in advance for the length of this post, it takes a some explanation to get to the heart of the matter.)

So, I have this favorite professor as my college. He's a really big cheese in the psych department (I’m a developmental psych major), and not surprisingly, lots of students love him. He’s a brilliant, kind, funny, truly charming man of about 65. He has the single most honest and acute grasp of the way people work - and he's still and optimist who loves people. I’m in a lecture he teaches that centers on the creation and foundation of clinical therapy. (Might I add that when we were covering Freud’s views on women he had some spectacular, insightful, feminist things to say? I immediately loved this guy.) It’s an amazing course and it has affected me more than I can say.

So, last week he emailed me thanking me for an essay I wrote asked me to meet with him. I go and see him, everything’s cordial and dandy, he actually remembers my name (which lets face it, in a lecture that’s pretty damn good.) He asks me why I think he wanted to meet with me. I get rather flustered (oh, god, must say something intelligent) and say I assumed he wanted to talk about my paper. As it turns out, yes he wanted to talk about my paper, but more specifically he wanted to talk about all of my papers. He told me that every year there are a handful of students that he sees with some really great potential, and he’s always sorry that he didn’t get more interaction with them. He went on to tell me that this year, I’m one of those students (my jaw hits the floor) and he’s thrilled I came to talk to him.

I am not a nice person. Never have been, probably never will be. But people just can't accept that. People can accept that a man can be naturally unpleasant (Dr. House, anyone) but not a woman, apparently.

And NO I'm NOT on my period!

I can't even count the number of times I've received a comment like this from another woman:

"Is it the cramps? Here, I have some Midol in my purse."
"Geez I know its that time of the month but shut up."
"You're always such a bitch when you're on your period!"

Forget that if that last one was true, I'd probably need to make an OBGYN appointment, ASAP, because it would mean I'm always on my period.

Why do women assume that this is ok to ask? Its nobodies business. "Hi, I just met you and don't even know your name, but you're a huge bitch so is it your period?" Yeah, sure...

Cross posted from here .

KABOBfest recently wrote a little article titled "KABOBfest Exclusive: Livni Sex Tape Exposed ." I initially assumed was going to be a story of how Bebe Netanyahu and cronies rummaged through Livni's personal space and realized that she has a fully functional vagina and is putting it to use, but as it turned out it was a parody article that was sexist and anti-Semitic.

This was on my MSN page this morning - "Reprinted with permission of Hearst Communications, Inc" who publish Good Housekeeping. Made me so mad I don't know what to say so I thought I'd give everybody here a crack at it.

We are moving forward aren't we?

So, I sent emails of complaint about that Virgin Atlantic ad to both the Advertising Standards Agency, and Virgin themselves. Virgin have yet to comment, but here's the reply I received today from ASA:

Dear Ms Scott

YOUR COMPLAINT ABOUT VIRGIN ATLANTIC AIRWAYS

Thank you for contacting the Advertising Standards Authority.

I should say from the outset that the ASA Council has considered this ad and the point you raise but didn’t think there were sufficient grounds for us to intervene. 

Our Code says that ads should contain nothing that is likely to cause serious or widespread offence.  The ASA bases its judgments on the content of the ad and the medium, audience, product type and prevailing standards in society.

Complaints about offence often require difficult judgements but we don’t intervene where advertising is simply criticised for being in poor taste.  Apart from freedom of speech considerations, even well-intentioned and thoughtful people will have different and sometimes contradictory opinions about what constitutes ‘bad taste’ or should be prohibited.  We can only act if the ad, in our judgement, offends against widely accepted moral, social or cultural standards. 

The ASA Council considered that most viewers would understand the ad presented an exaggerated stereotypical view of the 1980s and played on perceive attitudes of that time in a humorous way. Although some viewers may find the representation of women in the ad distasteful, Council considered it was unlikely to be seen as sexist towards either men or women or as reinforcing stereotypes.  It therefore considered that the ad was unlikely to be seen as sexist or derogatory towards women or to cause serious or widespread offence.

I realise this decision will disappoint you but we’ve passed your comments to the advertiser (without revealing your identity) so they’re aware of your views.  And we’ll continue to monitor the response to this campaign.

Our website, www.asa.org.uk , contains information about the ASA and the work we do, including the results of investigations into other complaints, many of which have been upheld.

Yours sincerely

James Duckworth

Complaints Executive

jamesd@asa.org.uk

I've included Mr Duckworth's email address because I'd like to give anyone who disagrees with him the chance to tell him exactly what they think of the assertion that the ad is 'unlikely to be seen as derogatory or sexist towards women ' and is in no way 'reinforcing stereotypes '.

Could rant forever about this kind of moral relativism that allows ads like this to go unquestioned under the guise that 'it's ironic, innit?' (yes, of course, it's funny to see 1980s sexism because of course we've eradicated all sexism and objectification here in 2009! Jesus.), but I'm opening the floor to y'all instead in the hope that you'll make ASA sit up and take notice. Ladies, show me what you can do.

Has anyone seen the ad for the new "Burger Shots" from Burger king? The ad is incredibly offensive. I'm unable to find a video, but it basically consists of a bunch of women fawning over hamburgers in low-cut t-shirts. This blogger has a post about it with some interesting points, and you can see screenshots here . If anyone can find a video and post it, that would be great!

I am passionate about sex.  Doing it, learning about it, talking about it.  I am particularly passionate about female sexuality and hope to pursue a career in which I can encourage and help women to truly embrace their sexuality and sexual drives.  There is so much I want to write about, eventually I hope to be able to organize all my thoughts into a coherent book, but for now I want to focus on something that happened this week.

I'm a junior in college right now, and just started a human sexuality class.  While I've been aware of sexual double standards and other misconceptions about sex and sexuality, it's been a while since I've heard someone in person actually flat out say such a sexist idea.  In the class, we were having a discussion based on different hypothetical situation.  They were short descriptions of 8 different people and their chosen sexual lifestyles.  We were then supposed to state whether we admired and respected the person, or whether we did not. 

Some asshole in a suburban yelled at me today while I was walking to get my lunch. All he said was "How Much? How Much?!" I didn't know what to do at first. I just cocked my head and tried to give him a dirty look through my sunglasses. Then, it came to me.

Usually in these situations, I freeze up and walk away thinking of all of the clever things I could have said. This time, I thought of it lightning fast, and before I could even consider whether or not it was dangerous to insult this pea-brained neanderthal, it was coming out of my mouth:

"Oh honey, you have to have a dick for that!"

He looked simultaneously amused and ashamed. Loud Ohhh's!!! could be heard from his friends in the back seat. I know it was childish and probably not productive and potentially dangerous. But you know what? I walked away from that situation feeling powerful rather than passive. Invigorated rather than insulted. And strong instead of the usual sulky.

It makes me mad that some dick on the street can ruin my day just that easily. Normally I would come away from that running the situation through my head, wondering what I did to provoke such a fucked up comment. I am a stranger on the street and this kid disrespects me enough to ask me how much I charge for SEX?! What made him say that? Am I dressed slutty? Was I sending some signal? Is he just making fun of me? If so, why?

It's insane to give someone that power. I'm not going to do it anymore. I refuse to give encounters like this any further thought than "what an asshole." It's not worth it to spend mental energy on it. Cause I would bet that they aren't spending what little mental energy they have on me.

Okay, rant complete.

I have a new iphone & I've already become one of those annoying people who whips it out whenever I need directions, or to check my e-mail, or just to distract myself at any time.

Sometimes I'll poke around in the app store just for fun. So far I've only downloaded 1 paid application (the classic books!), but it's fun to look.

Well, today I found a real doozy.

Something called "Wobble Anything."

And in case you weren't sure what they wanted you to wobble..the provide this helpful graphic:

Look! You can take the pictures on your iphone and then add 'wobbly' or 'jiggly' bits to parts of the body.

Apparently women's breasts are the PERFECT part of the body to wiggle or jiggle..whether they want you to do this to their picture or not.

I just got this in my inbox from my uncle, whom I have repeatedly told not to email me anything, ever, unless he needs something important, because this is all I ever get from him. I'm sure some/all of you have seen it before, but I just wanted some input on this... Or more correctly, someone else to be angry, too. Misery loves company and all. Thoughts?

WHY MEN ARE NEVER DEPRESSED: Men Are Just Happier People-- What do you expect from such simple creatures? Your last name stays put. The garage is all yours. Wedding plans take care of themselves. Chocolate is just another snack. You can be President. You can never be pregnant. You can wear a white T-shirt to a water park. You can wear NO shirt to a water park. Car mechanics tell you the truth. The world is your urinal. You never have to drive to another gas station restroom because this one is just too icky. You don't have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut on a bolt. Same work, more pay. Wrinkles add character. Wedding dress $5000. Tux rental-$100. People never stare at your chest when you're talking to them. New shoes don't cut, blister, or mangle your feet. One mood all the time. Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat. You know stuff about tanks. A five-day vacation requires only one suitcase. You can open all your own jars. You get extra credit for the slightest act of thoughtfulness. If someone forgets to invite you, he or she can still be your friend.

Via Pharyngula, comes the story of a woman who has been in a vegetative state for 17 years. Now the religious right don't want her life support system to be turned off (as her family wishes) because 'she is still fit for having babies'.

Wow, you can see what they value in a woman: a passive womb which will pop out babies without complaint. And what the hell are these wingnuts suggesting? That they rape the comatose woman? Because an unconscious person sure can't give consent to 'have babies'.

I was browsing this website for one of my favourite stores, Retro Rebels, when I noticed in the background was this:

They've used as their background a repeat pattern of a kind of flyer...? advertising 'White girls recruited for Singapore's dens.'

Nice to be reminded of this when I'm shopping.

I’m sure you all remember the Bridgestone Tire commercial that aired during the Superbowl.  Today at work I actually felt like the Mrs. for a brief moment when one of my fellow co-workers simply dismissed my “rant” because I am a “girl.”  I am curious as to how other women who work with the Mr. Potatoheads of the world handle such situations.  What follows is the disturbing sequence of events.

I work as a legal intern at a federal district court in the tri-state area.  This is a new job and I work alongside several other law student interns (whom I am still getting to know).  Today, myself and two other interns got to talking about movies.  Inevitably we happened upon the topic of movies for women such as Bride Wars, He’s Not that into you-you know the type.  Against the expectations of the other interns, male and female, I told them that those movies make me sick to my stomach.  I then had to explain to the other woman that I don’t think any less of her because she likes Sex and the City.   Then…

Dude Intern: what’s wrong with those movies, it’s true girls like shoes (this is comes from the same person who whined for hours after his shoes touched a puddle and *gasp* water touched them)

Wow, so I knew I had to start from square one with this one.   My feathers were a bit ruffled at this point.  I tried my best to coherently explain how women are portrayed in a cookie cutter way in the majority of mainstream films (wife, secretary, girlfriend, etc.).  I told him how women leads are rare in comparison to male leads who are typically the protagonist/hero/character the audience is meant to relate to. 

Dude Intern:  “What?  Oh I wasn’t even listening.  I never listen when women rant.  No guys ever do.”

I had posted last week about the Date Auction my alma mater was putting on (sidenote: unfortunately, I'm not in MN) and I *do* have a rather pleasing update! I was contact today by a writer for the school's independent newspaper about my comments and thoughts on the date auction. 

Any thoughts?

I'm going to post my answers here; I'm fairly certain you can figure out the questions:

(1)I think the Vagina Monologues Date Auction is a good fund raising applied to the wrong event. The Vagina Monologues has the explicit goal of empowering women over patriarchal (to use a feminist buzzword) treatment. A Date Auction is patriarchal because it reduces any person being auctioned to an object that needs to be paid for. This objectification, even if not intentioned in a harmful way, is counter productive to the whole idea of The Vagina Monologues as I've understood it to be conceived by Eve Ensler.

While ending domestic violence is an important and noble cause, as someone who has seen others survive and is a survivor of domestic violence, I don't feel that a Date Auction keeps in the pro-women, feminist ideals of the project with which their auction is associated. With monologues talking about how a woman should be able to wear her short skirt without being seen solely as an object or how painful it can be to be transgender or how much female circumcision (which is a cultural institution centered around the "beautifying" of the vagina) can pain a women, I don't see how an organization can put on such a powerful and important production about the power, faith and resilience against being seen only as a thing and not as a person and then put people on stage to be bid on. It honestly confuses and troubles me.

I've read "He's a stud and she's a slut..." recently and I couldn't help but notice Jessica forgot one big double standard, that when men have blonde hair there is no degrading personality type associated with it. But when a woman has blonde hair, people crack jokes about how stupid she is because her hair is yellow. I even have a friend who is a natural blonde who believes she's stupid for this reason. A lot of blonde women are portrayed as bimbo's by the media Paris Hilton, Jessica Simpson etc, all you have to do is act dizty and be attractive for them to make you out as an idiot. At least with have Pink. I have a dream that one day a woman will not be judged on the color of her hair but on the content of her character.

Is it wrong that this kinda bugs me? I try to let it slide and usually I don't sit and watch it and analyze it but it still pisses me off:

http://www.comedycentral.com/videos/index.jhtml?videoId=84870&title=mitch-fatel-vaginas

Not quite as bad as those Lysol ads from the 1950's telling you to use their product to douche, but just as ridiculous. I mean, is coffee that important to your relationship?

I thought I'd tap into the Feminist hivemind and see if I'm being a bit oversensitive on this.

My alma mater is putting on The Vagina Monologues as it has for the past 6 years. This year, as part of the fundraising, they're doing a "date auction" of men.

I thought this was a little backwards and was taken aback that this would be a good idea. The fundraiser is raising money for a local battered women's shelter and, additionally, is being run by the pro-women group on campus. While they're not auctioning women, I thought it was hypocritical of them to be doing anything which would objectify EITHER gender since this objectification can lead to the violence which they're trying to eradicate.

That in and of itself isn't too, too bad, but the other part of it that bothers me is that they're using men, and this is their phrase, as "props" in the show. Incorporating them as something to do used in the stage production.

As I've understood it, The Vagina Monologues is about promoting the power of women, the solidarity of women and the importance of acknowledging struggles of women as being contributing, strong members of ALL societies, ages and backgrounds. I feel as if using men in this way to prop up something so pro-woman is making the statement that men are inferior to women. It's like a turning of the tables instead of a shattering of the ceiling.

Am I being an oversensitive, humorless feminist? It really does honestly bug me because gender equality does not mean women are BETTER than men.

Last April I graduated with a Bachelor of Math degree from the University of Windsor (Canada). Since my boyfriend and best friend were both in Computer Science, I regularly followed/contributed to the CS discussion forum (run by the University). I still check out new posts, and for a couple more months at least, I'm able to post too.

There has been cases in the past of sexist stuff being posted (overall pretty good for a discussion of 95% male University age people). One example was a professor 'jokingly' suggesting that we give ugly girls plastic surgery in exchange for them going into CS. My best friend and I both called him out on it, and he immediately apologized.

Today, someone posted this joke. Obviousy it's not the most sexist joke ever, but it definitely has it's moments. So I responded with this comment:

"Oh yah, adding software language to old, tired, misogynistic stereotypes about women is just hilarious (he can't get his girlfriend to stop yapping while he's hanging with his friends; he 'installed' the wife program to get free sex, but he didn't realize that women always stop liking sex the second the honeymoon is over--classic!)

No wonder women don't want to go into computer science."

I think it got to the point pretty well. I do expect that someone will respond with "I showed this joke to my and they thought it was funny, so it can't be sexist". Though I don't go to this school anymore, I know that no men, and even the few women who read the forum won't speak up, so I felt that I should. Thoughts?

It's hard to convey to men exactly how it feels being a woman in patriarchy, but I thought I'd give it a go. If the order of patriarchy were reversed and we operated in a matriarchal hell, here's how I envision society:

Sex and relationships:

My guess is that the penis and its functions would be mocked as a form of incontinence. It would be seen as something fairly silly and useless, an appendage to be used by women for their higher purpose of getting pregnant, an appendage that could 'go off' at any moment and didn't obey the man it belonged to. It would be seen as a symptom of childish male nymphomania. Porn in the matriarchal dystopia would be full of a mockery of premature ejaculations and 'whores' getting erections in spite of their protestations. The same in a milder form would be true of music videos. The male inability to have many consecutive orgasms or sustain an erection would be lamented as 'frigidity'. The penis might be regarded as such a gross object that women would gossip in front of men about how gross an unshaven one was.

I am an identical twin: my sister and I are alike (physically) in every way. Our thought processes, personalities, and beliefs, however, could not be more different. Recently, we were driving back to school together and trapped in a car, had an argument about feminism.

I am a (very) feminist engineering major who truly believes that there are no "male" or "female" ways of thinking or being. She is a philosophy major who thinks that men and women are fundamentally different and should be treated as such. We got into a discussion about gender ratios in our respective majors: apparently, the philosophy department at our school is almost entirely male. She postulated that the discrepancy was due to the "fact" that men think in a more philosophical or abstract way, and women are more focused on people, relationships, and emotions. She also used this thought process to explain why more men are engineers than women, even though I have explained the sexism that females in science can face. I disagreed with her, although I am unable to explain the gender discrepancy in philosophy.

My sister then brought up evolutionary biology as proof of gendered thinking; she claims that no one should be discriminated against due to their gender, but that some jobs are better for men, and some for women, and overcoming this biology is "impossible". That is where the fighting started. To me, the idea of gendered thinking, in addition to being incorrect, breeds discrimination.

What do you, the readers of feministing, think about gendered thinking? How can I explain to my sister (who is a much better arguer than I am, and is much more eloquent) that sexism, in any form, is detrimental and wrong? And on a personal level, does anyone have any advice for dealing with non-feminist or sexist family members? Because we have had this conversation more than once, and it is starting to take a toll on our already strained relationship.

If the video doesn't work, sorry. Just got a mac and unsure of how certain things work still. Here's the link.

Anyway, if any of you don't know MST3K (which you really should), it's about a guy and some robots who make fun of B-movies and some shorts, such as this one. This particular short is an 'educational' film about grooming. It's got some pretty awful sexism, which they hilariously berate. Enjoy!

Hi, long time lurker, first time poster, so I'm just going to get on with it.

I've noticed that teachers at my school, sometimes swear and then if they apologize they'll only apologize to the girls in the class, as if at hearing the utterance of a slightly rude word our fragile female ears will break! Has anyone else had that happen? I'm proud of pointing that out to one of the teachers who did it in my presence.

This morning my Chinese friend (I live and work in Beijing) emailed the below pictures, which she too had received from a friend. After having a look and swallowing my anger, I poked around online to see if I could determine the origins. Apparently this is an ad for Israeli beer Goldman, done by McCann Erickson in Tel Aviv, Israel. They were put up in bar bathrooms. 

(Click here for larger image)

My attention was directed to this lingerie site earlier today: 

I have to wonder, I am being over-sensitive by finding it completely objectifying? In some ways it seems like it's aimed towards women, such as the option to "select a model in your size" (emphasis mine), but at the same time it just seems like one of those cardboard-cut-out-dress-up-doll games, only aimed at men and using real live women. The models tend to have flirty expressions on their faces, and I find something vaguely gross about the way the buttons to see the outfit from the back or closer-up are labelled "Come closer" and "Turn around", not being very subtle about the fact that they're giving men a chance to get their jollies by pretending to be giving commands to underwear models, who'll just willingly do their bidding without question.

There's also the fact that I found the site because my older brother is clearly bored at work and playing around on it, and posted a link in his Facebook status (which inspired a lot of gratitude from several of his male friends). And there's the option to embed a model wearing your particular favourite lingerie into your site, which isn't something I've ever felt was missing from the online-shopping process, but there we go.

Is it harmless fun? Or is it one of the most blatant examples of the objectification of women pretty much ever?

I started my new biology class yesterday and thus far I'm on the fence about my instructor.

I liked him pretty well at first, he seemed nice and approachable. Then he got started on the lecture and said a couple things that really irked me.

We started talking about what constitutes life and that led to a discussion of viruses. He asked us to name a few common ones. HIV, Rhinovirus, Influenza...and then someone brought up HPV.

Instructor launches into a whole thing about how HPV can lead to cervical cancer and 60-80% of women under 25 are infected with it and men are unaffected by it, so,

"Get tested and get your pap smears, ladies!"

Hi, this is my first post and I usually refrain from posting things on the internet because of a few bad experiences so I'll keep this short and sweet.

I read this very informative essay the other night about the 'Missing White Woman Syndrome' and I am eager to hear the feministing's community's thoughts on it:

The reason I am bringing to this to your attention, or asking for it, is that I am becoming increasingly alarmed at the divisions I feel are being created between WOC's and white women - It scares me because it appears to be a concerted and calculated effort by the white male elite on the Right and the Left in order to discredit women as a whole and to keep us all oppressed.

WE ARE COMRADES!

I just found this little gem on craigslist. I copied it in case it gets taken down later. 

Epileptic/Arson Productions has been seeking a publicist to publicize and promote the recently released video “COP BAR” starring several actors from “The Sopranos” but only seems to get contacted by fast talking, know-nothing, rope-a-dope, money grubbing, skanky cunts who purport to be Publicists. Being eternal optimists, we believe that there must be at least one legitimate non-skanky cunt Publicist out there capable of acheiving this goal.

This is a serious PR opportunity for the right person or firm who can demonstrate the ability and track record of successfully generating publicity for videos and TV shows for which “COP BAR” is being developed into.
View the video at: COPBAR.TV and if interested and QUALIFIED, contact epilepticarson@gmail.com for more information.

Needless to say; skanky cunts need not apply.

If anyone would like to share your reaction with the poster, here is the email.

As if my unemployment wasn't depressing enough, I can't even go on craigslist without being insulted and reminded of how sexism and my difficulties getting a job are related. For a long time I have been wondering how much the things on my resume that give me away as a feminist have been impacting my job search. I have thought about taking my double major in Gender Studies off for a period of time and seeing if I do any better (has anyone ever tried that?), but I worked hard for my double major and I shouldn't have to be ashamed of it. I know the economy is being rough on everyone right now, but I can't escape the feeling that it is being a little worse on me than others, and insults and discrimination in the want ads certainly doesn't help.

Right before I log into AOL to check my mail, this shows up and I can't help but read it.

This is one of the most ridiculous things I've read. Here are some gems:

"1. After washing your beautiful locks, don't forget to pick up your hair from the shower drain. It may not bother you but he doesn't like untangling your hair from his big toe."

"4. Speaking of..., don't let yourself go. That doesn't mean you must maintain a certain weight or length of hair for the sake of your marriage, but it is a gesture of love to take pride in your appearance. You may expect the same from him and you both deserve a mate that is clean, showered, shaved and cares about their health."

"11. Remember all those bodily functions you tried to keep discreet while you were in the throws of wooing him? Just because you have been married several years and are very comfortable around your beloved doesn't mean you can now blow, snort and pick to your heart's content."

Wow. I can't even think of a proper description for this. I mean, it's pretty horrible, but the fact that a woman wrote this almost makes it worse. It's not just some loser guy who wants to pretend that he knows how women work: it's a woman who's actually telling us how we should treat ourselves and our men (which, according to her, is to just be pretty and dainty and make sure he doesn't hear us fart).

Who decides what gets posted on AOL? A middle school child?

I don't know how many of you read the blogs over at Psychology Today, but one particular blogger has become very (in)famous for the popularity of his blog posts.

He's Dr. Satoshi Kanazawa and his blog is entitled the Scientific Fundamentalist and is entirely devoted to his musings on evolutionary psychology. However, what he's peddling in that blog of his is a very shady form of evo psych that more cloesly resembles unbridled sexism than it does true scientific theory.

Now, some of his topics are quite intersting to read (even if he provides little in the way of evidence, other than subjective musing) and not all that inflamatory. Lately, though, he's taken a major turn for offensive. A few priceless quotes for y'all:

"Forget what feminists, hippies, and liberals have told you in the last half century.  They are all lies based on political ideology and conviction, not on science.  Contrary to what they may have told you, it is very unlikely that money, promotions, the corner office, social status, and political power will make women happy.  Similarly, it is very unlikely that quitting their jobs, dropping out of the rat race, and becoming stay-at-home dads to spend all their times with their children will make men happy." (From How to be Happy)

"The best thing to do is to kill all the feminists and hippies and liberals.  Destroy political correctness completely once and for all.  Teach boys and girls that they are different, not the same, and that it’s okay (nay, wonderful) to be different.  One is not right and the other is not wrong.  Stop telling girls that they are inferior versions of boys, as feminists have done for the last half century, or, as has more recently been the case, stop telling boys that they are inferior versions of girls." (Also, from How to be Happy)

And here are some of his 'scientific' theories:

"The sex gap in earnings and the so-called glass ceiling are caused, not by employer discrimination or any other external forces, but by the evolved and internal sex differences in preferences, values, desires, dispositions, and temperaments." (From Women Have Better Things to Do Than Earn Money)

"For humans, because of high male parental investment, what is important is not the male’s genetic quality per se but his earning potential.  His genetic quality is important only to the extent that it predicts or correlates with his potential to earn and accumulate material resources." (From Why Young Single Men are More Xenophobic)

Hear that guys? You're gentic fitness is rolled up in your wallets... who cares if you have Huntington's or a fifth leg... as long as you got the $$ you get pussy (/sarcasm)

Anyhoo... I fully encourage and invite y'all to go read some of his blogs, just be forewarned they have a tendency to leave you flustered and angry, especially some of the comments.

Suggested Readings:

How to be Happy (by killing feminists )

Women Have Better Things to Do than Earn Money (apparently we're passive and way too into shoes )

Why Young Single Men are More Xenophobic (The KKK: not born of racism and Othering, but from the mating game)

The Power of Female Choice: Why Fat Chicks Get Laid More (whudda thunk?)

Why has the Age of Puberty declind in recent decades? (hint: Daddy issues)

Guess what is coming to my university? Yes! Carls Jr (i.e Hardees). Their Ads are made by a company named Mendelsohn Zien.

I have emailed the student union (ASUCLA ) and I'm hoping they will respond. I think just complaining among ourselves doesn't do anything. I wish there was a campaign to fight sexist ads in the US. I would join in a heartbeat.

Enjoy:

Ad #1: (Note: Hardee's is the east coast version of Carls Jr. The same version of this ad is currently is airing on the west coast)
http://www.myindiantube.com/show_video.php?video_id=gpD8zE-97AQ

A man is eating a burger. His car is vandalized with words "Cheater" written very large over the side of the car.
the narrator's voice:
"sometimes having three girlfriends is great...
other times,"
a smirk comes on the guy's face
"it's just expensive"

Ad #2: http://www.myindiantube.com/show_video.php?video_id=NLuhpaluL1M

Doctor's office with several women in the waiting room.
Secratary's voice: Dr. Ray's Office. Please hold.
A woman with big breasts gets up. A man that appears to be a doctor walks in and seems to be talking to the same woman who just stood up:
"Hello beautiful! I'm Dr Ray, thanks for coming. I was reading your file here and it says that you're interested in breast augmentation. Let me have you disrobe. and we're going to start with this measurement right here,...."
picks up some device that apprears to measure the size of a woman's breast.
Dr. Ray takes a measurement, smiles at the camera and says:
"wow, that's kind of small," then chuckles.
he continues: "now, there's nothing wrong with small breasts. But I think in your case, it would build your self-confidence if you went bigger.... Probably even a lot bigger."
the camera shows a chicken.
The narrator's voice: "Naturally larger chicken breast on the bacon swiss crispy chicken sandwich. New at Carls Jr."

Ad #3: http://www.myindiantube.com/show_video.php?video_id=OuNCMYKViN4

A teacher speaking to students in a classroom:
"it was once believed that the world was not round but flat." she takes off her glasses.
a male student leans over and looks at the teachers behind, and says: "check out the buns, they're fly,..."
The teacher lets down her hair, goes on top of her desk and says:
"ok class,.." and begins dancing on the desk.
A few male students start rapping about her "flat buns."
Meanwhile the teacher is laying on her desk and doing some sort of dance.

Ad #4: http://www.myindiantube.com/show_video.php?video_id=EKr_bvd8h2I

A young man eating buffalo wings at a restaurant where waitresses are all female and dressed in miniskirts and low cut shirts with big breasts. The guy is staring at the waitress.
The narrator says:
"Guys love going out for buffalo wings,..
that is,
when they're with the guys"
the camera zooms out to show a woman sitting next to the staring man who seems angry.
"Buffalo Chicken Sandwich, new at Carls Jr."

Other ads:
http://www.myindiantube.com/show_video.php?video_id=6as5B5E82ZE
(note: Hardee's and Carls Jr are the same)
http://www.myindiantube.com/show_video.php?video_id=P82hABWq1To
http://www.myindiantube.com/show_video.php?video_id=2rHuhl6ou7s

I'm up at 3:00 in the morning and I cannot sleep. So much is irritating me in society, and the lack of respect for teenage girls is what's messing with my head the most. I understand girls my age are under age and we don't really have that many rights until we're 18 but I feel the least a girl can get as a minor is respect as well as not being treated as if she's stupid or she's stupid because she doesn't agree with a certain adult.

Now before I sound too bratty, this topic is about teenagers having sex. I do agree to an extent that some teenagers aren't ready for sex yet but some are. I for one had lost my virginity at 15. Yeah I made a mistake with the first guy but as far as my good choices in sex partners along the way as well as boyfriends along with my knowledge of going on birth control, using condoms, getting tested everytime I get more birth control, and always having a stash of Plan B pills in my room makes me feel like I'm mature enough to make my own desicions in sex.

But it's more than adults telling me that I can't have sex because I don't have knowledge in protecting myself but also adults telling me I'm not emotionally stable either. I can't number how many times an adult has told me because of only being 16, I can't be emotionally ready for sex. I feel like no one can really tell me what I'm mentally able to do and that's just another thing that annoys the crap out of me.

Really Fox?  Really.  They have once again taken something completely out of context and used it to make stereotypical, slanderous, and sexist comments galore.  I haven't been offended on this many levels since Bill O'Reilly and the lesbian Pink Pistols gang.  The research behind this idotic tirade can be found here.

The point this study was making is that abuse and discrimination of LBGT youth is the cause of higher rates of pregnancy.  While the research methods may be dubious (surveying unwilling and unidentified teenagers at school), the point is that sexual abuse and general lack of support for LGBT students may be the cause for these findings.

Fox took this concept and made a mockery of it.  "There are no such thing as bisexual women, they're just horny." COME ON.  I'm aware that this coverage was meant to make fun of a questionable research project, but it does so in a way that is demeaning to women, the LBGT population specifically.

You can respond to these ridiculous "news" segments here: "Does Greg make your blood boil? Don't just sit there. Get off your ass and e-mail: redeye@foxnews.com"    

The next story will probably be about angry feminists who can't take a joke.

This is the second time I have to post something about the despicable things AOL publishes on its news site.

In a segment about how to read body language, it says

"Okay, you know enough about your partner's menstrual cycle to know when to leave her alone."

Lovely. I don't know which this is implying--that women are incorrigible, PMS-y bitches that you must avoid like the plague during "that time of the month," or that menstruation makes sex mysteriously undesirable for men. Both or either, it's really offensive.

We all know how hurtful accusations and fabrications about PMS can be, but I want to address the issue of sex during menstruation. Why is this such a stigma? It shames women about their natural selves, bodies, and cycles. And everyone owes their own life to menstruation, the sign that women are fertile. 

Is it too dirty? Truth is, I don't really care, because sex is already pretty messy, and if you need perfect cleanliness it probably isn't for you anyway. And the average person isn't like that. If people avoid sex during menstruation, it's because our misogynistic culture sends out messages like the one on AOL.

As Jenna Jameson said, "it's just a little war paint, who cares?"

So I braved a freezing cold and snowy Vancouver afternoon to do a little giftmas shopping at Chapters. I knew what I was looking for, but I browsed the gift idea tables to see if anything else would catch my eye. Do you know what I saw? The typical gift ideas for Him and Her tables, but it was what was on those tables that set my teeth on edge. On the Her table there were an assortment of cook books. On the His table a selection of sports books. Because men could never be interested in a cook book and a woman could never be interested in a book about sports. This is interesting considering my whole reason for shopping there was to get my BOYFRIEND a COOKBOOK! Funny eh?

Is there an "I can't believe this" category?

For $9.99, download this handy iPhone application to track the women in your life, specifically designed for guys to know what it's safe to have a major discussion during "her best time period." Yup, introducing iCycle, a tracking application that tells you where a woman is in her menstrual cycle.

Do they have an app to warn of patriarchal stupidity? Probably the alarm would be going off all the time.

Here's the description:

With one button click, always know when your girlfriends / wife have their period. Enjoy peace and quiet in your relationships.

Prevent arguments and unnecessary misunderstandings, save money, plan your dates, vacations, weekend trips, and major discussions within her “best time period” of the month, the Green Zone. iCycle is extremely simple to use and was specifically created for men but can be used by women just as well. If you are dating, married, or simply want to keep track of the important women in your life, iCycle can help improve your relationship(s).

The visual cues show when your women are about to get their period in their current cycle (the Caution Zone), when they are having their period and are highly irritable (the Warning Zone), when they are coming off of their period (the Good Zone), and when they are in the green zone (the Best Zone or Ovulation Period). Improve your relationship and your love life by knowing when your woman is in the “green zone”. Know when her sexual peak period is during the month. Great if you are planning to get pregnant and know when she is most fertile.

Features:
1. Visually displays the current zone she is in (Red, Blue, Green, or Yellow)
2. Display the number of days left for the current zone
3. Visually displays the cue for the next zone and the next date
4. Track an unlimited number of women
5. Easy to setup and use

Via.

My family happily listens to XM radio in the car and at home. Well, I used to listen happily. But after Ben Taylor's Wicked Way played on my favorite station (Channel 51-Coffehouse) , I have been too offended to continue supporting XM radio. In Wicked Way, Taylor sings about wanting to get a girl drunk so he can have his wicked way with her. He goes on to say that he has no interest in getting to know her and tells her "So don’t you fight it cause I know you’re gonna like it." 

Listening to this song literally gives me chills. The music itself sounds like a lovesong but the lyrics are distasteful and disturbing. One might argue that this is just a song about casual sex, but it is only his pleasure that is considered. The female in this song is merely an outlet for his sexuality. And after "three hours or more" she is no longer useful to him. And we wonder why girls invest all of their self-worth in their sexuality?

This song glamorizes sexual aggression yet it is being played over and over again. Is this the kind of song we want people to be humming at work or on the way to school? Please contact XM radio at listenercare@xmradio.com and tell them to stop playing such offensive songs!

Thank you,

Lilly

P.S.- If anyone has any suggestions about how to most effectivly stop XM radio (and all radio stations) from playing this song, please let me know. I am still high school and this is the first time I have tried to do something like this.

I just read Charles Blow’s column in the New York Times, “the Demise of Dating” . “The Demise of Dating” is a short piece chronicling the rise of what Mr. Blow calls the “phenomenon” of hooking up on college campuses and in high schools. Mr. Blow made a number of points in his column that I found very problematic.

In his discussion of hooking up, Blow makes some broad generalizations which are sexist and untrue.

“The cons center on the issues of gender inequity. Girls get tired of hooking up because they want it to lead to a relationship (the guys don’t), and, as they get older, they start to realize that it’s not a good way to find a spouse.”

It may be hard to believe, but not every female in college wants a relationship, or even to get married. It really bothers me that this article assumes that men don’t want a relationship. Such assumptions can be harmful to men who do want a relationship. Another problem I had with this article is the assumption that hooking up is restricted to straight people. There is absolutely no discussion of sexual encounters and relationships that do not conform to the heterosexual norm.

The column ends with:

“It used to be that “you were trained your whole life to date,” said Ms. Bogle. “Now we’ve lost that ability — the ability to just ask someone out and get to know them.”

Now that’s sad.”

Why is it a positive thing to train your whole life to date? What does that even mean? If it’s true that less emphasis is placed on dating this days, that doesn’t mean that people under 30 or people who “hook up” have lost all social skills. It is silly to think that it’s necessary to be “trained your whole life” to be able to ask someone out. 

Is it me, or is this really not funny?

Apparently certain people find it "amusing" that 1) such a commercial can air on TV in Denmark in the first place and 2) that the ad ends up being for a washing machine.

That's not the word I would use...

I am a 19 year old going to college in the states. I'm member of my university's philosophy club and have been for a year and a half now. Our meetings work like this: each member submits a question into a hat. The questions are pulled at random and then the club discusses it. Every question is read. Examples include "What is the meaning of life?" and "Is violence every justified?" etc.

I participate actively in the club and have ever since I joined. But about three weeks ago, I was reminded that no matter what I have to say in the philosophic realm, I am still a woman a talking vagina with a set of boobs. A freshman (coincidence?) submitted for his question, "On a scale of 1-10, how hot would Annabelle look in a toga?"

Because every now and then I need to be dehumanized, invalidated, and reduced to an object in an academic setting. I have never felt so embarrassed and stupid. To make matters worse- people started discussing the question. Follow up questions like "What kind of toga?" and "Would she be wearing a bra?" were asked. These are all people with whom I talk about Aristotle and Socrates, and not one of them acknowledged the inappropriateness (to put it lightly) of the question.

Before you go to comment "Get over it!" or "You should be flattered!" or anything along those lines...

NO.

I was humiliated in an academic forum . For christ's sake, this is an environment where I share my opinions on everything from morality to women's rights, and at least one person is just picturing me in different outfits while I speak. What was probably meant to be a flirtatious comment has had me incredibly upset and embarrassed for the last three weeks.

I am an intelligent woman. I am so fucking smart, and I get this horrible, sickening feeling that I will never be taken seriously because I have blonde hair and breasts. I am brighter than more than half the men I know, but hey, if you ever start to feel intimidated by that, you can just reduce me to a fucking object. I don't know, maybe get a cardboard cutout of me and take a picture of yourself grabbing "my" tit. That'll make you feel a little more secure.

 This is just ridiculous. In the talks I've had with older women during my time at the university, I haven't recieved much assurance that this sort of thing goes away when you start working with "mature" adults. 

Back when I was a wee bairn of eighteen years old (I say with a nostalgic sniffle in my old age of twenty), I was in an English class taught by a guy named Mr. Brady who's an ultra-conservative, born-again Christian.  His staunch conservative views in a class of generally liberal or on-the-border students made for some interesting discussions, since although he liked to talk about "the gay" being a choice and how awful abortion is, he was still a pretty cool guy outside of that.  My guy friends and I would sit around in his class for hours after school ended, discussing life as we saw it and gently debating our respective point of views.

He's fairly unique as far as the ultra-conservatives I know happen to go.  Teen pregnancy was high at my school -- really high -- and he made it clear that he would adopt any child that a girl wanted to abort as long as she agreed to a closed adoption.  Most people didn't take him up on the offer, although I know one young lady did talk to him about it and, I think, ended up keeping the baby for herself.  Whether or not that was a good decision doesn't matter, since it was hers in the end and I'm not going to judge.  In any case, he seemed to live his beliefs rather than just talk about them, which is admirable (even if I fiercely disagreed with him).

At the time, I was struggling with my gender identity.  There were gays at my school, but I wasn't strictly a lesbian; I called myself a "gay man" because I was more comfortable dressing and acting like a guy, even though I preferred other boys.  I did have a girlfriend at the time, but without knowing any other transgendered kids, I had no idea who or what I was.  I had never heard of "genderqueer" or realized I could be neither boy nor girl, gay or straight.  I've since become very comfortable with my role as third-gendered and am on the road to happily marrying an awesome guy who loves my genderqueered self for who I am.  At the time, though, I was completely lost, and it was actually sort of helpful to talk to a teacher who seemed to think that it was all a decision and clearly I had daddy issues or something, since it gave me a good perspective on what I didn't believe.

For our senior pictures, the boys had to wear tuxes and the girls had to wear feminine drapes, and I got forced into a drape and my mom seemed to think makeup would be a good idea so I ended up looking pretty girly.  The same kind of thing happened at prom (largely because I have a weird body and I couldn't find any tuxes that fit me), so on the last day of class I showed Mr. Brady my prom picture and my senior picture to kind of prove that it's not that I can't look girly, it's just that I don't want to.

Apparently, he completely missed my point, because he gave me a Look and said, "You know, you don't have to be gay.  You're good-looking when you're actually dressed like a girl.  You can get guys if you want."

At the time, I wasn't offended.  I turned it into a joke, waggling my eyebrows and saying, "In a couple hours I won't be your student anymore, if that's what you're getting at."  He laughed and flashed his wedding ring at me, and the whole class laughed too, and that was the end of it.  Reflecting on it now, what makes me wonder is the implication that only ugly girls have to be gay, bisexual, transexual, or somewhere in between.

Why?

Is this some idea that so-called ugly girls can't get guys, so they have to resort to being dykes?

The image-centered implications of that statement disgust me now.  I suppose it should be flattering that I'm attractive enough to get a guy when I look girly -- yeeeaaah -- but it's not.  Why could anyone possibly think that women must always want men, and if they resort to anything else, they must be ugly?  It's so... well... sexist.  It's the idea that men are better than women, and more desirable, and I honestly thought we were past that as a society.  I guess it's naive of me to hope for that.

What's ironic about the situation is that when I attracted my mate, I was "dressed like a guy."  And my man is about as straight as they come.  I actually don't have that much of a problem attracting men when I look boyish, to tell you the truth, so I think that shows I didn't have to be dressed like a girl for open-minded people to see my true beauty.

An animal-related forum I post on regularly also has an off topic sub-forum, and this post recently appeared, by a new poster:

I have dropped by this site from time to time because I enjoy some of the lampooning of bad breeders and the "snarky" humor. I don't make comments because I don't know all that much. But I have noticed in a couple threads some real female angst over the men in their lives. This pains me because I have a daughter and think a great deal about what and how to teach her about men. If I may, I would offer a point of view. Only that - just a point of view. Don't get in a twist - it's just my opinion and I don't have an overly developed sense of it's value.

Continue reading I don't think I'm out of line here, what do you folks think?.

Posted by mayfly - December 09, 2008, at 02:12PM | in Sexism

Yes, men still do this. It's part of the "game." I've been told that when a man "scores" a higher number, it makes him feel better about himself. So glad we're all here to make men feel better about themselves.

This practice has always enraged me. It reminds me of a dog show. I feel like the men who do this are out there in the bars with tape measures making sure we meet the AKC requirements for head size and sheen of coat.

I have to wonder what makes one human being feel that they have the right to apply a harsh, numerical, comparitive judgement on others. The way I understand it, it seems to be applied to groups of female friends. The guy who scores the highest ranking girl in the group, wins.

I remember back in high school I caught wind of a group of guys I knew applying the ranking system to my group of girl friends. These guys were supposed to be our friends, and some were even dating some of us. But, they felt the need to compare us based on breast size, body type, facial features, etc, and assign us numbers. We were in the smart kid classes with these guys, they knew we were more than bust sizes. Or did they? It bothered me a lot at the time- I felt violated to have been studying and judged without my permission. But I wrote it off as a high school boy thing.

What I have recently discovered (it's a very long story how) is that this ranking system is used by men of all ages and can be quite common. It seems also that the men who do it don't see anything wrong with it. They argue that everyone is attracted to certain looks, and the better looking girl they score, the better they feel about themselves. They don't seem to realize that comparing and judging other humans without their permission is a violation. They don't seem to realize that women don't like to have their body compared to their best friend's and get assigned a number accordingly. They don't seem to realize that women, no matter what they look like, do not exist to boost their own low self esteem. They don't seem to get that someone's value as a person can't be numerified and if it were it wouldn't be based on looks.

Basically, when I hear stories like this, I am led to believe that the men who do it don't see the women they are doing it to as people, fellow humans, not show dogs.

Recently I decided to keep a list of the sexist comments that people have said to me (I just started this semester but plan to keep this list going). What bothers me the most about these comments is that the people who said them didn't see how they were sexist. In each situtaion, I told them why their comment was BS and why it offended me; however, they either didn't always agree (which is OK, I like having "intelligent debates," so to say... just don't use your BS "statistics") or laughed at me.  What's sad is that these are only some of the comments people have made. Sexism is so ingrained in our culture that it is usually condoned. Below is my list. For some of the comments, I noted the context of the conversation and my thoughts in parentheses.

Sexit Comments Recently Made to Me:

• "It'd be such a waste for you not to become a mother." (When I suggested I may not want children or would prefer to adopt.)
• "You need to just give in and conform." (When I said I don't want a "traditional" wedding.)
• "Feminists bring down the male's status in order to boost their own."
• "Reading that book probably makes you get all worked up and what to castrate men." (When a classmate saw me reading Jessica's books... excuse me, these books rock! And feminism IS NOT about "hating men!")
• "It's in a woman's genes to be needy and want to be loved."
• "A good number [of sex partners] for guys is 19 before settling down and 12 for girls, but anything over 10 should be considered dirty." (When having a debate about the slut/stud double standard.)
• "You have no regard for human life." (When suggested to my mother [big mistake] that I was considering being an egg donor to help infertile couples, single woman, and same sex couples have children or for scientific research.)
• "You're not a feminist. You're one of those girls who's only a feminist when its convenient." (AHHHHH! This one bothers me so much! People seem to think feminism is "one sided," but it's the total opposite - it's about breaking down binaries, working towards equality, AND showing how sexism/racism/classism etc affects EVERYONE.)
• "You can't turn a ho into a housewife." (Because, you know, women are either for sex or for cleaning, cooking, and taking care of the kids. No inbetween.)
  
• "Feminists are about 10 to 15 years behind. They are fighting for issues that aren't relevant, like equal rights." (O! M! G!)
• "What kind of girl doesn't want to get married?"
  

Most of these comments were made by men (all except the one my mother made about egg donation and the last one on the list). These are comments that people (some are friends and classmates...) made to me and don't even realize why saying these things is wrong. Like I said, in each situation I stood up for myself; but most of the time they continued to disagree (with some more sexist BS) or gave some "statistics" and "facts" (ex: "If birth control were less expensive more younger girls would take it and have sex without condoms." [Because birth control makes you "slutty," apparently].) I didn't necessarily turn make arguments out of the comments, but I believe in standing up for yourself if you feel offended.

Overall, these comments frustrate me!

Pornographic magazines like 'Nuts', 'Zoo' and 'Loaded', as well as 'newspapers' like the Daily Sport, are available to anyone in Britain and are often at the eye-level of children in shops. One of these magazines (They are fairly interchangeable) encourages men to send in topless pictures of their girlfriends. Because they don't check with the women for their consent, they got in trouble for printing a photo of a 14 year-old girl in one issue. However, the magazine didn't go out of print. The Daily Sport is filled with adverts for prostitutes, and once ran a story about a woman raped and murdered on the same page as more than 100 of these adverts. Anyone can buy these, they are not age-regulated, but that might all change according to the British newspaper, the Independent.

Now, in my opinion, we should ban these misogynistic rags altogether, or at the very least put them only in sex shops. But age-regulations are a good start. What is interesting is the study quoted in the Independent article:

"The Top Shelf Report surveyed a sample of sixth-form students and found that 100 per cent of girls who looked at the Daily Sport, Zoo and Nuts reported being angry, offended or upset by the images they contained. Only 11 per cent of male students reported feeling the same, but one-fifth admitted that looking at this material encouraged them to see women as sex objects."

I am pretty pleased that the girls in this study didn't pretend they weren't offended just to please the boys. The organisation Object is also quoted in the article, and I encourage everybody to go and read Object's expose of them on their website (under 'lad's mags' in the middle).

I (luckily) don't have to put up with this this year, but my sister was talking about it last night and got me thinking.  She has a family Christmas party (on her finance's side) where all the women bring a gift (<$10) for another woman (wrapped) and all the men bring one for another man, and then you draw names and each pick a present (in the appropriate gender category).  I've had to participate in these in the past, and normally women get candles, bath products or kitchen supplies.  Men usually get some sort of little gadget or tool, or something else 'manly'.

I honestly never thought about whether this is sexist or not until last night.  I was going through store adverstisment flyers, looking for ideas of what my sister could bring to the party.  But then I started thinking how stupid and useless nearly every gift I ever got from parties like that was (to me).  I mean, I li