Silly Lawsuits, but More Importantly: Gender

A few days ago, Roy Den Hollander, a lawyer who has filed a series of misogynist lawsuits, came out with this gem: he has filed an antifeminist suit against Columbia University for offering women's studies classes, arguing that Columbia uses federal funding to support a “religionist belief system called feminism.” Now, part of me would like to dismiss this as the silly lawsuit it is, but sometimes such trivial things are important for us to reexamine the larger issues at stake.

As an undergraduate at Columbia, the debate on women's studies and on adding women writers to such classes as Literature Humanities (the great literary works from Homer to Woolf-- one of two female authors in the series) and Contemporary Civilization (the great philosophers-- from Plato to, well, Woolf once again, this time the only female writer), reared its head from time to time. In navel-gazing online college forums, such as Columbia's The Bwog, where commenters are anonymous and misogynist remarks rampant, the debate ran along these lines: someone starts off with a misogynist remark, someone asks why there aren't men's studies if there are women's studies, someone else points out that the past two thousand years were "men's studies," someone else ignores this somewhat cogent remark to take the opportunity to make a few jokes about "boobs" and other funny female body parts, and someone else rounds it off by saying that it is all moot as humanities majors are generally wasting their money on unemployable skills.

High-minded stuff, for sure. The point being that even those who try to get past the boob jokes are unable to articulate the purpose of women's studies beyond a call for balance. Which makes me think maybe the trivial isn't so trivial. Maybe it's time to rearticulate some of the values of women's studies. But more importantly, perhaps it's also time to make a wholesale change over to Gender Studies, which would undermine the whole of the lawyer's invidious accusations. Because in the end, with courses not only called "Feminist Texts" but "Gender, Culture, and Human Rights," and "Sexuality and the Law," and an institute called the Institute for Research on Women and Gender (IRWAG), that's what we, and Columbia, are really talking about.

Gender studies is very much the evolution of groundwork laid out by Women's Studies. While we now recognize that inquiring into women's role in society is imperative for an understanding of power dynamics and social relationships, we also recognize that it is just as important to understand how definitions of masculinity may shape men's approach to women, each other, and themselves. Even more so, we see that there is difference within difference: that seeing the world from a gay male perspective overturns traditional notions of maleness. The theory behind women's and gender studies goes further to a better understanding of class and race. We are no longer shackled with a simplistic grouping of "working class" as a faceless mass of singular experience, recognizing that women's and men's roles differ significantly within that group. We recognize that citizenship may also be defined along gendered lines (historically, women give their reproductive systems and males their lives to the state--but how does that definition change now that women are also on the battlefield?)

The intersection of race and class helps us to understand that women are not one "sisterhood" of victimhood throughout history, that women are actors in the past and today--both the perpetrators and the perpetrated--divided along lines of racial, ethnic, economic, sexual differences. Even at the seemingly strict dichotomous line of "body," we can overturn a male/female divide by recognizing that women have experienced their bodies differently throughout history: those who have reproduced, those who haven't, those who have undergone forced sterilization, and so on.

Ok, but enough of Gender Studies 101. What's the practical application? Well, a little thinking about gender might lead you to question a few things. For instance: Single sex public education, Gender testing at the Olympics, The effect of birth control pills on your love life, and to bring us full circle: Diversity in academia.

But maybe I'm jumping the gun of the whole Gender Studies thing. Is there still a place for "Women's Studies" (single gender) in today's colleges?

--Kristen

Attention Authorial Debutantes

For all you first-time authors out there, I just came upon a very cool find. The Debutante Ball is a group blog for debut authors (looks like almost exclusively women). They offer "takes on weekly bookish and not-so-bookish topics" and invite readers to "watch our collective sanity crumble as our debuts approach." Man, I know the feeling.

Thought I'd share some links from their blogroll, as they list a number of other group blogs about books that GWP readers may find of interest:

• Beatrice
• Channeling Erma
• Critical Mass
• Drunk Writer Talk
• Good Girls Kill
• Jungle Red
• Naked Authors
• Penny Dreadful
• Rocket Girls
• Writers’ Group Blog

And speaking of group blogs, I just heard a new term to describe them: "grog." I don't think I like. Sounds too much like "frog", or a drink you swig at an Irish bar, no? I think I'll stick with "group blog" when referring to the future incarnation of GWP. Unless anyone else has a suggestion? I'm open!

Where You'll Find Me in September...

Thanks to Speaking Matters, Lisa Johnson, Woodhull, and the Association for Women in Communications, here's where I'll be hanging out come September.

Hope some of you can join me!

SEPTEMBER 2 - “Girl with Keyboard: Making Waves in the Feminist Blogosphere”
University of South Carolina, Upstate
Noon workshop

“Talking ’bout My Generation: Youth, Gender, Race, Class and the 2008 Election”
University of South Carolina, Upstate
7pm talk

SEPTEMBER 5-7 - “Raise Your Voices”
Woodhull Nonfiction Writers’ Retreat
Ancramdale, NY
Workshop on nonfiction book proposals

SEPTEMBER 26 - “Women, Girls, Ladies: An Intergenerational Conversation about Work”
Association of Women in Communications Conference
Doubletree Hotel Crystal City
Washington, DC
12:45-2pm (luncheon panel)

I'm currently booking for December. To bring me to your campus, company, or organization, please email info@speakingmatters.com. Thanks!

We Will Miss You, Stephanie Tubbs Jones

I really can't believe she's gone, just like that. Many of my colleagues have worked with her office. Among other contributions, she was a staunch supporter of women's rights. She will be very sorely missed.

Life is precious. Live every minute, my mother always says. I have a feeling Stephanie did. And she should have had many, many more.

New Study on Generational Gaps and Bridges

Yesterday, EMILY's List released their 2008 Women's Monitor Study, “From 18 to 80: Women on Politics and Society.” Based on interviews with over 1,400 women voters in four distinct generational groups--Gen Y, Gen X, Boomers, and Seniors--the national study looks at look at "the gaps and bridges between generations and what they mean for the next president of the United States."

Among the findings:

• After Gen Y women, Senior women are Senator Obama’s next strongest generation: Obama leads Senator McCain by an incredible 30 points among Gen Y, 11 points among Seniors, 8 points among Gen X and 6 points among Boomers.

• Hope and Optimism vs. Safety and Security: The key thematic divide in the presidential race is the equal split between those women who are looking for a candidate who offers hope and optimism (supporting Obama by a 60 point margin) and those who are looking for a candidate who offers safety and security (supporting McCain by a 35 point margin). The women’s electorate divides exactly evenly among those who are looking for hope and optimism (38 percent) and safety and security (38 percent).

And, yes, my personal favorite:

• Young women don’t take equality for granted. Seventy-seven (77) percent of Gen Y agrees that sexism is still a serious problem for women today, including 36 percent who agree strongly. Seventy-eight (78) percent of Gen Y agrees that there is still a need for a women’s movement that has a strong political voice, including 34 percent who agree strongly. Eighty-three (83) percent of Gen Y thinks it would be better if more women were elected to office, including 48 percent who agree strongly.

The complete report is available on the EMILY’s List website at www.emilyslist.org.

And for those lucky ducks attending the DNC, EMILY's List will hosting a breakfast and a talk about the findings on Tuesday, August 26th at the Downtown Convention Center, Korbel Ballroom 2C, from 8:30-10:00. RSVPs required.

What's Next...

Next week I'll be "shedding," as Marco tells me it's called, at a writers and artists retreat up in Massachusetts. I'll be blogging about writing process again (it was so helpful to hear your thoughts on outlining last week!) so stay tuned...Kristen will also be blogging, and I'm thrilled to announce that she will now be joining me as a regular contributing blogger each week here on GWP! More exciting changes around here coming soon. This fall, a whole new look...

New Fertility Stats

This morning I woke up to the voice of Katherine Lanpher (LOVE her) on NPR's "The Takeaway" talking about a new Census Bureau report on fertility. According to the data, the number of women ages 40 to 44 who were childless in 2006 is twice as high as it was 30 years earlier. Among other highlights, the report, Fertility of American Women: 2006, found:

• The majority of women with a recent birth (57 percent) were in the labor force. (Are we, um, surprised?)
  
• Of the 4.2 million women who had a birth in the previous 12 months, 36 percent were separated, widowed, divorced or never married at the time of the survey. Of these 1.5 million unmarried mothers, 190,000 were living with an unmarried partner.
• Second generation Hispanic women tend to have lower fertility rates than either foreign-born Hispanics or those who were third generation (i.e., native and of native parents).
• The highest levels of current fertility (67 births in the year prior to the survey per 1,000 women) were among those with a graduate or professional degree.
  

The report also finds that the national birth rate for women age 15 to 50 receiving public assistance in 2006 was about three times of those not receiving public assistance. A decade after the passage of welfare reform in 1996, data show that women in this age range receiving public assistance had a birth rate of 155 births per 1,000 women, compared with 53 births per 1,000 women not receiving it.

To hear Katherine's interview with a prof from Florida who hits on some of the implications of it all, click here.

GUEST POST: Off the Shelf

This morning, the debut of another of our new monthly columns, "Off the Shelf" by Elline Lipkin. Elline is a poet and nonfiction writer. Her first book, The Errant Thread, was chosen by Eavan Boland to receive the Kore Press First Book Award and was published in 2006. She's currently working on a book about girls for Seal Press and will be a Visiting Scholar with the Center for Research on Women at UCLA in the fall. She recently taught at UC Berkeley where she was a Postdoctoral Scholar with the Beatrice Bain Research Group. And here she is! - GWP

Parenting, Inc. by Pamela Paul

Just six months ago I felt bombarded by my bedside stack of wedding guides. Each, under the guise of "must have to be happy on your Big Day," proscribed things to wear, stuff to buy, favors to give, rituals to enact, details to watch, all apparently needed to fulfill the American wedding tradition. Without each one in place, they warned, The Wedding Dream just couldn't be. Happily, I tossed most aside in favor of indiebride status (shared with you Deb! Mazel tov!), but the relentlessness of "to-dos," all sheltered under the umbrella of "necessary for happiness," was enough to make me question my every choice.

Moving quickly on to the next stage of later-in-life union, I was glad for journalist Pamela Paul's preview warning about the lists of Stuff new parents are told they need -- so I can know what not to do, or at least, to try to resist. The "new parents checklist" Paul is given before the birth of her first child starts her off on a consumer journey that exacerbates every anxiety, worry, and concern stewing about her impending parenthood.

In her new book Parenting, Inc., Paul fires back – by examining the multiple industries that launch both an avalanche of products at new parents (only sometimes aimed at their babies) and the landslide of guilt, obligation, and often enough, misinformation that accompanies these products. Paul outlines how confused, overwhelmed, and/or desperate parents feel and then how susceptible they become to overpriced wares and unnecessary "edutainment" programs that they're told will give their babies a head start.

Paul's research is thorough as she exposes the selling points of everything from Baby Einstein (experts can't tell if a baby is really engaged or not and setting a tape on an endless loop often serves as a less guilt-inducing break for parents since their child is "learning") to teaching signing to babies (results dubious) to exclusive NYC clubs tailored to well-heeled babies, nannies, and parents (tapping into peer pressure and celebrity allure). She visits "enrichment classes" that range from Little Maestros to Gymboree. It doesn't take a critical eye to see most kids are actively disengaged and that often the only ones benefiting are the parents who are eager to be out of the house and connecting with each other.

Paul exposes the phalanx of consultants who stand at the ready to charge overstretched or just overly concerned parents, from sleep specialists to thumb-sucking experts to bike tutors to potty-training day programs. A through-line in the book is the loss of extended family for support and expertise and their replacement with a consumerist approach to parenting through a deluge of products each packaged with angst-inducing rhetoric: This will be the key to make your baby smarter, brighter, swifter in his or her head start to Harvard. Particularly revealing are Paul's interviews with many of the business-savvy entrepreneurs (including some "mompreneurs") who realized what a vulnerable and anxious customer the new parent can be and who are ready to market accordingly.

Paul's writing is engaging, particularly as she candidly reveals her own needs and frustrations as a parent and partly researches the book while into her pregnancy with her second child. She uses her own experience as a measuring stick to look critically at what she finds.

One critique of the book is, in some sense, also its strength -- its relentlessness. Paul reiterates the sheer velocity of products to buy, outsourced help to tap, and crushing sense of obligation that parents feel, but her point is made (and remade) as she debunks their necessity. There are "nameologists" who will provide naming packages, tot manner minders, expert baby-proofers; no corner of childhood is exempt from a product or expert to help a parent do it better. The sense of frenetic obligation is palpable.

After awhile, I would have found it more interesting to hear about alternatives – parents who resisted, consumer groups who called products out, DIY'ers who found a way around the monolith of consumer pressure. And while she makes it clear that the dilemma of too much stuff is a class-based issue, this seems a place to expand her argument. How many kids who had tutoring before age 2 really live up to the racing head start they were supposedly getting? How many geniuses came from humble beginnings where no educational accoutrements were available? And from what context do these parents feel "every opportunity" is truly necessary for a child?

The negative effects of "helicopter parents" are only touched on and I wondered from where and when did such class-based devotion to achievement spring? Towards the book's end the text turns more reflective as Paul asks a range of experts what it even means to parent, never mind parent "well" and it's a relief, finally, to tie together the economic and social forces that goad parents toward an ethos of inadequacy and a cycle of self-doubt that seem to make few happy, despite the consumerism that promises exactly that. A few startlingly refreshing voices practically sing through the madness, such as that of Elisa Sherona, a 63-year-old grandmother who raised five kids in the '60s and '70s and is unafraid to declare outright you just don't need any of this stuff and questions how raising kids like this will affect them as adults. While the latter remains to be seen, at the book's end Paul finally has determined that she doesn't need these products or programs for her kids and that that doesn't mean she's a bad parent. She lets out a sigh of relief that echoes Sherona's thoughts, and seems all the more relieved that she can finally release.

-Elline Lipkin

INTRODUCING: A New Blog About Fathers

I was SO sad to hear that the organization Dads and Daughters had to fold its tent this month due to lack of funds. I add my voice to the chorus of women sending shout outs to the folks behind DADs for their wonderful work these past 10 years.

One door closes, another creaks open. I'm excited to share a new blog by a member of my writers group, Paul Raeburn (left), over at Psychology Today. It's called "About Fathers". Paul also blogs at Fathers and Families, and he culls from the latest research and writes Very Smart Things about the importance of fathers and how fathers affect children's development. Paul's a journalist and the author of "Acquainted with the Night," a memoir of raising children with bipolar disorder and depression, and a new father himself. I encourage GWP readers to visit and comment and check him out.

A Young Hillary Supporter Reflects

Jamie Maffeo is a student at Saint Ann's School in Brooklyn and will be in tenth grade this coming fall. At age 15, Jamie has become one of Writopia Lab's most prolific writers. She is a writer of poetry, memoir, and fiction, and has garnered multiple regional and national awards from Scholastic Art & Writing Awards in all three genres over the last three years.

We very much welcome (thoughtful!) comments on Jamie’s post. An aside: A former Hillary supporter myself, I’ve nevertheless been having mixed feelings about Hillary’s name being on the convention ballot and am still trying to understand the politics of it all. I find myself very moved by Jamie’s conviction below. - GWP

Hail to the Runner-Up!

In a recent writing workshop when Debbie asked me to write down three things, no matter how minor or grand, that I would like to change, only one thing came to mind. With each tap of my pencil I came to the realization that it was the only significant matter I wanted to write down. Quickly I wrote, “I would like to change the fact that Barack Obama became the presumptive democratic nominee-I wish Hillary Clinton had won instead.”

Over the past months I have become enraptured with Hillary Clinton’s intelligence, experience, and ability to continue fighting even with the bellicose nature of the press coverage. Not only was the press treating Barack Obama with obvious delicacy but they were also treating Hillary Clinton appallingly. For example, whereas Hillary Clinton was harshly criticized for showing emotion at a press conference, Barack Obama came out smelling like a rose after using the same words that Massachusetts Governor Patrick Deval used in one of his speeches as if they were his own. Regardless of what I saw as the clear press bias towards Obama, I was not and am not captivated by his empty speeches no matter how grandiloquent.

Many of my friends, however, were. After watching late night primaries, caucuses and debates I began to voice my opinion in school. I had never been as interested in politics and former elections as I was now: getting into arguments with close friends and shouting out in history class. I was tired of hearing the same mantras:

“But Obama wants change.”
“I’m sick of the Clintons.”
“Hillary has no personality.”

I would return their attacks with equal aggression saying, “Yes I get that Obama wants change but how is he going to make change? All of his speeches were bombastic and eloquent but they had no substance to them!” I would continue, wistfully, “She is just so intelligent. She has so much more experience then Obama. I just wish Obama had waited until 2012 or 2016 to run.”

I would emphasize the issues. I agreed with her universal health care plan. Hillary wanted to stop health care providers from turning away clients due to pre-existing conditions. She wanted mental illness to be covered. I also liked her plan to solve health care problems by starting now as a senator and not waiting until 2009. Hillary had great ideas about fighting global warming by using cars that run on fuel cells, bio fuels, and electricity. She wanted cars to get more mileage to the gallon then ever before so that the cost of driving will diminish. To conserve energy Hillary wanted buildings to be constructed that are more energy efficient. How can you argue with that?

Hillary talks facts and her solutions are realistic. She has had the motivation and dedication and after Obama became the presumptive democratic nominee I felt somewhat cheated as her supporter, wishing the press had been more just. With Hillary no longer in the race, my interest waned and I began to only casually glimpse at newspaper articles here and there. Slowly my day-to-day Obama versus Hillary arguments died down as the race turned to Obama versus McCain.

Now, days away from the August 26th National Democratic Convention, I’m getting excited again, because Hillary Clinton will speak at the convention.

I look forward to a count at the convention and am thrilled that Hillary Clinton’s name will be put on the ballot. A delegate count will give Hillary’s delegates the opportunity to cast their vote for this outstanding woman and will give me, a young Hillary supporter who cannot yet vote, the chance to honor my presumptive candidate with some R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

Newsflash: Glass Ceiling Intact in State Exec Branch

Following on the heels of that last one, this just in from the Center for Women in Government & Civil Society, University at Albany, SUNY:

A new report, Glass Ceiling in Gubernatorial Appointments, 1997-2007, provides new gender, race, and ethnicity data and a national and state-by-state trend analysis on the demographic composition of gubernatorial appointees in state governments, 1997-2007.

The report indicates that the glass ceiling remains intact for women appointed policy leaders in the executive branch of most state governments. Over the 11-year period, women's share of policy leadership posts increased by a modest 6.8 percentage points to 35 percent. With respect to race and ethnicity, even as substantial changes in the race and ethnicity composition of the U.S. population continue to be recorded, the demographics of executive branch policy leaders changed very little between 1997 and 2007.

The report is available for download here. Read it and weep.

She's Out There...

So check this out:

From the filmmakers of Mad Hot Ballroom comes a new social justice cause documentary, what's your point, honey?

The doc puts a "new face on political leadership" by introducing 7 possible contenders coming down the pipeline, while revealing the inequalities that still exist today. The aim is to start the conversation -- again. Teens and tweens, weave in and out to present the next generations' take on the topic, giving the film punch. On the doc’s trail is a soon-to-be published book, She's Out There! The Next Generation of Presidential Candidates, presenting a "doc in book form" to a mass audience.

Runtime is 87 minutes, and the film includes a 30-page study guide written by two faculty members at PACE University. Here's the trailer -- spread the word!:

"Just Married" Brunch

It's great to have models for married life, I tell ya. On Sunday, one of our favorite older married couples hosted a brunch for 4 newly marrieds -- one of which still had "just married" painted on the back of their car, absent the tin cans.

From left to right: John, Sheri, Marco, me, Dawn, Isaac, Rebecca, Jeremy. Awww. (Thank you, Ricki and Jeff! You guys are the best!)

Blogging Girls

A quick pic from the Writopia Lab blogging workshop I led last week. Stay tuned for more posts from the girls coming next week! In the meantime, we're loving everyone's comments on Jessica's post (below)...

Have a good weekend, all!

GUEST POST: Vegetarianism Served up with a Side Dish of Feminism

Jessica Zalph is a student at Hunter College High School in Manhattan and will be in ninth grade this coming fall. She is a member of Writopia Lab and has won various awards in the Scholastic writing contests. As an author, Jessica usually writes short stories and poetry, but she decided to break out of character to write this “coming out” piece about vegetarianism. With a dash o’ feminism mixed in. Here’s Jessica! -GWP

October is Vegetarian Awareness Month. If only people knew about it.

“Among men [vegetarianism is] regarded as, if not a girl thing, then at least a girlie thing — an anemic regimen for sensitive souls subsisting on rabbit food and tofurkey,” says Holly Brubach in her recent New York Times article “Real Men Eat Meat.” If the male gender sees vegetarianism as a “girl thing,” then that’s got to be our hardest obstacle to overcome. Whenever compassion and eating “rabbit food” became a girl thing, it became taboo for boys, because sexism is rooted so deeply in our society that girls are seen as weaker overall. But maybe making a harder decision wouldn’t be weak at all. Maybe it’d be more macho, if that’s what you’re after, to overcome the stereotypes. Overcoming the expectations society has of you could be “manly,” no?

I’ve been a vegetarian for the fourteen years of my existence – my parents stopped eating meat four years before I was born. They were told by a number of smug acquaintances that, just wait, I would become all “teenager-y” and start eating meat once I became obsessed with fitting in and defying my parents out of spite. We’re still waiting.

Probably the reason I’ve stuck with vegetarianism and animal rights is because it’s not just an arbitrary ritual I inherited, but is based on the unfortunate reality that the thing on the plate is the same as the cute little thing on the farm. I know I must have adopted this concept at an early age, because I recall feeling appalled fury at a boy in my preschool class who took the unsuspecting snails out of their tank and stepped on them.

Most of the attitudes I’ve encountered haven’t seemed to change much over time.

“Vegetarians are stupid” is the bluntest of the accusations I’ve received – this one coming just recently in our eighth grade hallway from a guy flaunting an anti-Wendy’s flyer, sparking the debate that flares up every now and again at school. It’s only in hindsight that I realize that these heated I-wish-they-were-discussions-not-shouting-matches are generally divided by gender. Girls my age tend to be considerably more tolerant, even if they don’t adopt the practice of not eating meat themselves, because boys, in general, have macho stereotypes driven into their heads from babyhood.

The anti-Wendy’s flyer is waved tauntingly. “Meat is good,” comes the challenge, which lingers in the air. Whatever futile hope has caused me to take this bait all these years rises in me again. And so it begins. Detailed description – the cruelty the animals face, the fact that they can feel emotions and pain, even if they don’t have your intellect, thank-you-very-much. Wild rebuttal – ending with “Vegetarians are stupid,” and exasperated disappointment from me. It’s not worth it.

And yet, in a grasping-at-straws way, it is. It’s a success any time that you can make someone confront the cruelty involved in butchering animals, because getting people to face the truth is the hardest thing you can make someone do, and possibly the first step toward creating a change.

I’m not sure when vegetarianism became seen as a sign of weakness. Maybe it always has been. “It’s human nature to eat meat. The food chain and all that,” says my friend. And maybe it is human nature to eat meat, but it’s also human nature to use violence to get and keep political power, and yet many countries have incorporated democracy to overcome this problem. If we can overcome our natural tendency to physically fight for power, surely this October we can overcome the meat-eating part of our omnivore selves as well.

Chew on that.

Into the Woods...Part 2

Man, I hate the book proposal stage. It's so mushy! My writer friend in the woods with me today is in the final throes of her manuscript, and I have manuscript envy over here.

Thanks for those comments on my previous post (anniegirl, Renee) -- you gave me a push to give the outline thing a try today. And I have to say, it seemed far less anxiety inducing to work on an outline than it did to face a blank screen and start pushing words around on the page. Which is what I generally do, and which ends up taking me AGES.

As for my next steps, I like Renee's approach, which she describes as follows:

The key thing about that outline for me is that I use the outline to make a VERY detailed To-Do list. That is the list that I then work from in completing the work -- items on it might be as difficult/conceptual as "Restructure introduction to add in the literature on social movements...." or as simple as "Add citation to McClurg and Mueller..."

At the end of any work period, I decide on two or three things on the to-do list that I will work on the next day/work period -- so I can percolate on the conceptual tasks I've set for myself, and then I warm up on the work by doing the easier/simpler tasks.

I'm gonna give it a try. Anyone got an answer to Renee's question (see comments, previous post), about deviating from the outline once you've got it? How strictly do you outliners out there hold yourselves to it? Inquiring minds wanna know :)

Into the Woods...

I've tucked myself away at a fellow writer's house in the woods for the next two days to re-jumpstart myself on my current book proposal, which I've been away from these past few months. So in addition to some guest posts, I myself will be writing over here about, well, writing.

Since I'm all about beginnings this morning, thought I'd share this quip from James B. Stewart's Follow the Story, which I'm reading upon recommendation of my authors group (aka the Invisible Institute):

"The key to a successful lead [beginning] is quite simple: it must attract and hold readers by re-creating in their minds the same curiosity that drove you to undertake the story in the first place."

And here's Stewart's pitch for outlining:

"I have been amazed to discover how much time I have saved, and how much anxiety I have avoided, by having a clear structure in mind, if not on paper."

And I have been amazed to discover how difficult it is to get myself to outline. I'm always curious to hear about other people's processes. Tell me, dear GWP readers--many of whom I know are also writers--do you outline? Does it work for you? Tips?!

COMING SOON: Guest Posts from the Girls of Writopia Lab

So I've been spending part of this week teaching a blogging workshop for girls over at Writopia Lab. The posts these girls are writing are SO GOOD that I'm posting them here on GWP. Stay tuned for some thoughts from the next generation of thinkers and writers. They will knock your socks off. They are definitely knocking mine.

(cool logo design by Marco Siegel-Acevedo!)

What Women Want...

A few quick hits for ya'll this morning:

Sisters, This Is an Election We Can't Sit Out, says the Rev. Valda Combs in a piece for Women's eNews, urging Hillary supporters, who have reason to be bitter about the primary, have to pull it together. The most vulnerable women in our society need our unity too much.

The Center for New Words launches a new election season project, This Is What Women Want!

And Girls, Incorporated launches the Dear World public education campaign in which girls express their daily realities, hopes, fears, and dreams in 30- and 60-second television spots and a website.

image cred

More Research on Ladies Who Boss

As an addendum to the post I wrote about the new Catalyst study earlier this week just came in from GWP's resident sociologist, Virginia Rutter:

Related research: In "Working for the Woman? Female Managers and the Gender Wage Gap" (October 07 issue of the American Sociological Review), Philip Cohen and Matt Huffman demonstrate that the greater representation of women in management jobs narrows the wage gap among non-management workers. When ladies are boss, all the ladies do better. But for it to really make a difference, women need to be in the higher levels of management. In fact, the authors reference the "title inflation" phenomenon: they saw evidence of a concentration of women in lower management--and that concentration doesn't give the workers much relief in terms of the gender wage gap. Reason I like this story--and the one on board membership here--is that it gives us concrete evidence for the glass ceiling, and why breaking through matters.

And btw, for Philip Cohen's latest, check out his post last month at HuffPo ("Women May Be Losing Jobs Too, But They're Different Jobs") in response to the NYTimes piece on how hard economic times are affecting women's employment rates. -GWP

Hot Mama

Sandra Tsing Loh’s new book, Mother on Fire: A True Motherf%#$@ Story About Parenting! comes out this month and I give her brilliant f&#%g credit for the subtitle. For a taste of Loh, see her latest, "I Choose My Choice!" in The Atlantic. (Thanks, Heather, for the heads up!)

More Lady Board Members, More Lady Bosses

I'm still catching up on things that were released while I was away mooning over honey. And here's one I particularly wanted to share, as it's from one of my favorite orgs, Catalyst.

According to a new study released on July 23, Advancing Women Leaders: The Connection Between Women Board Directors and Women Corporate Officers, the more women on the board, the more women higher ups. To wit:

-Companies with 30 percent women board directors in 2001 had, on average, 45 percent more women corporate officers by 2006, compared to companies with no women board members.

-Companies with the highest percentages of women board directors in 2001 had, on average, 33 percent more corporate officers in 2006 than companies with the lowest percentages.

-Companies with two or more women members on a company’s board in 2001 had 28 percent more women corporate officers by 2006 than companies with one woman board member in 2001.

Seems rather significant in this era when folks continue to scratch their heads and ask "where are the women in senior management?" The study drew on data from the 359 companies that were in the Fortune 500 during the years under investigation, 2000, 2001, and 2006. For more on the results, click here.

"My Girls Are Good!"

Oh, how men take pride in their sperm.

As a fertility specialist cum (hey no pun - it's Latin) interview subject recently told me, often when a man learns that his sperm are plentiful, mobile, and strong, he'll proclaim right then and there: “My guys are good! My guys are good!” Meanwhile, awaiting her diagnosis, his partner will slowly retreat back in her chair. And get this: even in an era when severe male factor infertility is one of the diagnoses most easy to treat, some guys who go in with their partners for fertility workups refuse to go through with the semen analysis because they’re too afraid of the results. For more on all this, of course, check out Sperm Counts: Overcome [pun intended] by Man's Most Precious Fluid by sociology and women's studies prof Lisa Jean Moore, a book I blogged about here a while back.

So with all that as a prelude, I thought I'd start out the week by karmically balancing the universe. Color me 1970s, but I firmly believe that more women should greet the news that their ovaries are working with "My Girls Are Good!" Or something like that. "Girls" doesn't quite cut it. Any one out there got an alternative expression for ovum pride? I'm taking suggestions.

Women - and a New Report! - at the DNC

I'm thrilled to announce that a report I took the lead on for the Women's Media Center, the White House Project, and the Maynard Institute for Journalism Education, will be released and distributed at the DNC in Denver on August 25. The report, "Bias, Punditry, and the Press: Where Do We Go From Here," includes recommendations for the media and consumers of media and will be available for download after its official release.

Additional happenings of interest going on at the DNC, all conveyed via Carol Jenkins (thanks, Carol, for the heads ups!):

-On August 25, there will be a reprise of the WMC/WHP/MIJE forum, From Soundbites to Solutions: Bias, Punditry and the Press in the 2008 Election, on which the report is based. This time the panelists will be Michel Martin of NPR, Jonathan Alter of Newsweek, Patricia Williams of The Nation, Rebecca Traister of Salon, Jamal Simmons of CNN, and María Teresa Petersen of Voto Latino, among others. Video clips from the original forum, which took place at The Paley Center, can be accessed from the WMC website.

-On Tuesday, August 26, Senator Hillary Clinton will address the delegates. That is the 88th anniversary of the day the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution became law, which gave women the right to vote in 1920. Senator Barack Obama accepts the nomination on Thursday, August 28th, before a public audience of 75,000 people. That is the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech.

-On Wednesday, August 27, the WMC is hosting a panel with Women's eNews at which six leading congresswomen (Loretta Sanchez-CA, Rosa DeLauro-CT, Carolyn Maloney-NY, Gwen Moore-WI, Lois Capps-CA confirmed so far) will discuss WEN's The Memo-- a status report of six areas that the candidates and delegates must address. The congresswomen will address the media's handling of women and the economy, immigration, women in the military, international issues, war and peace, and health. Do check out my fellow PWVer Pramila Jayapal's Election Dispatch on Immigration and Jennifer Hogg's Election Dispatch on Women in the Military.

-And finally, this year, the convention is chaired by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, the highest ranking woman elected official in the country, co-chaired by Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, Texas State Senator Leticia Van de Putte, and Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin. The CEO of the Democratic National Convention Committee is Leah D. Daughtry.

Bitch is Back

So the deadline has been extended for the search for a program director at the Bitch headquarters in Portland, Oregon.

They're looking for "someone bright, with a deep talent and love for analyzing media/pop culture from a perspective rooted in social/economic justice, who’s passionate about both print publishing and newer (to us, at least) forms like online, audio, and video, someone excited about helping shape the future of the work we do at Bitch (and who recognizes Bitch’s potential), someone committed to DIY/grassroots operating, who understands Bitch’s role as both critiquing what’s crappy and praising what’s good, who’s as excited about Bitch as a multimedia organization as Bitch as a magazine."

Sound like anyone you know?

Some of the job duties associated with this position:
- Oversee the editorial and production process for the magazine
- Edit articles and help shape editorial tone and scope of magazine
- Manage writer’s agreements and payment for each issue
- Outreach, fundraising, and event planning
- Oversee editorial internship program

For more info, contact publishing@b-word.org. Deadline for apps is now August 15.

Briding Out, One Last Time...

I loved all your unveiled feelings-about-veils comments yesterday. And cuz it's Friday I thought I'd round the week out with two last (unless you tell me you want more!) wedding photos -- one more featuring "the costume," left. The beauty in black full length gloves is filmmaker Ilana Trachtman, a dear friend from college who reminded me during her toast that I once stole a Ding Dong with her from The Village Corner in Ann Arbor.

The photo below is of Marco and me and our gaggle of flower girls. Because matter how cynical or intellectual one might be, it was very hard for me to resist inviting every little girl in my life to be a flower girl. I stopped at six.

Marco, always looking out for me, fears I'm going to lose my feminist cred if I keep wedding blogging. But I beg to differ! I'm still the same ole Girl with Pen. Ok ok, so your Girl is a little wedding obsessed right now. Thank you for indulging me.

To Veil or Not to Veil

Linda Hirshman's guest post over at Broadsheet yesterday, "Getting Nudged into the Chapel," is summarized thusly by Salon: "There's something in all of us that craves the trappings of a classic wedding -- even intellectuals who rail against the institution's traditions." Well, color me intellectual, but I had a BLAST dressing up as a 1950s-era bride, white gloves, veil, and and all. I figured, if I'm going to be the bride, why not camp it up and play it as a role?

Weddings are theater, we figured (our guests were invited to dress in 1950s garb and many of them took us up on it) so why not have some fun. The soundtrack was mambo (and klezmer) and we pretended -- sort of -- that we were at a Catskills resort, you know, the ones where Latin bands like Tito Puentes' taught the summering Jews how to dance. Since Marco and I are Latin-Jewish fusion and all.

But here's the thing: though I went into it "playing" the bride, I utterly became one. And it was the veil that did it. I became a bride not in the retro pregnant-in-kitchen kind of way (though I must say, at 39 and undergoing fertility treatments, I certainly wouldn't complain about the pregnant part--and I'll always be an active labor force participant by necessity and choice). Rather, the veil helped me become a bride in the physically-spiritually-transformed-special-and-set-apart kind of way. My groom, who donned a white linen suit in order to feel his own kind of special, was in costume too.

Sometimes a veil is just a veil. And sometimes it's not. What about you, dear GWP readers? Did the marrieds among you don it or ditch it? I'd be interested to hear.

(Hey--Shira--someone's gotta write about brides, feminism, and fashion for your new book! Any takers?)

Women Feel the Pinch, Says Poll

Women feel the impact of economic insecurity and rising food, energy, education, and health care costs more deeply than men – and see government as a key to the solution -- according to yesterday's poll from the National Women's Law Center. Are we surprised that women are significantly more pessimistic than men in their attitudes about the status quo in America, both on a societal level and in terms of their own lives?

Turns out, regardless of age, income, and education, more than half of women (55%) feel that the government should do more to solve problems and help meet people’s needs. Candidates, are you LISTENING? For more on it all, check out the NWLC's (stellar!) blog.

The After Party

Those who know me know I'm not a big drinker, so I thought you might find this one amusing. This is the evening of the day we were married. There's a funny story behind it which I can't exactly write about online, but needless to say it's all good.

Aisle Porn

Because it's still only a few days since I'm back, I can't resist weddingblogging. This here is a pic of the aisle we started down. For reals. It's in the backyard of our friends' house where we were married. !!!

Get Your Feminism and Fashion On

Shira Tarrant, editor of the fabulous Men Speak Out, is at it again with a call for essays for a new academic anthology, this time on feminism and fashion, tentatively titled Feminism, Fashion and Flair: Confronting Hegemony with Style. Here's the description:

Fashion is a powerful way we express our politics, personalities, and preferences for who and how we love. Yet fashion can also repress freedom and sexual expression. Fashion encourages profound creativity, rebellion, and defiant self-definition while simultaneously controlling and disciplining the body. Fashion signals resistance to sexual morés and it can also promote a problematic consumer culture. Fashion creates collective identity, but also constrains individual voice. In other words, fashion contains the paradoxical potential for pleasure and subjugation, expression and conformity.

This book explores the productive tensions generated by fashion and style. We are interested in essays that take up questions of gender with special attention to race, class, sexuality, age, and ethnicity. This collection blends theory and pop culture analysis in exciting ways, focusing on contemporary trends and controversies.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:
Theories of agency, style, and the presentation of self
Performing identity: race, class, gender and sexuality through style
Consumerist pleasure and anxiety
Fashion production in the context of global capital and trade
Bois, grrls, trannies and styles of queerness
Hardcore, metro, punk, and khakis: constructing masculinities through fashion
Body art and ethnic appropriations
Debates in plastic surgery and re-fashioning the body
Class identity and decorating domestic space
Feminist fashion: debates over style and politics
The ethics of green production and marketing
Everyday pornography and fashion fetish
Virtual style and online identities
Material culture and craft in a postmodern world
Slumming and radical chic: tensions of authenticity and irony
Vintage and thrift fashion: nostalgia and class signifiers
DIY Style: fashion off the corporate grid

Deadline for abstracts is August 15, 2008.

Format for abstracts: Word document, double-spaced, between 300 and 500 words. Include contact information and short bio.

Send to: FashionBook1@yahoo.com

Shira Tarrant
Assistant Professor
Women’s Studies Department
California State University, Long Beach

and

Marjorie Jolles
Assistant Professor
Women’s & Gender Studies Program
Roosevelt University

XX/XY: XXOO

It's my delight, as always, to bring you this guest post from GWP regular Virginia Rutter, prof of sociology at Framingham State College, to whom I send out a big batch of xxoo! -Deborah

At the American Sociological Association meeting this past weekend, Pepper Schwartz, Barbara Risman, and I spoke on a panel on gender and the media: The case study of the "opt out" story—covered here at GWP recently—helped get everyone on the same creepy page about how reportorial anecdotes get transformed into a mythic cultural truth…until the facts finally get the light of day.

Quick recap on opt-out: In the opt out story, the narrative was that women were choosing to leave the work force and join the mommy track. Heather Boushey and

others did the research to show that first, the work force is the mommy track—more than ever before mothers of small children—college-educated even more so than others--go to work. But there's more: our crash and burn economy currently means that women, like men, are getting laid off and losing jobs. Women aren't opting out, there are fewer jobs for them, just like men, to opt in. Evidence trumps myth.

But, as I reminded the little crowd at our ASA talk, there is a lot that goes right in our media in terms of making gender a mainstream topic, not an academic buzz word. The women and science debate set off by remarks Lawrence Summers made at Harvard has caused us to look explicitly at gender bias (thanks Larry!) and then of course to detect it in our imperfect public conversations about it. Hillary Clinton's campaign also brought about a platform for everyone to think about gender. The thinking is sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes ugly (check out the Women's Media Project's sexism sells video), but it is mainstream, as this public editor essay from the Times shows us.

So, on Sunday, it felt good to read Jennifer Finney Bolan's op-ed in the New York Times on "The X-Y Games." She gave us a textbook lesson on gender and sex. She reports that:

Last week, the organizers of the Beijing Olympics announced that they had set up a "gender determination lab" to test female athletes suspected of being male. "Experts" at the lab will evaluate athletes based on their physical appearance and take blood samples to test hormones, genes and chromosomes.

Bolan, who is an English Professor at Colby College, provides a history of sex tests at the Olympics (nudity worked in 776 BC, ocular assessment was the tool in 1968, and now we do chromosomal tests). The stories she tells are fascinating. But the lesson is crucial: even sex—what we think of as our biological profile as "xx" or "xy"—doesn't fit neatly into boxes, what with chromosomal anomalies and transgender and transsexual people. This reality with respect to biological sex reminds us that gender, too, doesn't fit neatly into boxes. (Pepper Schwartz and I write about this in our book, The Gender of Sexuality.) We can't, for example, determine whether someone is a man or woman by what they wear, who they love, whether they have babies or whether they can have babies or whether they like babies.

Bolan gave us a great lesson until her conclusion. She argues gender isn't what's on the outside, it is on the inside, which means it is about how we feel and think about ourselves. But, remember the opt-out narrative? Here's the deal: no woman has to feel any particular way about herself or her identity in order to be subject to 1. cultural narratives that place her in a box or ascribe meaning to what she's doing or 2. economic forces that make her more likely than men to be impoverished or to earn a lower wage or 3. a whole bunch of other social forces that mean that gender is not just about identity but about group membership and social class. Same for the boys: No man has to feel a particular way about himself in order to be subject to 1. the threat of violence based on homophobia or 2. workplace sanctions—formal and informal—for using family leave for domestic caregiving.

But the bigger lesson is this: we're talking about gender—not in code (at least some of the time its not in code) but in direct, clear, and therefore debatable terms. We're not just talking about it in academia (which from my academic point of view is also a great place to talk, just different). We're talking about it all over the place. And learning as we go along. So give me xx/xy and I'll give you xxoo.

My Organizational Alma Mater Seeks to Hire

My organizational alma mater, the National Council for Research on Women, has two open positions and I've been wanting to help them spread the word. If you or someone you know seems right for these, please let them know.

POSITION 1 - Director of Research and Programs

The Director of Research and Programs will report to the President and will take primary responsibility for overseeing and implementing the organization's programmatic and research agendas and its policy-oriented programs, including working groups, convenings, research reports and relevant advisory committees. A primary responsibility will include bringing the work of the Council and its network of Member Centers to inform public debate and policies, and manage and oversee the Council's rapid response function. The Director of Research and Programs will also oversee the work with the Council's 116 Member Centers. This will include developing stronger relationships among the centers, organizing conferences and convenings, assisting centers with identifying funding sources for their research, and providing technical assistance where needed. The Director will also work with and manage relations with relevant Board Committees.

The Director of Research and Programs will also help provide vision and strategic direction to the Council's programs, and help to ensure the organization's fiscal health through program-related fundraising, proposal writing, internal and external communications, and the use of technology to meet the needs of its various members, and other partners. The Director will also ensure that diversity and inclusion are core values and a strong component of all our strategic goals. The position also entails managing, training, and supervising staff and interns.

This is a unique opportunity to play a central role in shaping the work of a prestigious organization that is making substantial and significant contributions to the women's research movement. The new Director will be expected to strengthen the programmatic focus and direction of this growing organization and improve the ability of the Council to implement quality programs. The ideal candidate will be detail-oriented, self-motivated, informed, committed to success, deadline-driven and a team player capable of and committed to contributing to the senior management team's strategic thinking about the Council's future direction. She/he will also have excellent writing and research skills and the ability to translate research across various arenas. A social science or public policy background is preferred.

Ideal Experience and Qualifications
We seek a sophisticated professional with five years of experience in program development and management, preferably in organizations that share the Council's commitment to women's empowerment and to using research to promote social change. The ideal candidate will be expected to have general familiarity with the broader areas of women's research and policy related issues. S/he will also have the managerial and strategic planning acumen to accomplish policy program goals and objectives. In addition, the candidate will have the following qualifications:

· Self-starter with a demonstrated ability to identify priorities, work independently, and prioritize multiple activities and tasks;
· Extensive knowledge of public policies at the state and federal level
· Intellectual flexibility to engage a dynamic array of issues;
· Successful experience translating vision and ideas into working programs, creating networks and collaborations, and building partnerships with people of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds, personalities, and talents;
· Proven track record in creating and implementing programs dealing with issues related to the Council's mission and a demonstrated commitment to social change;
· Track record and experience with international issues and issues related to race, class, ethnicity, and other markers of difference is highly desirable;
· Successful experience managing or coordinating a research agenda/program; overseeing and coordinating the activities of advisors, consultants, and other participants;
· Expertise in developing publications, positions papers, and reports; organizing meetings, conferences, and other events; overseeing logistics and programs;
· Excellent verbal and written communication skills and the ability to represent the Council to a broad public;
· Credibility and experience to connect the Council to resources and opportunities outside the organization;
· An MA or Ph.D. in a related field (public policy, law, human rights, political and/or social sciences). Some experience in the nonprofit sector is desired.

POSITION 2 - temporary, part-time Researcher

The temporary, part-time researcher will be responsible for gathering critical data and research at the national level and in battleground states on the BIG FIVE issues*, especially data produced by our network of Member Centers and partners. The researcher should have the ability to identify multiple and reliable sources and develop fact sheets that will lay the groundwork for position papers that will be developed by the lead researcher, under whose supervision the temporary researcher will work. The content gathered will be a centerpiece of the campaign and will be used by advocates, thought leaders, and stakeholders to amplify the voices of women and girls in the upcoming election cycle. This is a Temporary, Part-Time position that could expand into additional opportunities, depending on the candidate's abilities, and the Council's needs.

*The BIG FIVE Campaign will bring together the Council's 117 Member Centers, and strategic partners, to interject a gender lens and voice in the presidential campaign and the next Aministration. Specifically, the campaign aims to influence national debates and shape public policies that directly impact the lives of women and girls by highlighting the critical issues that face them. These issues encompass economic security, health, immigration, violence, and education.

Responsibilities
· Undertake in-depth research for the BIG FIVE campaign focusing on economic security, immigration, health, violence and education.
· Synthesize data and develop fact sheets for each of the BIG FIVE issue areas.
· Work under the direction of the lead researcher.

Qualifications:
· A Bachelors degree, with preference given to Ph.D. candidates or those with a Masters in a relevant field (e.g. public policy, government, economics, health, immigration, women's studies, education)
· 2-4 years research experience
· Excellent research skills, preferably in a non-profit environment
· Attention to detail and excellent organizational, written, and oral communication skills
· Strong electronic and word processing skills including, website maintenance (CMS, Dreamweaver), Constant Contact, email campaigns, blogs and on-line social networking. Working knowledge of Donor Perfect, HTML, PowerPoint, and Excel ia plus
· Ability and willingness to work in a diverse environment
· Exceptional interpersonal communication skills and ability to network comfortably and effectively in both public and private sectors
· Flexibility, patience, a willingness to take on multiple tasks, efficiency, a friendly disposition, sense of humor, and problem-solving skills
· Interest and commitment to women's rights and feminist issues

Applications will be reviewed as received. Applications, which will not be reviewed without a cover letter describing your interest and qualifications, your resume (in Word or PDF format), a writing sample, and salary history, should be sent to: jobs@ncrw.org. In order to expedite the internal sorting and reviewing process, please write your name (Last, First, job title) as the only contents in the subject line of your e-mail.

For a fuller (!) description of the positions and who they're looking for, please email the Council at ncrw@ncrw.org.

Moon of Honey

Just wanted to thank everyone for all those good wishes yesterday, and on the day I posted Girl w/Groom (my one post during the honeymoon)! You made my day.

Here's one of my fave New Mexico pics (left), if only because it recalls a delicious state of mind. While Marco was climbing down into the Rio Grande River Gorge braving death-defying heights in order to get pictures of rocks, I was happily meditating up top. Breathing in, breathing out, ahhh....

Girl Re-entering World, Slowly

It's my first day back and I'm still feeling as high as I felt when I was carried into the air on this chair!

Before anything, I wish to extend heartfelt thanks to everyone who kept GWP going while I was gone, and particularly Kristen, blog steward extraordinaire. The wedding was bliss, the honeymoon was delicious, and coming back to a blog in full swing was a gift like none other.

Going away gives one a sense of perspective and, upon return, I feel we've really created something here, this lil GWP community. I love the plethora of voices these past few weeks and would so hate to give that up. I LOVED the content our guest bloggers posted (and will be contacting you one by one to follow up and express more personal gratitude)!

Speaking of which, I feel us naturally evolving into more of a group forum -- possibly even a group blog. Do you agree? Please let me know what you think of the idea of turning GWP into a group blog in comments here -- and also if you would be interested in being considered as a regular contributing blogger (you can also email me at girlwpen@gmail.com)! And soon, I'll post a survey to get more of a sense of your feelings.

Meanwhile, a hearty welcome to new readers (traffic and subscription were both UP UP UP while I was away!!), and to you loyal standbys, thank you for being here!

I'm off to catch up on a thousand emails and will be back posting GWPish content tomorrow, but wanted to leave you with my gratitude -- which, as I learned while putting together a wedding toast to our guests, has been called by someone or other "happiness mixed with wonder." That's absolutely what I'm feeling right now, post-wedding/honeymoon high, and returning to a virtual community that has become so very meaningful to me and so very, very real.

What Does Google Have on You?

Well, I am off on a much-needed vacation, as you can see by the picture of me in my traveling hat, and Deborah will be back next week, but I wanted to leave you with one last post for the weekend. Existing in the feminist blogosphere, one inevitably comes across the unpleasant, the misinformed, the spouters of inanities, the ignorant, bigoted, misogynistic and the more than slightly unhinged. In a world of internet anonymity, it is well known, seemingly mild-mannered humans will give free reign to all that is most crass in them. And it is up to the blogger or website master to decide how much they will stomach.

There are various options. Some allow everything and anything to be said—in the name of free speech or notoriety. Some screen all comments before they post, or any comments from new commenters. For example the policy at Bitch PhD is "Comments are great; obnoxious comments get deleted. Deal." Others, like Feministing, “don’t feed the troll”: i.e. they ask their commenters not to respond to comments that are intellectually prehistoric. The feminist blogosphere, constantly dealing with the misogynistic, are lucky to have a site such as Finally, A Feminism 101 Blog where they can send such misogynists for an elementary education. Needless to say, those sent to reform school are rarely pleased with the offering.

Ryan Singel at Wired Magazine recently wrote about a lawsuit against a number of commenters/posters and the administrator of the web forum, AutoAdmit.com. One commenter, charmingly named “AK-47” targeted two women Jane Doe I and Jane Doe II, who had been admitted to one of the country’s top law school, Yale Law. Here’s what happened:

The AutoAdmit controversy began even before one of the women, identified in court documents as "Jane Doe I," started classes in the fall of 2005, the lawsuit alleges. Doe I was alerted in the summer to an AutoAdmit comment thread entitled "Stupid Bitch to Attend Law School." The thread included messages such as, "I think I will sodomize her. Repeatedly" and a reply claiming "she has herpes." The second woman, Jane Doe II, was similarly attacked beginning in January 2007.

Both women tried in vain to persuade the administrators of the AutoAdmit.com site to remove the threads, according to the lawsuit. But then the story of the cyber-harassment hit the front page of The Washington Post, and the law school trolls became fodder for cable news shows. Soon after, the female law students, with help from Stanford and Yale law professors, filed the federal lawsuit in June 2007 seeking hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages.

The Jane Doe plaintiffs contend that the postings about them became etched into the first page of search engine results on their names, costing them prestigious jobs, infecting their relationships with friends and family, and even forcing one to stop going to the gym for fear of stalkers.

While the women asked the administrator, Anthony Ciolli, to take the comment thread down, Ciolli refused. He has since been removed from the lawsuit. I have various reactions to this, as I imagine you all do as well. In reality, internet “free speech” is a very different beast from real world “free speech.” Until now, the internet been an essentially anonymous forum with little chance that one will be held responsible or incriminated by one's words, as long as one remains behind the mask of the moniker. This has spawned good things, such as Bitch PhD. But it also allows for maximum impact with minimal responsibility. Here’s what I mean by maximum impact: the postings about Jane Doe I and II became so attached to their names that they showed up on the front page of search engines, which would inevitably be seen by future employers trying to dig up all the information they could on their potential law associates. AK-47, however, remained nothing more than AK-47.

I have been raised in a generation that understands that everything one writes or says may become fodder for the front page of a Google search devoted strictly to their life. Lucky are the Emily Smiths and Mark Cohens among us. Some would argue that our norms have changed as a result—we hardly bat an eye on learning that Obama tried coke, whereas just a decade ago it was a scandale whether Clinton had inhaled or not. The Chronicle of Higher Education and Inside Higher Ed has documented how the Academy views professors blogging for public consumption. And I am aware that the above silly picture might just be viewed someday by someone who wants to take my work very seriously. Alas.

But there is still an imbalance between the complete anonymity of some commenters who can drag a person’s name through the mud at will, the lack of consequences, and the inability of that person to erase the link from the Google frontpage. Should webmasters be required to reveal commenter’s identities in egregious circumstances? Should there be more lawsuits such as this one? In the future, will we become more permissive toward embarrassing photographs, blog posts, and stories from the past?

--Kristen