Category Archives: feminism
Girls Can Be Tomboys, Boys Can’t Be Sissies
No sissies. Just tough guise.
Every quarter I ask my women students if any of them had been tomboys when they were little. Many hands enthusiastically shoot into the air. The women often have fond memories of their time climbing trees and digging in the dirt.
Then I ask the men students if any of them had been sissies. The class bursts out laughing. One hand might sheepishly creep up.
One man claimed the question was unfair since the word “sissy” is stigmatized but “tomboy” is not.
Actually, there isn’t a non-stigmatizing word for a boy who acts like a girl. And there’s a reason for that. Read the rest of this entry
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Should Women Give Men The Porn Star Experience?
The porn star experience?
A lot of guys have come to expect P.S.E. [the “Porn-Star Experience”] … and plenty of women are more than happy to oblige. A few might enjoy it, but for most it’s harrowing. I think there’s a fear that if they can’t make it happen, their boyfriend will retreat online.
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What Abusers and “Pro-Family” Conservatives Have in Common
“The pill”
Birth control sabotage is a common form of partner abuse. In a report released by the National Domestic Violence Hotline, 25 percent of women callers to the hot line, who voluntarily answered questions about birth control and pressure to get pregnant in their relationships, reported some form of reproductive coercion.
The callers said their partners hid birth control pills or flushed them down the toilet. Some refused to wear condoms or poked holes in them. One woman’s partner became furious when she got her period. Read the rest of this entry
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Who Wants To Be A Piece Of Tail?
Want a piece of that?
• Piece of tail
• Piece of ass
• Piece of “that”
That’s how a sexually attractive woman might be described.
Well, “attractive woman” is an overstatement. Attractive body part, maybe.
The whole woman isn’t wanted. Just a piece of her. Read the rest of this entry
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My Mom v. Stanford
By Blair Crangle-Hall
My mother, Colleen Crangle, was the first woman to take a sex discrimination case to trial against Stanford University.
In 1995, after receiving a Ph.D. at Stanford in Logic and The Philosophy of Science and Language she joined the university’s academic staff and was soon recruited to a bioinformatics research group. The American Medical Informatics Association presented her with a prestigious award, and an article in The Biochemist recognized that she had quickly established a reputation for excellence.
Sounds picture perfect. But it was not. Read the rest of this entry
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Relationship Terms That Dehumanize Women
By
Meanwhile, we do a very good job of dismissing relationships as unimportant in American culture, even though most guys value them very much. These expressions below need to go the way of the dodo. And yes, some of these could be applied directly to men by women or have easy parallels. Those expressions need to go away too. Read the rest of this entry
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Pro-Life! But Don’t Care If You Die.
Portia Gibbs of Belhaven, North Carolina
“Pro-lifers” are poised to create 9,800 unnecessary deaths per year.
That’s what will happen if Supreme Court Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito — the rightist of the right — cobble together a ruling against the Affordable Care Act, aka, Obamacare.
Pro-life?
Meanwhile, “pro-life” Congress members have voted against the Affordable Care Act at least 54 times. If they ever got their way, that’s 9,800 more deaths a year.
Pro-life?
And since so many “pro-life” governors have rejected parts of Obamacare, people are already dying.
Like 48-year-old Portia Gibbs of Belhaven, North Carolina. Read the rest of this entry
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Who Wears the Pants?
Men and women: a history of costume, gender, and power
Pants symbolize power — partly because men wore them long before women dared try them on, and men have historically held power.
But pants empower in practical ways, too. Like allowing much more freedom to move.
Once upon a time, women wore heavy skirts and petticoats that were bogged down with wire machinery. So stair climbing required care to prevent tripping over skirts. Even sitting could be tricky, lest a hoop skirt rise and reveal all.
Big skirts meant horses were mounted “side saddle,” allowing women to exert only “gentle control.”
Meanwhile, running and biking were difficult, which limited a woman’s power and independence, as well. Read the rest of this entry
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Women Are Passive? Think Again
Rosie the Riveter
Most of us think women are more passive than men. It’s natural, right? Men’s testosterone makes them tough and assertive.
Think again.
Actually, it’s hard to untangle the effects of biology and society.
In fact, it’s hard to untangle the effects of biology, alone.
Testosterone makes men aggressive?
Yes, men have more testosterone. But: Read the rest of this entry
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Cross-Dressing’s Erotic Side
Grayson Perry, in drag
Being a transvestite is a complex cocktail of motivations. It’s different for everyone, but there’s often a strong sexual component to cross-dressing, although trannies sometimes find it hard to admit this. I feel it’s like the elephant in the room. I feel it’s really there, but nobody’s talking about it.
Maybe it’s this erotic dimension which is the hardest part for others to accept.
That’s what artist and cross-dresser, Grayson Perry thinks.
“Vivienne,” over at Bluestocking Blue began blogging to better understand why “she” feels compelled to cross-dress male-to-female. Read the rest of this entry
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