Category Archives: women
Only Virgins Can Be Sexually Assaulted
Indians protesting the way rape survivors are treated.
Once upon a time in America only virgins or married women could be raped, people thought. In some places people still think so.
The problem comes from failing to see the world through the eyes of victims.
And so an article from the 1952-53 Yale Law Journal explained that sexual assault is illegal because,
Women’s power to withhold or grant sexual access is an important bargaining weapon… it fosters, and is in turn bolstered by, a masculine pride in the exclusive possession of the sexual object… whose value is enhanced by sole ownership.
Even though this is the crime women most fear, outside of murder. Read the rest of this entry
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Pose Once to Look Female, Again to Look Male
Erika Linder plays both male and female in JC Jeans commercial.
Sex is biological: testosterone, estrogen and xx or xy chromosomes…
But gender is performance.
The act is easy to see when boys put on a tough guise and girls act sexy, because sexy on little girls and tough on little boys just looks a little weird. (Think “Little Miss” beauty pageants, for instance.)
But then we grow up and what had once been play and mimicry begins to feel natural and normal.
Then along comes model, Erika Linder, posing one way to look female and another to appear male. Read the rest of this entry
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Can Friends Survive Friends w/Benefits?
Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis in “Friends with Benefits”
Sometimes friendships between women and men turn into “friends with benefits.”
Not surprising, really.
Friendships between men and women often start when one of the two – usually the guy – is hoping for sex.
Or sex is wanted without the baggage that relationships can bring, and FWB seems more inviting than hookups with strangers — especially for girls who want to avoid being called sluts.
Still, many fret that if things don’t work out, FWB could bring the loss of their friend. To keep things platonic, many avoid discussing the relationship, and make sure to bring up romances with others. And no flirting.
Still, the line is crossed at some point in the lives of about 60% of college students. What happens next? Read the rest of this entry
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Game of Thrones ‘S Us
Daenerys Targaryen
Set in some mythical time and place reminiscent of Paganism meets Christianity here on Earth, the mirror that is Game of Thrones reflects both our gender bias and our rising equality.
In this patriarchal world the virtuous Daenerys Targaryen and her evil brother, Viserys, march to take back the Iron Throne they were born to, but are now exiled from. While Daenerys is clearly the wiser of the two, she has no right to rule — at least not while her brother lives. Instead, she is used as a pawn — sold off as a slave, really, to buy her brother an army. Read the rest of this entry
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Real vs Cartoonish Sexuality
Real sexuality? Or just cartoonish?
I believe we should afford our daughters and ourselves a right to our own authentic sexuality. Not the cartoonish MTV kind, but the kind where we respect ourselves enough to listen to what our bodies and hearts feel is right for us.
Paraphrasing psychoanalyst and author Joyce McFadden, there.
What is authentic sexuality? In my last post, I suggested it is neither shameful nor a crutch for powerlessness or low self-esteem. But what else? Read the rest of this entry
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Authentic Sexuality v Dressing Like Prostitutes
Hello Kitty thong
Why do moms let their daughters “dress like prostitutes?” asked Jennifer Moses in a Wall Street Journal piece that got people talking a while back.
Moses thinks it’s because the moms had a sexually free past, which they now regret. “Not one woman I’ve ever asked about the subject,” she declared, “has said that she wishes she’d ‘experimented’ more.”
Well, wouldn’t you want your daughters to NOT look like prostitutes, then? Read the rest of this entry
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Your Pain: A Small Price for My Pleasure
Police in Salinas, California conducted a home welfare check after three children, ages 8, 5, and 3, didn’t arrive for an unspecified appointment. What they found was gruesome. The isolated children, who were ostensibly being homeschooled, were malnourished and bruised.
But the eight-year-old girl seems to have gotten it worse than her brothers. She was periodically locked in a closet or chained to a wall, 4 feet off the ground. She was sometimes shackled by the ankle, and other times by a collar around her small neck. And starving, she resembled a concentration camp victim. Read the rest of this entry
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Girls Chasing Boys Chasing Girls
Ingrid Michaelson’s “Girls Chase Boys” is a tribute to Roger Palmer’s “Simply Irresistible.”
A tribute. And a commentary on changing times.
When I first saw “Simply Irresistible” years ago, it seemed pretty natural and normal. But after seeing Michaelson’s gender bending switch — and thu more feminist eyes — I see so much more.
In “Simply Irresistible” the girls are dolled up to passively attract.
In “Girls Chase Boys” it’s the guys:
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Sex Gets in the Way of Friendship, For Men
Harry told Sally that men and women can’t be friends because the sex part always gets in the way.
Sally didn’t believe him.
Maybe that’s because the sex part often gets in the way for men, but not so much for women. Read the rest of this entry
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Grandma and Susan B Anthony
Queen of the Platform by Laura Madeline Wiseman
Imagine having a great-great-great-grandmother who fought for “votes for women” alongside Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
Poet, Laura Madeline Wiseman’s great-great-great-grandmother, Matilda Fletcher Wiseman did just that.
Collected letters and newspaper clippings inspired a book of poetry that Ms. Wiseman calls, Queen of the Platform.
What prompted Matilda Fletcher Wiseman to join the lecture circuit? Luck, opportunity, the death of her only child, and a need for income. Talent and hope for the future, too.
It’s interesting to see the portrait Matilda Fletcher Wiseman paints of Susan B Anthony in her up-close-and-personal brushes with the icon:
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