Members of Congress with daughters vote better on women’s issues. 

humanrightswatch:

US House: Don’t Fail Violence Victims Again

The United States House of Representatives should approve a Senate-passed bill to renew the Violence against Women Act (VAWA), not a weaker House version that undermines protections, Human Rights Watch said today. Approving the Senate-passed bill would ensure that all women who are victims of violence have access to protection and services, Human Rights Watch said. The House is expected to vote on renewing the act this week.

FACT: Every female Senator just voted for the Violence Against Women Act. All 22 'nay' votes were Republican men.

A call for Mormon women to wear pants to church, begun this month by a small group of women, has stretched across the globe, but not before creating a backlash and even generating death threats.

“Wear Pants to Church,” an event on Sunday, was meant to draw attention to the role of women in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, using attire as a symbolic first salvo in a larger struggle over gender inequalities.

Though the Mormon Church has no official policy against women wearing pants to church, many say they feel peer pressure to wear a dress, particularly in the Western United States, organizers said. So on Sunday, thousands of Mormon women arrived at church in pants in places like Cambridge, England; Heidelberg, Germany; Austin, Tex.; the Marshall Islands; and Kotzebue, Alaska.

A number of the women posted their photos on Facebook and other Web sites. Others said they could not participate because they were fearful of ridicule or reprimand. A Google map, begun so women could show they participated, included posts like this one, from Kari White, in Sheboygan, Wis.: “felt free to be an authentic me for the first time in my nearly 5 years of membership in the church.”

Joanna Brooks, a professor at San Diego State University and the author of “The Book of Mormon Girl: A Memoir of an American Faith,” called it “the largest concerted Mormon feminist effort in history.”

Mormon Women Wear Pants to Church

nevver:

Anti-Flirt Club Rules:

1. Don’t flirt: those who flirt in haste oft repent in leisure.
2. Don’t accept rides from flirting motorists—they don’t invite you in to save you a walk.
3. Don’t use your eyes for ogling—they were made for worthier purposes.
4. Don’t go out with men you don’t know—they may be married, and you may be in for a hair-pulling match.
5. Don’t wink—a flutter of one eye may cause a tear in the other.
6. Don’t smile at flirtatious strangers—save them for people you know.
7. Don’t annex all the men you can get—by flirting with many, you may lose out on the one.
8. Don’t fall for the slick, dandified cake eater—the unpolished gold of a real man is worth more than the gloss of a lounge lizard.
9. Don’t let elderly men with an eye to a flirtation pat you on the shoulder and take a fatherly interest in you. Those are usually the kind who want to forget they are fathers.
10. Don’t ignore the man you are sure of while you flirt with another. When you return to the first one you may find him gone.

When 1,100 Michigan elementary students were asked to describe what life would be like if they were the opposite sex, over 40 percent of the girls saw advantages to being male; they would have better jobs, higher incomes, and more respect. Ninety-five percent of the boys saw no advantage to being female, and a substantial number thought suicide would be preferable.

Deborah Rhode in Speaking of Sex: The Denial of Gender Inequality quoted by Andrea Dworkin in Scapegoat 

There is an expectation that we can talk about sins but no one must be identified as a sinner: newspapers love to describe words or deeds as “racially charged” even in those cases when it would be more honest to say “racist”; we agree that there is rampant misogyny, but misogynists are nowhere to be found; homophobia is a problem but no one is homophobic. One cumulative effect of this policed language is that when someone dares to point out something as obvious as white privilege, it is seen as unduly provocative. Marginalized voices in America have fewer and fewer avenues to speak plainly about what they suffer; the effect of this enforced civility is that those voices are falsified or blocked entirely from the discourse.

Teju Cole

cheatsheet:

Yes, there is rape in the military, just as there is in civilian life. There is rape at home on military bases all over the United States, and also abroad. Being barred from combat jobs hasn’t kept it from happening. I spent three weeks in the hands of the “enemy” in Iraq as a prisoner, and I was not raped. Unfortunately, many of my fellow female soldiers were raped—sometimes by the very people who were supposed to “have their back.” Rape happens every day to women; giving women front-line combat jobs will not increase that threat.

Shoshana Johnson, a former POW in Iraq, argues in support of allowing women on the front lines, despite arguments like “rape.”

Clearly the experts on contraceptives: these guys.

Gender and Austerity: The Feminization of Economic Crisis Response

The women who are reporting this think it clearly shows that there’s something in Siri’s programming that is against abortion and day-after contraception. Looking at the evidence, it’s hard not to believe they are right.

The coincidences are too many, and the information is readily available all over the web. It seems impossible that Siri can’t provide these answers while it can happily tell you where to find hospitals for any illness or how to get to the closest strip club.

Is Siri Pro Life?

From AdWeek:

 Last week, we had that hair-salon print ad that showed a woman with a black eye receiving a diamond necklace from her partner. Now, controversy is swirling around Glee actress Heather Morris, who sports a huge shiner and has her wrists bound by an iron’s power cord in a photo series by celebrity photographer Tyler Shields. Parsing what such efforts might be trying to “say” is a waste of keystrokes. Intellectually and artistically, they say nothing. They’re crass publicity ploys.

What is going on? How did this become acceptable? It’s sad to think Morris, given her stature, even agreed to do this.

soupsoup:

Every district court nominee with unanimous opposition from the Senate Judiciary committee Republicans has been a woman or a person of color.

Click here.