So about this guy in Taiwan who drops his child in order to catch a foul ball at a baseball game… I don’t know whether to be more appalled at the man’s action or at the media’s framing of it. Am I appalled that we condition our males to value sports over parenting? That they’d …
Category: gender issues
Oct 01 2011
“And son? Take care of your mom while I’m gone.”
Excuse me? I don’t need a child to take care of me. I know, he might reply, I’m just trying to – trying to what? Teach him to be a man? Teach him that grown women need looking after? And that he, as the one with the penis, is just the person to do it? …
Sep 19 2011
The Sexism Compensation Index (SCI)
I suspect that even with today’s rigorous interview and job performance appraisal techniques, which require that all applicants be asked and scored on the same questions, multiple standards still interfere with merit as the sole criterion for hiring and promotion. How? Well suppose
Aug 31 2011
From Romeo and Juliet to “Ass” and “Hole”
I filled in for a high school English teacher one day who had left the following instructions: “Have the students rewrite one of the two scenes from Romeo and Juliet – either the balcony scene or the fight scene – into contemporary English.” “Okay,” I said to the class, “this can be lots of fun, …
Aug 24 2011
Wedding Leave
I recently discovered that my workplace has ‘wedding leave’: apparently you can get up to three days off—with pay. What the fuck is going on here? I mean, what’s a wedding? It’s just a big party. Should employees be allowed to have personal parties on company time? I think not. Oh, but it’s a once-in-a-lifetime …
Aug 09 2011
The Little Birdies?
So I’m out walking today, and as I pass a neighbour tending his bird feeder, I wave. And the guy calls out to me “I’m feeding some seed to the little birdies!” The little birdies? What am I, twelve? No, I’m female. (I have a hard time believing that he would’ve said the same thing …
Jul 20 2011
Some sports are just too dangerous
‘Some sports are just too dangerous for women. They might get hurt.’ Oh please. This from the sex that makes beating someone senseless part of the game. And has its reproductive vitals hanging by a thread at bull’s-eye of the body with nary a half-inch layer of fat for protection. (What’s next in the evolution …
Jul 11 2011
The Gender of Business
Business is male. Make no mistake. Everything about it smacks of the male mentality. First, the obsession with competition. You have to be #1, you have to outcompete your competition. So hierarchy, rank, is everything. As is an adversarial attitude. It doesn’t have to be that way. Business could be a huge network of co-operative …
Jun 25 2011
Permitting Abortion and Prohibiting Prenatal Harm
I think abortion should be allowed. And I think prenatal harm (especially that caused by ingesting various legal and illegal substances while pregnant) should not be allowed. Some accuse me of hypocrisy or, more accurately, maintaining a contradictory position: either women have the right to control what happens to their bodies or they don’t. No …
Jun 19 2011
To the Morons who wear Make-Up
First, there’s the ageism you’re perpetuating: make-up is intended, to a large degree, to make one look younger. In many respects, younger is better, but in many respects, it isn’t (and anyway, make-up merely gives one the appearance of being younger). True, at some point in time, being old is completely the pits, but hey, …
fiction
