When the Washington Post featured a story about a transgender five-year-old last week, online commenters accused the parents of overreacting to harmless "tomboyishness." But parents who listen to their kids, allow their kids to live as their preferred gender, and guide them through consensual medical decisions are choosing life for their children when the alternative could be far more serious than a temper tantrum.
A study published last week by Loyola professor Kendall J. Eskine in Social Psychological and Personality Science reports that people who eat organic food are self-righteous assholes. My main question is: What in the ridiculous research hell kind of study is this?
The Pew Research Center offers startling, groundbreaking numbers on "Today's Woman" who "often balances her career with her husband and children." (Yes, this is a study from 2012, not 1975.) It is called "A Gender Reversal on Career Aspirations: Young Women Now Top Young Men in Valuing A High Paying Career." Hide your kids, people.
There's been a lot of discussion about the gender pay gap. But there are some jobs that pay women many more pennies than 77 cents to the dollar. Among them: Shoe Shiner, Butler, Secretary, and Computer Repair Technician.
I've been watching your miniseries, Weight of the Nation, and though you have some good information, I am largely disappointed. Not that I’m all that surprised—the title alone employs the same old fat-shaming rhetoric. "Look at these fat people!" your show says. Yeah yeah, health problems, diabetes, etc., blah blah. LOOK THEY’RE FAT.
This week, the New York Times covered the death of a Lorena Escalera, a Brooklyn woman who perished in a suspicious fire. They could have opened with a colorful description of her career in the ballroom scene—Escalera was a member of the House of Xtravaganza. Or they could have focused on the poor electrical circuitry in her apartment—a probable cause of the fire and symptomatic of lower-income housing. Instead, Al Baker and Nate Schweber opened with neighborhood gossip and physical descriptions: "She was 25 and curvaceous, and she often drew admiring glances in the gritty Brooklyn neighborhood where she was known to invite men for visits to her apartment, her neighbors and the authorities said." This turns out to be a set-up for them to mention that Lorena Escalera "was born male." You know, according to neighbors.
What's the most useful career advice anyone ever gave you? Here's my best shot at dispensing words of wisdom that I wish someone had told me when I entered the workforce but I didn't know until later. Feel free to add some to the comments. I'm sure me and my imaginary boo, Ryan Gosling, are missing something.
Last week, Argentina gave citizens the freedom to change their legal and physical gender without having to undergo medical, psychiatric, or judicial procedures. Along with eliminating patronizing barriers to swapping an "M" for an "F" on a driver's license, the law gives Argentinians a freedom you won't find anywhere else: gender self-determination.
This is why solar panel company Sunrun’s new ad campaign feels like a breath of fresh, sun-warmed air. It makes fun of solar energy’s leftist hippie stigma in a way that's funny and relatable for, say, my dad. Or whoever else! These ads avoid the exhausting political rhetoric and instead treat renewable energy like any other old industry, which can have nothing but positive effects at this point. Turning green energy into a political debate fuzzes the big picture; environmental issues like this one deserve an apolitical, agenda-free discussion. People don’t need to wear hemp and attend drum circles to be part of a movement that secures the future of clean air, clean water, and healthy land. We can all be different and still work together.
Maybe it is because I am breast-feeding my own son and am used to seeing women whip out a boob to put in baby’s mouth at the drop of a hat, but when I saw the cover of TIME this week, I didn’t find it all that odd.
Frankly, my first thought was, "Great! A picture of a woman breast-feeding!" After the uproar in 2009 about Facebook removing photos of breastfeeding mothers, as well as the rise of “lactivists” staging nursing sit-ins everywhere from airports to the Hirshhorn Museum—places that had asked women to stop nursing their babies—I usually appreciate seeing breastfeeding in the media. Obviously, though, when we have steps forward, we have steps back. The TIME cover is problematic in several ways, its problems well-pointed out in a previous Bitch post. Also unfortunate is the way the image coats the story inside, which covers “attachment parenting” with a greasy, unfriendly film.
Social Commentary
End of Gender: Not "Just A Tomboy"
Fertile Ground: Looking at Photos of Organic Food Makes You Jerk-y, Pointless Study Says
Lady Business: Breaking News! Women Like Marriage and Work
Lady Business: You'd Make as Much as Men If You Shined Shoes
Fertile Ground: Weight of the Nation, HBO? Let's Talk Industrial Agriculture First
Dear HBO,
I've been watching your miniseries, Weight of the Nation, and though you have some good information, I am largely disappointed. Not that I’m all that surprised—the title alone employs the same old fat-shaming rhetoric. "Look at these fat people!" your show says. Yeah yeah, health problems, diabetes, etc., blah blah. LOOK THEY’RE FAT.
No Respect Paid: The New York Times' Anti-Trans Coverage (And Why There's Hope for the Future)
*Trigger Warning*
This week, the New York Times covered the death of a Lorena Escalera, a Brooklyn woman who perished in a suspicious fire. They could have opened with a colorful description of her career in the ballroom scene—Escalera was a member of the House of Xtravaganza. Or they could have focused on the poor electrical circuitry in her apartment—a probable cause of the fire and symptomatic of lower-income housing. Instead, Al Baker and Nate Schweber opened with neighborhood gossip and physical descriptions: "She was 25 and curvaceous, and she often drew admiring glances in the gritty Brooklyn neighborhood where she was known to invite men for visits to her apartment, her neighbors and the authorities said." This turns out to be a set-up for them to mention that Lorena Escalera "was born male." You know, according to neighbors.
Lady Business: Ten Things That Would Have Been Good to Know At and After Graduation
End of Gender: Argentina Grants Gender Self-Determination
Last week, Argentina gave citizens the freedom to change their legal and physical gender without having to undergo medical, psychiatric, or judicial procedures. Along with eliminating patronizing barriers to swapping an "M" for an "F" on a driver's license, the law gives Argentinians a freedom you won't find anywhere else: gender self-determination.
Fertile Ground: New Ads Say You Don’t Have to Be a Pickle-Eating Hippie to Get Solar Panels
This is why solar panel company Sunrun’s new ad campaign feels like a breath of fresh, sun-warmed air. It makes fun of solar energy’s leftist hippie stigma in a way that's funny and relatable for, say, my dad. Or whoever else! These ads avoid the exhausting political rhetoric and instead treat renewable energy like any other old industry, which can have nothing but positive effects at this point. Turning green energy into a political debate fuzzes the big picture; environmental issues like this one deserve an apolitical, agenda-free discussion. People don’t need to wear hemp and attend drum circles to be part of a movement that secures the future of clean air, clean water, and healthy land. We can all be different and still work together.Fertile Ground: Attachment Parenting Isn't About Being "Mom Enough"
Frankly, my first thought was, "Great! A picture of a woman breast-feeding!" After the uproar in 2009 about Facebook removing photos of breastfeeding mothers, as well as the rise of “lactivists” staging nursing sit-ins everywhere from airports to the Hirshhorn Museum—places that had asked women to stop nursing their babies—I usually appreciate seeing breastfeeding in the media. Obviously, though, when we have steps forward, we have steps back. The TIME cover is problematic in several ways, its problems well-pointed out in a previous Bitch post. Also unfortunate is the way the image coats the story inside, which covers “attachment parenting” with a greasy, unfriendly film.
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