Brittney Griner

What a freaking week, huh?

• Boston is on lockdown. Stay safe, everyone. [NPR]

• Gabby Giffords served up a big heaping plate of fuck all y'all with this editorial in The New York Times about the failure of the Senate to serve the American people by passing "common-sense legislation" requiring expanded background checks for gun buyers. [New York Times]

• A new Tumblr called Boys Clubs highlights the organizations, panels, boards, presidencies, and other institutions where women don't exist for a bracing visual on what insitututional bias—whether conscious or not—looks like. [Boys Clubs]

• Top WNBA draft pick Brittney Griner has been in the news a ton lately, but not because she's gay. Autostraddle discusses her graceful, casual acknowledgment of her identity, and, well, we love this girl: "Don't worry about what other people are going to say, because they're always going to say something."  [Autostraddle]

• Vulture investigates a classic Hollywood gender dynamic with a series of snappy charts showing that as film's most bankable male stars age, the female costars with whom they're paired, well, don't. (Or as one famous lothario put it, "I get older—they stay the same age.") [Vulture]

• Speaking of movies, IndieWire's Women and Hollywood blog has a list of all the female-centric movies opening this summer. Get excited! [Women and Hollywood]

• Former Bitch blogger Michelle Dean looks at the long history of pervasive sexism levied at memoirs written by women. [The Cut]

• If you're a fan of Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak, you'll want to know about her partnership with the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network. If you donate to RAINN this month (Sexual Assault and Prevention Awareness month), her publisher, MacMillan, will match your contribtution. [RAINN]

• Are we running out of female body parts around which to create consumer anxiety already? The apparent craze in the U.K. for nipple-darkening tattoos, or "tittoos," suggests yes. Greeeaaaat. [The Telegraph]

Have a great weekend, and join us in hoping for a blissfully uneventful coming week. Oh, and if we missed anything, let us know in the comments.

Good morning! Ready to start your weekend off right with a big bowl of healthy links from around the web?

• Tyler Perry's new movie, Temptation, looks to be a moralizing mess. But it's also dangerously cavalier about rape, according to Carolyn Edgar, who posits that the movie's larger message about "fallen" women getting what they deserve makes it even trickier to discuss the issue. [Carolyn Edgar]

• Earlier this week, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban caused a stir in the sports press by saying he's interested in drafting Brittney Griner, the star player for Baylor University's women's basketball team. But is it simply a "publicity stunt" on Cuban's part? Would drafting a woman into the NBA be terrible for women's basketball? Everybody's got an opinion. [ESPN, ThinkProgress, Business Insider]

• Elsewhere in basketball news, Rutgers men's basketball coach Mike Rice was fired this week after video surfaced of him physically and verbally abusing players during practice. At Autostraddle, a Rutgers alumna considers why Rice's apparently longstanding habit of using antigay slurs to bully (or, as he thought of it, "motivate") players was hush-hush for so long. [Autostraddle]

• In all the recent discussion about women leaning in and having it all, where's the discussion about what men can do? A paid paternity-leave quota in Quebec could be changing both how typically gendered work is valued as it allows mothers more freedom to continue working post-childbirth. [New York Times]

• It's Steubenville all over again: In the town of Torrington, Connecticut, two high-school football players have been charged with the rape of two 13-year-old girls—and the girls are on the receiving end of bullying and vitriol. [New York Times]

• Nevada assemplywoman Lucy Flores testified this week about the consequences of inadequate sex education, noting that her sister all gave birth as teenagers, and that she herself opted for an abortion. Cue the death threats, since as we all know, that's the pro-life way to do it! [ThinkProgress]

• If you're a Walking Dead fan who's been frustrated with how the show portrays women, well, get ready to be a little more frustrated: The comic series' author is on record as believing that women are weaker than men. "That's science." [Village Voice]

• Yesterday we lost Roger Ebert, a film critic who was so much more than just that. The Daily Beast rounds up some of his best reviews—as well as his most awesome burns. (Lookin' at you, Vinccent Gallo.) [Daily Beast]

As ever, let us know what you're reading in the comments!

OK, so before addressing the controversy surrounding the use of the word "lame" in my earlier post (that one’s gonna take some time), allow me to share some videos I stumbled upon while gathering my thoughts on the WNBA. They’re all of women who can dunk. And, while I’m partially of the mind that women dunking might actually diminish what makes women’s hoops special, it’s still pretty cool to behold. So check it out (sorry—some of the footage is a little grainy):