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• The Biggest Driving Mistakes Moms Make

  As responsible parents, we'd never drive drunk, tailgate out of road rage, try to apply makeup or read while driving, right? But turns out some very common behaviors are just as dangerous. According to this story from MSNBC, a recent University of Utah study found that subjects using cell phones in a driving simulation had three accidents, while those who were drunk had none (although I take major issue with the story for this... Read More... Posted Jul 29 2008, 04:32 PM by AmyinMotown with | with 6 comment(s) Filed under: driving, dangerous, cell phones, sexism, sippy cups, accidents, distracted driving, convenience

• America's Main Problem? Men Are Oppressed

  Normally I’m not one to draw more attention to the Ann Coulters of the world—people who get famous by writing books making the most inane, controversial arguments they can think of. But this Jezebel rant on one such book is so much fun, I’d thought I’d share. I believe Kathleen Parker's intelligence level is pretty clear from the book cover pictured. The provocative subtitle, mysteriously written in all lower case letters, is, "why men matter; why women should care." Unfortunately, this is not a witty spoof of the most ridiculous book topic ever.  Read More... Posted Jul 25 2008, 02:58 PM by Hannah Tennant-Moore with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: books, feminism, Ann Coulter, thailand, history, sexism, controversial, united states, kathleen parker, oppression, shared housework, gender bias, gender equality, save the males, men are oppressed, women hate men, failing boys, reverse sexism, bias against men, why men matter

• Dads Get Screwed For Staying At Home--Just Like Moms!

  Here's a problem many women who took a break from working outside the home to be with the kids have faced for a while: How to explain the blank space on the resume? The fact that being a SAH parent isn't given much respect, and the unfair impression some employers have that it means you aren't serious about your career have meant women have had a harder time breaking back into the paid workforce. But hey, problems like this aren't just for the ladies anymore. Ain't equal treatment grand? With increasing numbers of dads opting out to raise the pups... Read More... Posted Jun 13 2008, 05:01 PM by Kelly Mills with | with no comments Filed under: dads, moms, working, sexism, SAHD, jobs, SAHM, career, employers, workforce, stay at home

• Saudi Women Treated As Children

  A report released by the New York based Humans Rights Group says adult Saudi Arabian women hold the status of “perpetual childhood” with their husbands and the male members of their families. Among the other rights not afforded to Saudi women are the right to drive and the right to health care unless given permission.     What this means for Saudi mothers is not being allowed to make even the most simple choices for their own children, because they, after all, have the same status as their children... Read More... Posted Apr 25 2008, 07:02 AM by Cole Gamble with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: children, women, New York, human rights, sexism, Saudi Arabia, patriarchy, middle east, oil, human rights group

• 5 Reasons Wives Do More Housework

  A recent study found wives do seven times more housework than their husbands. As I write this post my wife is folding laundry, and I wonder, can this be true? Do wives really do more housework?  Nah, crazy talk. Oh honey, while you are tackling that mound of freshly laundered clothes, could you grab my coffee mug? It’s sooooo far away. Okay, okay who thinks this comes as a big surprise? It's a stereotype, a running joke, a real screw job for women, but I think I have some legitimate reasons why women do more around the house. Old Fashioned Sexism. Not until I met my in-laws did I discover some people really see a difference in “women's work” and “men's work"...   Read More... Posted Apr 15 2008, 06:00 AM by Cole Gamble with | with 12 comment(s) Filed under: chores, laundry, sexism, housework, Gender roles, report, in-laws, men versus women, doing the dishes, dusting, vaccuming, inequality, spring cleaning, Pledge

• Political Nanny: Naughty Chair for Kentucky Bigots

  At a Lincoln Day dinner in northern Kentucky, GOP lawmakers had a fun time criticizing Democrats. But as one blogger who was there reported, the comments went a bit far.   Read More... Posted Apr 14 2008, 06:32 PM by Madeline Holler with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: racism, Kentucky, hillary clinton, barack obama, sexism, "boy", Hooters, GOP, fundraisers

• Open Letter of the Month: Dear PR People...

  Greetings PR people! First, let me say I'm so glad you love the site, I appreciate that compliment. And I know your job can't be all easy, sending e-mails to bloggers and not knowing if you will be well-received or if some rogue is gonna mock the product or event you are pitching, though I suppose publicity is publicity. So let me just say a couple things and you can take or leave it, but I do mean this kindly. First, I should warn you that I'm not such a fan of receiving e-mails that start, "Dear Mommy Blogger." I know many are fine with that term, but even my kid... Read More... Posted Apr 08 2008, 06:35 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: Celebrities, products, parents, dads, moms, stereotypes, daddy blogger, sexism, mommy blogger, PR, posts, open letter, titles, mocking, public relations, letters

• Because Womenfolk Like Babies, Not B-Ball

  Does this sound like a ridiculous barking dog to anyone else? Yes, Discovery Health's Baby Madness, billed as the mom's alternative to basketball's Final Four. Because of course I would never want to watch basketball. Because I am a girl. And I like babies.  Ha! Ha! Babies! Cute. Not basketball. Not like my husband probably decided I was the one for him due to my excellent trash talk the first year we were dating, when my school met his in the first round (the same year, I might add, I won a statewide journalism award for a sports story I worked on). Not like I spent much of last year's tourney several notches ahead of my best guy friend in his own tournament pool. And I'm not even especially a sports fan.   Read More... Posted Apr 02 2008, 04:02 PM by AmyinMotown with | with no comments Filed under: basketball, sexism, michelle duggar, Baby Madness: Multiples

• Your Girls Can Be "Bimbos" Online!

  Sometimes you see stuff and think, "Is this fer real?" When I read about the Miss Bimbo game, I kept thinking, "Oh, in a minute they'll say the game is for adults." But no, in fact the majority of the 200,000 players are between the ages of 7 and 17. But let me back up: There's a virtual "fashion" game for girls where they get a "Bimbo" and have to navigate her through boob jobs and diets and so on to make her the coolest bimbo of all. Girls can dress their dolls in sexy outfits for clubbing, and are encouraged to keep them waif thin through diet pills and plastic surgery. Niiiice. Most of the accounts I read focused on the weight and cosmetic horrors of the game, but I personally was more disturbed by the fact that... Read More... Posted Mar 25 2008, 07:02 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 7 comment(s) Filed under: health, teens, internet, girls, diet, daughters, online, self-esteem, plastic surgery, eating disorders, weight, sexism, virtual reality, body image, boob job, dolls, computer games, misogyny, sugar daddy, self image

• Controversy: Nature/Nurture

  Madeline's post this week expressing frustration and despair at the blatant sexism in her Target circular definitely pitted the feminist theorists against the . . . I don't know, what do you call those who pretty much said, "Chill out, it's just a Target circular"?    I too was raised to think of gender as a cultural construct.  My mom drilled into my head that girls like pink and dolls and dresses and boys like blue and trucks and guns because society tells us we should.  And I believed it. Now, can I hear from all of those who thought as I did until we had children who thwarted our every expectation?  Because I KNOW there's a lot of us out there.   Read More... Posted Mar 14 2008, 05:30 PM by asflutz with | with 9 comment(s) Filed under: stereotypes, Target, sexism, Gender roles, nature-nurture

• Did the Washington Post Say Our Girls Are Dim Or Not?

  The other day I was discussing the women's suffrage movement with my daughter. When she asked why women couldn't vote in the past, I cited a number of reasons, including the fact that many people thought women were too emotional and less intelligent than men, and therefore couldn't be entrusted to make good decisions. She looked dumbfounded, and asked, "Well, since the women knew that wasn't true, why didn't they just take over?" That led to another involved discussion, and it came up that some women also bought the stereotypes about themselves. Hey, and then the next day the Washington Post printed this idiotic thing on how women are dumber than men.  You may have heard that the Outlook editor John Pomfret says the piece of crap was intended to be "tongue-in-cheek." I dunno... Read More... Posted Mar 04 2008, 06:35 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 5 comment(s) Filed under: girls, satire, humor, women, feminism, Washington Post, sexism, women's rights, emotion, editor, charlotte allen, sex differences, stereotype, stupid

• Older Moms Do It Better

  If you follow this sort of thing, you know that older moms have been lambasted in the media lately because of the drop in fertility and the fact that they have a higher risk of birth defects and miscarriage, blah blah blah. There's been some members of the medical community and a couple of female columnists exhorting women to stop waiting so long to have kids, saying ladies should maybe settle for a less-than-great mate in order to spawn early and safely or risk being alone and childless. Those wicked older moms. Why, a group of mothers hasn't been this villified since...um, single moms? Lowri Turner is mad and she isn't gonna take this crap anymore. She argues... Read More... Posted Feb 22 2008, 03:31 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: fertility, men, sexism, divorce attorneys, single moms, daily mail, older moms, middle age, career, teen mothers, selfish, lowri turner

• Do Celeb Moms Get a Worse Rap Than Celeb Dads?

  You know how all the news sources cover celebrity parenting like we'll just die if we don't know who held their baby over a pit of wild vipers and paparazzi and which celeb doesn't even know how to install a child safety seat? Well, when I saw this bit on how women celebs get more media focus for their antics than the dudes, I wondered if the same held true for celebrity parenting. After all, two of the examples given--Britney Spears and Heath Ledger--fit the parent bill as well. (And let me just say for the record that when the author of that bit says "It's time to bring some quality journalism attention to both sides of this equation and highlight these struggles before anyone else dies unexpectedly" I groan "Puhleeze". The media is gonna save lives by reporting early on the fact that so-and-so is depressed or a drug addict? Quick, get photos of him taking his anti-anxiety meds, before it's too late!) I'm usually the first person to... Read More... Posted Jan 28 2008, 04:31 PM by Kelly Mills with | with no comments Filed under: steve irwin, paparazzi, Britney Spears, michael jackson, celebrity parents, alec baldwin, sexism, David Hasselhoff, heath ledger, famous dads, stars, journalism, gender inequality, famous moms

• Her Depot Is For Tools

  You know, I like working on projects around the house, but I find that Home Depot just isn't attuned to my needs as a woman and a mother. Everything is so, you know, manly and sawdust-y, it just makes me feel intimidated. And those power tools are so big and scary-looking...Mmm, big, whirring, intimidating tools... What?  Oh yes, I'd really like is a store that has a more feminine vibe, so that me and my little girl can feel comfortable when we embark on a decorating project (let's leave the repairs for the guys, okay girls?) And look, Home Depot has answered my shrill little womanly shriek! Now they're opening "Her Depot" stores. Her Depot understands what I'm all about. Check this out... Read More... Posted Oct 17 2007, 05:37 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 5 comment(s) Filed under: moms, sexism, home depot, domesticity, home repairs, her depot

• Disney: Mean To Girls For Ages

  Ever since my kid could say, "I wuv Sweeping Beauwty" she's been getting the strident friendly mom-with-a-women's-studies-background blather about how the Disney princesses should just save themselves and why are they so passive? I came down as pro-Mulan early on, which led to some discussions about how girls have historically been excluded and isn't that weird and that's why Mulan had to pretend she was a boy to fight in the army. As a result, my kid now claims sexual equality is measured by the fact that girls can fight in battles. Sigh. But look, Disney has had a long legacy of being not-so-nice to chicks, and this letter from 1938 is an interesting example, via boing boing. Miss Ford got turned down for animator training school because she was female. I guess if we look at the stationary, it's clear a woman's purpose is to be leered at by seven creepy, dirty little guys, not for the tough man's work of drawing shit. Even the woodland creatures agree. Posted Jul 03 2007, 11:27 AM by Kelly Mills with | with 4 comment(s) Filed under: disney princesses, girl power, sexism, gender differences

• Here's Your Hussy, Honey: Dolls That Make Us Cringe

  Move over Barbie, and Bratz teen dolls! Make way for Bratz Babyz! Dorothy at BlogHer says it like it is, describing the disturbing thing about these dolls that they scarily resemble many toddler girls. But now with makeup! And short dresses! The challenge of raising daughters in this  culture is the disappearance of girlhood, the sexualization of women and girls, and the message that the only thing about them that matters is their looks.  Ugh. So when my daughters tell me they're fat, or bad at math, or think boys are stronger, I want to kick something (maybe a weak boy).  And they don't watch television and they don't play with Barbies or Bratz or Baby Hooker Junior.  But like all the other worried mommies out there, I'm confident this won't prevent them from having the usual preoccupations. At minimum, I can keep these horrid dolls out of their toy box.   Posted May 03 2007, 01:26 PM by Rachael Brownell (Redsy) with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: barbie, gender stereotypes, BlogHer, bratz, Bratz Babyz, sexism