Posts Tagged ‘gender’
Caster Semenya is clean: the’dilemma’ of being yourself
Well done, Caster Semenya for winning Olympic gold in the women’s 800m. Much has been made of Semenya’s gender.
Presented her Olympic gold medal by the same organisation that will look to restrict her future in the sport, Caster Semenya stood on top of the podium and smiled broader than ever before.
The finest 800m runner the world has seen for almost decade, there was little doubt that she would depart these Rio Olympics with a gold medal round her neck.
There were three people in that race with what can be termed ‘intersex’ characteristics.
AP says the “result that will only stoke the complex debate over whether women with much higher levels of testosterone than normal should be allowed to compete unchecked.”
Asking:
Do women who have much higher levels of natural testosterone than normal have an advantage over other women in athletics, and if so, is it unfair?
The athlete said in 2010:
“I have been subjected to unwarranted and invasive scrutiny of the most intimate and private details of my being. Some of the occurrences leading up to and immediately following the Berlin World Championships have infringed on not only my rights as an athlete but also my fundamental and human rights.”
NBC calls her competing a “dilemma”. The New Yorker called her “breathtakingly butch”.
No one is accusing Semenya of using illicit substances. Quite the opposite: Some have suggested she should be taking drugs in order to bring her hormone levels more closely in line with those of average women.
Semenya was raised and identifies as female. But according to a leaked medical test, Semenya’s testosterone levels are three times as high as those of most women, and she has internal testes instead of ovaries.
Is surgery the solution? The New York Times:
At the London Olympics, four female athletes, all 18 to 21 years old and from rural areas of developing countries, were flagged for high levels of natural testosterone. Each of them subsequently had surgery to remove internal testes, which produce testosterone, as well as procedures that were not required for resuming competition: feminizing vaginoplasty, estrogen replacement therapy and a reduction in the size of the clitoris.
Olga Khazan wonders:
Still, it’s not considered unsportsmanlike to simply be strange-looking. Countless Olympians are celebrated for unorthodox features that give them an edge in their sports. Much has been made of Michael Phelps’s preternatural wingspan and ultra-flexible feet that turn into “virtual flippers.” Biostaticians have said Usain Bolt’s 6-foot-5-inch height and fast-twitch muscle fibers make him perfectly suited to sprinting. Other athletes have less obvious advantages, like high levels of hemoglobin or diminutive heights tailor-made for tumbling passes.
What to do? Can you make a new division of competition: men, women and intersex?
Jessica Valenti says something really dumb about shopping
Jessica Valenti is writing about gender unfairness in the Guardian. The headline to her story: “Women are overpriced.” Ha!
A report this month on products in the UK found something very similar: when it came to the same products marketed differently for men and women, there was a whopping 37% difference in price. Beauty products, toys, everything. It doesn’t even get better as you age: adding insult to injury, women are even charged more for adult diapers.
Beyond the profound unfairness of having to pay more for the same products (while making less money, to boot!) there’s something quite frustrating about the fact that shopping is something that has long been used to paint women as frivolous and financially irresponsible.
Got that? Women are unfairly portrayed as frivolous, says Valenti, because they didn’t realise (i.e. bother to check) they are over-paying for stuff.
Wow!
Posted: 26th, January 2016 | In: Broadsheets, Reviews | Comment
Newspapers only feature naked or hired women on front pages
A survey in January this year revealed that women do read newspapers.
But how do newspapers report on women?
These are today’s front pages:
The only women on the front pages are either advertising trinkets or / and showing lots of skin. The Scottish Daily Mail bucks the trend by showing a mother and daughter rowing.
And the backpages:
Women in sport? None.
German town invites male drivers to park between a naked woman’s legs
The “men’s parking space” invites drivers to park between “Steep mountains, moist valleys”. The “Männerparkplatz” in the Black Forest town of Triberg is just a joke, says Triberg Mayor Dr. Gallus Strobel claims.
But gender equality activists in Baden-Württemberg are not l,aughing. They say:
“This type of sexist advertising, which uses a woman’s naked body to grab attention and suggests women are a sexual commodity, is both misogynistic and inhuman.”
Mayor Strobel responds:
“It’s a matter of artistic freedom. Art is allowed to provoke people, and should do so.”
As we Mr Strobel browses the ‘art collection’ on the top shelf of his local newsagents and his laptop, the artist behind this piece of adolescent crud says it’s not him. Werner Oppelt, for it is he, explains:
“I was unwilling to take part in this from the start. It’s simply not my style.”
As distracted male drivers misjudge their distances we await an artwork featuring mayor Stobel’s and artist Oppelt shunting one another in a small wood.
Study: Women who make more money still do more chores than men
A research paper published the journal Work, Employment and Society says men who earn less money than their female lovers do more housework than men who earn more money than their better halves.
But:
Even in households where women made more money, though, women still did the majority of chores.
It was not a big study:
Clare Lyonette of the Warwick Institute for Employment Research interviewed 36 women and 12 men, all of whom worked full-time; all of the couples also had at least one child younger than 14. In their interviews, nearly every person expressed their belief that men and women should share the household chores equally, even if that’s not what actually happened in their own homes.
Men. You have been warned…
Liz Prince On Tomboy: ‘I’ve always thought about gender’
In Tomboy, Liz Prince looks at growing up, being a girl and what gender means:
“I’ve always thought about gender, as someone who has been categorically ‘gender nonconforming’ for my entire life, I was forced to think about it, but obviously I became more conscious of it as a social issue as I’ve gotten older. And as I’ve met more folks who are genderqueer or trans, it’s been really enlightening to hear their stories, and it got me thinking about my own gender history.
“An unexpected side effect of writing Tomboy is that I have gotten a lot of letters and emails from parents of tomboys, who say that they read the book, and they feel like they understand their children so much better now. I got a really emotional letter from a woman who has a tomboy daughter, who she has in the past tried to force to conform more strictly to a gender norm, and my book made her feel really terrible for doing that, because she understands now that her daughter should be free to express herself the way that is comfortable to her.
“I was really unprepared for receiving feedback like that; letters about how my book has actually changed the way someone approaches their parenting. It’s very validating.”
Police Seek ‘Socially Awkward’ Asian Male Who Chatted Up Women On Campus
TO the University of Waterloo, where being socially akward is a crime. Cambridge University students look on with fear:
“I’m sure some of them were very concerned about how this guy approached, but we still had to deal with university policies and laws, and we’re not seeing he’s breached any of those,” says Dan Anderson, director of UW Police Services.
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Women Are Child Abusers: Gwendolynn Lindgren Is Not A Man
IT’s not only men who attack children. But if you read the mainstream media, you wouldn’t know it.
The Guardian notes:
There is much more we don’t know, including how many paedophiles there are: 1-2% of men is a widely accepted figure…
And of women? No data is given. Not even a guess.
An Albuquerque woman photographed herself engaging in sex acts with a 7-year-old boy and told police she couldn’t promise to not do it again, according to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court. Gwendolynn Lindgren, 34, was charged with criminal sexual penetration, among other things, after her husband told police he found photographs of her and the boy in emails on her cell phone.
We’ll keep track on the women who abuse children. It might makle men feel less like abusers-in-waiting…
The War On White Men: Transgender Timothy Boatwright Is Too Male To Be Wellesley College’s Diversity Officer
THE war on white men continues: a caucasian female student who identifies as a man has been discouraged from becoming Wellesley College’s diversity officer because to have a white male in that position would perpetuate patriarchy.
Timothy Boatwright was born a girl, and checked off the “female” box when applying to the Massachusetts all-women’s school, according to an article in the New York Times. But when he got there, he introduced himself as a “masculine-of-center genderqueer” person named “Timothy” (the name he picked for himself) and asked them to use male pronouns when referring to him.
And, by all accounts, Boatwright felt welcome on campus — until the day he announced that he wanted to run for the school’s office of multicultural affairs coordinator, whose job is to promote a “culture of diversity” on campus.
But some students thought that allowing Boatwright to have the position would just perpetuate patriarchy. They were so opposed, in fact, that when the other three candidates (all women of color) dropped out, they started an anonymous Facebook campaign encouraging people not to vote at all to keep him from winning the position.
Oh, brave new world…
Against Me! singer to change gender even though America can’t handle the idea of gay marriage
WHILE half of America shouts loudly about how much it hates the gays, it is with unimaginable bravery that Against Me! singer, Tom Gabel, announces that after years of living with gender dysphoria for years, he is to become she and start living life as Laura Jane Grace.
Gender dysphoria is not a laughing matter (despite the hooting that surrounded Lady GaGa’s non-penis) and changing your sex is surely one of the most difficult decisions a human can make. Yet, you can almost hear the catcalls from those who are steadfast in their unwillingness to understand the situation.
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Posted: 10th, May 2012 | In: Celebrities | Comments (4)
The disappearing gender pay gWE’VEap
WE’VE been screamed at for years that there was this gender pay gap thing and told how appalling it was. Thing is, the gap seems to be disappearing:
Although overall the gender pay gap remains, with women earning 9.1 per cent less than men, in part-time work the trend is reversed.
Data from the Office for National Statistics show that since 1998, median hourly earnings excluding overtime pay have been higher for female employees.
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