In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Month: December 2012

On hating Chris Brown

I love Ann Friedman and I think this piece about Chris Brown and Rihanna is good, but I also think she’s wrong. It’s worth a read, and the content isn’t exactly what the headline says — Ann makes the argument that hating Chris Brown isn’t particularly helpful for Rihanna, and that bad-mouthing abusers isn’t effective since most women who are abused go back to their abusers many times over and repeated negative comments may further alienate them from support networks. She also says that we can’t (and shouldn’t) be telling Rihanna what to do when it comes to Brown.

Let the kids start white student unions

Students want to start white supremacist groups on campus? Let ’em (although I’m heartened to hear that they’re having trouble finding a faculty adviser). Encourage them to put that on their resumes. List the group membership on the campus website so that future employers know the kind of liability they’re opening themselves up to when they hire these little jerks in the future.

If you only read one thing about the Kasandra Perkins murder

Make it this at What About Our Daughters. Jovan Belcher killed his girlfriend and then himself; she did not bring that on herself by going to a concert. She was not, as published in Deadspin, a “catalyst” to her own death (also, it’s apparently now totally cool and responsible to publish anonymous, unsubstantiated hit pieces on murder victims penned by the murder’s friends. Because “context,” or something).

Is an all-female Supreme Court in the near future?

Sadly, despite Justice Ginsburg’s hopes, I say probably not. And this is actually one of my favorite pieces I’ve ever written for the Guardian (the ensuing comment section also suggests that readers hate it, so there’s that). A (big) section of the piece:

Unfortunately, an all-female supreme court is a long ways off. And not because women aren’t just as smart as men, don’t achieve as highly or aren’t as ambitious. But because, socially, we set men up to succeed and set women up to fail.