From here:

Nina Power is a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at Roehampton University, and writes the blog Infinite ThØught. She discusses her new book, One-Dimensional Woman ( Zero Books), a critique of the kind of contemporary feminism that poses women as thriving in consumer capitalism.

Where have all the interesting women gone? If the contemporary portrayal of womankind were to be believed, contemporary female achievement would culminate in the ownership of expensive handbags, a vibrator, a job, a flat and a man. How has it come to this? That the height of supposed female emancipation coincides so perfectly with consumerism is a miserable index of a politically desolate time. Much contemporary feminism, particularly in its American formulation, doesn’t seem too concerned about this coincidence.

This short book is partly an attack on the apparent abdication of any systematic political thought on the part of today’s positive, up-beat feminists. It suggests alternative ways of thinking about transformations in work, sexuality and culture that, while seemingly far-fetched in the current ideological climate, may provide more serious material for future feminism.

► Listen or download ♫

The book has already generated a lot of blogular commentary, much of it by people who do not seem to have actually read it.

–Ann Bartow

Scantily clad dancers were the draw at a downtown men’s entertainment club over the weekend for an event that raised nearly $1,000 for victims of the earthquake in Haiti. * * * Although the billing may be misleading – lap dancing is illegal in Ohio – the intention isn’t.

General Manager Kenny Soprano said Sunday the club donated all the money from the day’s regular $10 cover charge to International Services of Hope, or ISOH/IMPACT, of Waterville. * * *

That’s the amount needed to send a container of relief supplies to Haiti, said Linda Greene, ISOH/IMPACT’s chief executive officer. Ms. Greene said she has not been contacted by the club regarding the event.

The organization is grateful for any donations it receives to aid the people of Haiti.

“I don’t have a problem with it,” she said.

The full article is here.

According to the recipient organization’s website (here), the group has a religious-based mission:

The mission of ISOH/IMPACT is to Reach Out & Serve Others in the name of Christ through disaster relief and development projects at home, across the United States, and around world.

The organization pushes a “financial accountability” message (here):

We believe that each one of us should use whatever gift he has received to serve others (1 Peter 4:10) and that our acts of compassion will touch the hearts of those we serve. Furthermore, we believe that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful. (1 Corinthians 4:2)

Next we know, the charity will spin this with a press release describing the women working for the “men’s entertainment club” as using their gifts to “serve others.”

-Bridget Crawford

H/T David Cassuto

-Bridget Crawford

Here are a couple of data points the NYT missed:

In 2008 despite the higher number of female applicants, 68 more men than women were offered a place in the class of 2012 – 9.8 percent of men — and just 7.5 percent of women — were accepted.

In Fall 2008 the College of William and Mary admitted 43 percent of its male applicants and 29 percent of female applicants.

And:

At Harvard University, for example, the pool of more than 22,000 applicants has remained equally divided between men and women, meaning that both sexes are admitted at an equal—if dauntingly low—9 percent. Harvard—again, a relative newcomer to coeducation—has seen its percentage of female undergraduates increase steadily over the past decade from 46 percent in 1997 to 49 percent in 2006. Princeton, Stanford, Rice, Duke, and Yale Universities are in the same boat; ditto for the elite liberal arts colleges such as Amherst, Williams, and Middlebury.

–Ann Bartow

I wondered why Grandin, understanding how out of control factory farming has gotten in the last forty years (thanks in part to her own work?), has continued her work in the same field without reevaluating present conditions. Coming from such an intelligent person, her striking lack of analysis troubled me.

I also tend to be confused by Grandin’s stated bond with cattle when her actions seem to imply the opposite. As someone who also has deeply empathic bonds with animals—and also has a photographic memory—I’m genuinely bewildered by her ability to create systems that enable further slaughter while stating that she feels connected to animals. If you feel connected—and when your mind can replay life events as vividly as mine can—I truly don’t understand how you can live with that knowledge, with those mental images, of murder by your own hands. Maybe I misunderstand autism, despite having worked with autistic adults in the past. Maybe I also misunderstand myself. Anything is possible, but I remain troubled nonetheless.

In the past, I’ve said that Grandin’s work might bring people closer to understanding animals as sentient beings, deserving of our compassion and protection. But maybe I was wrong, and I’m definitely unsettled by HBO’s description of her as an “activist.” Grandin’s work may shine a much-needed light on autism—particularly adults living with autism, who remain largely misunderstood in society—but must that come at the expense of other lives? Jim Sinclair, an animal rights activist who is also autistic, has responded to Grandin’s work in slaughterhouse design with a beautifully simplistic statement: “If you love something, you don’t kill it.” * * *

Will ordinary folks think twice about the theory that “human slaughter” is an oxymoron or that Grandin believes quality of life is somehow more important that preserving the life itself? Can her work actually shift perspective, or does it simply make allowances for the continued use and needless killing of animals?

Shoot has several recent posts over at Bitch that might be of interest to those interested in the intersection of animal law and feminist theory, including, “Ecopsychology,” “Intro to Ecofeminism” and “Reclaiming Cow.’”

-Bridget Crawford

(cross-post from Animal Blawg)

From the NYT article entitled “Costa Rica Elects 1st Woman President in Landslide”:

… Chinchilla, the mother of a teenage son, is a social conservative who opposes abortion and gay marriage. She appealed both to Costa Ricans seeking a fresh face and those reluctant to risk the unknown.

As a female president, she would follow an increasingly common trend in many Latin American countries: Nicaragua, Panama, Chile and Argentina have all elected women as presidents.

Alfredo Fernandez, 77, said he has always voted for the National Liberation Party, but this time his ballot was special.

”It is an honor to be able to have a woman president,” he said.

Even Costa Ricans on the margins of society backed Chinchilla.

Heizel Arias, a 24-year-old single mother voted at a prison where she is serving an eight-year drug smuggling sentence.

”I voted for Laura Chinchilla because she has promised to fight for women,” Arias said. ”She was the only one who visited us and told us her plans and I believe in her.”

Okay, she doesn’t sound like a feminist, or someone I’d agree with much. But she may be able to accomplish a lot of positive changes for women in Costa Rica anyway. Here’s hoping.

–Ann Bartow

Here is an excerpt from Ediberto Roman’s inaugural post:

Then this past year at a conference of leading Latino and Latina legal scholars and activists, a panel on Latin public intellectuals both challenged and inspired me. The group addressed the nature of the public narrative levied against the Spanish-speaking communities, but somewhat struggled and perhaps even disagreed on the membership of Latino and Latina public intellectuals. Writers, poets, politicians, and even revolutionaries were mentioned, but a question seemed to arise concerning the place of legal academics in this laudable group of civil rights advocates and social justice champions. After some debate, a junior faculty member challenged many in the room and argued that many of the individuals that eventually would join this group—Voces Latina – were indeed public intellectuals. While those overly generous comments inspired me, and I am grateful to be included in such a list, I reflected and questioned whether my efforts at advocacy had any consequence. Despite perhaps being considered productive, possessing a resume that boasts numerous articles, books, and even a book series, I seriously questioned whether my efforts had any impact other than on the relatively few scholars that write on similar issues or happen to find one or two of my pieces. Was that enough?

I think not!

Then I, along with a group of accomplishend scholars, decided to create this blog in order to reach a broader a audience. In our organizational meeting at this year’s AALS conference, many of us wondered why we had not started this project earlier. We told stories that inspired us to undertake an engagement that would invariably take considerable time and perhaps cause criticism. I smiled and envisioned my daughter and many beautiful young Latinas and Latinos that would likely appreciate academics challenging hateful portrayals through a medium the younger generation might actually follow.

I look forward to following this group blog.

-Bridget Crawford

Governments around the world have undertaken reparations programs following historically recent experiences of serious human rights violations. This article uses tort theory to defend monetary payments as a constituent of national repair. It argues that paying money to victims comports with feminism too.

Once accepted in principle, this measure raises a new question: What is the best way to convey pecuniary reparations in transitional settings? With due heed for the reality that circumstances always vary from country to country, the chapter argues for “microfinance” (as distinguished from “microcredit”) as the preferred mode for transitional governments designing new national reparations programs. The article works with, while also trying to deepen, a conventional wisdom that microfinance advances the social and economic status of women.

The full article is available here.

-Bridget Crawford

Some Montgomery County high schools passed out fliers this week from an organization that contends gays can become heterosexual through therapy, and the schools say they cannot prevent the use of their distribution system by such groups.

The fliers, from the group Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays, were distributed Thursday alongside report cards by teachers at Winston Churchill High School in Potomac. The group says it delivered them to about half the county’s high schools this week and plans to do the same at the remaining high schools at the end of the school year.

The board of education claims that, under the terms of a settlement agreement from a 2006 lawsuit, it is required to distribute any literature that is not deemed hate speech and that is provided by a registered nonprofit organization.

Though this may not rise to the level of hate speech in the sense of being a slur or threat, it certainly seems inconsistent with the board of education’s nondiscrimination policy, which “affirm[s] the Board of Education’s commitment to maintaining an environment where all students and staff members conduct themselves in a manner built on mutual respect.” Telling straight high school students that their lesbian and gay peers could be straight if they just tried hard enough will in no way build mutual respect in the school system. If anything, it contributes to an environment in which you will encounter hate speech and acts of violence targeted at students who just seem not to be trying hard enough to toe the heterosexual line.

It also raises some interesting questions about double standards. Do you think that the school system would distribute a flier with its report cards from a nonprofit that said that we could achieve world peace if only everyone embraced Jesus Christ as their personal savior? That certainly isn’t a slur or a threat either, but, like the flier from the ex-gay group, it would contribute to an atmosphere of intolerance–in this case, of religious minorities. Or, would the school distribute a flier from a nonprofit that flatly contradicts another area of the curriculum–say, a flier from a nonprofit organization that advocated the view that the Earth is flat or that espoused creationism? Neither of these messages are hate speech, but they would run counter to the educational mission of the school, just as the ex-gay group’s flier apparently runs counter to the school’s health law curriculum.

Also, the school’s standards for distributing materials seem unduly lax. Any organization with 501(c)(3) status or a notarized letter on the organization’s letterhead stating that it is a nonprofit can get access to this distribution system. The school system seems to be taking 501(c)(3) status as some type of government imprimatur of an organization’s message. This is a mistake. And the fact that an organization is a nonprofit (or says that it is a nonprofit) says nothing about the appropriateness or trustworthiness of its message–all it means is that the organization is not a commercial enterprise. These two criteria for giving unfettered access to young minds seem completely misguided. A school is an educational institution. All of these organizations certainly have the First Amendment right to espouse their views, but does that mean that they should have the right to disseminate those views through the school system? Shouldn’t the messages that a school sends out to its students–even with a disclaimer–be in keeping with its educational mission?

-Tony Infanti

Via her website.