Yard with a view
August 13, 2008 | Stuff
This was the view from our front yard this evening. We closed on the house today — two days early. Now just waiting for furniture to arrive …
Posted by Becky @ 11:22 pm | 3 Comments
Anyone know why my sidebar is messed up?
August 8, 2008 | Stuff
I can’t figure out why it’s showing up way at the bottom of the page. I haven’t made any updates to my sidebar. And I haven’t started drinking tequila yet.
Posted by Becky @ 6:30 pm | 3 Comments
Tequila shots tonight!
Stuff
So, we had an open bottle of tequila in our cupboard.
The packers don’t pack open bottles.
Oh, darn.
Books: Rumors of our Progress have been Greatly Exaggerated by Carolyn B. Maloney
August 7, 2008 | Uncategorized
I just finished reading Rumors of our Progress have been Greatly Exaggerated: Why Women’s Lives Aren’t Getting any Easier and How We Can Make Real Progress for Ourselves and Our Daughters by Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, D-N.Y. I received a review copy from the publisher, Modern Times, an imprint of Rodale, Inc.
As I was getting ready to write something about the book, I ran across Maloney’s July 29, 2008, appearance on Comedy Central’s Colbert Report. At first, I thought I would just include it with other links, but the more I thought about it, the more it bothered me.
| The Colbert Report | Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| Better Know a District – New York’s 14th – Carolyn Maloney | ||||
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Is it really funny that women get fired for lactating?
Here’s a quote from Maloney’s book.
I also heard numerous stories about difficulties in the workplace, including one woman whose male colleagues mooed outside the door as she expressed milk to take home and another woman being banished to do so in her car across the street from her office.
I didn’t laugh once while reading her book, but maybe I missed something. Exactly which issue that she wrote about was funny? Rape? Domestic violence? Burkas? Breast cancer? Or maybe prostitution? That link goes to a 2007 feature in Prism magazine, which Maloney reprinted on page 246 of her book and said it made the strongest case against sex trafficking she had ever seen.
Depictions of prostitution in the media and popular culture (including the movie Pretty Woman) can be grossly misleading, even glamorous. In fact, street prostitutes are typically trafficked, exploited, battered, and often force-fed drugs by slavemaster pimps. This series of mugshots of street prostitutes, which documents their first arrest to their eighth, illustrates the reality of life on the street, which more closely resembles a descent into hell than a Hollywood movie.
Is that funny? If not, I’m confused about why one of the first places she went to discuss her book was Comedy Central.
The blurbs on the back of her book are written by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, Gloria Steinem, Pat Schroeder, Ellie Smeal and Arianna Huffington. (Geraldine Ferraro was also included in the online “praise” section for the book.) Were they slapping their knees and giggling at the sight of Colbert using a breast pump while Maloney smiled and kept her cool? If not, does that mean they just can’t take a joke?
I’ve written about the blurred lines between celebrity and politics. It’s as if something has shifted. Instead of looking back as former government officials (elected or not), they now have to prove they don’t take themselves too seriously while they’re in office, no matter how “serious” the positions they hold. They have to prove that they get the joke. Hey, they’re even in on the joke because so many things that happen in Washington are, well, a joke. Is that it?
Maybe I just don’t get the whole Inside the Beltway atmosphere. Is it really just a non-stop college kegger where everyone has to hit the beer bong and slam shots until they puke their guts out to prove they can keep up?
Sigh.
Maloney’s book is a fairly comprehensive list of women’s issues — what’s been done, what’s been undone and what still needs to be done. For those who regularly keep up on these issues, not much of the information is new, but it’s interesting to read about the issues from Maloney’s perspective as a policymaker.
She put a “take-action guide” at the end of each chapter, providing contact information for some of the groups and organizations working on specific issues. Her goal is to convince readers to do something, anything: “I hope to persuade you that any action in support of your beliefs matters, whether it is large or small, brief or time-consuming, successful or unsuccessful.”
She included women’s personal stories as well as her own story and a wealth of information from other sources.
She draws upon the work of Martha Burk (Cult of Power: Sex Discrimination in Corporate America and What Can Be Done About It
She also included some of her own research and highlighted inconsistencies between cultural myth and everyday reality.
Maloney mentioned Morgan Stanley, which settled a class-action sex-discrimination case for $54 million and then another one for $46 million, yet it consistently appears on Working Mother magazine’s 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers list, a topic I have written about many times.
You might think that Morgan Stanley would work especially hard to eradicate sex discrimination after so costly [$54 million] an episode. But the firm settled another class action sex discrimination suit in 2007 for $46 million — bringing its overall sex discrimination price tag to an even $100 million. That sounds like a lot, but it only amounts to a few good days of trading.
Despite these incidents, Morgan Stanley has been cited numerous times by Working Mother magazine as one of the 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers. That makes me wonder how bad things are at other companies.
While she pointed out the inconsistency of the companies that appear in Working Mother with their employment track record, she listed in the take-action guide the National Association for Female Executives, which might be a perfectly fine organization. But it falls under the umbrella of Working Mother Media, which publishes Working Mother magazine, whose 100 Best list is — well, let’s just say I’m highly skeptical of the whole thing.
She also gave this example.
If you drive your Mitsubishi to the airport after filling its tank at Sunoco, board a Boeing-built plane for a United Airlines flight, use your Verizon cell phone service to call your spouse before you take off, and then bite into a Krispy Kreme doughnut, you’ve just enriched six household-name companies that have settled or lost sex discrimination cases and lawsuits in recent years.
Right. At least one of those companies — Verizon — makes Working Mother magazine’s 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers list year after year.
In the take-action guide at the end of the “Health Care That’s Always There” chapter, she recommended (among others) Dove’s Campain for Real Beauty as a way to “start health education early by teaching our young and teenaged girls about issues that affect them.” If you scratch the surface of Dove, you’ll find a wee bit of image manipulation of its own.
Unilever is the maker of Dove products (and major “research” funder), which are the basis for the Campaign for Real Beauty and its self-esteem education for young girls. Unilever also makes and markets Axe products, which exist in a parallel universe where the V.I.X.E.N.S. (Very Interactive Xtremely Entertaining Naughty Supermodels) and Bom Chicka Wah Wahs don’t have “real beauty” or self-esteem issues.
In “The Pretty Woman Myth” chapter, Maloney wrote about misleading portrayals of prostitution in popular culture and mentioned that the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 2006 went to ‘It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp,'” whose lyrics include:
Wait I got a snow bunny, and a black girl too
You pay the right price and they’ll both do you
That’s the way the game goes, gotta keep it strictly pimpin
Gotta have my hustle tight, makin change off these women, yeah
I remember when that happened, thinking, what?!? There was George Clooney, smugly patting himself on the back for Hollywood being “out of touch” for “giving Hattie McDaniel an Oscar when blacks were still sitting in the backs of theaters.” That was in 1939. Just how long was it, dear George, until the next black person was so honored? That would be 1948, then 1964, then 1982, then 2002. And just how far has Hollywood come, George, by glorifying “the black man” … as a pimp, not to mention portraying women of all colors as simply a venue for making money? Hollywood’s out of touch, George. Ya think?
Which brings me back around to the Comedy Central appearance.
If it’s a matter of reaching a younger audience? C’mon, they deserve more credit than that. It’s not only “the kids” watching Comedy Central, and “the younger audience” is watching much more than just Comedy Central. And there are tons of young, vibrant, intelligent voices on the Internet. Dust off the mouse and start clicking.
Besides, there’s not a damn thing that’s funny about this book. Just like the issues Maloney discusses in the book — the media and popular-culture myths that harm the efforts to improve the lives of real people — Maloney’s Comedy Central appearance did nothing but belittle and mock some very serious societal issues. The people behind the stories about sex discrimination, prostitution and unacceptably high infant-mortality rates (to name just a few) deserve much more than to become the butt of a comedian’s joke.
Related posts
Politics: All the world’s a stage
Colin Powell goes from class act to class clown
Rumors of housekeeping have been greatly exaggerated*
Categories: Working Mother
Know your Working Mother press releases
What Working Mother magazine won’t tell you, part 1
Will you let Working Mother magazine speak for you?
What Working Mother magazine won’t tell you: Abbott
Psst! Scientists prove girls prefer pink! Pass it on!
SLBTM: Unilever/Dove’s real beauty***
Posted by Becky @ 4:10 pm | 18 Comments
Just sayin’
Stuff
Somebody else: Life’s too short to drink cheap wine.
Me: No it’s not.
Posted by Becky @ 7:45 pm | 2 Comments
Rumors of housekeeping have been greatly exaggerated*
August 1, 2008 | Journalism,Media,MSM,Research,Statistics
This headline was on the front page of my newspaper this morning: “‘Clean Enough’ Is New Housekeeping Standard.” My newspaper didn’t archive it online, but it’s a McClatchy article written by Federica Narancio.
In my own little upside-down world, I imagine that instead of this …
Many women who work outside the home, including those with helpful kids and husbands, have come up with a new housekeeping standard, according to sociologists and family relations experts. It’s called “clean enough.”
the first paragraph would read like this …
Many men who work outside the home, including those with helpful kids and wives, have come up with a new housekeeping standard, according to sociologists and family relations experts. It’s called “clean enough.”
And y’all’d be going, “And this is news?”
Right.
*I totally ripped off the headline for this post from a book I just started reading: Rumors of our Progress have been Greatly Exaggerated by Carolyn B. Maloney.
One of the first things I highlighted came after she talked about $54 million damages Morgan Stanley paid in a sex-discrimination case, and she pointed out that the cost might have made the company work especially hard to do away with discrimination. Yet, in 2007, Morgan Stanley settled another sex-discrimination case for $46 million.
Despite these incidents, Morgan Stanley has been cited numerous times by Working mother magazine as one of the 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers. That makes me wonder how bad things are at other companies.
Hmm. Seems Rep. Maloney can smell the BS.
Posted by Becky @ 7:54 pm | 3 Comments
Just call us George & Weezie
July 28, 2008 | Stuff
Well we’re movin’ on up,
To the countryside.
To a deluxe corn field and a red barn.
Movin’ on up
To the countryside.
We finally got a piece of the farm.
Armadillos won’t dig in the back yard;
Gators won’t swim in the pool.
Gotta get us a big tractor
To mow grass and plow all the snow.
No more shorts in the winter
Time for boots and a hat.
As long as we live, it’s you and me baby
There ain’t nothin’ wrong with that.
Well we’re movin’ on up,
To the countryside.
To a deluxe corn field and a red barn.
Movin’ on up
To the countryside.
We finally got a piece of the farm.
…
Yep. It’s official. We move in less than two weeks. We pack Aug. 8, load Aug. 9, clean and take off sometime that weekend. We’re supposed to close on our house up there Aug. 15, and the kids start school Aug. 19. And I don’t want to jinx anything (I’ll blame it on the rooster), but if all goes well? This house I’m in right now won’t be ours anymore in September. [Fingers crossed!] Nothing like packing in a bazillion things into a couple of weeks just to keep things exciting.
Posted by Becky @ 11:42 am | 6 Comments
What is it with me and birds?*
Stuff
I have lived in Tampa for seven years (almost to the day). For the first time ever, I heard a rooster crow yesterday morning. What’s the deal? Is this some sort of weird sign? Meh. Sometimes, I suppose, a rooster is just a rooster. But I still can’t help but wonder what in the world was a rooster doing in my neighborhood. We’ve got all kinds of strange critters around here, but … a rooster?
*There are the Sandhill cranes. They are almost as tall as I am, and they have lethal-weapon-looking beaks — you know, the kind that could peck your eyeballs right out. They aren’t afraid of people and will walk right up to you. Freaks me out. At least in Nebraska (where the cranes hang out every year), you have to drive to the Platte River and watch them from a distance. I never knew I’d have them in my back yard (and on the sidewalks and walking down the middle of the street) one day.
*Then there were the vultures that gathered on my neighbor’s roof for a few days. Then the mourning dove soon after. I couldn’t help thinking, cripes, who died? Only to discover them later feasting on a dead turtle in my neighbor’s yard.
*And more vultures circling over our house one weekend recently, tempted no doubt by the dead armadillo in our street.
