Blog posts from July 2005
Men valued more highly in the caring professions
By Lynne Miles | 28 July 2005, 17:41
Researchers have found that men who pursue careers in the caring professions (nursing, teaching and other so-called ‘women’s jobs’) get more respect than women in the same professions. A study recently published by Brunel University, reported in The Guardian, found…
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Man to chair women's studies department
By Jess McCabe | 26 July 2005, 20:48
Is it appropriate for a man to chair an women’s studies department? The University of Washingston thinks so, because they’ve just appointed David G Allen to exactly that role. As Inside Higher Ed reports, the move has received a mixed…
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Dove "Real Women" ads hit U.S.
By Catherine Redfern | 23 July 2005, 12:07
The Dove “Campaign for Real Beauty” adverts, which have been over here since April 2004 and again more recently have started to incite debate in the U.S. Msmusings has a good summary of the reaction. When the ads were first…
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Iraqi women's rights under threat
By Jess McCabe | 21 July 2005, 21:57
Iraqi women could see their rights stripped away from them by their newly democratically elected government, Ms reports. Plans to revise the Iraqi constitution would see the stipulation that women hold 25% of seats in the national assembly scrapped, and…
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'Industrial revolution' of marriage all for the best
By Jess McCabe | 21 July 2005, 12:41
So-called “family values” have come to be the byword of social conservatives concerned with pulling back free-ranging social change and returning us to a time when women were women and men were men. And they were married to each other….
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'Wife fattening farm' force feeds Mauritanian girls
By Jess McCabe | 20 July 2005, 15:10
Although in the West we are used to one standard of beauty - thin, mostly white - this has not yet spread world-wide. However, as this BBC reports reveals, that does not mean the rest of the world is any…
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Bush announces Supreme Court nomination \x96 and why you should care
By Lynne Miles | 20 July 2005, 11:54
George Bush has announced that John Roberts is his nomination for Supreme Court Justice, to replace Sandra Day O\x92Connor, who recently announced her retirement. There has been huge concern among feminists over this nomination (we’ve written about it here and…
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It's not feminism
By Catherine Redfern | 19 July 2005, 22:54
Confusing article in the Guardian today entitled “Women getting rich faster than men”. It claims that “women are becoming increasingly more wealthy than men” and “it is estimated that by 2025, women will own 60% of the nation’s personal wealth”….
Islamic feminists key to anti-terrorism
By Catherine Redfern | 19 July 2005, 22:18
Further to Louise’s post below about the London bombings, on Friday last week Johann Hari took an interesting perspective on this in The Independent, in a comment piece called “The best way to undermine the jihadists is to trigger a…
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Spectre of Renewed Racism?
By Louise Livesey | 19 July 2005, 08:27
They are concerned about women bearing the brunt of a backlash in which Muslims are all branded as potential terrorists thus making Muslim women vulnerable to both branding “as part of extremist groups; at the same time, they will remain the target of fundamentalist forces within their own communities”.
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US women skip treatment because of cost
By Jess McCabe | 13 July 2005, 22:21
In the US, 27 per cent of women say they are have skipped doctors visits or delayed treatment, because they are afraid they cannot afford to pay, AJC reports (found via Lilith news round up). Women are also failing to…
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Careers advice failing Welsh girls
By Jess McCabe | 13 July 2005, 15:40
Girls in Wales are loosing out on better-paid careers, because schools are channelling them into jobs traditionally dominated by women, the Equal Opportunities Commission said today. A BBC report today reveals that Wales is worse than the rest of the…
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Woman to command first shuttle launch since Columbia
By Jess McCabe | 12 July 2005, 15:14
The first space shuttle to launch since the Columbia exploded in February 2003 will be commanded by a woman, Women’s E-News reports. Eileen Collins already has a number of firsts under her belt - she was NASA’s first female pilot…
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Late abortion survey
By Jess McCabe | 12 July 2005, 09:07
Most women who have abortions between 19 and 24 weeks into pregnancy do so because they only realise they are pregnant late on, Marie Stropes International reveals today. In a survey of more than 100 women who had undergone terminations…
Woman refused contraception
By Catherine Redfern | 11 July 2005, 21:53
F Word reader Helen has alerted us to a shocking news item from early July. The BBC reports that in February, a Cardiff couple whose contraception failed went to buy emergency contraception from their local Asda store. The on-duty pharmacist…
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Cambridge Shorts
By Jess McCabe | 11 July 2005, 15:59
Are you in Cambridge this weekend? If so, you may want to check out Birds Eye View’s series of shorts being screened on Saturday as part of the Cambridge Film Festival. More info here, but highlights include a samurai short…
Historical buzz
By Jess McCabe | 10 July 2005, 22:06
Did you know that the small electric motor was invented to power a vibrator? Or that it was the fifth electrical appliance to be sold for use in the home - after the sewing machine but before the electric iron?…
Emergency contraception use remains steady
By Jess McCabe | 10 July 2005, 18:15
Surprise surprise - making the morning after pill available over the counter in chemists has not resulted in a surge in unsafe sex, the BBC reports. Researchers from Imperial College London surveyed women aged 16 to 49, both before and…
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Women Have a Lower Pain Threshold Than Men
By Lynne Miles | 5 July 2005, 13:48
BBC News report on clinical testing which has shown women to have a lower pain threshold than men \x96 which leaves me wondering: \x93So What?\x94 Physical differences between males and females are really only interesting in terms of the ways…
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US emergency update
By Jess McCabe | 4 July 2005, 16:16
Ms Magazine have come up with a list of five rights Americans could be set to lose, if Bush elects a hard line right winger to the supreme court. We all knew about abortion, but did you know that gender…
US women face "state of emergency"
By Jess McCabe | 2 July 2005, 10:57
Women’s rights are facing a “state of emergency” in the US, NOW president Kim Gandy said yesterday. She was referring to the retirement of supreme court justice Sandra Day O’Conner - the first woman ever to serve on the supreme…
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Look, I\x92m sorry, but I feel *compelled* to talk about Big Brother
By Lynne Miles | 1 July 2005, 16:16
Another week, another eviction. Maxwell and Saskia are up, and you just know that Saskia\x92s going to be for the chop. But why is it that when a woman comes up against a man in a Friday night vote, she\x92s…
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Are there any female superheros? Yes!
By Jess McCabe | 1 July 2005, 09:41
As Batman Begins hits the screens, Tanya Gold (writing for the Guardian), asks where are all the femal superheros?. On the big screen, she’s right - they’re few and far between, and unconsciounably drippy. But that doesn’t mean they don’t…
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