I am literally unable to respond

[ellid]

The blend of pseudo-science, misinterpreted data, and good old-fashioned internalized self-hatred in this op-ed in, of all places, The Washington Post is utterly appalling.

And no, she's not joking. She seems to be dead serious.

Comments

[visionshadows.livejournal.com]

Wow. That was one of the most offensive, embarrassing things I've read in a long time.

If I could formulate words beyond 'offended' and 'embarrassed' I would be sending a very angry email right now.

[eponis.livejournal.com]

Icon twins!

I really want to reread the article and try to figure out some way in which she intended this as parody, or satire, or something other than truth. Because the alternatives are really frightening. Yes, people like this are out there . . . but for the Post to publish them?

Of course, that would require rereading it, so never mind.

[briony530.livejournal.com]

Wow...okay, I admit that there are times when I too am guilty of grumbling about my gender, but that was WAY over the line. And BTW, I LIKE Grey's Anatomy: why didn't she mention that one character's mother was a world-class surgeon? Or that the female residents are the best in the program? Or the world-class female cardiac surgeon who is spurning the advances of a hot male doctor? Yes, there's a lot of sex, and there was a prom, but that's just entertainment, and IMHO the sex is not treated in a way that degrades women.

[zephre.livejournal.com]

that's seriously disturbing. not just that she wrote it at all, but that millions of readers of the WP will give her some level of credence just because of her publication in its pages.

How dare she write something so incredibly demeaning and try to pass it off as wisdom; and how dare they offer her such validation by publishing it, even on the op-ed page?
(Well, it's clear how they dare, and editorial decisions for inflammatory articles are obviously intended to boost sales/viewership. I still think it's in incredibly poor taste for a newspaper to publish anything so blatantly sexist (or racist, or agist, or whatever). They have the final say in their choices, of course, but what I got out of this piece was not the idea that the newspaper or the author was inviting a dialogue. She is simply laying out a spurious argument for stepping back women's roles and implying that the opinions and desires of half the population are unimportant simply by virtue of their gender. I don't watch TV, so I can't speak to her categorization there, but since when does TV reflect anything like reality, anyway? It's entertainment, and at least in most cases it does invite discussion, which is more than can be said for an article like this. Let's all go sit on the beach and eat chocolates and wait for the men to solve the world's problems, shall we?)


I have probably cluttered your comment space enough now...

uh....

[animangel.livejournal.com]

WTF?

When I read the beginning of the article, I could sort of understand where she was coming from. (My explaination for this is for most of the population, it takes more than a couple of generations to change certain gendered acceptable behaviors and expectations which have been around for, sadly, centuries.)

But the last part....Hello? Spatial skills is one of my greatest strengths. Far better than my memory, in fact. Or maybe I'm just a man????

Wow. Just....wow. *facepalm*

[lorena-snape.livejournal.com]

How utterly insulting. Sounds like one of those bible-thumping bun-heads in disguise - who believe that a woman's place is in the home, and that wives must be 'submissive' to their husbands. Granted, this chick took about what, 1500+ words to not-say it, but the end result is the same.

Miss (or Mrs?) Allen states: So I don't understand why more women don't relax, enjoy the innate abilities most of us possess (as well as the ones fewer of us possess) and revel in the things most important to life at which nearly all of us excel: tenderness toward children and men and the weak and the ability to make a house a home. (snip)...Then we could shriek and swoon and gossip and read chick lit to our hearts' content and not mind the fact that way down deep, we are . . . kind of dim.

Assuming we find a rich husband to support us, right? *snort* I think SHE is the dim one here and possibly even blonde.

:-p

[persevero.livejournal.com]

'Then we could shriek and swoon and gossip and read chick lit to our hearts' content and not mind the fact that way down deep, we are . . . kind of dim.' - er - this has to be irony, right?

Hate chick-lit; don't have any particular affinity with any children except my own; crap spatial sense; total systemiser. Just confused?

[ladyaelfwynn.livejournal.com]

**sigh**

I'm really tired of people spouting disturbing nonsense.

The world is measured by male standards. Women don't measure up because the tests are skewed to prefer men.

If men were measured by the same standards they apply to women, they would fail abysmally.

I'm tired of being told I'm inferior (a worse driver, weird if I do something that I'm good at and it's not on the list of things that I'm supposed to excel at, not good spacialy, etc.). What happens with generalizations like this is that when a study shows that women have more accidents, it becomes "all women are worse drivers" and so on.

I want to see men measured to female standards and lets see how much they suck! (yes, this brought out my radical militant feminist side)

[rwday.livejournal.com]

That's so disgusting. That disease she mentions, where you feel like bugs are crawling under your skin? I got that from reading her editorial.

Why on earth would a reputable paper print something like that? Not all opinions are deserving of a space in a forum like that, IMO.

[lherelenfeline.livejournal.com]

WTF? Seriously, WTF?

[jedirita.livejournal.com]

Good God, that is simply appalling. And shame on the Washington Post for printing such a pointless, stupid diatribe. One expects the opinion page to contain an actual opinion, not just a rambling mash of drivel.

[briony530.livejournal.com]

Sorry to insert lightness in the very justified grumbling, but I LOVE that icon!

[gmonkey42.livejournal.com]

WOW.

A female friend of mine plans to write a horror novel titled "Office of Women," in which nothing ever gets done and everyone spends the day talking about Botox.

Good thing it's not "Lab of Women," because we only have two male grad students and they're rarely around, yet we get plenty of work done. Maybe that's just the residual testosterone left over on Brian and Nate's chairs.

Yeah, "hur hur, women are stupid and you can't criticize me for saying that because i are one!" that's not been done before or anything, Ann. I mean Charlotte.

[ladyaelfwynn.livejournal.com]

Turns out that particular OpEd is sitting on the main page of the WaPo this morning with a photo of a woman with an early 60s hair-style hollering about something. Grr.

The good news is that after looking at the comments (most of the first page, at least) most of the readers are appalled that this was written and published. As of a few minutes ago there were over 700 comments.

I'd like to say I was amazed that something that offensive was published but, as the comments attest, people are reading the commentary, whether on-line or in print, and then feel compelled to go to the website and comment. Since I checked yesterday afternoon when the comments were at about 450, that's over 250 people bopping by the site and seing the adverts.

So, as little as I like the sentiment, I can see why the Post would publish it. I just hope the author realizes the mistake she's made and reevaluates her position. That or that she has a really thick skin and can take lots of negativity because she's getting a lot of it.

[mistress-kabuki.livejournal.com]

Wow. You know, I was sort of agreeing with her for the first paragraph or two when she was questioning the swooning Obama fans (can we say WTF?), but then she went all anti-feminist. It was like watching a train wreck.

Here's a particuarly large pile of crap:

So I don't understand why more women don't relax, enjoy the innate abilities most of us possess (as well as the ones fewer of us possess) and revel in the things most important to life at which nearly all of us excel: tenderness toward children and men and the weak and the ability to make a house a home.

This must mean the Post is desperate for any attention, even if it's just pissed off readers leaving angry responses on their reply board. Let it never be said that the work of feminists is done.