yahoo! maternity leave.

two months ago, yahoo! ceo marissa mayer
banned telecommuting at her company,
a move broadly perceived as anti-family,
as it eliminated much of the scheduling flexibility
that helps working parents — especially moms, of course –
succeed at both working & parenting.

today, ms. mayer has extended her company's maternity policy
to offer new moms 16 weeks of paid leave & new dads 8 weeks,
a move being touted as pro-family [fair enough] & which just about doubles
the amount of leave yahoo! employees have been getting.

http://www.takepart.com/article/2012/02/28/infographic-americas-moms-deserve-better

but.

the new yahoo! policy still isn't up to snuff with other silicon-valley competitors,
like facebook, which offers new moms four months of paid maternity leave
plus a $4k baby bonus [yahoo! provides $500 of baby money for 5+-year workers],
& google, which offers new moms 22 weeks of paid maternity leave.
& both offer the same benefits to same-sex couples.

on the other hand, microsoft gives new moms only 10 weeks of paid maternity leave,
& all of these firms waaay outpace most american companies,
which are mandated by the federal family & medical leave act to give only
17 weeks of UNpaid leave – & naturally, many new parents can't afford to take that.

http://womenandtech.com/infographic-paid-maternity-leave

america's lack of universal paid leave for new mothers
makes us one of only three countries not to offer it –
while 178 nations worldwide offer new moms paid maternity leave,
only swaziland, papua-new guinea & the u.s. don't.

according to working mother, only about half of all american first-time moms
get any paid leave at all. only about 20% of working moms get any leave with full pay.
& from 1998 to 2008, the percent of u.s. companies offering fully paid
maternity leave fell from 27% to 16%. so, it's getting worse, not better.

http://www.sodahead.com/living/public-opinion-supports-paid-maternity-leave-infographic/question-2295181

working mother is partnering with the national partnership for women & families
to make paid parental–maternity & paternity–leave universally available to u.s. workers
by 2015. click here to sign their online petition.

an iron lady worth remembering.

margaret hilda roberts thatcher,
baroness thatcher, lg, om, pc, frs
was her full & official moniker.

but millions worldwide knew her as maggie,
the british conservative party politician
who, from 1979 to 1990, served as the
first & only woman prime minister of the united kingdom,
the longest-serving british pm of the 20th century,
& the first woman to lead a modern western power.

she was maggie, & she didn't settle.

maggie roberts was born in grantham, lincolnshire, on october 13, 1925.
she & her older sister muriel grew up in a cold-water flat
above one of the two grocery stores owned & operated by her father.
alf the grocer was also a methodist preacher & ambitious politician.
following the tenets of his religion — hard work, personal responsibility & traditional values —
alf became mayor of grantham in 1945-46, & was a local alderman until 1952.

as a youth, maggie learned plenty about those methodist
tenets & about politics from her father. she also
played piano & field hockey, & enjoyed poetry & swimming.

in 1943, maggie went to oxford on scholarship.
she wanted to join the oxford union debating society,
but the organization didn't accept women until twenty years later,
so maggie joined the the oxford university conservative association,
of which she became president in 1946.
in 1947, she graduated with second-class honours
in the four-year chemistry bachelor of science degree,
& became a research chemist.

in 1949, maggie met denis thatcher, a divorcée ten years her senior.
he was also a conservative activist, a decorated artillery officer,
& a millionaire businessman. they wed in 1951, & in 1953,
maggie gave birth to twins, mark & carol [pictured above].

maggie decided to study law, & became a barrister
specializing in tax law. but politics was always her real calling.
she began running for various offices in 1948, but didn't succeed
until she was elected member of parliament [mp] for finchley in 1959.
in 1970, prime minister edward heath appointed her
secretary of state for education & science.
but heath was ousted in 1974, & the following year, maggie
defeated heath & several other male contenders
to become leader of the opposition that took over the conservative party,
becoming the first woman to lead a major british political party.

just a year later, it was the soviet press who provided her enduring epithet,
the iron lady. maggie embraced it as a badge of honor.

meanwhile, britain was being called the sick old man of europe, plagued by
the economic ills of severe inflation, budget deficits & industrial unrest.

so it was no surprise when a special vote was called for may 1979,
the conservative party, with maggie as their leader, displaced the ruling labour party,
& margaret thatcher was elected prime minister of the united kingdom.

maggie's leadership had turned the conservative party,
the historical champion of the status quo, into the party of reform,
& thatcherism had been born:
the belief that economic freedom & individual liberty are interdependent,
that personal responsibility & hard work are the only ways to national prosperity,
& that the free-market democracies must stand staunchly against aggression.

with uncompromising politics & leadership style,
maggie pushed an agenda that stressed strengthening business
via deregulation & privatization of state-owned companies,
& weakening unions. her first few years were grim,
but eventually, her policies rescued the british economy,
revitalizing business,spurring growth & expanding the middle class.

during her eleven years at the helm,
maggie also led great britain to victory in the ten-week
falklands war against invading argentina in 1982,
helped guide the united states & the soviet union through the cold war's final years,
helped repel saddam hussein's invasion of kuwait,
& negotiated the end of gb's lease over hong kong.

but, by the time she was re-elected a second time in 1987,
maggie's successful reign had peaked, & storm clouds were gathering.
the recession had returned, her community charge [a sort of poll tax]
was unpopular, & her refusal to integrate the uk with
the rest of the european community ultimately caused her
cabinet members to mutiny. maggie resigned as prime minister in 1990.

two years later, she retired from the house of commons
upon receiving life peerage as baroness thatcher
of kesteven in the county of lincolnshire,
which permitted her to sit in the house of lords.

maggie spent her post-pm years consulting, speaking & writing her memoirs. among other honors,
she was awarded the presidential medal of freedom, the highest civilian honor given by the u.s.
she suffered a series of strokes in 2002 that exacerbated looming dementia;
in 2003, her dear husband denis died of pancreatic cancer, & she stopped speaking publicly.

margaret thatcher died monday of a stroke at the age of 87.

carry on, iron lady. & we will do the same.

secret no more.

a week ago, an infamously thick glass ceiling was shattered
with president obama's selection of veteran agent julia pierson
as director of the u.s. secret service.

pierson is the agency's 23rd director & its first woman leader.
the key responsibilities of the secret service are protecting the president,
& investigating counterfeiting & fraud.

a native of orlando, pierson was an explorer with
the boy [yes, boy] scouts of america,
in a post chartered by the orlando police department
specializing in law enforcement.

she earned her degree in criminal justice
at the university of central florida,
& became one of the first women to serve
as an opd patrol officer.

pierson joined the u.s. secret service in 1983 as a special agent
& has steadily climbed the ranks of the agency,
serving on the presidential protective details of
both presidents bush, as well as president bill clinton.

since 2008, she has served as the secret service's chief of staff &
assistant director of the office of human resources & training —
already the agency's highest-ranking woman.

president obama chose pierson as the woman for the job
following criticism that his second-term picks for high-level posts
have not been diverse enough, & criticism that the secret service's
notoriously male-dominant culture has gotten out of hand.

a year ago, the agency's reputation was sullied when
several secret-service agents took prostitutes to their hotel rooms
during preparation for the president's visit to cartagena, colombia.
in all, 13 agents & officers were caught up in the scandal.

pierson — who as a high-schooler worked at disney world
as a parking & watercraft attendant, as well as in costume
in park parades — is now tasked with turning
her agency's fratboy image around.

it's no secret that this woman — whom her colleagues call
smart, experienced & even-keeled — is up for the job.


image source: www.heavy.com.

hey, pope francis . . .

i'm not catholic [thank god].

but i love the concept of patron saints,
good guys [+ gals!] turned super-specific guardian angels,
available at a prayer's notice to help a believer out
with anything from girl scouts to lumbago.

lately, my work flow has been awfully, painfully s . l . o . w.
like, leech-like-money-bleed slow.
& candidly, i'm just about drained dry.

so, today i'm calling upon a sainted trifecta:
nicholas [patron saint of money problems];
cajetan [patron saint of job seekers]; &
john the baptist [patron saint of prosperity],
to send mama some good money-making opportunity.

& while i wait for my prayers to be answered,
i'll send up one more prayer, one of gratitude
that i don't live in one of the ten worst-paying u.s. cities for women.

for the past five years, the u.s. pay gap has remained
essentially unchanged: women earn not quite 79% of what men earn on average,
which comes out to an annual difference of about $10,000 less.

based upon a review of america's 100 most populous metro areas,
24/7 wall st. has identified the top ten worst-paying cities for women.

24/7 wall st. compared the median earnings for the past 12 months
of both men & women working full-time, year-round in the country's
100 largest metropolitan statistical areas, based on u.s. census bureau data.

& i'm seriously relieved to reveal texas has no cities in the top bottom ten.
can i get a yeehaw, y'all?!?

the winner biggest loser [spoiler alert!] was provo-orem, utah,
where being a homeschooling mom apparently pays better than professional employment.
women there earn not quite 62% of what men earn,
which calculates to just about $20k less a year.

*sigh.*

here's the rest of the list of cities not to go to for a self-value lift, ladies:

2. ogden-clearfield, utah [women earn 65 cents for each dollar men earn]
3. lancaster, pennsylvania [almost 69 cents]
4. baton rouge, louisiana [69 cents]
5. palm bay-melbourne-titusville, florida [almost 70 cents]
6. colorado springs, colorado [70.5 cents]
7. wichita, kansas [almost 72 cents]
8. bridgeport-stamford, connecticut [72 cents]
9. tulsa, oklahoma [almost 73 cents]
10. seattle-tacoma-bellevue, washington [73 cents]

& again, i'm pleasantly puzzled by the scarcity of southern states represented here.

now i'm wondering how "we" get a patron saint of women's rights named? hmmmm . . .


image source: mary's prayers @ etsy.com.

vawa-lleluia.

american women need no longer wait to exhale.

the violence against women act [vawa] has finally been approved by congress
& is off to the president for his stamp of approval.

first passed in 1994
& readily renewed in 200 & 2005,
congress has failed to reauthorize the law
since it expired in october 2011.

so, following 500 days of delay,
the u.s. house of representatives finally voted 286 to 138
to pass the bipartisan senate version of the bill.
all house democrats & 87 house republicans voted 'yea.'

the approving vote immediately followed a rejecting vote
by the house of its own republican version of the measure.
the house bill was voted down 166 to 257,
with no democrats & 60 republicans voting 'nay.'

which is a good thing.

because the proposed house bill would have
stripped protections for lgbt survivors of abuse,
not granted tribal courts new authority in some domestic violence cases,
& added new visa eligibility restrictions for abused immigrant women.

it also omitted two separate measures attached to the act: the safer act,
which helps law enforcement deal with a backlog of untested rape kits;
& the trafficking victims protection reauthorization act,
which targets human trafficking.

now, vawa will be reauthorized for another five years,
& $659 million will be provided for programs related to domestic violence.

president obama said he'll sign vawa back into law as soon as possible:
"today's vote will go even further by
continuing to reduce domestic violence,
improving how we treat victims of rape,
& extending protections to native american women &
members of the lgbt community."

amen, brother — & sisters. amen!


image source: inquisitr.com.

women's congress?

the good news about the 113th u.s. congress?
a record number of women — 80 representatives + 20 senators —
were sworn in as members earlier this month
as a result of last november's election.

the bad news about the 113th u.s. congress?
i know, i know — there's a saddening bad-news smorgasbord from which to choose,
but the bad news i'm referring to is that despite the above-mentioned good news,
the violence against women act died.

for the first time in 19 years, the vawa doesn't exist
because the u.s. house of representatives failed to pass its renewal.
house republicans, it seems, didn't want to extend protection to
immigrants, the lgbt community or native americans.

co-written by a democrat & a republican, the vawa targets domestic violence.
& though about 85% of the victims of domestic violence happen to be women,
the law protects across the board, regardless of gender.
it includes measures that:

:: support investigation & prosecution of violent crimes;
:: impose automatic & mandatory restitution on those convicted;
:: permit civil redress in cases prosecutors choose not to persue;
:: provide legal assistance for victims;
:: provide housing assistance for victims;
:: fund family shelters & outreach groups;
:: fund community programs dedicated to fighting violence;
:: educate police about the signs of domestic violence,
how to interpret crime scenes & witness testimony; &
:: help prevent elder abuse.

the vawa was first passed in 1994, & was readily renewed in 2000 & 2005.
here's hoping our more-womanly-than-ever congress
gets 'er done — with protection for all americans —
again here in 2013.


image source: the house women democrats, 1.3.2013, via upi.

american woman proud.

oh, what a night . . .
what a ladies' night!!

last night, american women — voters & candidates alike —
kicked some serious patriotic ass, & yes, gentlemen — we took names.

on election day 2012:

:: women made up about 54% of the electorate.

:: 55% of women voted for barack obama. 44% of women voted for mitt romney.

:: the total gender gap added up to 18% in president obama's favor —
an expansion of over 30% since his 2008 election.

:: the 113th u.s. congress will include 20 women senators,
the most ever in u.s. history [we're currently at 17].

:: 5 new women senators were elected — 4 democrats + 1 republican —
while all 6 democratic women incumbents were re-elected.

:: a record number of women candidates ran for both
the u.s. senate & the u.s. house of representatives.

:: in massachusetts, democrat elizabeth warren became her state's
first woman u.s. senator, winning over incumbent republican scott brown
in the most expensive senate race nationwide — at more than $70 million.

:: in new hampshire, the first-ever all-women delegation was elected —
their 2 women u.s. senators [1 dem, 1 rep] will be joined by
2 democratic women congressional representatives, as well as
governor maggie hassan, who will be the only woman democratic governor in 2013.

:: in missouri, democratic senator claire mccaskill won re-election
against republican representative todd akin, who infamously said
pregnancy rarely results from a "legitimate" rape.

:: in indiana, democratic representative joe donnelly won a senate seat
against republican richard mourdock, who infamously called
pregnancy resulting from rape "something god intended to happen."

:: in nebraska, republican deb fischer became her state's
first full-term woman u.s senator, winning over democrat bob kerrey.

:: in wisconsin, democratic representative tammy baldwin became our country's
first openly gay senator & her state's first woman u.s. senator,
winning over republican former governor tommy thompson. her house seat goes to
assemblyman mark pocan, also an openly gay democrat.

:: in hawai'i, democrat mazie hirono became our country's
first asian-american woman u.s. senator, winning over
republican former governor linda lingle.

:: also in hawai'i, democrat tulsi gabbard became our country's
first practicing hindu ever elected to the u.s. house, winning over
republican kawika crowley. gabbard intends to take her oath of office next january over
a bhagavad gita, a sacred text for followers of the vaishnava branch of hindu.

image source: women for obama.

#govote.

image source: http://govotenov6.tumblr.com.

gore for president.

with the election only — & finally — a week from today,
i just thought i'd share this video gem
from "it's my party" girl lesley gore.

gore, now 66yo, endorsed the use of her hit "you don't own me"
for the political psa, created by sarah sophie flicker, leader of
new york's the citizens band,
a cabaret collective that makes political statements.

i don't know about you, but this just makes me
want to pick up a hairbrush "microphone" & belt along:

image source: music stack music marketplace.

feminism primer. by dudes.

ok, i just discovered the factuary: comical education on cultural topics.

the factuary is a series of youtube webisodes,
hosted & written by comedian guy branum,
each addressing an issue of interest —
from scientology explained to why the rapper mia is always pissed off —
& presenting the facts of the matter, funnily.

check out the channel — but first, check out this episode:
"what do feminists have left?" {hint: plenty.}

this guy totally gets it, man.

i am malala.

two weeks ago, a masked gunman boarded a pakistani schoolbus full of children
& shot a 15yo girl twice
because she wants girls to be educated.

malala yousufzai was aptly named for a pashtun poetess & warrior woman.
she lives in mingora, a village in the swat valley of northwest pakistan,
with her parents, her two little brothers & two pet chickens.

in 2009, taliban militants forced the girls' schools
in swat valley to close, & blew up 100+ of the buildings.
malala, with the permission of her father, ziauddin —
a poet, educational activist & school owner himself —
began anonymously blogging her experience as a girl
under taliban rule for bbc urdu. she was 11yo.

eventually, malala's school reopened, but she continued to tell her story.
a new york times documentary was filmed about her life,
she became chairperson of the district child assembly swat,
& last year, she was nominated by desmond tutu for
the international children's peace prize &
won pakistan's first national youth peace prize.

but as she became more recognized, malala became more & more endangered.
death threats against her & her family have been
published in newspapers & slipped under their front door.

in a meeting this summer, taliban leaders unanimously agreed to kill malala.

a group of grown men, considered leaders by their peers, agreed to assassinate a child
because she promoted girls' education & criticized them for trying to eliminate it.

{wow.}

& so, on a tuesday afternoon, as malala was riding home from school,
a masked gunmen boarded her bus & shouted, "which one of you is malala?
speak up, or i will shoot you all."

once identified, malala was shot twice — in the head & in the neck — & left for dead.
the bullet causing the most damage entered above the back of her left eye,
traveled down through her jaw & into her left shoulder.

two of her schoolmates were wounded, too, but were stable enough
at the scene to provide details to the police & reporters.

the taliban readily claimed responsibility for the attack,
calling malala "the symbol of the infidels & obscenity,"
& reiterated its intent to kill malala & her dad.

malala was airlifted to a military hospital where neurosurgeons saved her life.
a week ago, she was flown to birmingham, england, to continue her treatment.
the pakistani government has offered to pay all of her medical expenses.

as of yesterday, malala is conscious, communicating freely
through written notes [she can't speak yet due to a tracheal tube],
has the motor control to stand, & seems to understand where she is & why.

she's still at high risk of infection, & likely has several more surgeries
to go through, in addition to extensive rehabilitation.
but 15yo malala yousufzai today is a survivor & an international hero.

former british prime minister gordon brown has launch a united nations petition
using the slogan "i am malala" & calling for:

:: pakistan to agree to a plan to deliver education for every child;

:: international organizations to ensure the world's 61-million
out-of-school children are in education by the end of 2015; and

:: all countries to outlaw discrimination against girls.

heal on, malala. this world needs your vision, your courage & your example.


image source: getty images.

madame moderator.

so, while i was all wrapped up in my own olympics aftermath,
the world continued turning, & stuff happened.

for example, on august 13th, cnn chief political correspondent candy crowley
was named as moderator of the second 2012 general election presidential debates,
making her the first woman in 20 years to be chosen for the prestigious role.

crowley will moderate the only townhall-style presidential debate between
president barack obama & republican presidential candidate mitt romney.
the debate is scheduled for tuesday, october 16th at new york's hofstra university.

candy crowley's selection may have been in large part due to
the efforts of three 16yo girls from new jersey.
emma axelrod, sammi siegel & elena tsemberis of montclair, nj,
launched a change.org petition calling for a female journalist to moderate
the presidential debates. their petition gathered more than 180,000 signatures,
& apparently, the commission on presidential debates noticed.

"having the support of [1992 moderator] carole simpson,
senator [kirsten] gillibrand & representative [carolyn] maloney — powerful women
who are heroes to many — underscored for us how important
this campaign was to wage," said tsemberis. "this campaign wasn't
about partisan politics, or liberal or conservative issues.
this was about equal representation, regardless of political party."

the other presidential debate moderators are
pbs newshour's jim lehrer & cbs face the nation's bob schieffer;
abc's martha raddatz will moderate the vice-presidential debate.


image source: vegetarian star.

nine@forty.

june 23rd is the 40th anniversary of title ix,
the equal opportunity in education act —
landmark legislation that helped even up
the playing field for american girls.

37 simple words —

no person in the united states shall, on the basis of sex,
be excluded from participation in,
be denied the benefits of, or
be subjected to discrimination under
any education program or activity
receiving federal financial assistance —

that opened up a whole new world of opportunities
for girls across america, from athletics
[female participation has risen over 1,000%]
to science, technology, engineering & math.

espn.com is featuring a section of its site
dedicated to this auspicious anniversary,
including an interesting article called
"nine before their time," profiling some
outstanding american women athletes who achieved their
impressive accomplishments long before title nine was around.

here are three whom i found particularly fascinating:

:: babe didrikson zaharias.
a fellow texan, babe was born mildred ella in port arthur in 1911.
she was an all-american basketball player,
a two-time olympic track & field gold medalist,
& a golf champion who won 82 tournaments &
helped found the lpga.

she also played organized baseball & softball,
was an expert diver, bowler & roller-skater,
a competitive pocket billiards player,
a recording singer & harmonica player,
& an excellent seamstress who sewed most of her own clothes.

babe was employed directly following high school
as a secretary for the employers casualty insurance company;
the firm really hired her for her athletic abilities —
they wanted her to lead their basketball team to victory,
which she did with the 1931 amateur athletic union championship.

representing her company at the 1932 aau championships,
babe was a team of one, competing on her own in eight of ten events.
she won five of the eight events & tied for a sixth,
meanwhile setting five world records in the javelin throw,
high jump, 80-meter hurdles & baseball throw, all in an afternoon.

babe won the championship for her firm single-handedly.

following her two gold & one silver medals won at the
1932 los angeles olympics, babe took up golf.
by 1950, she had won every golf title available —
including 17 straight women's amateur victories,
a record which still stands today.

babe didrikson zaharias died of colon cancer in 1956 at the age of 45.

:: conchita cintron.
"la diosa de oro," they called her. "the golden goddess,"
for her shining blonde hair. born in 1922, conchita grew up in lima, peru,
& debuted as a bullfighter at 13yo. at 17yo,
she was gored in the thigh & refused treatment until she
finished off her foe. which she did, then collapsed.

but the dramatic pinnacle of her career came in spain in 1949.
women there weren't permitted to fight the bull on foot;
they had to fight on horseback, then let a man finish off the foe.
conchita requested permission from the spanish president to dismount;
he denied her. so she seized her male replacement's sword,
marched into the ring, & as the charging bull approached,
she flung the sword aside & simply grazed the animal's
shoulders with her fingers. she was arrested [& later pardoned],
but the crowd loved her.

she fought only once more, retiring from bullfighting at 27yo.
she spent the remainder of her life writing her memoirs,
serving as the portuguese correspondent for several
latin-american newspapers, & successfully breeding portuguese pointers.
conchita cintron died of a heart attack in 2009 at the age of 86.

:: althea gibson.
known as "the jackie robinson of tennis," althea gibson
broke the sport's color barrier, beginning with her historic debut
at the 1950 u.s. championships. she went on to become
the first black player to compete — & eventually, win — at
wimbledon, to win the french open & to become the u.s. national champ.

between 1956 & 1958, althea won five grand slam events.
she retired from tennis with 56 career victories,
only to go on to break the color barrier in golf.
in 1964, althea debuted with the lpga & played on the tour
until 1971. in retirement, althea penned her autobiography,
dabbled in singing & acting, & worked in several public-service positions.
althea gibson died of circulatory collapse in 2003 at the age of 76.

mother's day.

according to recent studies,
if we paid stay-at-home moms
a salary commensurate with their duties,
then they’d earn $117,000 a year.

meanwhile, mothers out in the workforce
continue to face a more than 20% pay gap,
& working women with children earn another
7 - 14% less than their childless peers.

so while a grocery-store bouquet, bag o’ candy
& some homemade cards are nice once a year
[ok, woefully inadequate – but well-intentioned],
wtf is happening the other 364 days?

i am enough,
but apparently not quite enough
to be compensated appropriately for my contributions –
to the company, to the family, to the world?

representing that crazy hybrid, the work-at-home mama,
please permit me to respond to that bullsh*t with a big old HMPH.

gender inequality is a cultural conundrum
developed over the history of the world.
so, just like the baby weight, it won’t be shed overnight.
or maybe even over our lifetimes.

but, also like the baby weight, it can be shed,
& it begins with baby steps. our baby steps.

here’s an inspiring idea from jennifer siebel,
ceo & founder of missrepresentation.org:

before we give a woman coming into the room the once-over
& before we feel threatened by another woman’s accomplishments,
let’s pause, dig down deep & see where those judgments begin:

the assumption of scarcity & the sense that there isn’t enough for all of us.

reject those thoughts, & rather, celebrate the fact
that we are all in this together –
that one woman’s success is a success for us all.

in accepting these feelings of abundance & connection,
& incorporating them into our lives,
we pave the path for a more just & equitable future for everyone.

dear mamas,
you do enough.
you are enough.

& there is enough –
room, money, opportunity, respect, happiness, success –
for every one of us.

so let’s start acting like it &
begin the change ourselves, for ourselves.

& if you like, then you can
put down the cookie, too, while you’re at it.

happy mother’s day.


image source: cutestlife.com.

you are enough.

truth: i think judging people is wrong,
yet i'm embarrassingly judgmental.

& i don't know why . . .
but i suspect it mostly comes from my own insecurities.

which, while i wholly own them, are cultivated & nurtured
by the media & its merciless promotion of the
myth of the 21st-century superwoman.

as american women, we're up against some pretty harsh cultural beliefs.
like, if you don't have it all & have it all together,
if you're not doing it all & doing it all 'correctly,'
if you're not being everything to everybody while wearing a smile,

then you're f*cking up

& are essentially inadequate
as a woman, a wife, a mother & a professional, because —
& here's the biggest whopper of them all —
there are women who are having & doing & being all that, & a bag of chips.

[but only organic chips made from locally grown potatoes,
picked by legal but disadvantaged immigrants for fair pay,
free of trans fats & endorsed by michelle obama.]

pssst . . . those all-that-+-chips women?
they don't exist.

which is my main issue with the recent controversial
"are you mom enough?" time magazine cover.

it's all about fostering feelings of inadequacy
& competition among women, bullseye-targeting the very area
where we tend to feel the greatest vulnerability: motherhood.

confession #2: when i saw this cover,
i judged.

not the breastfeeding — breastfeeding is great,
i'm the first to support moms being able to breastfeed
whenever & wherever they need to,
& most images of breastfeeding i find sweet & touching.

but . . . declaration tre:
based in large part on my personal experience, i've got some
deep-seated issues with the way breastfeeding is, excuse the expression,
force-fed to women within our society.

breastfeeding for the first year is positioned as
the. best. thing. for. every. child. period.
so women who can't or don't breastfeed their baby,
or who can't or don't do it for a full year,
are implicitly not doing the best thing for their child,
& are therefore less-than as mothers.

that is, less than mothers who do breastfeed for the full first year.
again, a lie that feeds the perception of inadequacy & competition among women.

but back to my cover-judging . . .

not the concept of breastfeeding of a 3yo
nor the concept of attachment parenting.
while i personally don't think i could breastfeed a child
beyond about 18mos with emotional comfort,
or practice attachment parenting
[my husband & i agree, one of the best household rules
we ever established was our 'everybody sleeps in their own bed' decree],
if it works for your family — meaning parents & children alike —
then go for it. it's just not something that i feel would work for me.
& as we all know, if mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.

so, here's what i did judge:

:: the image time chose to use:
model-esque 26yo mom dressed in a cami & skinny jeans,
posed in a defiant stance, seemingly oblivious to her preschooler
son standing awkwardly up on a chair, with a facial expression
of complete discomfort as he suckles while twisting toward the camera.
wtf?

at the top of this post, you can see an alternate shot
from the same photo shoot, of mama & boy in a cradling embrace
as they share a quiet nursing moment.
this, time magazine, is what breastfeeding
& attachment parenting are really about:
nurturing, nourishing, bonding & love.

but that sh*t don't sell magazines.

:: the mom's exposure not of her breast, but of her child.

she is an adult consenting to quasi-expose her breast
& her beliefs on the cover of a national magazine
[& subsequently, international media of all sorts].

he is a little boy, unable to consent to having a photo of himself
suckling at his mother's breast on the cover of a national magazine
& available internationally forever [once it's on the internet . . .].

add to that imbalance the fact that this particular mom
has a blog called iamnotthebabysitter.com
where she refers to herself as a narcissist [dingdingding!],
has a photo of both of her sons [ages 3yo & 5yo] breastfeeding
simultaneously [the elder son, incidentally,
was adopted from ethiopia late 2010 . . . ?],
& a knee-slapper post — with photos — of the brothers
discovering — & yes, taste-testing — her edible undies,
& it all adds up to, for me, a mom who put her own self-interest
above & beyond her child's best interests, &
in a way that may prove to be damaging to them.

to be fair, this particular mom also seems like a
genuinely good-hearted person trying to do good in the world —
she advocates strongly for breastfeeding, adoption &
multi-racial families; she volunteers; she even launched
her own nonprofit [the fayye foundation] to help
ethiopia's orphan crisis by supporting health clinics
offering antiretroviral medication & prenatal care, &
by providing orphanages with food, supplies & healthcare access.

i'm not trying to accuse her of being an evil person
or even a bad mom. i just feel she made an extremely poor —
& unfortunately, lasting — parenting choice
with the whole breastfeeding-her preschooler-on-the-cover-of-time thing.

:: the utterly offensive women vs. women headline.

the photo got all the attention,
but the headline, for me, is much more egregious.

"are you mom enough?"
again, wtf?

honestly, i feel this sensationalistic cover is just another grenade
lobbed our way in america's apparent "war on women."
the deeply appalling thing here is how it sets women up
to compare, compete & hate on each other — as mothers.

it is, in a word, shameful.

especially assuming the time team members who put it together,
if not women themselves, then at minimum all had/have mothers of their own.

lisa belkin @ huffingtonpost.com said it perfectly
in her piece "no. i am not mom enough."
so i'll leave the final word of this lengthy post to her,
with a resounding AMEN. [& i want to be her when i grow up] from me:

i am not mom enough to take the bait. ...
to feel inferior, or superior, or defensive, or guilty —
or anything at all, if it means i am
comparing myself to other mothers.

motherhood is — should be — a village,
where we explore each others' choices, learn from them,
respect them, & then go off & make our own.

i refuse to see either a heroine or an extremist
in time's cover photo. i won't condemn her or praise her.
i will not stoop to the level of pretending that
we are so unidimensional that we can be divided by a lifestyle choice.

i am not mom enough.

equal pay day.

just like tax day, it comes around each year,
& is always a little depressing.
equal pay day.

49 years ago, president john f. kennedy signed
the equal pay act of 1963.
today, women still must work until mid-april of this year
in order to earn what the average american male earned last year.
yep — today's the day we catch up with where the men were january 1st.

according to the latest u.s. census stats,
full-time working women earn 77 cents for every dollar earned by men.
& naturally, the gap is wider for women of color.

*heavy. sigh.*

ok. so, the better-than-nothing news is,
president obama has flagged equal pay as a priority.
in fact, in his 2012 state of the union address, the president said,
" ... an economy built to last is one where we encourage
the talent & ingenuity of every person in this country.
that means women should earn equal pay for equal work."

so, what is the president doing to walk that talk?

1) he created the equal pay task force.
since its creation two years ago, the eptf has helped:

:: increase enforcement actions;

:: increase recovered money for women seeking
their fair share for doing the same work as men;

:: increase outreach to employers & employees alike,
with rewarding results; &

:: make sure the full weight of the federal government
is centered on closing the gender pay gap for good.

2) the department of labor is gathering & distributing good pay-gap info.

:: a solution to the gender pay-gap problem has been difficult
in large part because access to essential information has been limited.
the equal pay app challenge invited software developers to use
publicly available data & resources to create applications that provide
— greater access to pay data, organized by gender, race & ethnicity,
— interactive tools for early career coaching or online mentoring, or
— data to help inform pay negotiations.
the winners of the challenge have been announced, &
soon, anyone with a smartphone, tablet or computer
will be able to easily access the info they need to make sure they're paid fairly.

:: the dol has also just published two new brochures
to educate employees regarding their rights &
to ensure employers understand their obligations
under existing equal-pay laws.

let's hope once more americans know better,
more americans will do better.
until then, tip your waitress an extra 23% today,
in "celebration" of equal pay day.


image source: fringepop.

ashley judd's face.

it's practically a tale as old as time . . .
beauty vs. the beast.

actress stars in new tv show.
actress promotes new tv show.
actress' appearance seems slightly different ["puffy," according to some].
media presumes actress has had plastic surgery.
media feeding frenzy ensues.

except this time, the actress was ashley judd,
& you don't mess with ashley judd.

judd promptly penned a piece for the daily beast,
condemning the current "conversation" about women's bodies
as "the assault on our body image,
the hypersexualization of girls & women
& subsequent degradation of our sexuality as we walk through the decades,
& the general incessant objectification" —
i.e., misogynisitc bullshit.

the whole essay is well worth reading, & you should.
but what really hit home for me was the portion in which,
as jezebel.com writer lindy west says,
"ashley judd just dunked on us so hard."

my dunking/aha! moment:

"that women are joining in the ongoing
disassembling of my appearance is salient.
patriarchy is not men. patriarchy is a system
in which both women & men participate.

it privileges, inter alia, the interests of boys & men
over the bodily integrity, autonomy, & dignity of girls and women.

it is subtle, insidious, & never more dangerous
than when women passionately deny that
they themselves are engaging in it.

this abnormal obsession with women’s faces & bodies
has become so normal that we
(i include myself at times — i absolutely fall for it still)
have internalized patriarchy almost seamlessly.
we are unable at times to identify ourselves as our own denigrating abusers,
or as abusing other girls & women.

a case in point is that this conversation was
initially promulgated largely by women
a sad & disturbing fact."

sad & disturbing, indeed.
& oh, so common.

in fact, if i'm truly honest, then i must confess
one of my first knee-jerk [emphasis on the jerk part] reactions to
the buzz about ms. judd's altered appearance was
something along the lines of a resigned "like mother, like daughter."
[ashley's mom, country singer naomi judd, has copped to a facelift or two.]

but like jezebel.com's lindy west,
i hope along with growing older, i'm also growing wiser,
deeper & much more accepting.
i hope i'm growing into a better feminist:

"i'm certainly not innocent of celebrity body-snarking ... .
but i find that the older i get the more consciously i avoid it,
& the more i reject the notion that when you profit from being a public figure
you become public property.

we've locked celebrities [female celebrities in particular]
into this impossible position —
they lose five pounds & they're anorexic;
they gain that weight back & they might as well
call maury povich to airlift them out of their trailer.
so what the fuck are they supposed to do?

there's a line between reasonable attention & unreasonable scrutiny,
&, for my part, i'd rather sacrifice a few good jokes
about the flavor-of-the-week's gaping coke nostril
than contribute any more to the commodification & dehumanization of women.

my feminism doesn't end where your celebrity begins."

dear ashley judd,
you are a beautiful woman.
a woman with a beautiful face & body, yes.
but much more importantly, a woman
with a beautifully brilliant mind.
a beautifully brave spirit.
& a beautifully open heart
[click here for more on her humanitarian work,
which includes extensive global efforts
to fight aids & poverty, & — not surprisingly —
to advocate for women's rights].

not to mention your beautifully eloquent &
hopefully moving [as in moving on, moving forward] words for all of us:

"who makes the fantastic leap from being sick,
or gaining some weight over the winter,
to a conclusion of plastic surgery?
our culture, that’s who.
the insanity has to stop, because as focused on me
as it appears to have been, it is about all girls & women.

in fact, it’s about boys & men, too,
who are equally objectified and ridiculed, according to
heteronormative definitions of masculinity that deny
the full & dynamic range of their personhood.

it affects each & every one of us,
in multiple & nefarious ways:
our self-image, how we show up in our relationships & at work,
our sense of our worth, value, & potential as human beings.

join in — and help change — the conversation."

doing my best, ms. judd. & still promising to do better.

yours, mine & ours,
me


image source: unknown.

e.r.a.gain.

under the u.s. constitution,
discriminating against a person of color
is punishable by law.
discriminating against a woman
isn't.

some americans have been trying to
fix this discrepancy for 88 years,
without success.

thank goodness, they're not done trying.

the equal rights amendment [e r a]
to the u.s. constitution
was originally written by american suffragette alice paul
& introduced in congress in 1923.

51 years later, in 1972, the e r a
was passed by both the u.s. house & senate
by a two-thirds vote.
it had a decade to become ratified
by two-thirds of the states [38].
it died in 1982, lacking only three more states' approval.

the amendment consists of 52 words,
with the key line being:

"equality of rights under the law
shall not be denied or abridged
by the united states or by any state
on account of sex."

that's the sentence that means
men & women will have equal rights under the law.

that's the sentence that will make the courts
treat gender discrimination with the same strict scrutiny they use to deal with racial discrimination.

who would have thought american women
were considered lesser citizens than black men??
of course, they got the right to vote first, too.

june 21st, u.s. senator robert menendez of new jersey
& u.s. representative carolyn maloney of new york
reintroduced the e r a,
now known as the women's equality amendment.

why? because as long a way as we've come,
baby,
over the past few decades,
as many glass ceilings as we've shattered,
as many positions of power we've proven we can excel at,
as many military members as we've sent into war,
women are still underpaid & underrepresented
here in the good ol' u s of a.

president obama – surrounded by strong, smart, capable
women & girls who also happen to be
the people he holds closest to his heart –
has put his full support behind passage of the w e a.

quoth my president:
"history shows that countries are more prosperous
& more peaceful when women are empowered."

& so, a week prior to the national holiday
celebrating the freedoms offered by our country,
i must ask in response to mr. president's observation:

why not america??


image source: banning+low.

oh, bama.

so, two days ago,
my president came to austin.
& i went to see him.

not quite personal [alas, no meet-&-greet],
but definitely up-close.

like, 25 feet, maybe.

yep. leader of the free world.
talking to about 750 austinites.
of which i was one.

talking about his first-term achievements.
talking about his second-term goals.

talking about disappointments.
talking about sacrifices.
talking about reality.

talking about connection.
talking about togetherness.
talking about sameness.

talking about americans.
talking about putting on boots.
talking about climbing up hills.

talking about yes. we. can.
again.

now, that's what i'm talking about, y'all.


**HUGE thanks goes to my dear & generous friend
& fellow blogger diana,
who shelled out the giant clams necessary
for me to be her plus-one
to this once-in-a-lifetime experience.
best. friend. ever.**


image source: just me & my canon powershot, baby. booyah.

tune for today.

my fellow americans,

YES, WE CAN.

remember??
i do.

& whenever i can't,
whenever i doubt,
i watch this.

take four minutes today
& make yourself remember
what's great about being an american.
[p.s. working together for the greater good isn't just for democrats.]