The award for best critical book review this week goes to Ashley Sayeau @ The Guardian writing on Laurie Gottleib’s Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr Good Enough. She gets points for historical analysis (“The book’s jacket claims this is all new – the author, it states, has said “the unthinkable” – but of course nothing could be farther from the truth”) as well as attempts at finding a kernel of worth in an otherwise painfully anti-feminist screed (“This is frustrating for many reasons, but especially because Gottlieb’s subject – the question of compromise in modern relationships – actually deserves attention, just not of the sort she gives it”).

Bianca M. Velez @ RhRealityCheck wonders about the wisdom of consent laws which dictate to young women whom they can and cannot consent to sexual relationships with in Consenting to Sex: Yes, No, Maybe?

PhDork @ The Pursuit of Harpyness blogs about how olympic “human interest” reporting has subjected female athletes to shaming comments about their body weight and health in Female Olympians are Fat!(TW).

Ann Bartow @ Feminist Law Professors highlights the official opening of the Feminist Theory Papers at Brown University’s Pembroke Center. I seriously considered applying for a year-long processing position with the FTP a couple of years ago, and they are definitely on my watchlist as an Archive I would love to work with/at someday.

My “new blog” discovery of the week (well, one of them: the list of feeds on Google Reader is getting scary long!) was Sex and the Ivy, authored by Lena Chen. On said blog, I found this delicious analysis of a talk given last November by faux feminist Christina Hoff Sommers on why modern feminism has supposedly failed. I have a sick fascination with people who look at the world and see the things I believe are amazingly awesome as a sign of deep pathology.

Kinda like this guy (and his audience), posted by Melissa McEwan @ Shakesville who seem to believe that courses in feminist theory that incorporate issues of race and class are . . . antidiversity?

(Speaking of Melissa McEwan @ Shakesville, this week she also posted a thoughtful critique of the assumption that it takes having kids to become a family.)

Thanks to Sex and the Ivy I also discovered a couple of older (2005) blog posts on the subject of sex-positivity and pornography which I enjoyed reading. One is by Susie Bright @ Susie Bright’s Journal in which she responds to a Slate.com book club discussion of Pornified and Female Chauvinist Pigs which took place in 2005 involving Wendy Shalit (another faux feminist whom I find it easy to fixate upon), Meghan O’Rourke, and Laura Kipnis. The other is one of Laura Kipnis’ contributions to said bookclub discussion in which she points out that “people may like making their own preferences into norms, but that’s a bit monstrous in itself.” Well said, Ms. Kipnis. Read the whole thing over at Slate.

MandyG @ Feministing Community cross-posted an op-ed by Nancy Willard, Sexting: A Rational Approach, which discusses the adult hysteria over adolescents engaged in the exchange of self-created sexual images online.

A Georgia bill revives tired stereotypes about connections between family planning and eugenics. Planned Parenthood’s Kelley Robinson @ RhRealityCheck points out that, far from “targeting” minority women for abortions, clinics like Planned Parenthood are often the only sites where minority women are offered affordable reproductive healthcare.

Cara Kulwiki (of The Curvature) comments @ The Guardian on the results of a recent study showing that women are more likely then men to blame victims of rape for their assault. “When we say that women are less “forgiving” of rape victims, we ignore that being raped is not something for which one needs to be forgiven. And while being blamed for your own rape is an incredibly traumatising experience, we forget in this discussion that there would be no victim to blame if there wasn’t a rapist committing assault first.”

And just so we’re not ending on that important yet not exactly uplifting note, I will end this thread by introducing you to the mind-bending concept of cupcakes for men. You didn’t know cupcakes were a girly thing? Click through and gwen @ Sociological Images will enlighten you.

*image credit: Life Drawing by henrybloomfield @ Flickr.com. Thanks to Hanna this week for selecting the featured picture.

Here’s a shorter-ish links list this weekend; anyone who can name all the musicals quoted here (without using the interwebs as a reference!) gets special mention in next weeks’ installment :). Leave your IDs in comments.

Marry the man today / and change his ways / tomorrow. Vanessa @ Feministing draws our attention to the publication of a new book urging women over thirty years of age to “settle” for “Mr. Good Enough.” While I’m 150% for not holding human beings to inhuman expectations, I find this idea insulting no matter what the age and/or sex of the parties in question. Who wants their life-mate to turn to them and say, “Gee, honey, I thought about it and decided you were adequate as a spouse…”

My white knight / not a Lancelot / nor an angel with wings. Kjerstin Johnson @Bitch Blogs also tackles the Gottlieb Question, concluding that the “take-home message isn’t that successful relationships (and yes, even those recognized by the government) rely on compromises; but that it’s your fault for being too picky to settle down.” Sarah Menckedick @ Women’s Rights Blog adds pointedly (in The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough) that media coverage is only “reinforcing the feminism vs. Gottlieb and feminism vs. marriage dichotomy, setting up feminists as reactive raging crusaders attacking the poor Gottlieb — who was only acknowledging the truth after all.”

Everything you can do / I can do better / I can do everything / better than you. Charlie Todd @ Urban Prankster posts a video and photo of counter-protesters who showed up outside Twitter headquarters to butt heads with protesters from Westboro Baptist Church (the group that tours the country virulently protesting homosexuality). This confirms my hypothesis that one of the most effective ways to combat hate and fear is through humor.

Princes wait there in the world, it’s true / Princes yes but wolves and humans too. Jessica Valenti @ her personal blog that anti-feminists over at the beatifically-named Network of Enlightened Women (NeW) hold feminist activists responsible for the commodification of female virgin status. As Jessica points out, methinks they need to do a little homework on the long history of commodifying women’s sexual status.

You wait, little girl, on an empty stage / For fate to turn the light on /Your life, little girl, is an empty page /That men will want to write on. BeckySharper @ The Pursuit of Harpyness blogs about a “Miss Manners” column in which a young man wrote in asking advice about following up on a meeting he had with the father of a prospective girlfriend.

I’ll teach you what shoes to wear / how to fix your hair / everything that really counts to be / popular! Roxann Mt Joy @ the Women’s Rights Blog reports on the deceptive use of imagery by a conservative Focus on the Family affiliate in Florida to oppose gay parenting. Short version? 1) only straight folks who conform to our current definitions of optimal beauty can be parents and 2) women who conform to those current definitions can’t possibly be non-straight (’cause apparently everyone “knows” what lesbians look like). The mind boggles.

I need a place / where I can hide / where no one sees my life inside / where I can make my plans and write them down / so I can read them. Harriet Jacobs @ Fugitivus points out the monumental fuck-up that was Google’s roll-out of its new networking feature “Buzz” this weekend. Really, Google, please please please do not EVER automatically enroll me in a social networking site again. (Update: Fugitivus now requires a WordPress account to login; if you wish to read about the story without creating an account or logging in, you can visit TechCrunch, which covered the story in Google Buzz Privacy Issues Have Real Life Implications.)

Sentences of Amys / paragraphs of Amys / filling every book. And finally, totally “for the win” this week comes this proposed word-centric condom campaign from Durex as mst’d by Amanda Hess @ The Sexist. I can’t answer her question about what my boobs would say if they could talk, but I find myself mesmerized by the people made of words and what their boobs are saying.

*image credit: Lookout II by rivergalleryartist @ Flickr.

“Turkish police have recovered the body of a 16-year-old girl they say was buried alive by relatives in an “honour” killing carried out as punishment for talking to boys.” Robert Tait @ The Guardian wins for “most horrific sexuality and gender related story of the week” with his story of a Turkish teenager who was killed by her family for transgressing their expectations of appropriately feminine behavior. I wish to point out that, rather than demonstrating some yawning chasm between “West” and “East,” this sort of action should be seen as a symptom of our global preoccupation with the purity and virginity of girls and women.

“It’s maddening that the people who want to take away women’s right to choose have annexed “choice” to their own cause. If the law compelled women like Sarah and Bristol Palin and Pam Tebow to continue problem pregnancies, there would be no heroism in doing so–you don’t get much credit for taking the difficult path if that’s your only option.” Katha Politt @ The Nation vents about the current politics of abortion in her latest “Subject to Debate” column.

“One of Blankenhorn’s leading concerns is with the well-being of children. He has argued, citing solid studies that corroborate this, that children raised by single parents are, as a group, at a disadvantage, and that having two married parents is a boon to children. But surely this raises the question: wouldn’t same-sex marriage help the children of same-sex couples…?” Margaret Talbot @ The New Yorker News Desk wonders why the pro-gay-marriage side in the Prop. 8 case hasn’t pushed the antis harder on the question of how gay marriage will hurt families in Gay Marriage and Single Parents.

And further, Talbot suggests that “You sometimes hear it said that a courtroom is not the best venue for playing out battles in the culture wars [yet] a courtroom can also be a great and theatrical classroom, where the values of thoroughness, precision in speech, and the obligation to reply have a way of laying bare the fundamentals of certain rhetorical positions.” See The Gay-Marriage Classroom.

“I’m not sure. Can your partner be your best friend? If so, can you still have other best friends? And if they can’t be your best friend, then what are they?” Essin’ Em @ Sexuality Happens muses about the delicate line between “friend” and “significant other” in My New Best Friend.

“When I close my laptop and head to work, I’m not exactly sure what’s going on in the world, but I do kind of question whether I’m pretty or young-looking enough to navigate it.” Christina C. @ the Women’s Rights Blog argues that science reporting on “studies” supposedly determining optimal human attractiveness are as biased as the advice columns in women’s fashion magazines in Sexy Science: From Lips to Hips to Cheeks, Studies Rank Women.

“Recent hopes that Apple was about to unveil an electronic device that could do absolutely anything were dashed when it became obvious that the iPad cannot in fact locate the G-spot. Nor can it fit in your handbag, which is another reason why women are disappointed by it.” The Independent weighs in on the kerfluffle about women’s sexual pleasure and “the geographical whimsy with which the mystical G-spot appears to operate (or not)” in Yes, Yes, Yes, No, Yes!

In other sex-meets-science news, Jill Filopovic @ The Guardian comments on the latest study on abstinence-until-marriage propaganda in sex education. “If there is one thing that has proven true throughout human history, it’s that people like – scratch that, love – to have sex…Of course, for a lot of us, the ‘going forth’ part is more desirable than the actual multiplying, and so human beings have also spent centuries trying to separate one from the other.”

And finally, for your “weird but true” story of the week: “Senator Saxby Chambliss, the Georgia Republican, warned [in Senate hearings] that ‘the presence in the armed forces of persons who demonstrate a propensity or intent to engage in homosexual acts’ would be likely to create an atmosphere susceptible to ‘alcohol use, adultery, fraternization, and body art.'” Lauren Collins @ The New Yorker News Desk reports on the Senate hearings about the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy concerning sexual orientation and kindly alerted me to the hitherto under-reported link between same-sex attraction and the desire for ink.

Note to self: must really see about getting that tattoo I keep talking about.

*image credit: Victoria – Nude woman painting at Whitebird Cafe by Tarjin Rahman @ Flickr.

“I tried to give them an explanation that might actually sink in, something a little deeper than ‘Don’t say that.'” Pandanose @ Little Lambs Eat Ivy reflects on discussing the importance of language with her students in Out of the Mouths of Boys.

“Even in the relationships I had that didn’t have permanence as part of their raison d’être, I have regrets about too-free-sex.” Candelaria Silva @ BlogHer writes about her own coming-of-age during the mid-century Sexual Revolution in Rethinking the Sexual Freedom of My Youth.

“We have laws in place to prevent the exploitation of the vulnerable by the powerful. In other words, there’s a non-reciprocal relationship involved that heightens the risk of exploitation. So far so good. But in sexting cases, the non-reciprocal, exploitive relationship is posited to exist between the child and herself (or himself). And here’s where things start to become nonsensical.” Rachel @ The Feminist Agenda muses about the thought process that lies behind the prosecution of young adults discovered to have distributed naked or sexual photographs of themselves via the internet.

“‘It’s hard to sit and read the dictionary, but we’ll be looking to find other things of a graphic nature,’ district spokeswoman Betti Cadmus told the paper. Alison Flood @ The Guardian reports on a California school district that is pulling the Merriam-Webster Dictionary from its shelves in “Oral Sex” definition prompts dictionary ban in US schools.

(As of Wednesday, LIS News reported the book was back on the shelves.)

“These cynics are missing the point, because few things retain the ability to shock like the idea that a woman doesn’t necessarily float off on an iceberg of chastity after her 35th birthday.” Hadley Freeman, also @ The Guardian considers social outrage (and apparen terror) that still descends upon women in relationships with younger men.

“A pro-life, anti-abortion, pro-reproductive rights, pro-choice person joins the rest of the reproductive rights movement in trying to reduce the need for abortion, through actions such as increasing accessibility to birth control, addressing economic constraints, or supporting adoption.” Alex DiBranco @ the Women’s Rights Blog has a brilliant assessment of why pro-life and anti-choice are not synonyms, and why you can be pro-life and pro-woman but not anti-choice and pro-woman.

“If you’re opposed to porn, to the point where you’re not willing to be involved with someone who ever watches it, you need to seriously rethink whether that’s a reasonable thing for one adult to ask another.” Greta Christina @ The Blowfish Blog writes about porn, relationships, and what’s reasonable to ask of another partner regarding the enjoyment of erotic material.

“Basically, it’s classing a certain normal female body type as obscene. It’s declaring all flat chests to be automatically juvenile, something that should not be viewed by anyone.” In what might be the award-winning story of the week when it comes to blind panic and idiocy, Courtney @ Feministing linked to a story about Australian efforts to make pornography that depicts smaller-breasted women illegal on the grounds that small breasts = children and therefore people who enjoy watching small-breasted women be sexual beings are all pedophiles. Mike @ Someone Think of the Children! (an Australian-based blog) has more. May I just say: W.T.F.

“Yesterday at the Perry v. Schwarzenegger trial was the day you got to see David Boies set loose on a witness, and, to judge by the transcript, his cross-examination was a little like watching your cat play with his food before he eats it.” Margaret Talbot @ the New Yorker News Desk blogs about the latest from the Prop. 8 circuit court trial.

“For the Olson and Boies side, the key point was that whatever either woman actually did, what they felt inside was fundamental. ” Earlier in the week, Talbot also blogged about one of the core philosophical questions that faces both sides: is human sexual identity immutable?

“A trial that should have been a straightforward reinforcement that murder is the deliberate taking of human life instead will be remembered in part as the forum for justifying why a person’s life can be sacrificed to save a fetus.” Emily Bazelon @ Slate explains what went wrong at the trial of Scott Roeder, the man who murdered Dr. Tiller.

“I dread them getting sick not only because I want them healthy, but also because I have so little sick time.” Rachel @ Feministe blogs about a new series from Fem2.0 that tackles the work/life balance in America; meanwhile, Rachel @ The Feminist Agenda shares the good news coming from the UK that fathers in Britain are now eligible for six months paternity leave if the mother of their newborn goes back to work.

And on a final and fluffy, note, Hanna and I have been following with great amusement the story of a English woman who has been charged with an Anti-Social Behavior Order (or ASBO) for disturbing her neighbors with bouts of noisy sex. While on first blush the case seems like an outrageous infringement of the woman’s right to privacy, officials apparently put decibel meters in the building to test for sound levels and found her in violation of noise ordinances!

*image credit: Female nude from Channel 4 life drawing series by carolekeen @ Flickr.com.

To lead off, this past Friday (January 22nd) was the 37th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision and thus Blog for Choice day. I’m still reading my way through all the thoughtful, passionate posts that were written by participants, but in the meantime I thought I’d share some of the round-ups that highlight contributions from around the web.

The Blog for Choice website put together posts throughout the day that excerpted posts; see What We’re Reading, More and More Blogs for Choice, What NARAL Staff and Friends are Saying, More Pro-Choice Blogging, What “Trust Women” Means to Heidi from SisterSong and Posts Keep On Coming….

Vanessa did a similar round-up at Feministing as did Rachel at Women’s Health News (on a small full-disclosure note, they both linked to my own post from yesterday — thanks for the love ladies, and I’m glad what I said made sense to someone outside my own skull!).

I’m (fingers crossed!) going to read my way through all of these during the coming week, and hope to share some of my own favorites next weekend. Meanwhile, here are the rest of your “sunday smut” for this week.

Hanna read and reviewed a biography of Athenais de Montespan, mistress to Louis XIV, and writes in her post about how the author felt compelled to critique the physical appearance of her historical characters.

Steerforth @ Age of Uncertainty shares with us the nineteenth-century perils of novel reading for women.

Nathan Schneider @ Killing the Buddha ruminates on sexual privacy in the age of the internet, and how “changing the balance of what’s hidden and what’s seen will also change what’s hot.”

Jessica Valenti of Feministing, over at her personal blog, offered some great observations about the damage elitism can do, even in the name of values (for example, gender equality) we believe in: “And that’s what really irks me about this kind of elitism – how some people talk of breaking down power structures while simultaneously using feminist rhetoric to place themselves at the top of a new intellectual feminist hierarchy that does nothing to further justice.”

Coming & Crying: Real Stories About Sex From the Other Side of the Bed is the tentative title of a book project by Melissa Gira Grant and Meaghan O’Connell, described as “a collection of stories (and photographs) from the messy, awkward, hilarious, painful, and ultimately true side of sex.”

“When a friend is sick, you bring her soup. When she loses a loved one, you bring her flowers. But what do you do when she has an abortion?” Before Blog for Choice day, Chloe @ Feministing offered some thoughts on a new script for talking about abortion.

Hanna passed along this respone in the Guardian to a woman who wrote in asking about the ethics of sexual experimentation.

The BBC is trying to evaluate its GLBT programming; Stephen Brook lets us know what he thinks in a recent op-ed titled BBC to ask homophobes what they think of its coverage of gay people. As Hanna pointed out, if only they’d renew Torchwood for another season they’d have their bases covered!

The National Sexuality Resource Center posted a video of author Carol Joffe speaking about reproductive rights and justice in The Emotion Work of Reproductive Health Specialists (50:32 video).

Over at the New Yorker, Margaret Talbot writes about Perry v. Schwarzenegger (the Proposition 8 case headed to the Supreme Court) in A Risky Proposal. Terry Gross also interviewed Talbot on Fresh Air this week; if you have time the audio interview is worth listening to (a transcript is also provided).

EastSideKate @ Shakesville poses questions about the euphemisms for masturbation in our culture.

And finally, something to look forward to: The Guardian reports that Focus on the Family has bought time during the Superbowl to broadcast a reportedly anti-choice television ad. Stay tuned for further outrageous developments ;).

*image credit: Life drawing couple by Philip by life drawing london @ Flickr.com.

Last week, Hanna found a wonderful opinion piece @ The Guardian by a vicar reflecting on his experience ministering to a woman considering abortion.

In a piece that relates to both human sexuality and information science, figleaf @ Figleaf’s Real Adult Sex muses on the challenges of making research available for public analysis when so many journals are provided through astronomically expensive databases.

Miriam @ Radical Doula asks if “choice” is a poor frame for childbirth policy.

Jessica @ Feministing asks people who are against women’s rights to stop identifying as feminists. “I don’t believe that there’s one ‘true’ feminist platform,” she writes. “A huge part of the power of feminism today is its diversity of thought and the numerous intersecting political goals of the movement. But you have to draw a line somewhere. And women who actively hurt other women and aim to limit their choices and take away their rights are just not feminists.” I would re-write that last sentence to say that people who actively hurt women and aim to limit their choices and take away their rights are just not feminists since I believe anyone can be a feminist . . . but otherwise, I’d say spot-on.

Charlie Glickman @ the Good Vibrations Magazine blog offers his own answer to the question “why use the word ‘cisgender’?”

And while we’re on the question of words, the Simmons Graduate School of Library and Information Science (GSLIS) podcast series presents an hour-long research colloquium presentation on “the classification and language of gender.”

The Onion reports that a gay teenager in Louisville, Kentucky is worried he might be Christian. Setting aside the simplistic equation of “Christian” with “right-wing fundamentalist,” it’s a cute joke.

Linda Hirschman @ The Nation weighs in on the Supreme Court’s decision against televising the circuit court oral arguments over Proposition 8 (California’s same-sex marriage legislation). While tangentially a “gender and sexuality” story because of the nature of the case, I’m mostly just disappointed I won’t get to hear or see any audio or visual clips of the legal process. Let’s hope Nina Totenberg gets sent in to do NPR coverage!

Lisa @ Sociological Images points out that a stripped-down cell phone marketed for five-year-olds (yes, five-year-olds) assumes the child using the phone will be part of a two-parent, hetero family unit.

The anti-choice activist who murdered Dr. Tiller is being allowed to defend himself in court on the grounds that he killed Tiller out of the belief he was saving lives. Emily Bazelon @ Slate explains why this is a deeply problematic decision.

And Finally, Hanna and I commute passed the Planned Parenthood in our neighborhood every morning on the way to work, and often there are protesters outside — though rarely more than a handful, and often only one woman with her posters and pamphlets. Still, on the occasions when I’ve walked by at the same time as someone was trying to enter the clinic, the harassment of young women (as likely to be going in for pelvic exams and birth control as abortion services) feels invasive — even to me as a passer-by! It’s amazing to me that the folks who picket Planned Parenthood believe they are being helpful. And yet, as Jos @ Feministing wrote this week, protesters often (disturbingly) believe that’s exactly what they’re doing.

*image credit: charcoal by fairsquare @ Flickr.com.

“Nation’s Nipples Severely Under-Clamped, U.S. Bureau Of Masochism Reports.” As so often with the The Onion, the headline says it all.

Amanda Marcotte takes on the idea of sex addiction; I usually don’t agree with her in every particular, but I share her skepticism about the overuse of the concept.

CarnalNation reports on a new study by British Scientists claiming to prove the G spot doesn’t exist; Amanda Marcotte again weighs in as does figleaf, and xkcd (in comic strip form, of course).

Worth special mention is Rachel Kramer Bussel’s response (well worth the click-through), which mades the case for honoring the complexity of human sexuality: “I’m all for reducing anyone’s sense of inadequacy around the “right” way to have sex (including men who think they’re not superstuds because they can’t coax a woman’s G-spot out of hiding), but this is not the way to go about it. Articles which call the only evidence of the G-spot ‘a woman’s imagination’ do everyone a disservice.”

Hanna commented in her review of Sherlock Holmes on the potential homoerotic reading of the relationship between Holmes and Watson. Apparently, this potential has disturbed the copyright holder of the Conan Doyle novels (who, in my opinion, doesn’t understand much about late-nineteenth-century sexuality and homosociality). As Ben Walters writes in The Guardian,

If the film’s depictions of Holmes engaging in underground boxing bouts, rescuing damsels from occult ceremonies through brute force and diving for cover from exploding warehouses are to get a pass – if, that is, it’s fine for the physical prowess described by Conan Doyle to be ramped up a few notches – then why shouldn’t a similar process of exaggerated extrapolation apply to the intimacy unquestionably enjoyed by the detective and his sidekick in the original stories?

Anna Clark @ RhRealityCheck reports on the efforts of universities to establish enforceable standards of etiquette for sexually-active students. As Dorothy Sayers might say, “Some consideration for others is necessary in community life!”

Another book to add to my 2011 reading list is Jesus Girls: True Tales of Growing Up Female and Evangelical, reviewed by Brittany Shoot @ Feminist Review.

Jessica @ Feministing asks “is sleep a feminist issue?” and also wonders “how do you feel about feminist ‘waves’?.” As an historian, I find the “wave” analogy a pretty limiting one that ends up drawing too heavily upon mainstream stereotypes of feminist activism.

I don’t usually go in for advice columns, but I like Greta Christina’s advice @ The Blowfish blog to a young woman who, burned by an internet relationship, believes all men are liars but wants no-strings-attached sex with them anyway.

Sociological Images offers us a sociological analysis of the color “girly blue” and earns a special place in my heart for coining the phrase “fractal gender binaries.”

Amy Gates @ BlogHer writes about a Christmas “miracle” in which a laboring woman and her infant nearly die due (potentially) to a botched epidural . . . and the attending physicians are quick to cover their asses.

And finally, in the spirit of a new year, The Economist has just discovered what my U.S. Women’s History professor used to call “difference feminism” — that is, the strand of feminist thought (present in self-identified feminist philosophy and praxis since at least the 1840s) that is based on the belief that male and female human beings are innately different not just in physical parts but in their way of being in the world. So what this tells me is that The Economist has just woken up from a really, really long nap. Welcome to the 21st century guys: it’s when everything changes :).

*image credit: life drawing by fairsquare @ Flickr.com.

“The more time women are compelled to spend fighting their own bodies, the less they have to fight for anything else.” Michelle Goldberg ponders the rise of surgical alterations of women’s bodies during what I guess we’ve decided to term “the aughts,” suggesting that we’re not much further ahead at dispelling the beauty myth than we were in 1991. In fact, we might be much further behind.

“The Bush years may have been one of the worst times for those of us interested in gender equality.” Suzanne Reisman also has some sober reflections about what the past ten years have wraught, along with a few things she’s grateful for (and more reflections promised in January).

“If you don’t want to be accused of indecent exposure and ‘traumatising’ young children, cover up or install curtains.” Carnal Nation reports that a man in Virginia was convicted of “indecent exposure” for being naked in his own home.

“It is inaccurate to view all sexual activity among young people as intrinsically negative.” Carnal Nation reports on a new study from the University of Alberta that suggests a positive relationship between emotional maturity and satisfying sexual experiences. While I have questions about who’s defining “mature” vs. “immature” I appreciate that the researchers are pushing back against the idea that all young people are unprepared to be sexually active.

“I clearly remember the sexual anxiety from my undergraduate days. For one thing, I had no real idea of what my sexual needs were; I knew they weren’t being met, but I tried not to think about it because I didn’t even know where to start, so thinking about how I wasn’t getting what I wanted just made me feel awkward and confused.” Clarisse Thorn writes about BDSM, radical feminism, and sexual availability. She also notes that the post is “a bit feminist-theoretical.” For those whom such words cause hives, you have been warned.

“Birth films tend to be very romantic or absolutely terrifying. I wanted to juxtapose real and fake births and let people make up their own minds, and I wanted to make it funny, because the subject can be so intense.” Film-maker and childbirth educator Vicki Elson discusses Laboring Under An Illusion, which explores the way childbirth is depicted on television in sitcoms, dramas, “reality” television, and documentaries.

“Because seriously, what’s more fun than thinking of virgin/whore visuals?!” Jessica Valenti’s latest book, The Purity Myth is going to be reworked as a documentary.

“Clearly, the objection to strawberries is that they’re so pleasurable, and someone on food stamps is viewed as someone who doesn’t deserve even the smallest pleasures.” Amanda Marcotte writes about economies of pleasure, and the way in which Americans — and social/sexual conservatives more specifically — view pleasure as something to be “earned” and “granted” by some sort of authority, and pleasures which are free and private (sex), or which are viewed as unearned (a marijuana high) are treated with suspicion and folks who engage in them often downright vilified.

“This was a bad policy that had a good point at the heart of it. The loss of troops from vital places is an important point to ponder — but a policy that targets women, whether intended to do so or not, isn’t the way to get the mission accomplished.” Brandann Hill-Mann at the Women’s Rights Blog discusses the recent news story about a General in Iraq who was court-marshaling women who became pregnant serving under him (and, where applicable, their sexual partners).

“Modeling for Playgirl doesn’t make Levi a model for decorous fatherhood, but it’s hardly enough to strip him of his right to help make decisions about his son’s life.” Emily Bazelon discusses why Bristol Palin should not be awarded sole custody of her son Tripp.

“Why, today alone I have endangered my 15-week-old fetus by taking a warm bath, painting my nails green, eating Parmesan cheese that I’m not SURE was pasteurized, and struggling to install a new cable box . . .!” A pregnant woman writes to Lenore at the blog Free Range Kids to ask “How about a companion website: Free-Range Fetus?” as a way of counteracting the culture of perfectionism that currently pervades every aspect of reproduction, from pre-conception through post-college parenting.

And finally, Elyse at Skepchick asks “What information do you wish you had about sex back in the day? What information do you wish you had about sex now?” The comments make great food for New Year’s thought.

*image credit: nude aqua by linda boucher @ Flickr.

News flash: women no longer have “hymens” but “vaginal coronas.” Why, you may ask? Ann Bartow @ Feminist Law Professors explains.

While the idea of re-naming the hymen has a certain amount of political merit, I’d say the same does not hold true for calling the vagina a “baby-making hole” (aside from being clunky, it’s factually inaccurate people!). Check out the sex education book that used this term at beyond birds and bees (via aag, who provides the book illustrations for the visually-inclined).

Artist Zina Saunders is doing a series of portraits of “long-standing gay couples” in response to New York state’s recent failure to pass a gay marriage bill.

I’m equal parts gleeful and creeped out by this story of the “ex-gay” organization Exodus International severing ties with a Michigan-based affiliate after allegations of homoerotic abuse. Most puzzling to me is why any group would name itself “Corduroy Stones” (outside of the emo rock band context) and what that could possibly have to do with sexual orientation therapy.

Ann at Feministing offers yet another perspective on the abusive relationship dynamics of New Moon, pointing out the normalization of violence in the Native American community depicted in the book and film.

On Wednesday, Jessica, also at Feministing, solicited peoples’ stories about Women’s and Gender Studies programs in an open comments thread.

I enjoyed Hanna Rosin’s book God’s Harvard which I reviewed here a couple of years ago. However, sometimes her op-ed pieces cause in me a “what the fuck?!” sort of reaction. For example, her recent ruminations on her husband’s behavior in the kitchen, titled The Rise of the Kitchen Bitch. As my friend Joseph sarcastically commented, “I so appreciate her writing a piece about men doing more cooking and describing them as bare-fisted, potty mouthed, and (my favorite) testosterone-fueled assholes.” I mean, really, I could spend paragraphs dissecting harmful class- and gender-based assumptions being made in these two sentences alone:

I first heard this term in Sandra Tsing Loh’s recent Atlantic story about her divorce. She used it to describe a friend’s husband who was anal and fussy and altogether too feminine—he belonged to an online fennel club, for God’s sake.

While we’re on the subject of harmful stereotyping, Dr. Marty Klein describes how our cultural terror of online sexual predators effects the ability of consenting adults to role-play sexual fantasies online in “Fantasy On Trial (Again)”

In an instance of entirely tone-deaf wording, the BBC online forum “have your say” published a piece this week it titled “Should homosexuals face execution?” (since changed to “Should Uganda debate gay execution?“) The simple answer to that, boys and girls, is no. The more nuanced answer is fuck no. (via Cruella-blog). Journalists and the public complained, and the BBC has since apologized. Hanna and I have been debating between ourselves the effectiveness and legitimacy of the headline; she thinks the first version got the response the BBC wanted, I think the second is more accurate. Either way, it’s an interesting case-study for how these international issues are framed and reported on by media outlets.

In another instance of media framing, I’ve been seeing various iterations of this headline the past few days: “topless teen causes auto accident” or, as DigitalSpy.uk put it, “breast-flashing teen hit by car.” A New Zealand teenager who was dared to flash oncoming traffic was fined for supposedly distracting one driver so badly that he veered off the road and ran her down. Okay: flashing traffic is possibly not the brightest idea going (akin to mooning someone out the window of your car, right?: stupid prank) But I’m irritated by the way no one is asking why a woman’s breasts were so distracting to a driver that he hit her with the car — and if, indeed, that’s the case, why it’s somehow her fault and not his.

Lots of folks weighed in on a recent study that concluded young people who engage in casual sexual encounters do not necessarily experience adverse effects. Brandann Hill-Mann @ Women’s Rights Blog announced “this just in: sex isn’t going to destroy you!“; Thomas @ Yes Means Yes wrote about “the absence of harm“; Amanda Marcotte, writing @ Double X concludes that “the kids are downright boring.”

And finally: speaking of sex, as opening lines go, Rachel Kramer Bussel definitely takes the cupcake this week with “I lack sexual restraint. Philosophically, I don’t see the point in it.”

*Image credit: PICT1897 by Always Rain @ Flickr.

The links list in which I indulge my interest in things sex and gender related that I’ve read around the internet.

First off, from the fabulous Fug Girls comes this PSA: “EVERYONE’S VAGINA IS FINE. WORRY ABOUT THE CLOGS.” Best advice in, like, forever. Although I doubt clogs really need worrying about either. Mostly, I find they’re pretty low-maintenance footwear.

Can someone explain to me why “sexting” somehow more lewd and/or potentially dangerous than writing love letters or having flirty phonecalls? I don’t get it. Emily Bazelon over at Slate suggests there might be some truth under the hysteria while Ani DiBranco over at the Women’s Rights Blog asks whether “sexting” is the biggest problem facing teenage women.

(Personally, I think maybe we should be worrying about that giant octopus off the coast instead. . . but that could be me).

I have a few links related to trans issues this week. First up is Laurie Penny over at the UK-based F-word argues for the death of transphobic feminism in Moving towards solidarity. “Not a single person on this planet is born a woman,” she writes, “Becoming a woman, for those who willingly or unwillingly undertake the process, is torturous, magical, bewildering – and intensely political.”

Next comes Helen G over at Questioning Transphobia has a post up about “psychiatry’s civil war,” or the politics of revising the Diagnostics and Statistics Manual (currently in-process), particularly when it comes to gender identity.

And finally, on a similar — and no less contentious note — The Bilerco Project published an opinion piece this week by Ronald Gold in which he took a stance against the concept of “transgender,” going so far as to question the very existence of trans folks (obviously very hurtful to people for whom this is lived experience). The post has since been removed. These situations are, I think, complicated, emotionally fraught for everyone involved and I don’t know enough about this one to pass my own personal judgment on the rightness or wrongness of pulling the piece. But what I actually want to link to this morning is the original response written by Bil Browning (founder of the Project) about why he decided to publish Gold’s piece in the first place, which I found thought-provoking as an example of how to handle these struggles over what does and does not appear in (online) print.

Liz Kukura @ RhReality Check and Rose @ Feministing wonder about the validity and usefulness of “generational divide” talk around reproductive rights.

Also on the subject of reproductive rights, Michelle Goldberg at The American Prospect reports on a case before the European Court of Human Rights that has the potential to recognize women’s universal human right to reproductive freedom.

On the opposite side of the political spectrum, anti-choice activists increasingly invoke the concept of “choice” to bolster their own political aims. Amanda Marcotte over at RhRealityCheck weighs in on the trend.

Two stories on public breastfeeding this week, one from sexgenderbody about a Target store in Michigan (oh, the shame!) that called the cops when a woman refused to stop feeding her daughter (Woman’s Rights Blog also weighs in) and another from Her Bad Mother at BlogHer about ads in Chicago proclaiming breasfeeding “tacky”. Her Bad Mother writes:

This question should be settled, as settled as not refusing to serve same-sex couples in restaurants, or ensuring that public places are accessible to disabled persons. You have every right to be discomfited by public breastfeeding. You just don’t – or shouldn’t (depending upon what state or province we’re talking about) – have the right to protest or disparage it publicly.

Well . . . um, yeah, actually I believe you do have a right to “protest or disparage” it (although, please, people, get over it already). What you do NOT (or should not) have the right to do is discriminate by such methods as requiring someone to feed their infant in a restroom (ew!) or calling the fucking police when someone engages in a perfectly legal activity. This is why many nursing mothers and advocates have started pressing for legislation specifically protecting their right to feed their children in public. Because apparently it’s something they can’t take for granted.

Essin’ Em at Sexuality Happens muses about whether it’s always important or necessary to come out (and, conversely, why straight, monogamous, “vanilla” folks never feel the pressure to come out about their own sexual proclivities).

Why do we have this default of “you should only come out/express your sexuality if you’re not the norm?” I mean, really, what’s wrong either with no one having come out, or having everyone come out? Why is it so specific?

Also on the subject of language and communication, Hanna mused at …fly over me, evil angel… about the power of words, and what happens when people shift from highly emotive words like “rape” to (possibly technically more accurate but nonetheless distancing) phrases like “sexual- and gender-based violence.”

Lisa at Sociological Images offers a lovely set of real-life portraits of phone sex workers, juxtaposed with images taken from phone sex adverts (nsfw).

And finally, on a mildly celebratory note, congrats this week to the Episcopalian church here in America which just elected its second openly gay Bishop. See the New York Times and The Guardian for more.

*image credit: Ture Ekroos, posted at The Art Department by way of the Tor.com Cthulu art thread.