Category: Feminism

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Some initial thoughts on the Male Malaise

  By Economic Justice, Feminism, Love and Sex

I heard a fascinating podcast on my drive to Philly: Ezra Klein talking to Richard Reeves who wrote Of Boys and Men in 2022. It’s perhaps the most detailed / data focused book on the problems of men. I have not read it yet but now will do so soon.   The main outlines of the “male malaise” are probably well known to you: boys do worse in school than girls, are less likely to go to college, and less likely to graduate. They are less likely to hold full-time jobs in their 20s or be on career tracks. As Reeves say, they tend to zig-zag more than women. And then there are the psychological issues: Men are less happy, lonelier, more likely to become substance abusers, more likely to commit suicide, and even more likely to die of COVID women. What is not clear to me is the causes… Continue reading

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Sex, Gender, and Athletics

  By Feminism, Philosophy, Sports

The controversy about the Khelif-Carini fight is, I believe, a terribly missed opportunity for learning something about not just gender and sexuality but about how human practice and thought fits the world. Or at least, that’s my conclusion after reading and thinking a lot about it yesterday and writing down some of my thoughts today. Given that I think I have learned something from some of that thinking,  I want to share it here.  Four preliminary points First, some of what I Iearned—about the biology of sex differences–comes from a post by the biologist Rebecca R Helm. You should read it. I don’t know much more about those issues so some of what I say can be a misinterpretation of what she wrote. Second, this post is not about the Khelif-Carini case. At the end of it I make some suggestions about general rules for determining when women with an… Continue reading

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Statement: PA Budget and Policy Center Lauds Passage of PA House Bills on Sexual Abuse

  By Feminism, PA Budget and Policy Center, Sexual and gender equality, Sexual harassment, Statements

Today the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center applauds the two bipartisan bills passed to allow those who have been past victims of sexual abuse in the state to sue their perpetrators and the institutions that protect them. Legislation creating a two-year window waiving the statute of limitations for these crimes is long overdue. And while we believe that there is no constitutional barrier to such legislation, we are also glad that a constitutional amendment allowing such legislation was passed today, as well, in case the Courts disagree with our analysis of the issue. We congratulate Speaker Mark Rozzi for his leadership on this important, deeply personal legislation. Continue reading

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Day Six

  By Biblical thought, Feminism, Philosophy

In Christian traditions, and most Jewish ones as well, the story of the Garden of Eden is the story of humankind’s estrangement from God. Jews and Christians differ about how we are to understand that estrangement. Many Christians see the fall as the source of original sin. Jews, on the other hand, typically reject the notion of original sin. Yet the dominant interpretation of Genesis 2 is that, in eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Adam and Eve are rejecting the authority of God. As a result God punishes them, and us. The most troubling circumstances of human life flow from the action of Adam and Eve. And only a return to God, in this world or the next, can free us from our predicament. Against this traditional interpretation of the text I want to pose another, radically different and feminist reading, one that draws on… Continue reading

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The Cost of Banning Abortion in Pennsylvania

  By Abortion, Feminism

By Claire Kovach with Marc Stier Drawing on a few decades of research, this paper shows that banning abortion would severely harm women in the state, especially women of color and women with low incomes. The paper summarizes research showing that the inability to secure an abortion harms women’s physical and mental health, makes it harder for them to secure an education, reduces their prospects for employment and good wages, and is likely to leave them facing hardship and poverty. The paper concludes that the combined direct and indirect effects of a total ban on abortion in Pennsylvania would likely reduce wages in the state by $10 billion a year. <a href=”http:marcstier.com/blog2/wp-content/uplaods/22/09/CostOfAbortionBan-2.pdf” rel=”noopener” target=”_blank”>Click here to read full screen or print.</a> &nbsp; Continue reading

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Statement on Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade Decision

  By Abortion, Feminism, PA Budget and Policy Center, Pennsylvania, Statements

  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 24, 2022 Contacts: Kirstin Snow, snow@pennbpc.org   Statement on Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade Decision By Marc Stier, Director, PA Budget & Policy Center The right to abortion is paramount to the right to personal autonomy. There is no choice as life-defining as that of whether to bring a child into the world. Without the right to have an abortion and access to the procedure, pregnant people are denied the autonomy and freedom to make decisions about their own health, well-being, and the course of their lives. Banning abortion would limit the rights of half the population: women, transgender, nonbinary, and gender non-conforming people, undermining their ability to be full participants in our political, social, economic, and cultural life. And the radical opinion signed by six justices of the Supreme Court not only undermines the right to abortion but is a threat to other kinds of… Continue reading

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The modern transformation of asceticism and the origins of the culture war

  By Abortion, Feminism, Love and Sex, Philosophy

Many of us have responded to the new threat to Roe v. Wade by reminding people that the aim of the right is not to protect unborn children but to control women. However, for some people, accustomed to living in a world in which they expect women to be treated as full participants in our political, social, and cultural lives,  that notion is odd. They don’t understand that control of women means and why it is so important in right wing thought. There are a number of answers but one is that policing abortion is part of the right-wing project of policing sexuality as a whole. And policing sexuality, especially female sexuality, is, for the  right wing mind, critical to ensuring that men carry out their responsibilities to have and take care of children and hold down a job. As is common in political and social life these claims rest… Continue reading

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Alito’s Jurisprudence Aims to Bring Back the Bad Old Days

  By Abortion, Feminism, Jurisprudence, Philosophy

Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization is an exemplary piece of judicial writing. His argument is clear, powerful and straightforward. With one small exception, he doesn’t shrink from explaining both how he reads the constitution and the consequences of reading it that way. Again with that one exception, he doesn’t sugarcoat his views to avoid political controversy. And that exception is so glaring that we can easily see through his reticence. Indeed, I think he wants us to see through it because Alioto is not trying to avoid controversy. He believes that a substantial body of Constitutional law was wrongly decided, has a strong argument to defend his conclusion, and wants to see his views triumph not just in this case but in others. His views are also deeply wrong and profoundly dangerous. They are based on a theory of constitutional interpretation that we… Continue reading

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It had to be us

  By Feminism, Love and Sex, Sexual and gender equality

Stop and think about it for minute: Every woman I know has said “me, too” in the last few days. In fact, it appears that every woman on FB has said, “me, too.” That’s a lot of awful treatment of millions of women. And it was not all done by Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby, Donald Trump, and three or four other guys. Most of us men have to be responsible for some part of it. Who else is there? Some of us may have only engaged in or tolerated the repulsive, slut-shaming that was common place when I was in college. Some of us may have asked for sex in ways that were unfair or pressured. (My book on sexuality got its start my junior year in college when I recognized that the sexual revolution gave men seeking unattached sex a new way to badger women into having sex that… Continue reading

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I Was HOJO Girl Number 14

  By About me, Feminism, Racial Justice, White Supremacy and Structural Racism

                      At the start of the summer of 1973, the year after my parents sold our hotel where I worked every summer from the time I was 11 to 16, I needed a job. When the new owners of the hotel called our house to ask where the switches were to turn on the lamp posts on the sidewalks, I said would work for them as a handyman which is what I had done at the hotel, among other things,  for two summers. I did have the capacity to fix many things, especially plumbing, and I knew the physical plant of the hotel. But they wouldn’t pay me the $125 a week I asked for so I need another alternative. Since I had some experience in the dining room and my cousin and some of her and my friends worked… Continue reading