The XX Factor: What women really think.

If "Modern Bride" Is a Has-Been, What Does That Make Me?

A guest post from Robin Marantz Henig:

When I was in college, I did what every aspiring journalist did back then, in the dark ages of the 1970s—I would research and write an article, type it out on my portable electric typewriter, put it in an envelope, lick a stamp, and mail it off to a glossy magazine in hopes of getting it published. How quaint every step of that process seems now, right down to the stamp. Writer’s Market was my bible, a fat directory I’d leaf through to get editors’ names and addresses for the magazines in which I longed to appear. Oh, to have my words printed on the pages of Esquire, the Atlantic, Saturday Review, or that pinnacle of sophistication and beautiful prose, the sanctified New Yorker ... (Read more in DoubleX.)

Rich Older Women Want More Than Pringles

I can’t quite get my head around the piece about More magazine in today’s New York Times. Apparently the fact that a magazine aimed at women over 40 is pulling readers who are women over 40—and rich ones, at that—is off-putting to advertisers. Silly me, I thought all advertisers cared about was money! But even though “the average More reader makes about $93,000, around $30,000 more than the average for Vogue, Allure or Harper’s Bazaar, according to Mediamark Research and Intelligence,” the ads it runs are notably low end: “The July/August issue’s ads included Crystal Light, Pringles, Coffee-Mate, packaged meals from Oscar Mayer, Bertolli, Tyson and Marie Callender’s, and two liquor ads—for wines under $10. Oh, and Friskies.” (Read the rest of this post, or the whole conversation, in DoubleX.)

If Writers Wrote the News

Earlier this month, an Israeli Newspaper, Haaretz, undertook an intriguing experiment. What would happen if, instead of traditional journalists, novelists and poets wrote the news?... (To read the rest of this post, visit our new website DoubleX.com!)

Ladies Top Forbes.com Celebrity 100

The NYT Publishes What Could Be An Onion Parody, and I Feel Bad About It

Last week, Michael Kinsley wrote a brutal takedown of the redesigned Newsweek, attacking it page by page and graph by graph for failing to be readers' "guide through the chaos of the Information Age." It's something that editor Jon Meacham wrote in the editor's note that the new Newsweek would not "pretend" to be, and that Kinsley thinks newsmagazines totally need to be in order to survive. The assessment was shrewd, but perhaps needlessly vicious, as noted in New York's Jessica Pressler's response, titled: "Michael Kinsley Attacks the New Newsweek, and We Feel Bad About It." (Full disclosure: I'm particularly sympathetic to Newsweek, since I used to work there. Plus it's owned by the same company that owns Double X.)

It's Not Acceptable to Treat a Woman Like a What?

The eternally awesomely grouchy Copyranter points to a provocative ad campaign from the Rhode Island Coalition Against Domestic Violence. The pair of arresting images features a "woman" as a) a punching bag and b) a slab of meathook-hung carrion. The accompanying copy reads: "IT'S NOT ACCEPTABLE TO TREAT A WOMAN LIKE ONE." Copyranter wonders: "Like what? A woman?"

The ads are akin to PETA's shock-happy petsploitation ads... (To read the rest of this post, visit our new website DoubleX.com!)

Chris Brown, Silly Boy

The Answer To E.J.'s Question of 'What's Missing'...Hint: It Isn't What You Think

E.J., you just asked what's missing from the list of finalists for the Mirror Awards just released by Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. Despite the finalists' names that you mentioned (Eric Alterman, Ken Auletta, Seth Mnookin, Clive Thompson, Mark Bowden, Charlie LeDuff and Richard Pérez-Peña), the answer is NOT that women are missing. Among the finalists you didn't call out: Rachel Sklar for her piece in the Huffington Post on a misleading Pentagon story in the New York Times; Evgenia Peretz for her Vanity Fair piece on James Frey; Megan Garber for her commentary for the Columbia Journalism Review.

It's fair to call out the gender imbalance of the list of finalists. There are 23 men and only five women, if you count repeat offenders like Eric Alterman and Rachel Sklar separately for each category in which they appear. But let's not pose a rhetorical question that implies that the list is devoid of women entirely when in fact what it's missing is much murkier: strict gender balance. And as we have already debated on the blog, maybe 50-50 boy-girl splits for all awards is not really a reasonable—or even admirable—goal. Give women an equal education; choose unbiased panels of judges. But after that, if the men are producing the best stuff, then go ahead and let the best man win.

What's missing from this awards list?

I just got this announcement via email: "Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications today announced 29 finalists in six categories in the third annual Mirror Awards competition honoring excellence in media industry reporting."

The winners include such media watchdogs as Eric Alterman, Ken Auletta, Seth Mnookin, Clive Thompson, Mark Bowden, Charlie LeDuff, and Richard Pérez-Peña.

But hmm... something is missing from this list ... whatever could it be?

To Porn or Not To Porn?

Samantha, I, too, saw the Washington Post story on how an adult-movie screening on the University of Maryland campus was canceled after Senator Harris suggested a budget amendment could strip the public university of nearly $500 million in funding. Sure, Harris' hysteria over porn on campus is silly at best—I don't know how truly "dangerous" pornography is to the culture at large—but what struck me as inappropriate is how an adult-production company is generating free publicity for its movie by trotting it out before its target demographic and pretending the experience is educational by coupling the screenings with safe-sex speakers or academics droning on about "gender and sexuality."

You say: "Still, the public viewing would at least get people in a room together, talking about sex and maybe—hopefully—even dipping into the sort of difficult, analytical discussion of sexuality and exploitation that colleges should promote." Personally, I doubt it. Porn rarely leads to analytical discussions of anything, much less sex. Instead, it looks to me like the colleges are getting snookered by publicists who have found their perfect mark in porn-happy academics.

Hilariously, the Planned Parenthood speaker who would have spoken on safe-sex practices would be doing so in the context of a movie in which none of the adult performers were using condoms. Way to set an example. In the end, porn is little more than smoke and mirrors.

Have the Obamas Spawned a Sex Frenzy?

Seriously, I write about sex, so I know I'm not the best one to ask. But it seems like ever since—well, I want to say ever since the Obamas got elected, it's all sex all the time. At least in the media. Usually, there are periods of time when you'll see more sex-related stories than others. In the spring. If there's a political sex scandal. If another low-ranking celebrity spawns another low-budget sex tape. After election night, I noticed there was a slow but discernible increase in the number of sex-related "news" stories. Sure, there were the obvious ones—the "aren't the Obamas sexy" ones (click here for the latest from the meme that wouldn't die)—and then there were the recession ones—call girls are dropping their rates! housewives are selling sex toys to make extra money! recession sex: here's how to have it!—but I expected at some point for all the sex stories to stop. But they haven't. They keep, well, coming. So, did the Obamas spawn this mini-sex revolution—or was it all that hope—or is it just me?

Did Sarah Palin Become a Post-Gender Candidate?

Poor Meghan?

Awhile back I wrote that Meghan McCain had learned to negotiate the difficult terrain of being a political daughter by oversharing on surface-level stuff, and keeping quiet on the truly personal. Looks like she hasn't quite stuck to that-on Hannity and Colmes, she revealed a bit more about the grudges she holds as a political daughter. She's mad about the Atlantic cover controversy, saying"I have a problem when it gets dirty and you're doctoring photos."  Most  striking is what she said about her support for Kerry and Gore, framing it as more of a vote against Bush, who ran a nasty smear campaign against her dad in the South Carolina primaries,  than for the Democrats:

MCCAIN: I can be behind my father all day every day.

COLMES: Sure.

MCCAIN: . until the end of time. I just couldn't get behind President Bush. I just couldn't. It's personal.

COLMES: Yes. You couldn't get behind President Bush?

MCCAIN: It's personal. I was 19 at the time.

HANNITY: And it's a primary 2000.

(CROSSTALK)

COLMES: Hold on, let's.

MCCAIN: It had to do with my little sister, and like, you know, you were just saying that the wounds of a political child run really deep. And there are things that I don't know if I'll ever completely get over.

COLMES: Was it because of what happened in 2000 during the campaign?

MCCAIN: Yes.

COLMES: That you two -- what about your dad now? Is he -- looks like he may have.

MCCAIN: No. He's a great forgiver, move on-er. No. Yes.

Her decision to stump for her dad was obviously one made out of love and personal, rather than party, loyalty.  And now she's got to stand there and justify her dad's politically expedient apostasy by saying he's a "mover on-er," and she's got to somehow justify to herself that even though she's been deeply hurt by negative campaigning, it's ok that the McCain campaign isn't exactly taking the high road these days. When I wrote about her earlier,  I was impressed with the amount of agency I saw her taking-exploiting the publicity system lest it exploit you first isn't exactly a feminist battle cry, but at least it's not passive.  Now, all I can think when I read this is "Poor Meghan, she's trapped."  But am I getting played like a flute?  Now's probably not a bad time to be reminding people that the McCains have been on the receiving end of smears, and Meghan, at her own admission, didn't go in to this thing a political naïf.  This wasn't her first interview, and it wasn't the first time she's talked about the way the 2000 election affected her. Should I put back on my armor of cynicism?

What's a Girl To Do?

I'm struck by this debate because in many ways it perfectly encapsulates something I've been feeling lately. As a 20-year-old girl (woman?!) who aspires to a career as a conservative journalist, I find myself agonizing over where I'll find my place professionally.

I've spent several summers working in journalism, and I've always thought it's better to be a conservative in a liberal pool than to hole myself away with a bunch of neoconservatives. But sometimes I feel like I don't get credit for that. I've found that at many news outlets, conservatives are written off as either stupid or delusional. Smart conservatives tend to be regarded as interesting conversation pieces. Experiences such as those have me toying with the idea of dyeing my hair a few shades blonder and throwing myself into a career as the next Ann Coulter.

Emily may be right that there's more immediate glory for women who play "truth-teller" against feminist tenets. My own critics would probably label me that way, and in truth, in my short writing career as a college undergraduate, I probably have gained more attention than I otherwise would have because of my willingness to bash one popular feminist cause or another. Still, I like to think that I'm taking those stands because I'm searching for intellectual clarity, not because I like attention. (On a related note, I won't even tackle the Larry Summers reference of earlier posts, because then we could be here awhile.)

Suffice it to say that I worry every day that I could fall into the peroxide trap of some of the Fox News extremists (though those women do dress well). Maybe other conservative women are not as idealistic as I am, but I think we might need to cut them some slack, "ka-ching, ka-ching" and all. If we don't, there really is nothing keeping these new conservative voices from diving into the right-wing deep end—yes, I acknowledge there is a very troubling conservative deep end. Once that has happened, the landscape of media could become even more polarized than it is now and even less effective. And that's a problem I'm eager to avoid.

Chardonnay or Pinot?

I'm saying, Emily, that it's not acceptable, much less a Fast Pass, to question feminist dogma on choice within the ranks of "mainstream media"—though I'm sure there are no shortage of book contracts to be had at Regnery. Until the Times hired Bill Kristol, weren't such voices almost exclusively consigned to conservative outlets? Maybe you're thinking, "Sure, isn't that where they're supposed to be?'  (And maybe you're not, though ah, how much easier to win arguments with myself; I also enjoy solitaire Scrabble.)  But it does seem to me that that is the one issue on which there is little to no diversity of opinion at news organizations that otherwise try to present all sides.

Need More Than Two Fingers? I Didn't Think So.

We Are All Plagiarists Now

I've thought a lot about rip-off writers and wondered not only why they steal but why they steal the cheap stuff, lifting boldly and yet at random, like those guys who broke into the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum years ago dressed as Boston cops—and after going to all that trouble, left behind The Titian. (Of course, if you really loved words or art, you wouldn't steal at all, out of pride if not reverence.) My interest goes back to my first reporting job, at the Dallas Morning News, where one of my colleagues was busted for copying the most banal imaginable observations about dating out of a magazine for a feature-section piece on relationships. As this was pre-Internet, she had to work at getting caught and went so far as to leave the magazine she'd lifted from open on her desk, where its discovery led to her dismissal. Along with the rest of the staff, I joined in endless speculation about why she'd do that when walking outside the building and interviewing the first person who happened by would have been so much easier. (This was before she wrote a best-selling book about the depression that drove her to it and was hired by The New Yorker.)     

Google has long since made getting caught inevitable, of course. And mostly that's not only a positive development, but one that makes the question of why anyone would do this, knowing how the story would end, all the more interesting. But while volume is up, quality has suffered, and some of these recent plagiarism cases are iffy at best: Goeglein's is a classic of the genre; why would a lovely guy with a great job appropriate material for guest columns he was under no pressure to submit—and didn't get paid for—in his hometown paper in Fort Wayne, Indiana? Now that is one worth mulling. But Obama's failure to consistently credit his friend Deval Patrick with a line he fed him? As scandals go, that's pitiful. And with all due respect, Jack, that Times reporter who scribbled down the definition of the illegal drug he was writing about and then popped it into his story without bothering to rewrite the sentence? If we damn that guy, we're rewriting the definition of plagiarism.

Navel-Gazing With a Runny Nose

Just now back from the land of consumptive coughing to discover that in my absence Hillary Clinton has somehow decided she’s running against us. Between this Hillary-versus-the-media meme and the Obama/messiah silliness, we in the media may have finally managed the inconceivable: The entire focus of the primary race has officially become ourselves. It reminds me of that old joke: But enough about me, what do you think of me?   

Who's Sorry Now?

After the events of this past weekend, it’s very difficult to hear Hillary Clinton extol the virtues of forgiveness. Indeed it’s extremely hard to hear Sen. Clinton say anything at all today over the relentless drumbeat in my own mind: “Don’t say pimp ... don’t say pimp ...”

I really need this job.

Clinton is typically fluid and charming before more than 800 students in American Politics 101, a class taught by the legendary Larry Sabato, at the University of Virginia. Batting back questions about biofuels and stem-cell research and universal health care with data and talking points, Clinton gets a solid 10 for technical merit. Still, you can’t help but wince when she gets to the parts of her remarks in which she describes people who lose their jobs. Clinton’s compassion for America’s unemployed is seemingly boundless, unless the unemployed in question have dissed her daughter.

The remarks seem to spin off into a different stratosphere in response to a student question about the “most influential person in her political career.” After paying homage to the Roosevelts, JFK, and LBJ, and with just a roundabout reference to her husband, Clinton arrives at Nelson Mandela. She describes Mandela at his inauguration, introducing three prison guards who’d treated him humanely in his many years at Robben Island. She quotes Mandela saying, “If I left prison embittered and full of hate, I would still be in prison. ... You have to give up whatever hate you have. You must learn to forgive.”

This is obviously a lesson with which Clinton still struggles. She can describe how powerfully it affected her that Mandela—in a spirit of bipartisan trust and hope—left the army and police force intact when he assumed power, while she cautions that 40 percent of Americans won't support a Democratic nominee regardless of who wins, presumably because there can be no trust or hope. She can claim to have forged deep personal friendships with individual Republicans—from Lindsey Graham to Sam Brownback—by getting beyond “caricatures” and “stereotypes.” But then she warns that whoever wins the Democratic nomination will surely be swift-boated—“subject to the full force of the Republican machine,” because “that’s what they’re good at.”

And Clinton draws a distinction between herself and Barack Obama when she says, “I have no illusions about bringing the country together in the absence of a fight.” But the implicit distinction between herself and Mandela is there, too. She wants reconciliation, and she wants to forgive, but she can’t get beyond her certainty that what needs forgiving and reconciling is an immovable wall that only she can overcome. Clinton wants to say that she, like Mandela, has not been exiled to some remote emotional prison of bitterness and hate. Yet she just saw to it that a reporter was suspended for saying mean words.

Dan Gross pointed out earlier today that the Clintons have a complicated relationship with forgiveness and redemption. Hillary Clinton wants to believe she’s forgiven what’s been done to her while warning us that she’s the only one tough enough to stand up to the next round of it. As always seems to be the case with the Clintons, the political is personal. The personal is personal, too.

One Hand Slapping ...

It’s hard not to contrast the New Niceness pervading last night’s Democratic debate with the intramural slashing and burning of John McCain. No doubt there’s a lot happening under the surface here, but it’s hard to dispute that Clinton had to rein it in after South Carolina’s nastyfest because women get called “shrill” the moment they step over some invisible Maginot Line of niceness.

Truth? I don’t much care what animated yesterday’s warm fuzzies—I loved it. I’ll always prefer a respectful policy exchange to a mud fight, particularly when we’re talking about war and the economy and health care—issues so rarely illuminated by sequential head-slapping. One of the reasons Obama’s always been an inspiring candidate to me is that he is authentically trying to back away from the ugliness of partisan discourse. That doesn’t always serve him well, and it leads people I respect enormously to dismiss him as a lightweight, but I think it’s also persuaded at least some women with Fox-fatigue that there’s another way to talk to each other; that allowing your enemy to actually finish his sentences has worked fairly well for humanity for the last few millenniums for a reason.

This brings me round to your post, Rachael, about what women may want from their A Sections, which may well be a model for what they want in their political discourse. Not necessarily “anecdotal” or “personal” news as you (sarcastically?) suggest. But perhaps, as Deborah Tannen has argued, something more than the “attack-dog” editorial page we’ve adopted.

I know many tough-as-nails women bloggers and opinion writers who have no problem with attack journalism or attack politics, but I know a lot more women, and young moms, who are truly grateful that Obama’s tried to light the way to something else.