You GOTTA hear this. Ok, a little juvenile, but LOL funny. Highlights:

“Just because I can see the moon
doesn’t mean I’m an astronaut, you loon!
Your foreign policy expertise is poo.”

And, the chorus:

“Oh, if you become VP
Oh, it’s Canada for me…”

To cap off your day, here’s Framingham State College’s Virginia Rutter with a great post on what exactly Sarah Palin doesn’t seem to get about “feminism” and “sexism” and how this allows her to erroneously invoke identity politics in her favor.–Kristen

Sarah Palin wasn’t the first to be confused about what is sexism—and what is feminism. Remember This is Spinal Tap, the rock mockumentary from the eighties? In an oft-quoted scene, dufus rocker Nigel Tufnel responds to the news that the next Spinal Tap album won’t be released because their cover is sexist with, “Well, so what? What’s wrong with bein’ sexy?” When, earlier this week, Palin said, “There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t support other women,” she was missing the point—and the words—sort of the way Nigel did. Her so-called feminism is really a form of sexism. She revealed just how much her candidacy is about identity politics—not issues.

In response to Palin’s misquote of Madeline Albright, Kristen asked, “Am I going to hell?”and clarified that feminism—in the sense that Albright meant it, and that many who are part of feminist movements intend—is about reducing inequality (all kinds!).

We don’t get to ask our candidates too many questions. But a friend offered a question for Palin, in light of her voicing the imperative of women for women: “If Hillary Clinton had been the Democratic nominee instead of Obama, would you, Governor Palin, be voting for a Democrat this year?”

Well, of course not. Because politics is done best when it is about ideas and interests, not passions and identities. (Thanks A.H!)

–Virginia Rutter

Here are some quick hits of issues on the Sex and Sensibility front that caught my eye this week:

1. When Sex and Politics Meet: Amy Schalet, whom Virigina referenced in her post on Juno and teenage love back in January, is at it again with a brilliant article in the Washington Post. This time she has a question for Sarah Palin:

Should public school students be taught that contraception and condoms can prevent unintended pregnancy and disease?

But beyond this, she addresses how parents should address the question of sexuality with their teenage children. A question near and dear to my heart, Schalet makes a great historical argument on the changing role of sexuality in young people’s lives:

Simply put, the circumstances and aspirations of young people have changed since the 1950s, but our society’s narratives about the place of sexuality and the nature of relationships do not reflect these changes. And we pay a price for that inability to talk realistically about teenage sexuality and love.

Of course, with all the hoopla around Sarah Palin’s daughter’s pregnancy. In my opinion, this is a topic that is off-bounds, in my opinion, in any facile understanding of Palin’s VP suitability, but totally in-bounds in questions of conservatives’ and republicans’ generally obtuse and unrealistic (read: abstinence only) approach to teenage sexuality and public sexual health education. And Schalet makes a valid point on this topic:

The Palins, of course, deserve credit for their public embrace of their eldest daughter, which shows that, ideology notwithstanding, parents still love their daughters even if they have sex. If that embrace allays fears that prompt girls to keep sex a secret from their parents, then the Republican Party may have, inadvertently, facilitated the honest conversations we need to move beyond the myth-only approach to adolescent sexuality.

Given Palin’s especial appeal for the conservative Christian base, I wonder whether Palin speaking openly and warmly about her unmarried daughter’s pregnancy does indeed represent a turning-point in public discourse on the realities of teenage sex and love.

2. And about those realities of sex and love: Part of what I love about the feminist blogosphere community is that it acts in many ways like the consciousness-raising groups of the 70s, except with a very different purpose and outcome. Instead of sharing lived experiences that make women realize we all have similar ideas and problems, what often happens is that we realize the diversity of the female experience.

This happened recently in the comments section of a post Courtney did at Feministing on whether it is feminist to demand a female orgasm. The discussion was extremely interesting, and even got a bit brutal with arguments on what a woman should or should not demand from a sexual partner, and whether we should even attempt to write such rules. I’m starting off with my comment and then a few other representative comments:

more...

For all those who’ve been working furiously on their Election 2008 book, here are a few tips on getting that book to the editor from a real insider, Laura Mazer. We’re lucky to have Laura here monthly with her column, “BookSmarts,” but she needs to hear from you: what do you want to know? -Kristen

Hi again Penners,

I’m back after a wee bit of a hiatus (read: several months during which I idiotically took on way too many books and paid for it by having to work long hours while everyone else was at the Hamptons). I’m very excited to be back now and to be writing the BookSmarts column in GWP’s new incarnation — and especially to be posting alongside the other amazing and talented GWPers here. Hi, ladies!

This month I’d like to pass on a few creative but common sense tips that I think can significantly increase your book’s chances of being considered seriously by editors or agents, and ultimately help you match up with one who wants to champion your project. Consider these strategies:

— Pitch wide. When pitching agents, go wide. Why query five agents if you can query fifteen? Why query fifteen if you can query fifty? Every agent who sees your proposal is another agent who could fall in love with it. The same goes for querying editors directly — unlike pitching newspaper or magazine stories, it’s perfectly fine to query multiple publishing houses at once. If you’re lucky, you’ll get interest from more than one editor, and if you’re really lucky, those editors will fight over you in a bidding war involving multiple zeros.

— Polish it up. I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating: Make your proposal look as good as it reads. A dense, single-spaced, multipage document is a slush-piler for sure. Instead, make your proposal read as efficiently as a magazine: Include a table of contents, subheads, different typefaces, sidebars, pull quotes — anything that will make it more user-friendly for the editor or agent reviewing it. And write in the tone you’ll be using within the book itself. If your editorial voice is satirical and quirky, your proposal’s should be, too.

— Be open to options. Love your book idea, but be willing to change it if it’s not selling. If your book is about a historic world event, you may be able to recast your analysis in terms of current events and give it a fresh marketing angle. If you’ve written a memoir, you could give it an editorial makeover and resubmit it as a novel. Send your new (and maybe even improved!) package to a new crop of agents or editors, and to those you’ve approached before who sounded even somewhat enthusiastic about your book, especially if your changes address specific feedback they’ve given you.

— Get out and get social. Go to book readings, launch parties, and literary events. Not only are they fun and interesting, but they’re a great place to meet editors and agents. Plus I swear it’ll bring good juju to your own projects to get out there among other authorial types.

And, finally, not a tip but a request: Will you send me your questions about the publishing industry? I want to know what you want to know, and I’ll do my very best to tell you. So write, post, comment, or query!

Cheers for now,

-Laura Mazer

These stories just in, courtesy of our lovely Rebekah over at the WMC:

With Palin Effect Fading, Polls Find Women Sticking With Obama in Swing States
10/7/08
US News & World Report: Throughout September, as the “Sarah Palin effect” seemed to buoy John McCain’s campaign, Democrats worried about how Barack Obama could woo women voters in a race without Hillary Clinton. Yet recent polling data shows that women appear to be sticking more closely to their traditional Democratic leanings than many pundits had speculated.

Nielsen: Palin Pulls In Hockey Moms
10/7/08
Broadcasting & Cable: Hockey moms were 39% more likely to watch the vice presidential debate between self-professed hockey mom Sarah Palin (R-Alaska) and Senator Joe Biden (D-Del.) than so-called “average moms.” That’s according to Nielsen, which posted the stat on its blog Tuesday. Nielsen said that 33% of hockey moms tuned in to the debate, while only 23.8 percent all mothers 25-54 tuned in.

Let’s Just Say You Had $700 Billion to Spend
10/08/08
Women’s eNews: With news readers feasting on $700 billion headlines this week, a variety of advocates were asked what portions of that they’d need to solve some social problems. Among the answers: eradicating world poverty for two years.

Candidates Need To Address Family And Healthcare Issues
10/8/08
Miami Herald: While politicians are focused on the economy and the War in Iraq, national groups are trying to get them focused on things that affect working families.

Obama SO won that debate. Clear and square and fair. “That one” won, hands down. But don’t take my word. Check out the reaction groups from Fox, CNN, and CBS. HA!

Still annoyed about Sarah Palin’s behavior at the VP debate? Then enjoy this little tidbit: Gwen Ifill on Meet the Press says: “Sarah Palin blew me off.”

Warm wishes,
Deborah (still your girl with the pen)

At a rally on Saturday in California, Sarah Palin offered up what Nico Pitney at Huffinton Post calls a rather “jarring” comment, and which I would term as offensive and mind-boggling on a variety of levels (though given the current McCain/Palin strategy, we shouldn’t be surprised). To a cheering crowd, she claimed to be quoting former Clinton Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright when she said:

“There’s a place in Hell reserved for women who don’t support other women.”

In a GWP post last week, Virginia Rutter told us why she wouldn’t sign those “women against Palin” emails, as she believes “the ‘women against’ gambit feeds into the identity politics of Sarah Palin that make her so damn scary. Ironically, by mounting a ‘women against’ campaign, we make her a ‘woman’s candidate.'”

And how right she is. In fact she has Albright to back her up, who responded to the misquote (the right word is “help” not “support” and was a comment on society, not politics) with the following: “This is yet another example of McCain and Palin distorting the truth, and all the more reason to remember that this campaign is not about gender, it is about which candidate has an agenda that will improve the lives of all Americans, including women.”

But given that Palin has herself brought it up, I think it’s fair game to point out the significant ways in which Palin has not supported women throughout her political career. I would like to note that this is not a response by me as a woman; it is a response by me as a voter who cares deeply about issues that affect women.

more...

Today we bring you our first official column from our sociologist from Framingham State College, Virginia Rutter, “Nice Work.” Nice work, Miss Virginia! -Deborah

Lotta talk about markets and the economy right now. But let’s change the subject for a moment and talk about marriage markets.

A “marriage market” refers to the notion that there are in any given community a bunch of people seeking mates, and they will make the best possible match that they can. Using the marriage market metaphor, researchers have noticed that characteristics of “the market” (I’m not talking Wall Street) will influence what kind of “deal” people get. When we say “he has high market value” on the marriage market, we mean he can get a better-than-average mate. When we say, “she can do better than that,” we think that her market value is above her partner’s.

Turns out that the marriage market itself can influence not just how “good” a partner you can find, but also how good the resulting relationship might be, too. An innovative new study in the current issue of the journal Demography examined what happens when there aren’t enough men in a (heterosexual) marriage market. UPenn’s Kristen Harknett compared unmarried mothers who live in communities where women outnumber men with those in communities that had a more favorable ratio. When the marriage market was tight—that is when women didn’t have a lot of men to choose from—their matches weren’t as good.

Now all this is not saying the guys didn’t have the right degree or weren’t cute enough. (In fact, Harknett found that “the economic quality of a male partner has much more to do with unmarried mother’s own characteristics than it does with the marriage market or local economy.”) I’m saying that the relationships themselves aren’t that good—there is more conflict, less supportiveness, and fewer signals of commitment. That’s right. The market forces don’t just affect what product you get. They affect how you enjoy your product! And so it makes marriage for these unmarried mothers less likely.

This is useful information. There’s a lot of research that shows the benefits of marriage—the benefits of a good, well functioning marriage—to the adults and any children who are in it. But, taking Harknett’s study to heart, marriage may not always be the rescue plan for single moms that we might otherwise think it is. Sometimes, a marriage bailout is a bust.

–Virginia Rutter

Yes, we know it’s in the air, but it’s ON the air too.

The WMC’s Robin Morgan and PWV participant (and fellow GWPenner) Courtney Martin will be on the radio tomorrow night, hosted by ABC’s Lynn Sherr who is doing a special radio program on The New Feminism, a one-time special live SIRIUS radio show airing October 7, 2008 from 6:00 – 7:00 pm ET on SIRIUS Stars channel 102.   Columnists Ellen Goodman and Gail Collins are among the panelists discussing feminism and the vote…just before Obama-McCAin debate #2.  I. CAN’T. WAIT.

(Thanks to the ladies at the WMC for the heads up.)