This last week New York Times suggesting that older woman/younger man relationships were on the rise.  But I wouldn’t get too excited just yet.  The data below shows that the percentage of men marrying women ten and especially five years younger is decreasing and the percentage of women marrying men ten and especially five years younger is increasing.

It all looks very dramatic until you check out the y axis.  Notice that the y axis for the “husband older” graph is zero to 35%, but the y axis for the “wife older” graph is zero to 10%.  This makes the data for men look more impressive than it is.  Not that 8 or 10 percentage points is insignificant, but it would be far less impressive on a zero to 100 scale.  The data for the women, especially sitting right next to the “husband older” table, look far more impressive than it is.

Only about 6% of women are marrying men five years younger or more.  That’s a two percentage point increase since 1960.  Not exactly a cougar revolution.  One in four men are still marrying women five years younger or more.  And, though it appears that they’re not marrying women five years younger or more as frequently, the age distribution of the remaining 69% of marriages is left invisible and most of them probably involve women that are somewhat younger than their husbands.

So, yes, today women are more likely to marry younger men than they were in 1960.  But the presentation of the data (the inconsistency in the y axis) makes the degree of difference seem larger than it is.

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

Lindsay H. sent in a Kingsford Charcoal ad, in which we learn the proper cooking roles for men and women–men cook outside, women cook inside:

It’s just like how men are supposed to do their cleaning outside by mowing the lawn! Glad we cleared all that up, and also instructed women how to avoid embarrassing their male partners in front of their guy friends.

I have argued elsewhere on this blog that the fact that companies don’t sell make-up to men is a triumph of gender ideology over capitalism.

That said, a few companies are trying to sell make-up to men (and their strategies are really something else, see link above).  It turns out, however, that they’re not breaking new ground, as this vintage ad shows:

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

A 1926 eugenics poster (from autistics.org):

From left to right the boxes say (and the left two are what we need less of, the right two what it says we need mroe of):

This light flashes every 48 seconds. Every 48 seconds a person is born in the United States who will never grow up mentally beyond that stage of a normal 8 year old boy or girl.

This light flashes every 50 seconds. Every 50 seconds a person is committed to jail in the United States. Very few normal persons ever go to jail.

This light flashes every 16 seconds. Every 16 seconds a person is born in the United States.

This light flashes every 7 1/2 minutes. Every 7 1/2 minutes a high grade person is born in the United States who will have ability to do creative work and be fit for leadership. About 4% of all Americans come within this class.

Here’s another example of the use of pseudoscience to make racial arguments (via):

Notice that the “woman mulatto” is draw to appear extremely unattractive, and that while the white man and mulatto woman have a “pass-for-white” daughter, the son on the far left isn’t “pass-for-black”–he really is black. The idea of “passing for black” made no sense at the time, while “passing for white” was a major concern. I am surprised to see here, though, that the baby of the pass-for-white woman and the white man is defined as entirely white.

Of course, none of this makes any logical sense at all, but lots of supposedly scientific studies at the time applied many statistical and other methods to prove various racial arguments.

Adeste S. sent in this performance by two women about the difficulties and frustrations of being transgendered:

Performed at Brave New Voices.

NEW! (Mar. ’10): Ryan sent in this video of Sass Rogando Sasot speaking to the United Nations about transgender rights. From an article at Coilhouse:

Her speech, titled “Reclaiming the Lucidity of Our Hearts”, addresses the need for vastly improved acceptance, support and protection of transgender citizens worldwide.

Her entire presentation is very moving, but about 8 minutes into this clip, something shifts in Sasot’s voice and delivery. What began as an engaging speech swiftly transforms into something far more urgent, immediate, and beautiful.

In the U.S. today, men enroll in college at a lower rate and drop out at a higher rate. In 2005, there were 57 women on campus for every 43 men.

This is such a significant problem, that college admissions officers are letting in a larger percentage of male applicants, even sometimes admitting less qualified men over more qualified women.

But this isn’t just a gender story.

A USA Today story offered this data from the ACE Center for Policy and Analysis:

Looking at the very bottom line of the table (and just at 2003/2004), you can see that the gender gap is largest among lower income students.  Men make up 40% of undergraduates 18-24 when you consider low-income students only, and 49% when you look at upper income students.

The gender gap also correlates with race.  Asian students show the smallest gender gap, whites the next smallest, with Hispanics and blacks trailing.

You might notice that the correlation of the gender gap with race mirrors the class correlation.  That is, income and wealth data for racial categories follows the same pattern with Asians out earning whites (categorically speaking) and whites out earning Hispanics and blacks.  So there may be an interesting exacerbation effect here.

The gender gaps for each racial/ethnic group, however, decreases as the students’ families get richer.  And, among the upper income groups, the racial difference shrinks to only three percentage points (from 11 among low- and middle-income kids).

So, it’s not just about race, it’s not just about class, and it’s not just about gender.  Then, what is it about being poor, black or Hispanic, andmale that results in low male enrollment in college and a higher drop out rate?

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

Emma B. sent in an image of this wonderful toy:

As Emma pointed out, commenters on digg seemed to mostly interpret it as a hotel housekeeper’s trolley, though the website referred to cleaning the house.

There is nothing inherently wrong with toys that allow kids to mimic doing household tasks. Kids like to play at doing what they see adults doing–in fact, it’s an essential part of development. I had a toy grocery cart as a kid and thought it was awesome, particularly when I forced my cat to ride in it (he was very patient).

What annoys me is the way these products are so clearly gendered–in this case, blatantly so (“girls only“). Girls learn that playing at household chores is fun fun fun:

To my surprise, though, I found one site that showed a boy playing with the cleaning trolley:

I don’t think I’ve ever before seen a cleaning toy with a boy pictured playing with it. And that’s awesome. Though for reasons that are not clear to me, this site listed the trolley at $158, while it was $35-45 at all the other websites.

So I was able to find one example of a boy playing with a housework toy, but the overall marketing message was still clearly that housework is fun for girls…only.

NEW (Dec. ’09)! Lynne S. sent in these photos of housework toys at Toys ‘R Us that include both girls and boys playing:

 ALSO NEW (Dec. ’09)! Fia K. found some examples too:

See also this post featuring screen shots from a site that advertises masculine toys primarily with girls.

But see these posts on the Rose Petal Cottage, rigidly gendered Sears and Amazon catalogs, and Mom/Daughter domesticity by Nintendo.

A gallery at Time Magazine offered a set of photographs that counter the frequent representations of Saudi women as (veiled) and downtrodden.  The slide show features professional women at work.

Daneh Abuahmed, Rotana’s head of information technology:

Dr. Maha Al Muneef, Executive Director of the National Family Safety Program:

Sultana al Rowaili, the head of human resources at Rotana:

Members of the National Family Safety Program:

Norah Al Malhooq, administrator King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre:

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.