New world 800m champion Caster Semenya has been asked to take a gender test, according to athletics' governing body

Link to article

Got To WorkHow the Obama jobs program will really affect women workers.

Slate.com

By Linda Hirshman

Looks like the Obama administration is finally remembering who most of its voters were: women. During the early rollout of the Obama jobs program, all the talk was of roads, bridges, and alternative fuel. And as many people quickly noticed, that plan might as well have had the old boys' club sign posted to it: NO GIRLS ALLOWED. Who builds roads and bridges and invents alternative fuels? Construction workers and engineers. And according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the construction trades are approximately 3 percent female and 97 percent male, while engineers are 12 percent female and 88 percent male.

Since the start of the recession, the unemployment rate for women is up by 1.6 percentage points. That is not as dramatic an increase as men's unemployment (up 2.8 percentage points), but it's clear that women's unemployment went up by a factor far greater than 10 percent of the men's rate, while they would have captured only 10 percent of the jobs, as they were originally described. So in the recession-suffering Olympics, it would have seemed that women were entitled to a little more than 10 percent of the job ointment.

Without ever letting on, of course, the no-drama Obama mantra suddenly began to shift on the stimulus package to include talk of new jobs also going to places where women can sometimes be found, such as "education" and "health care." Then last Saturday, the president- and vice-president-elect's chief economic advisers, Christina Romer and Jared Bernstein, released a report on the program, titled "The Job Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan," which includes an analysis of the effect of the jobs program on women. The report said almost nothing about any other group.

According to Romer and Bernstein, the jobs program as now conceived will be a veritable estrogen-fest:

The total number of created jobs likely to go to women is roughly 42% of the jobs created by the package. Given that so far in the recession women have accounted for roughly 20% of the decline in payroll employment, this calculation could reflect that the stimulus package skews job creation somewhat toward women, possibly as a result of the investments in healthcare, education, and state fiscal relief.

The rest at: http://www.slate.com/id/2208521/

Sarah Palin, The new face of feminism?

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=94369835

All Things Considered, September 7, 2008 · First came Hillary Clinton, then came Sarah Palin. Both women have brought feminism into the foreground of the 2008 election. But because they represent different parties and ideologies, Clinton and Palin call into question the very definition of the word feminist.

Stanford University historian Estelle Freedman, author of No Turning Back: The History of Feminism and the Future of Women, and host Jacki Lyden discuss whether a conservative such as Palin can be called a feminist in 2008.

South Dakota Abortion Law: Even More Nonsensical Than You Thought

I just read this article in slate and had to share it - it's about South Dakota's new policy of requiring doctors to read patients a discouraging and medically incorrect statement (drafted by the legislature) before they get an abortion

- Amanda

Fetal Separation

Starting this week, under orders from the state attorney general and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8^th Circuit, medical providers in South Dakota must present a scripted statement to women who seek abortions. The script, dictated by the legislature three years ago, declares that any abortion "will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being."

Until now, I wasn't aware that the fetus—a term that, according to the South Dakota law, includes "the implanted embryo"—was a whole, separate, living human being. I thought it was ... you know ... implanted. I mean, I'm just a guy, not really an expert or anything. But, um, placenta? Umbilical cord? Do those terms ring a bell? And that's not even getting to the tricky stuff, like the role of maternal RNA in directing embryonic growth or all the work done by the womb to facilitate the embryo's attachment and nourishment.

I have to say, it's a relief to learn that the embryo is so complete and independent. I mean, it solves the whole problem. Here's this woman who just wants to be separated from her embryo. And lo and behold, it's already separate! No need to agonize. Just detach it and let it grow. It's separate, it's whole, it's living. Cancel the abortion. Perform a separation instead.

Sure, some cranky district attorney might take you to court, claiming your separation was really an abortion. Make sure you countersue for legal costs, because you've got a slam-dunk case. The law under which you're being prosecuted doesn't just declare that embryos and fetuses are separate. It also defines abortion as "the use of any means to intentionally terminate the pregnancy of a woman known to be pregnant with knowledge that the termination with those means will, with reasonable likelihood, cause the death of the fetus."

How can South Dakota claim that you should know separation will kill the fetus, when South Dakota has insisted on informing you, prior to the procedure, that the fetus is already whole and separate?

Don't give me some medical-school mumbo jumbo about obstetrics. The legislature mooted all that blather when it superimposed its judgment. Fetuses are whole and separate. Therefore, being a law-abiding citizen, you have no reason to believe that separation will cause fetal death. Therefore, under the law's terms, separation is not abortion. No need to bother with the onerous paperwork and liability threats the legislature has assigned exclusively to abortion. You're not in the abortion business anymore.

Look, I don't like abortions. Fortunately, neither do the women who ask for them. Most abortions happen because women get pregnant when they're not ready. Prevent the pregnancy, and you prevent the abortion. So, here's a word of advice to legislators like those in South Dakota: Stop withholding birth control and stop lying to women about their bodies. You can't even keep your lies straight. That's how you ended up telling doctors to tell women that separation will kill a separate human being. See you in court.

Published Monday, July 21, 2008 7:32 AM by William Saletan Filed under: abortion, embryos, birth control, fetus

The Sisterhood Split

Hey everybody,

I just read an awesome article about the presidential campaign and some tendencies to split race vs. gender, and some older feminists not taking into account intersectionality as much... It's good! Read it!

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080324/valenti

Hillary Sexism Watch

Here is a running tally of the anti-Hillary, sexist episodes in the primary campaign:
It's been compiled by Melissa McEwan of Shakespeare's Sister.

UNIFEM

Hey, I just got an e-mail that says: UNIFEM is starting to end violence against women. Today,
the UN Foundation announced that it will donate $1 dollar for each of the first 100,000 signatures to the online petition. If you would like, check out the article at feministing.org or you can go to the
campaign's website at saynotoviolence.org. 18,000 people from all over the world have already added their names to the "Say NO to violence against women" campaign since November.