From Washington Post

I grew up in a time when two-parent families were still the norm, in both black and white America. Then, as an adult, I saw divorce become more commonplace, then almost a rite of passage. Today it would appear that many -- particularly in the black community -- have dispensed with marriage altogether.

But as a black woman, I have witnessed the outrage of girlfriends when the ex failed to show up for his weekend with the kids, and I've seen the disappointment of children who missed having a dad around. Having enjoyed a close relationship with my own father, I made a conscious decision that I wanted a husband, not a live-in boyfriend and not a "baby's daddy," when it came my time to mate and marry.

My time never came...

From Yahoo News

SEOUL (AFP) - A feminist and former political dissident was picked to become South Korea's first woman prime minister. Han Myung-Sook, a lawmaker from the ruling Uri Party, was nominated for the vacant post by President Roh Moo-Hyun, a move hailed as a step forward for women in male-dominated South Korea... Han, known as the "godmother" of South Korean feminism, is a two-term lawmaker who served as minister of gender equality in 2001 and environment minister in 2003.

Han, 61, cut her political teeth as a dissident fighting South Korea's military dictators of the 1970s and 1980s. She was jailed for two years for pro-democracy activities in 1979... "She has worked for more than 30 years to improve women's rights, environment protection and democracy," said presidential secretariat chief Lee Byung-Wan.

"She has worked for more than 30 years to improve women's rights, environment protection and democracy," said presidential secretariat chief Lee Byung-Wan...

From Bitch Magazine

"We grew older, stronger, weaker apart, in love, love, love," writes Lauren Eve in "Cherie," one of the more than 60 essays, poems, and interviews in Diane Anderson-Minshall and Gina de Vries's brash new anthology of writings by queer youth. In under three pages, "Cherie" quickly captures the adrenaline- fueled intensity of being a young adult-the craving for adventure, the rapid cycling between elation and despair, the pleasure and pain of being love-struck- with striking self-awareness: "Money, grades, parents, friends; it all flew out the window.... Underage, underloved. We were clichés and above it all and flying with wings spread so far it was easy to lose control and easy to soar and easy to nose-dive." The writers in Becoming aren't the teen set you see in mainstream media: They struggle with family, addiction, abuse, and school, but all with the added complication of being queer. Anderson-Minshall and de Vries have assembled a remarkable collection of new queer voices that soar, like the speaker in Eve's poem, precariously high...

From Slate Magazine

Ever since the breast pump began to catch on a decade or two ago, the device has been a fault line in the motherhood wars. The pump seems like the perfect have-it-all solution: Women can nurse without taking round-the-clock care of their babies. Other adults (fathers!) can help out with feedings, too. Yet La Leche League, the half-century-old pro- nursing organization, approaches the device with a curled lip. "Before investing your money in a breast pump, you may want to consider whether it is something you really need," the group sniffs in its seventh revised edition of The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding. "When mother and baby are together most of the time"-the group's ideal-"a mother may have no reason to pump her breasts." Likewise, some feminist writers disparage pumps for letting employers off the hook. Instead of bending to the needs of mothers and babies by granting extended maternity leaves, a workplace can designate a little room with an electrical outlet and call it a day.

Is that really a bad thing? Nursing may be one of nature's best illustrations of supply-and-demand-a mother's milk supply adjusts to meet her baby's appetite-but the reality of the practice has never translated into tidy ideology. Pediatrician Dr. L. Emmett Holt, America's first widely popular parenting expert, championed breastfeeding at the turn of the 20th century as the best way to feed a baby-as it unquestionably was in an era of dicey water supplies and dirty cow stalls. Yet, as Slate contributor Ann Hulbert points out in her book Raising America, Holt's conviction didn't stop him from peddling a manual that instructed mothers on how to prepare cow's milk for baby bottles. The doctor was well aware he had an audience of mothers who were eager not to be tied down. Holt's own son received most of his milk from a wet nurse-the closest Holt's wife could have come to a good breast pump...

From The Observer

Chiara Cargnel wants to have it all: a high-flying career and a successful marriage. So far she is halfway there. At 26, she is an investment banker in London working over 70 hours a week and earning more than £80,000 a year. Cargnel, like many other young women, is excelling in a world many thought governed not by their rules, but by rules set and enforced by men.

For the first time in history these 'elite women' can succeed in any career they want. According to a remarkable thesis that has blown open the debate around feminism, sexism and the future role of women, a new generation of bright, rich professionals have broken through the glass ceiling and have nothing to fear from the men around them. They will be just as successful.

From Vote Run Lead an initiative of the White Hose Project

Go Run is a weekend long training through the White House Project dedicated to equipping younger women, the future candidate, with the skills to run and win. The training aims to demystifying the political process and increase the number of progressive women in the political pipeline. Go Run provides the nuts and bolts of running for political office by focusing on such areas as communications, fundraising, and campaigning, amongst others.

"...Powerful, insightful, dynamic, mujeres. This describes the women I met at Go Run 2005. It was so empowering to see so many women, especially women of color, who were ready to serve in public office. Hearing the stories of those who had run and won, run and lost and of those who were getting ready to run enlightened me not only about the races, but also about the challenges and victories of women and their struggle for recognition and validation in our political system. Go Run allowed me to become a mentee to a successful and realized Latina woman in Denver. She has run for office, won, became president of city council and continues to serve and lead - true inspiration. Go Run offers workshops and trainings that will only refine and further the skills that I will need to one day run myself. As co-chair of a non-profit board, the networks I have created connect my organization to so many other women - whom themselves are also leaders..."

From The Guardian

Young women are apathetic. They're not feminists. They don't call themselves feminists. They don't know what feminism is all about.

"That," says Jessica Valenti, "was all we ever seemed to hear - from colleagues, from the media. And we just thought, who are they talking about? I know young women all over the place who do feminist work. We wanted to show that young feminists aren't crazy or mean, but cool. A lot of feminism has this academic basis that can be very off-putting. And so we thought, let's put something out there that's not dry and academic, but lively and fun."

So Valenti became one of the founders of Feministing.com, a highly popular blog website that attracts 100,000 visitors a month. Each day it features between five and 10 women's stories, ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous. An article on incoming Chilean president Michelle Bachelet, for example, is followed by a wisecrack on a dubious skin-tightening product called Virgin Cream.

From a blog for Fat Athletes

I've been thinking a lot lately about just how much of an iconoclast one must be in order to avoid doing direct damage to oneself in the interest of becoming socially acceptable. Fat activists are personally familiar with that terrifying moment when the doctor or nurse or sort-of friend looks at us directly, and recommends weight loss surgery without a moment's questioning or hesitation, or even a second's consideration of the extraordinary dangers and extraordinary dehumanization involved. It's right up there with being offered the grape kool-aid. And, if we refuse their smiling offer, will they force us, or hit us with an injection when our vigilance drops? Those people scare me, dudes.

There's plenty more to be scared of, though. No body's exempt. In a culture where a disturbing number of guys are willing to risk disease and unplanned pregnancy because condoms "ruin the experience," a young woman who wishes to present herself at the height of sexual fashion must engage in numerous acts which guarantee that her erogenous zones are first subjected to pain, and then literally numbed out, permanently...

From What' s Up with Kanab?

Kanab is a small town in Utah with a population of about 3,500. Like many places in Utah, it has a strong Mormon base along with a diverse mix of other residents.

Recently, the Mayor and City Council of Kanab decided that they were tired of "putting up" with some of their residents and passed city ordinances aimed at excluding these people....

The resolution specifically states that the "vision" of the natural family should serve "as a guide to policy formation and public action". It also declares that "the protection of the natural family" is the "first responsibility" of the local government...