"All the apple-cheeked babies, captured for eternity in Creamsicle onesies three sizes too big, are nearly grown."

That's the first sentence of what?

The incredibly long and abstruse Sports Illustrated article about Peyton Manning, from which I was unable to extract the reasoning for choosing him as Sportsman of the Year (other than, looking at the sidebar of other possibilities, the lack of anyone more compelling).

When the hell did sportswriting turn into that sort of thing? Babies. Onesies. Should a man even use the word "onesies"? Creamsicle? Come on, people.

But if we're going to talk about football, let's talk about the Green Bay Packers humiliating the Dallas Cowboys last night. Wasn't that a highly emotive experience?

"It took me everything not to cry," McCarthy said..... "I was drained. I don't think people realize what professional athletes put into a contest. Just to see the emotion of guys... what we overcame. I don't have the words. My vocabulary's stuck right now. It was incredible."

Mars needs women. Women have the words. We're more verbal. We can say "onesies" and "babies" and "Creamsicle" and more. But I'll just say "the emotion of guys"... I love that. And... go, Packers, and good for you, Peyton Manning.

"Men, to the best of my knowledge, don’t even read."

"When’s the last time you heard a man say, 'I’ve been reading this great book, you’d really like it’? My girlfriend always tells me about these books she’s reading, and I don’t even see her reading the book! Where does this book live?"

A quote from Bryan Goldberg, the founder of the website Bustle, quoted in this New Yorker article titled "FROM MARS/A young man’s adventures in women’s publishing." I enjoyed the whole article — Goldberg raised $6.5 million to start up a website for women, though he knew he knew nothing about what women want to read. He just knew there was money to be made from advertising if he could deliver big numbers of young female readers, and he hired a whole lot of young women to work for $50 or $100 a day writing blog posts about whatever interests them (because what interests them will kinda sorta already be what interests young women). His goal is 50 million readers a month, and as of the publication of that article (last September), he'd gotten the traffic up to 14,000 a day — i.e., about half the traffic I get here, with just my own self writing, albeit not to the demographic most loved by advertisers, even though I am sure that some of you do get excited by the newest innovation in eyeliner.


But what got me thinking about that quote about reading was running acrosss this new article in Slate: "Dan Kois’ Favorite Books of 2013." Dan, a man, apparently read enough books to have 15 favorites in one year. How many books do you need to read in a year to have 15 favorites? I'd say at least 1 a week. But he's the book editor there, so he'd better do some reading. The truth is, if you put me in a room with all the books sent to the book editor in a year, I could produce a 15 favorites list in a single 8-hour workday. You just need a methodology, right? Spend less than 10 seconds on most books until you've got about 30 that seem as though you're going to like them. Maybe 30 more that you'll give a chance. Go through the first pile of 30, 5 minutes per book, and see if you get 15 you like. If not, proceed to the second pile. Put another 10 minutes into each of the chosen 15 to check that you haven't been fooled. If you find any clunkers, swap in one of the also rans from the top 60, maybe something with a colorful title or strange author name. I see Dan has on his list "There Once Lived a Girl Who Seduced Her Sister’s Husband, and He Hanged Himself: Love Stories," by Ludmilla Petrushevskaya.

Ha ha. Does my method sound like a male way to construct a top 15 list? It would amuse me.

"The notion that your manhood depends on The Man giving you a job with a paycheck is some weird modern-day delusion."

"Those of you inside that delusion seem uncreative and impractical and, frankly, afraid of strong women."

Part of a comment of mine in the thread from yesterday about the NYT article "Wall Street Mothers, Stay-Home Fathers/As Husbands Do Domestic Duty, These Women Are Free to Achieve."

"As hardy perennials go, there is little to beat that science hacks' favourite: the hard-wiring of male and female brains."

Writes Guardian science editor Robin McKie (who's a male, if that matters to you)"

For more than 30 years, I have seen a stream of tales about gender differences in brain structure under headlines that assure me that from birth men are innately more rational and better at map-reading than women, who are emotional, empathetic multi-taskers, useless at telling jokes...

And there are no signs that this flow is drying up...

McKie, being male, slips in a menopause joke.

... with last week witnessing publication of a particularly lurid example of the genre. Writing in the US journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia revealed they had used a technique called diffusion tensor imaging to show that the neurons in men's brains are connected to each other in a very different way from neurons in women's brains....

It is biological determinism at its silly, trivial worst. Yes, men and women probably do have differently wired brains, but there is little convincing evidence to suggest these variations are caused by anything other than cultural factors...

Equally, when gender differences are uncovered by researchers they are frequently found to be trivial, a point made by Robert Plomin, a professor of behavioural genetics at London's Institute of Psychiatry, whose studies have found that a mere 3% of the variation in young children's verbal development is due to their gender....

Read the whole thing. And try to maintain some rationality this time. Especially you men. I know it's hard for you. Oh, no, Althouse, being female, could not have made a joke. I must with heavier, manly hands crack that joke in the comments, that joke that she could not have made.

Uptalking is not just for females.

It's catching on amongst the males. 

"One possibility is that this is an extension of a pitch pattern that we actually find in most varieties of English which is used when you're making a statement but you're [also] asking indirectly for the interlocutor to confirm if they are with you," Prof Arvaniti said.

That theory entails the inference that males are increasingly feeling a need for assurance that there is agreement and acceptance.

"Lazy Men Are Responsible for the Great Orgasm Deficit."

A headline at Cosmopolitan. Excerpt:

These days, it feels like men are letting themselves off the hook for one-sided orgasms a little too easily.... "I know some women don't have orgasms every time. Don't worry about it." Now that he's framed it like you're the one who's being forgiven for your tricky, finicky genitals...

Framing. It's not just for politics.

And since the new study on the low rate of female orgasm has emerged, so have myriad response pieces (by women) about how sex feels good even without an orgasm, and how orgasms are almost besides the point.

Are they? Sure, it's true, to a point. But is this just a rationalization to continue letting men off the hook and Criss Angel Mindfreak women into thinking that their own orgasms aren't as important as the man's?

I had to look up Criss Angel Mindfreak. I thought it referred to some character who puts her all into pleasing men, but apparently it's the name of a reality TV show about a magician named Criss Angel. Mindfreak isn't part of the performer's name I was disappointed to learn.

That short Cosmo article used the phrase "off the hook" twice, and the about the new study — which went to another Cosmo article — is about the orgasm deficit in during "hookup" sex. Too many hooks!

And Cosmo math is terrible. The headline at that linked article says "Only Half of All Women Orgasm During Casual Sex," and the text says:

Today in ~*~*Duh, Science~*~*, research presented at the International Academy of Sex Research’s annual meeting reflects that women are half as likely to orgasm during oral or penetrative sex as a casual hookup versus either of those sex acts in a relationship.

~*~*Duh, Math~*~*

"Movember as microaggression... characterized by too many moustaches, overarching shows of masculinity, and a general overload of testosterone."

"The pure and charitable sentiment is there – raising money for prostate and testicular cancer research, and fighting mental health problems among men – but what once started out as a harmless campaign has become sexist, racist, transphobic, and misinformed."

The idea of suggesting that men show solidarity with each other by growing moustaches is completely absurd....

[Blogger Jem] Bloomfield... remarks that, “This campaign, intended as a project by men for men, has immediately been turned into a pretext for demanding that women submit themselves and their bodies to male approval.... I don’t want to be told that a moustache makes me a man, or that my identity depends upon shaming women into being presentable to the male gaze.”

"Completely absurd" is a great phrase here. Who knew mustaches were such a problem beyond the mere aesthetics of a given man's face?

"But are men, and the age-old power structures associated with 'maleness,' permanently in decline?"

"Or do men still retain significant control over the workplace, the family and society at large, including women?" A very lively debate on the proposition: "Be it resolved, men are obsolete…"

Pro: Hanna Rosin, Maureen Dowd. Con: Caitlin Moran, Camille Paglia.

Rosin and Dowd pretty much retreat from the strong version of the proposition, and Moran and Paglia kick ass. Rosin and Dowd end up winning because they "persuaded" more people, after beginning with only 16% on their side (and ending with 44%).

Very amusing, or enraging (if you're the type to get steamed over the obvious fact that it would be considered outrageous for a bunch of men to get all hyper and cheeky over a comparable topic about the value of women).

ADDED: You might need to subscribe to watch at that link, but you can listen (which is what I did) here. 

"The First Four Women To Complete Marine Infantry Training Took A Celebratory Selfie Together."

"Harlee 'Rambo' Bradford (in the middle) snapped this selfie after her and the three other women in the photo were the first of 15 to complete a Marine Corps pilot course."

Infantry training for Bradford’s group required the women to to meet the same standards as any other Marine.

Including a 12 1/2 mile march in combat gear that lasted almost 5 hours, running at a 4 mph pace carrying 90-pounds of gear.

"Well, you know, I don't want to put the men senators down. There are some really great men senators here..."

"... but I do see women working collaboratively and listening more to people to try to find their core common ground to get something done."

In 6 weeks, only 40,000 have signed up through Healthcare.gov — if "signing up" means putting a plan in your "shopping cart."

"That amount is a tiny fraction of the total projected enrollment for the 36 states where the federal government is running the online health-care exchange, indicating the slow start to the president’s initiative."

Though the number is inflated with those who haven't actually purchased a plan, it's not not additionally puffed up with those who signed up for Medicaid. That number is said to be 440,000, which means only 8.3% of those who have managed to use the website are actually buying health insurance, and 91.6% have used it to access a welfare program.

A spokesman for the insurance industry’s main trade group said the slow early enrollment does not matter as much as how many sign up by the spring. “That’s what will determine how well these reforms are going to work,” said Robert Zirkelbach, spokesman for the group America’s Health Insurance Plans.

The insurance industry has a substantial stake in who enrolls, as well as how many do so. Unless enough young, healthy Americans sign up, the cost of coverage is likely to escalate — in turn, discouraging people from getting or keeping coverage.

So the number — 40,000 — is dismal, but if it turns out these are disproportionally the sort of person who will be using a lot of health care services — and don't you think they are? — that's an even bigger problem.

By the way, what's with "young, healthy"? I understand "healthy," but why "young"? If we're going to use stereotypes and generalizations about the groups of people who are less likely to incur health-care costs, why stop at "young"? Why not say "Unless enough young, healthy, male Americans sign up"?

"They stink, have rough skin and look like old dogs. No wonder they have to pay for a man."

"Men won’t touch them where they come from," said a male "sex worker," quoted in an article with a title in the form of a question that assumes a fact I didn't know was in evidence: "Why Is Female Sex Tourism Embraced By Society?" 

Via Instapundit, who says: "Female sexuality is always to be celebrated, unlike that icky and dangerous male sexuality." But that's missing something, and I'm saying that as an "old dog" — shouldn't that be bitch? — myself. If male sexuality is "icky and dangerous," how can an older woman leave the safety and comfort of her home country and travel somewhere foreign specifically for the purpose of exposing her vulnerable body — in some private, as-yet-unknown space — to this grotesque and physically stronger being? I don't see how you can "celebrate" the woman here without also celebrating the male.

What I see being celebrated is the power of money and the value of sex.

Why would a libertarian get miffed about that?

"Yet women are... 'fickle, quarrelsome, suspicious, weak, and fearful'... 'tirelessly lustful.'"

"Strong men may imperil their health by trying to fulfill their sexual demands. So, in order for life to proceed calmly, women must submit to men and, above all, be chaste... Those who do not obey their husbands should be beaten," writes Joan Acocella in The New Yorker, paraphrasing something a female character says in  Boccaccio's "Decameron."

In support of that view, Boccaccio ends his book with what has become the famous story of “patient Griselda.” Gualtieri, the Marquis of Saluzzo, has no wish to marry, but his subjects pressure him. So he takes, as a wife, a peasant girl, Griselda. In time, Griselda gives birth to a daughter and a son. Both babies are taken away from her, with the strong suggestion that they will be put to death. Griselda makes no protest. So Gualtieri tightens the screw. He declares that he needs a noble wife, not a peasant. Stoically, Griselda returns to her father’s house, leaving even her dresses behind, since she feels that they belong to her husband. Soon Gualtieri calls her back, saying that he needs her to oversee the preparations for the wedding. “Gualtieri’s words pierced Griselda’s heart like so many knives,” but she agrees. On the wedding day, a boy and a girl appear whom Griselda does not know. Gualtieri introduces the girl as his bride-to-be. Griselda praises her. Finally, Gualtieri can go on no longer. He tells Griselda that the boy and the girl are her children (he had them brought up by kinfolk in Bologna), and that he is taking Griselda back, more beloved now: “I wanted to teach you how to be a wife”—that is, submissive.

Much more at the link as Acocella reviews a new translation and compares it to other translations.

Also at the top link: much feistier women and much sexier stories. Read the one about the barrel.

"Perhaps the most astonishing aspect of this story is the virtually unanimous support for the 'survivor' from anti-rape activists and their supporters."

"Letters published in The Post, from women and men alike, deplored the 'disheartening' skepticism about the 'poor woman's' claims and decried the pernicious sway of 'the rape culture.'" 

[A] class of 2013 alumnus... chided "misguided skeptics" for failing to realize that "it takes incredible courage for a woman to come forward and report a rape," since she subjects herself to "massive public scrutiny."...

A column on ThinkProgress.org.... suggested that eyewitness accounts confirming that both participants in the act were "very, very drunk" proved that, no matter how consensual it looked, it fit Ohio University's criteria for sexual assault.  (Actually, the university policy quoted in the column states that a person is unable to consent if "incapacitated" due to alcohol or other factors.)  The writer, Tara Culp-Resser, did not seem to realize that by her definition, the man can be considered a victim of sexual assault as much as the woman — leading to the absurd conclusion that they were raping each other.

That's actually not "absurd." In statutory rape, depending on how the statute is written, both can be committing the crime. If you want to define "sexual assault" broadly, it can be possible for both to be committing the offense. If a campus would like to exercise more parental control over students, it can say no drinking and sex. You can think about why that may or may not be a good policy, but it's not absurd. In the old days, the rule was just: No sex.

The question of what is "rape" — or a "rape culture" — can be distracting. We're talking about a university's disciplinary code, not putting people in prison. The case at the link shows the problem of treating the female as the presumptive victim in drunken-but-otherwise-seemingly-consensual sex. But what's so bad about treating them both as violators of a campus code forbidding drunken sex?

As I said the other day, it might help to ease up on the "rape culture" talk and discuss whether there's a "bad sex" culture.

Minimizing the crimes of women (in a serious case about federalism).

Here's how WaPo's Robert Barnes begins his report about a case of attempted murder:

A melodramatic love triangle begat a ham-handed revenge poisoning. That led to what one Supreme Court justice called an “unimaginable” federal prosecution of the scorned wife under a law enacted to implement a global chemical weapons treaty.

As long as the victim didn't actually die, it's just some kind of joke?

Now, there is a problem with the feds taking over this prosecution, and that should be the focus of the story about this case. But you should see how outrageous it is to diminish the criminal behavior in this gendered fashion.

Carol Anne Bond, a Pennsylvania microbiologist... ordered a rare blend of chemicals, partly off the Internet, and over the next several months tried to poison [Myrlinda] Haynes 24 times by putting them on her doorknob, car and, critically, mailbox.

Just some nutty lady's bumbling parry in a cat fight?

Federal prosecutors charged Bond with violating the 1998 Chemical Weapons Convention Implementation Act, a law based on the chemical weapons ban treaty that is signed by all but four of the world’s nations.

The problem here is not the unseriousness of attempted murder. It's that murder is traditionally left to the states, and the federal government is — at least theoretically — a government of limited, enumerated powers. With this important constitutional principle at stake, Bond is represented by the great ex-Solicitor General Paul Clement:

Clement...  said that if the law implementing the treaty “really does reach every malicious use of chemicals anywhere in the nation, as the government insists,” then it violates the “bedrock principle of our federalist system that Congress lacks a general police power to criminalize conduct” that does not have distinctly federal concern....

[Justice Elena Kagan] said the treaty gave Congress the power to pass implementing legislation. “So you have to find a constraint on the treaty power. Where does it come from?” she demanded.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor worried about the courts hamstringing efforts to deal with terrorism. 

Writing tip for Barnes: If you've already got "ham-handed," don't use "hamstringing." Too much ham.

“It would be deeply ironic that we have expended so much energy criticizing Syria, when if this court were now to declare that our joining or creating legislation to implement the treaty was unconstitutional,” she said.

Now, we're getting to the real meat of it. The government was represented by the current Solicitor General, Donald B. Verrilli Jr.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who posed no questions to Clement, asked Verrilli if it would be possible for the president to join a treaty that gives national governments all powers and for Congress then to put in place such legislation.

When Verrilli said that would be unimaginable, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy shot back: “It also seems unimaginable that you would bring this prosecution.”

That led the conservative justices — plus Justice Stephen G. Breyer, who usually sides with the liberals — to unleash a barrage of hypotheticals of what could be prosecuted under the broad law, which covers chemicals that could harm humans or animals: a wheelbarrow full of kerosene; a poisoned potato given to a horse; the performance-enhancing drugs allegedly used by cyclist Lance Armstrong.

“Would it shock you if I told you that a few days ago my wife and I distributed toxic chemicals to a great number of children?” Alito asked Verrilli, drawing laughter from the court’s spectators. He explained that chocolate Halloween candy is “poison to dogs, so it’s a toxic chemical” under the act.

Verrilli chafed, saying, “This is serious business.”

Yes, it truly is. It's easy to see Kennedy's point: The federal government shouldn't have chosen to prosecute this case. But it did, and now what? It's easy to think: The central government needs ample power to do everything that might need to be done at a national level and it should refrain from using that power to deal with matters that are better left to the states.

But it doesn't refrain.

What not to do when telling women what not to do.

A memo to women lawyers is a good negative example:

Last night, we started receiving reports of a memo entitled “Presentation Tips for Women” that was distributed by a member of the Women’s Committee to all women associates across the U.S. offices of Clifford Chance.

I haven't worked in a law firm since the 80s, so you tell me: Why is there a "Women’s Committee" in the first place?

Our tipster was correct in that the vast majority of these words of wisdom aren’t tips for “women,” but rather, tips for “human beings.”

Yeah, but there's a "Women’s Committee." These are women helping women. Either you like that or you don't. Pick one.

We’ve listed some of the most ridiculous “tips for women” here, along with our commentary...

My link goes to an Above the Law post by Staci Zaretsky, which has the text of "the full memo," but I don't see the title "tips for women." Is that the title, or is the "for women" simply a characterization that arises from the fact that there is a "Women’s Committee" and it communicates with the women? In any event, the demeaning that the recipients experienced came, it seems, from the special effort at mentoring the women.

Anyone might benefit from most of these tips, but some address problems only women have, such as whether a little cleavage is ever okay or even good, whether to leave off the high heels if you're not expert at walking in them, and whether you need to make a point of wearing something with lapels if you're going to have a clip-on microphone, and whether you're doing something that might be termed "the urinal position" (which I'm guessing — Google didn't help — is a hands-around-genitals position that men are more likely to realize looks unprofessional).

How would you like to be an older woman at the firm trying to help the younger women present themselves in a way that won't have clients talking behind their back about their uptalking and creaky voice and so forth? It's not easy! We could reverse-engineer that badly received memo to come up with some Tips for Senior Women Advising Junior Women.

1. Don't affect "girltalk." You have power and authority. Acting like you don't fails to create the sense of warmth and intimacy you want and, ironically, sets a bad example of how to sound professional.

2. Make it gender-neutral. Everyone involved already knows you're women mentoring women. Continually pointing it out creates anxiety about whether it really is a special problem to be female.

3. Don't attempt humor, even when — especially when — you're talking about seemingly lightweight things like vocal quirks, hand gestures, hairstyles, and fashion. Even if you were a gifted comic writer — and you're not — it's best to be utterly dull when conveying advice that will be received as personal criticism. Remember the old punchline: That's not funny.

"It’s just wrong that men look just fine the way they are, but we women are encouraged to believe we don’t look good enough unless we 'fix' our faces."

Writes Roz Warren in her anti-makeup manifesto in the NYT, where the first commenter plumps her up with "You go girl!"

Which highlights my point: Women can use makeup OR not use makeup and people think it's just fine. Women are encouraged to believe we can be whatever we want, either glammed up beyond recognition or utterly fresh-faced or anywhere in between. It's true that the expression "fix my face" originated with women — women with a sense of humor, by the way. (And it wasn't just "fix my face," it was also "put on my face," as if — oh, horror, from the viewpoint of a Women's Studies major! — a woman without makeup is faceless!!!)

But the truth is, the woman could and still can fix her face as much as she wants or not at all, and most of the time it only takes a couple minutes and those who do more are having fun with it.



It is men who are deprived of the option to tinker with what they've got naturally. The quote I put in the title would make more sense rewritten as: It’s just wrong that women look just fine whatever they choose to do, but men are encouraged to believe they look however they look and they're not allowed to fix their faces.

Not that there aren't big brands like Marc Jacobs attempting to liberate men from their prison of fresh-facedness: "There's the Remedy concealer that has a really lovely palladium tip that really feels nice and cool to your undereye area, and God knows I can always use a bit of Remedy Concealer myself... Then there's the brow tamer which has a lovely soft application wand and the formula itself is soft and smooth feeling rather than sticky and gooey or hard... there's the Liplock which has a nice minty fresh taste. It's very important to have a nice moist lip so you're always ready to kiss and make out with that right person."

Yeah, you laughed at him? See how oppression weighs on the male?

"Mars Needs Women."

Movie title invoked by me in the context of critiquing philosophy departments. That's participating in my own comments thread section, where I also say something I'd like to reprint here:

The question of politeness is important.

The notion that women are "polite" in some special way needs examination. Women may have developed a strategy that gets called politeness that works in many situations. But let's be honest about what that really is and why it developed, both biologically and culturally.

No one is engaging in physical combat here. It's verbal sparring, and there's an emotional element that affects your predisposition to that kind of fighting.

There's no reason to think women are less able than men in verbal argument, but there is an emotional aspect to it. Still, when you do verbal argument, you are using emotion. You can't extract all emotion.

Lawyers know this perhaps more than philosophers.

Philosophers are stewing in their own juice. They think the juice needs more women, because lack of women is not the current taste.

They're going through an awkward phase of trying to add women. But women are not passively accepting the role as ingredient in their foul stew.

Why should they?!

Where do those female undergraduates in philosophy go if not to philosophy grad programs?

I bet they go to law school, which would be an extremely rational thing to do.

Although if philosophy departments are desperate enough [about needing] to display chunks of female floating in their gloppy gumbo, it may be a good bet for a few individuals to offer themselves up as the women philosophers, at least for a while, and these women may play the game especially well if they package themselves as specialists in "women in philosophy" issues.

Circa 1970, females entering law teaching would do "Women in the Law" and "Family Law" topics. When I was graduating from law school in 1981 and going into a law teaching job search, one of my female lawprofs advised me (and other women) to resist getting assigned Family Law or any of those women-associated topics. Get right to the seemingly "male" things like Contracts and Corporations.

The cooking metaphor began in the post proper, and the philosophers introduced it.

I just want to warn women to be very careful if any of these aliens displays a text — written in abstruse language — titled "To Serve Women."

Tales of gender difference, the Socratic Method, and the hostile environment that is philosophy.

The story of one female University of Wisconsin-Madison student and the undergraduate club the Socratic Society:

“People were yelling and banging on the table to make their points,” [Macy Salzberger] says. “It was basically a free-for-all... The environment felt hostile, and often I was the only girl in the room”...

“I told women that I understood the problem, but that it was possible to balance out the combative tone if more of us came. The women who started coming were intentional, as well. They shared that goal.”...

“Macy has been an outstanding leader,” says Philosophy Department Chair Russ Shafer-Landau. “It’s absolutely vital that we enfranchise all who want to participate in philosophical discussion, and Macy’s efforts have been exemplary in this regard.”

Can we get some Socratic dialogue on what "enfranchise" means here? And nice as it is to feature some hard work by a UW student, do you really believe that if only more women came in at the intake level and "shared" a "goal" of inclusiveness, then some "tone" you view as exclusionary would be "balanced out"? What do you think women are? Are we some bland ingredient to be added to an over-spiced stew to make it more palatable for everyone?

And I say that as a female who went to law school, where the Socratic Method supposedly reigns, in 1978, and who has been teaching in law school since 1984, doing something that some people might call Socratic, but which got watered down long before 1978. ("The Paper Chase" is a cornball Hollywood movie, people.) Law school discussions are facilitated by professors who dearly want the participation spread around. It's in no way a free-for-all and there's nothing hostile about the environment, and the numbers of males and females are close to equal, and still — if you go on volunteers — the males talk more than the females.

Circa 1990, there was an uprising of female students who took the position that the Socratic Method was required in order to reach gender equity. The mellow, volunteer-based classroom oppressed women, we were told by earnest advocates. They demanded an authoritarian environment as the way to make women equal. That was perhaps the most surreal experience in my 30+ years inside law schools.

Oh, but enough of my memories. I need to keep reading this article:

 “I had been reading more about why women are less represented in philosophy,” [Salzberger] says. “One article documented the 'tapering effect,'which shows that even though a lot of women tend to major in philosophy as undergrads, there are a lot fewer in grad school and even less in faculty positions.”

And here's UW Philosophy Professor Harry Brighouse (who spoke on a panel on the status of women in philosophy):

“It is easy for people to think this is a male discipline.... there is a degree of aggression. Philosophers don’t act in ways that others might see as polite.”

Adjusting the heat from “boil” to “simmer” would go a long way toward improving the climate for all undergraduates, he says.

Ah, so they do have a cooking metaphor. I still have the question: Why would making things friendlier at the intake level solve the problem of failure to continue on to grad school and a professional (academic) career? If you've already got — as Salzberger says — "a lot of women" majoring in philosophy as undergrads, how would lowering the heat prepare them for the fighting they'll need to do when the competition gets tough?

This is a very old issue, and philosophy departments sound like they are where law schools were 40 years ago.

"Woah, Ann, all this time I thought when women show appreciation for the beauty of other women it's because they appreciate the beauty of other women."

"I still have that conceit. Pretty women clearly tend to enjoy each other more than they enjoy less attractive women. I see it all the time but I'm reminded specifically of a time when I worked third shift, and most people on our shift were dreary slobs, and there was only one woman whom I would have called pretty. Then a new girl was hired and the pretty girl confided in me, 'It's nice to have another pretty girl.'"

A new comment, by Mark Trade, from a post from several days ago about attitudes about beauty, to which I've got to say: Key word: another.

Why did he write "Woah, Ann"? (I'd have spelled it "whoa" and prefer to be called "Althouse," so "Whoa, Althouse" would have been better, in my book, but it's frontpaged anyway.) He was reacting to something I'd written in the comments:

When women show their appreciation for how other women look, I think they are doing some or all of these things:

1. Communicating friendliness and being sociable.

2. Sublimating envy.

3. Thinking about things they could do to look better (like get a dress like that or a haircut like that), so it's like shopping for ideas to be used on themselves.

4. Expressing hostility in [a] weird way. ("You look great" = you look bad on other occasions.)

How would I diagnose Mark's workplace confidante? First, you've got to notice that the person he calls "the pretty girl" was not showing appreciation to that other woman, she was speaking in confidence to the man who regarded her as the only pretty girl.

So what was she really doing? Worrying about her own status as the pretty one and fishing for a response like "Oh, you are much prettier"? Bolstering her relationship with the male who has noticed her prettiness to make it harder for the "new girl" to challenge her status? Expressing her long-term anxiety that she has been looking unattractive in the context of a workplace that appears to be somewhere only "dreary slobs" would work?

Her taking Mark aside for this mini-drama of self-esteem-boosting and relationship-building apparently worked, because Mark remembers her fondly as "the pretty girl" who was magnanimous toward other "pretty girls." She worked his vanity and male pride successfully, and it wasn't even very hard. Despite years of reflection and prodding from my 4-point list, he still puts a rosy interpretation on the scene.

The naivete. The world runs on the lubrication of this naivete!

AND: And by "this naivete," I mean Mark's naivete. I though that was obvious until I started reading comments.