Article here. Excerpt:

'In America we have the blessings of free speech, fully protected by the First Amendment of our Constitution. The roots of this special right do not trace back to England, but to the Christian ministers who evangelized the colonies, creating the Great Awakening. To this day England and the rest of Europe do not protect a constitutional right of free speech. Some remarks in Western Europe can cause the speaker to be imprisoned.

Article here. Excerpt:

'The number of stay-at-home dads has doubled in the past decade, partly due to the economy. But rather than bumbling through an awkward shift brought on by circumstances, the stay-at-home dads I know seem to be taking it all in stride. Thriving, even. Seriously, stay-at-home dads, your ability to just ease into the primary caregiver role like it's a job folding sweaters at The Gap is making the rest of us look bad. At least Michael Keaton's Mr. Mom had the courtesy to feed the baby raw chili and overflow the washing machine.

Today's SAHD's make parenting seem too easy and fun. And that's no good for me or my stay-at-home mom job security.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Is there a wage gap between men and women? Despite the rhetoric, there is little, if any, difference between salaries for men versus women. This truth has been uncovered by an American Association of University Women (AAUW) Study, an organization which seeks to advance "equity for women and girls through advocacy, education, philanthropy, and research."

Article here. (Get around login by pasting the URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/09/business/global/british-panel-opposes-quotas-to-place-women-on-boards.html into Google and clicking "Google Search", then click the first hit in the search results). Excerpt:

'LONDON — As the debate in Europe widens over the merits of female quotas on company boards, a parliamentary committee in Britain plans to stake out its position: not so fast.

A report to be released Friday by a House of Lords committee concludes that such quotas would “generate negative perceptions amongst women and business leaders” while failing to address the “root causes” of inequality. Quotas, and penalties to enforce them, should be considered only as a last resort, the report says.

The findings come as little surprise. The British government has led opposition to a push by the European Commission to legislate on the issue.

Article here. Excerpt:

'John Bercow, the Speaker of the House of Commons, has said that women behave better than men in Parliament and revealed that he tries to avoid allowing an unbroken sequence of male politicians to speak in the Commons.

“On the whole women are better behaved in Parliament and on the whole less inclined to be shouty and raucous. There is less of the bar room or Oxford Union Society culture amongst the women but that doesn’t mean they should lose out,” said Mr Bercow.

Speaking today at the International Parliamentary Conference on Gender and Politics held in Westminster at Portcullis House, the MPs’ office building, the Speaker also revealed a little bit about how he chooses who speaks next in Parliament: “Giving one of my secrets away - I wouldn’t normally want to call half a dozen men in a row to speak if I can also see that there are several women standing – so that’s an attitudinal thing on my part. It’s not a quota, but it’s a question of thinking it through.”'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Others appreciate feminism but simply don't identify with elements of the movement.

"Extremists are what turn me off from immediately labeling myself as a feminist," said Amelia Vereb, 25, a media relations manager. "What they preach and what I'm actually experiencing, or noticing ... don't always align." She explained that she hasn't actually experienced discrimination in the workplace, though feminists would insist she has. "Considering how terrifying the job market was when I graduated, I feel like I've been able to achieve the type of success that I had hoped for at this point in my life."

In some cases, millennial women said it's silly for men and women to be equal in the workplace when they're biologically dissimilar.

"Why should an employer hire a woman and then pay her for work she isn't doing? A baby isn't a medical emergency," said Rosenblatt, who believes both maternity and paternity leave are unnecessary financial burdens on employers.

Drost put things more bluntly when discussing feminist tactics.

Link here. Excerpt (emphasis added):

'APPENDIX 4 - GUIDELINES ON EXCLUDED ELECTIVE SURGERY PROCEDURES

SA Health has endorsed a list of Elective Surgery procedures that will not be performed at South Australian Public Hospitals. This also includes private patients in public hospitals.

A4.1 Excluded Procedures

As of 5 November 2007, the following list of surgical procedures will not be performed in public hospitals in South Australia unless assessed and justified on true clinical grounds or there is no access to a private hospital within one hour from a patient’s usual place of residence.

Article here. Excerpt:

'On a small piece of woodland next to the Technido daycare centre in Karlsruhe, a group of boys noisily build a bush camp out of logs. Amid whoops of glee, they start running around, wildly shooting at each other with sticks.

“Karl, Lennie, the rules are keep the sticks down at belly height,” says teacher Todd Phillips calmly as he walks up to the boys. “No sticks near anyone’s eyes.”

“It's important to have a man here when the warring camps construct their battleground,” Phillips said afterwards, tongue in cheek.

The 47-year-old has been working at the daycare centre looking after children aged between four and six for more than four years.

Phillips, who hails from Florida but has been living in Germany for 15 years, had been working as a graphic designer at an advertising agency. As he became increasingly dissatisfied with his job, he started looking for alternatives and decided that he wanted to work with children.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Why are boys — even those who cultivate college dreams — so prone to underachievement? Explanations abound, but boy advocates say we’ve created a classroom culture that ignores critical boy-girl learning differences and mainly rewards the things girls do well. Bored and disengaged, boys tune out or act out. Too many drop out.

By the time the SAT rolls around, these boys have vacated the school building. They aren’t sharpening No. 2 pencils; they’re mulling the unemployment line.

Feminist groups surely will seize on the latest reading and math scores as proof that girl power is enfeebled, even after years of concerted efforts to work toward gender parity in education.

But this argument doesn’t withstand scrutiny. Of course, we must continue our efforts to help girls achieve. The mother of a son and a daughter, I want a level academic playing field for both boys and girls.

But I’d say right now, the girls are all right. Boys, however, need our targeted attention if they ever are to realize their full potential.

Article here. Excerpt:

'On Barack Obama: “I think that he has an incredible devotion to our Constitution.”

On culture:

I believe that the social construction of gender - the cultural beliefs and practices that divide the sexes and institutionalize and normalize the unequal treatment of girls and women, privilege the interests of boys and men, and, most nefariously, incessantly sexualize girls and women - is the root cause of poverty and suffering around the world.

And she’s a fanatical supporter of abortion. Remember when she viciously mocked Rick Santorum?'

In case you need it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashley_Judd

Link here. Excerpt:

'A new PSA from Women's Health lets women Veterans know they've come to the right place when they choose VA health care.

Watch the video and learn more about VA's ongoing culture change campaign. Read a recent article that expands on the message. See more headlines about women Veterans and Women Veterans Health Care.

Did you know that women are the fastest growing group within the Veteran population? Learn more about the changing face of women Veterans and what VA is doing to meet their health care needs.

This web site provides information on health care services available to women Veterans, including comprehensive primary care as well as specialty care such as reproductive services, rehabilitation, mental health, and treatment for military sexual trauma.

You can also find answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about women Veterans health care.

A NYT OP-Ed piece, so of course if you try to get to it by clicking this link: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/06/opinion/brooks-the-heart-grows-smarter.html, you'll be asked to sign in. The way around this is to copy the actual link text:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/06/opinion/brooks-the-heart-grows-smarter.html

and paste it into the Google search box at Google.com. Then the page link will come up as the first hit and click on that link. Now, you can see the page. Excerpt:

'If you go back and read a bunch of biographies of people born 100 to 150 years ago, you notice a few things that were more common then than now.
...
It wasn’t only parents who were emotionally diffident; it was the people who studied them. In 1938, a group of researchers began an intensive study of 268 students at Harvard University. The plan was to track them through their entire lives, measuring, testing and interviewing them every few years to see how lives develop.

In the 1930s and 1940s, the researchers didn’t pay much attention to the men’s relationships. Instead, following the intellectual fashions of the day, they paid a lot of attention to the men’s physiognomy. Did they have a “masculine” body type? Did they show signs of vigorous genetic endowments?

Article here. Excerpt:

'Family breakdown is as devastating for today’s children as it was when divorce was a source of social disgrace, a state-backed report warned yesterday.

Even though divorce is no longer considered ‘shameful’ – as it was until the 1970s – the children of broken families continue to suffer destructive effects throughout their lives, the report said.

The paper, produced by a team of senior academics, found that the damage caused to a child by divorce continues to blight his or her life as far as old age.

It said parental separation in childhood was ‘consistently associated with psychological distress in adulthood during people’s early 30s’.

The report added: ‘This seems to be true even across different generations, which suggests that as divorce and separation have become more common, their impact on mental health has not reduced.’'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Ohio judges confront a growing problem. Increasingly, parents involved in family law disputes are coming to the court without representation. They either cannot afford or choose not to employ attorneys to represent them. Because they are unfamiliar with the rules and procedures of courts, these parents’ attempts to represent themselves often create additional burdens for, and delays in, the courts.

To address this problem, the 2006 Ohio Supreme Court Task Force on Pro Se (self-represented) and Indigent Litigants recommended that the Court develop easily completed forms for a variety of legal issues, including many in family law. The Supreme Court has now drafted a set of proposed forms and has published them for public review and comment.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'The ad shows a "typical" British mom masterminding a family Christmas dinner, exhausting herself in the effort. It's cheesy, heartwarming stuff. The tagline: "Behind every great Christmas there's mum and behind mum there's Asda."

Fathers4Justice, however, objects to the portrayal of the dad in the commercial. His character is portrayed as ineffective and clueless -- a typical "dumb dad" stereotype that has become increasingly common in advertising.

The context here is that when it comes to groceries, women tend to make most of the purchasing decisions; thus grocery ads tend to see things from their point of view. And Fathers4Justice is a media-stunt loving group that believes the law discriminates against men who have split up with the mothers of the their children.'

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Ed. note: Asda is owned by Walmart.