Article here. Excerpt:

'Harriet Harman was yesterday accused of 'riding roughshod' over Labour leader Ed Miliband after she launched a new bid to boost the power of women Labour MPs.

Ms Harman, Labour's deputy leader, sparked fury among male party colleagues by announcing that the 11 women in the Shadow Cabinet were holding their own meetings.

They said Ms Harman informed the Labour leader of the plan – already being dubbed 'Harriet's Kitchen Cabinet' – at a full Shadow Cabinet meeting earlier this month.

One witness told The Mail on Sunday that towards the end of the meeting, Ms Harman mentioned that the women members would be meeting on their own. The source added: 'The blokes on the Shadow Cabinet just looked at each other as if to say, what the hell is all this about?

'Harriet then said that as the Tories were now losing the women's vote, it was important that we made sure our policies appeal to female voters.

Story here. Excerpt:

'The Walk a Mile in Her Shoes event, which assembled near at the Skowhegan Chamber of Commerce building, was organized by the Somerset Domestic Violence Task Force, Family Violence Project and Sexual Assault Crisis and Support. Organizers encouraged men to don high heels to illustrate the point that masculinity isn't about violence against women.
...
"They're pretty tight, but it just represents the idea that oftentimes as men, we're sort of self-centered and don't put ourselves in someone's else's shoes. Empathy really has to be encouraged in men," Heath said. "I think all of us are here to bring into the forefront the impact domestic violence is having on families and, most importantly, women in Maine. The deaths that have resulted just this year have impacted the whole community."'

Article here. I wonder if a similar program about child safety exists for teen girls or do they assume only teenage boys are incompetent unless taught otherwise. Excerpt:

'A new course for teenage dads is opening the eyes of young fathers to a brighter future with their children.

Run by the Otara Health Charitable Trust the Teen Parent Programme mentoring initiative is giving young fathers the confidence to be better parents.

Alom William is one of those reaping the benefits.

As the primary caregiver for both of his children, aged six and four years old, he struggled with his role as a young dad.

But the course has given him some tools to be a better father, he says.

"It was a wake-up call to learn about things like sudden unexplained death in infancy syndrome, safety for children and then the legal stuff like children's rights and access.'

Story here. Excerpt:

'The mother of a UND student who was falsely accused of sexual assault and kicked out of school says her son will not return to UND.

Sherry Warner-Seefeld says her son Caleb Warner just wants to put the incident behind him and get on with his life. Nearly two years after being accused of rape Warner's expulsion was reversed.

Despite being cleared of the charges, Warner wasn't able to get his expulsion reversed until he brought in the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education to represent his case.
...

Warner's accuser, a UND student at the time, was charged with making false allegations.

Despite being cleared of the charges, Warner wasn't able to get his expulsion reversed.

That is until just about a week ago when UND vacated the expulsion after Warner brought in the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education to represent his case.

UND had refused to reopen the case as late as August 2010.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Sexual harassment returns, and now it’s all about vague gestures.
...
This weekend, the Politico website devoted four reporters to bringing us the horrifying tale of two anonymous women who claim Herman Cain made vaguely inappropriate gestures at them ten years ago, when he was head of the National Restaurant Association:

On the details of Cain’s allegedly inappropriate behavior with the two women, POLITICO has a half-dozen sources shedding light on different aspects of the complaints.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Social Security benefits are doled out according to a progressive formula, meaning that lower earners receive a bigger fraction of their lifetime earnings than higher earners in an attempt to address income inequality. But a new study shows that the wage gap between men and women wipes out a lot of that redistribution when you look at benefits received per household, rather than per individual. In other words, the gender wage gap makes Social Security benefit system a lot less progressive than it might seem, essentially redistributing funds from higher-earning men to lower-earning women. Here’s what Alan L. Gustman, Thomas L. Steinmeier and Nahid Tabatabai say in their new National Bureau of Economic Research working paper:

Article here. Excerpt:

'Perhaps this is why I was so shocked — and yes, slightly horrified — by claims made by a men’s rights organization.

Of all the ludicrous ideas that work their way into reality, never once did it occur to me that men would claim to be discriminated against.

There has been quite a bit of buzz around campus in regard to the Men’s Rights Movement Group at ASU. This organization is focused on protecting men’s rights on campus and eliminating male discrimination.

After reading the “key priorities” listed on their website, I couldn’t help but wonder if I was looking at a sort of satirical piece or “Saturday Night Live” skit. Some bizarre goals included, “Eliminate all institutional and social gender-based discrimination, including ‘Ladies nights’ at bars.”

Article here. Excerpt:

'While Title IX's goals are admirable, it has not worked out in practice as it was meant to. Its implementation dictated that colleges had to balance the numbers of female and male athletes to mirror the student population at their institutions. In theory, it was as simple as creating more female sports teams to even out the number of scholarship athletes between the two genders. But in practice, many males suffered as a result of this legislation.

Male athletes from all over the country were told that their sports would be cut and they would have to provide an education for themselves. Young men who had dreamt of playing a sport in college, many of whom could not pay for an education if it weren't for their full-ride scholarships, were left out to dry.

That isn't equality, but a ludicrous attempt to justify more discrimination. Not one critic of Title IX will argue that creating more athletic opportunities for women is a bad thing. But discriminating against males to fill a quota for athletic departments is just as wrong as exclusion.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Earlier this year, we learned that men greatly outnumbered women among Wikipedia editors. But now the site's article on men's rights has been through a controversial edit, and some men are calling Wikipedia "feminist propaganda."

The trouble seems to have began late last month, when editors, including one Kevin Gorman, began rewriting Wikipedia's Men's rights page. Gorman explained the rationale for his edits thus:

"...
I'm not going to be removing these completely, but will also be looking to repair:

Any section where MRA positions are presented as mainstream positions, or sections where most of the section is talking about MRA positions [...]

Story here. Excerpt:

'ORLANDO, Fla. — A Florida woman was convicted of trying to murder her husband by setting the couple's bedroom on fire while he napped, in one of two suspected attempts to kill him, authorities said on Saturday.

Kimberly Boone, 46, who investigators believe tried twice over four months to kill Robert Boone for his life insurance money, was convicted of attempted murder and arson, a spokesman for the Seminole County Jail booking center said. She is scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 5. A jury deliberated four hours on Friday before issuing the verdict.

Story here. Excerpt:

'Queensland's Minister for Women has criticised Bob Katter over his views on domestic violence, after the independent MP said overcrowding in homes was to blame for the social problem.

Karen Struthers said Mr Katter was oversimplifying the problem and called on the federal independent MP to show leadership on the issue.

"Mr Katter in his leadership role should be calling on men to take responsibility for their violence and end their violence against women and children andother men," she told ABC Radio.'

Story here. Excerpt:

'MANCHESTER - A city woman is accused of pimping a 16-year-old girl she met in Victory Park during the Occupy NH demonstrations.

Justina Jensen, 23, of 341 Hanover St., is charged with felony prostitution. Police allege Jensen met a teen at the local protest, which is an offshoot of Occupy Wall Street, and used the Internet to arrange a first liaison for the girl with a man who turned out to be an undercover police officer.

Police said the teen's mother called them Thursday about noon to say her daughter was missing and that her photograph had been posted on a website advertising adult party entertainment.
...

The missing teen was found inside Jensen's third-floor apartment. Court documents show the teenage girl told police that Jensen had taken her photo and posted it on the website and said Jensen was going to start training her to be a prostitute, with her first customer scheduled to be “Mad Mike.”

Story here. Guilty on 16 counts of sexual battery and she gets... 4 years in jail, eligible for parole in six months. A sentencing disparity? Nahhh, none here! Sure. It's so outrageous that it's even gotten press time. Now it has to be pretty bad for that to happen. Excerpt:

'A popular Ohio high school gym teacher has been sentenced to four years in jail after a judge rejected her insanity defense and convicted her on 16 counts of sexual battery for sleeping with several of her former students.

Stacy Schuler, a former gym and health teacher, had sex with five former students, some of whom were football players, at the school in suburban Cincinnati, where she taught since 2000. During her trial, which ended Thursday, Schuler's lawyers defended her actions with explanations ranging from her vegan diet, the use of the antidepressants, blackouts from alcohol and even irritable bowel syndrome, claiming it rendered her unable to determine right from wrong.

Via email from Steven Svoboda. This report can also be downloaded here.

I participated in a conference organized by the UK-based Genital Autonomy organization and by the University of Keele. The conference, entitled "Law, Human Rights, and Non-Therapeutic Interventions on Children," was held on August 31-September 1 at the University of Keele in Keele, UK.

Genital autonomy refers to the principle that all minors--male, female, and intersex alike--should be protected from genital cutting that is not medically necessary. The conference organizers, including David Smith of Genital Autonomy and Michael Thomson of the University of Keele, used a very creative approach to the conference, bringing together a mix of, on the one hand, intactivists, and on the other hand, academics and officials whose interests and inclinations align somewhat with ours but who are mostly not associated with intactivism.

Via email from a reader:

Here is a way to send the FBI a letter through a feminist site. I wrote asking that the definition of rape not include when a woman is under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Here is my letter. I wrote both men. Feel free to use it (though it does have a couple grammatical errors) if you want others to also write in. Thanks.

"Dear Mr. Mueller,