Daughter of No Comment -- October 2003

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Our own Virginia pipeline to God, Pat Robertson, has asked God to remove three justices from the Supreme Court. "One justice is 83 years old, another has cancer and another has a heart condition. Would it not be possible for God to put it in the minds of these three judges that the time has come to retire? With their retirement and the appointment of conservative judges, a MASSIVE change in federal jurisprudence can take place." His web site, www.cbn.com does not name the justices but he has said he is thinking of John Paul Stevens, 83; Ruth Bader Ginsburg,70; and Sandra Day O'Connor,73. He also said he hopes Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist stays forever. Robertson is right about how important the court is to our past gains, our ability to hang onto these fragile, and to Robertsons's crowd, evil rights. Especially our need to continue to make progress so that our daughters and all girls and women have a level playing field. Being able to appoint justices is the big prize in any presidential election, and with the divided court we now have, any change could spell disaster. When you vote, remember the court. Carol Shields, 68, author of the Pulitzer Prize winning "The Stone Diaries" died recently. Her description of how she came to feminism after having five children and expecting to devote her life to her family reflects the experience of many other women of her generation. She read Betty Friedan's 1963 book "The Feminine Mystique" which she said "was like a thunderbolt." "I came to feminism late. I knew there was something wrong, I just didn't know what it was. I was astonished. I had no idea women thought like that or women could be anything other than what they were....It did change the way that I thought about myself. I did begin to do a graduate degree part time, thought about doing some writing. It gave me courage." Her thunderbolt experience is shared by many women, some of whom credit their becoming feminists with saving their lives. Feminism is a powerful community. Some European countries, notably Norway and Sweden, are requiring companies to increase the number of women on their boards. Swedish Vice Prime Minister Margareta Winberg said action was needed because "At today's speed it will take up to 150 years until half of the Swedish boards' seats are held by women." In the United States, women held 12.4 percent of all board seats in Fortune 1,000 companies in 2001 (which is the latest year figures are available). Companies talk a good line but progress is glacial and the bottom line issue is power. Stockholders have to make boards understand they want women represented by how they vote and by taking hard line with brokers and others they have financial dealings with. And we all know how well company money is (mis)managed by some current boards. Dr Bernadine Healy says caveat emptor. The breast implant business just keeps on luring 230,000 women annually into spending around $5,000 for a cosmetic procedure that has as many problems as perceived benefits. These are not post surgery implants. These augmentations have unique complications. They are large foreign structures that the body walls off in fibrous scar tissue. The medical term is "capsular contracture" which means rock-hard breasts. That's the major reason 1 in 4 women undergoes a reoperation within 5 years of implantation. Implants can also pop, deflate and spew their contents into surrounding tissue. When the liquid is saline it is no big deal but when it is a pasty yellow gel, it creates a big mess that needs a surgeon to go in and mop up. Other problems can be pain, loss of nipple sensation, and difficulty breast feeding. Many women get tired of the problems and have them removed. Dr. Healy feels women have to be informed of the risks to decide if the benefits are worth it. So who are the women who think perfection is a couple of cup sizes away? Well, she's a thirty-something, married with kids and a family income around $70,000. All body sculpture surgery has the potential for problems and who decides what perfection is? Girl prostitutes are a big problem. The average age is 13 with some as young as 9. Many come from middle class homes and are recruited at malls where the pimps offer to buy them things. Most prostitutes are runaways, illegal immigrants and children from poor urban areas but in the past 3 years there has been a dramatic increase (70%) in girls from middle and upper class homes many of whom have not suffered mental, sexual or physical abuse. Statistics from Frank Barnaba of the Paul and Lisa program which works with the Dept. of Justice and the FBI in tracking exploited kids. Local law enforcement agencies treat this as a minor (no pun intended) offense and the feds have named 13 cities that have a significant juvenile-prostitution problem. Some activists put part of the blame on a culture that glorifies pimping so sing along with superstar rapper 50 Cent whose song P.I.M.P. is not so subtle. "Bitch choose with me, I'll have you stripping in the street/Put my other hoes down, you get your ass beat." And I will not print Rapper Jay-Z's song "Big Pimping" except to say that the often used "F" word is not feminism. Charged serial rapist, Reynaldo Elias Rapalo, 32, was linked by DNA evidence to 7 attacks which if he is convicted could mean life in prison for this Miami resident who had an expired visa. He said he had three children in Honduras. His victims ranged in age from 11 to 79. Daughter wonders if there is any age when it is less traumatic to be raped. In a study done in Fairfax County some time ago the victims ages ran from 6 months to a woman in her eighties. Rape is an assault using a sexual weapon. It is about control not sex. Montana Gov. Judy Martz finds the resemblance between her and a naked saloon dancer depicted in a sculpted clay Helena historical mural to be too close for comfort. The mural, part of a new downtown development, also shows a trio of nude bordello dancers including a tall woman with glasses and short hair that many people say looks like Martz. The artist, Kristine Veith, says she modeled it after her aunt, not Martz. Says the Gov. "I'm a very modest person, no one would ever see me like that. My husband doesn't ever see me like that." The Gov.'s spokesperson, Chuck Butler says "Dancing women didn't dance with their breasts bared. They showed those off later. They showed off their legs with their black stockings and garters." Daughter applauds historical accuracy and the tenacity of the researcher. The high-tech industry is starting to target women. Think pink. Gateway Inc. lobbied hard to get a pink laptop computer prominently placed in the summer blockbuster "Legally Blond 2." "We recognized by producing a pink laptop and putting it in a strong female character's hands we'd be able to reach women in a way we hadn't before," says Gateway spokesman Brad Williams. Tech savvy women say the underlying assumption is that women are clueless when it comes to technology. Aliza Sherman, author of "Powertools for Women in Business" says "I've corresponded with thousands of women and I can tell you they are just as offended as I am. It's insulting to think in order to appeal to women you have to turn it pink and simplify it." "Women as equals in the world of business is a recent phenomenon, and there's a lot of inertia when things are done in particular ways," says Kathy Gornik, Chair of the Consumer Electronics Assoc. and President of her own company. "You're talking about having to change the entire orientation and culture of a company." This is a continuation of segmented marketing which we have seen in consumer product ads for everything from cars to shampoo. Palm Inc. which in 1999 launched a product line with an image of a naked woman says it didn't mean to imply that women prefer simpler products. "We didn't target women specifically with a simple product-we target women with products that fit their specific needs," says Palm spokesman Jim Christensen. Michaela Pereira, co-anchor of the "Tech Live" TV show says "They make us sound like simpletons." Sony vice president, Denise Lee Yohn says "We know what women's tastes are, and they aren't pink." She's got that right. If you think something is condescending, It Is. Well you've come this far so you must know your A,B, C's. Right? Abortion Breast Cancer link is the battleground, and it is in, or coming to, a state near you. This alleged link has been debated for some time and American studies have always been clouded because women were not always accurate about their abortion history. The antiabortion folks love the idea of a connection to help influence women facing a difficult decision. They claim the breast cancer has gone way up since Roe v. Wade without mentioning better diagnostic techniques which means many more tumors are being found. Most American studies have included a few hundred women, some of whom may not have wanted to admit to having had an illegal procedure and so these studies were inconclusive. A study of 1.5 million Danish women, and Denmark is a country that has very inclusive records, showed no connection between breast cancer and abortion. Well, that should have settled the matter but in 2002 a group of about 30 antiabortion members of Congress appealed to then HHS Sec'y, Tommy Thompson and studies from both sides were included in official documents leading the New York Times to call the revision "an egregious distortion of the evidence." A later Chinese study also found no evidence of a connection but that doesn't change the fact that in Mississippi medical professionals are required to inform a woman seeking an abortion that having one could increase her risk for breast cancer. Minnesota, Texas and West Virginia recently began requiring the same notification. Nationally, 70 bills have tried to mandate such a law. There is no requirement to tell a woman that one woman dies every day in child birth, that psychosis is 10 times more likely to occur in the postpartum mother or that having a child puts a woman in potentially grave economic circumstances. There are no certainties in this area but the standard is known as the preponderance of evidence. How can a doctor ethically tell a patient information that s/he knows does not meet that standard and is merely political propaganda? Daughter finds the profession sadly lacking in integrity and back bone. Politics and medicine should not be in bed together. Just when I finished writing this, a friend who is a doctor called and I told her I was excoriating her profession. She thought readers would want to know that the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology is no longer a member of the American Medical Association. The De Beers diamond people are after your beautiful right hand now. They figure you already have a ring he paid for on your left hand so they want you to know you have two hands. One ad says "Your left hand rocks the cradle. Your right hand rules the world." Another says "Your left hand says 'we.' Your right hand says 'me.' There are a variety of designs so the rings can be designed to be affordable, critical for a product intended largely for purchase by women. "Women might want to own several right hand rings," says Carol Brodie Gelles, global director of communications for jeweler Harry Winston. Not everyone is convinced. Ginny Cartwright, a CA communications Exec. says "It's almost a little bit sad that you would have to buy yourself a diamond." Martin Rapaport, publisher of the Rapaport Diamond Report says "The diamond business is not about diamonds. It's about what's going on between the ears of women, which is the most complicated thing in the world." Daughter would like to help all the marketeers guessing about What Women Really Want. For starters, how about EQUALITY NOW.