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Girls will be jocks | page 1, 2

I'll get to the sex stuff in a minute, but while we're on the topic of women's issues, here are a few more interesting articles published this week that address a variety of feminist topics:

In a challenging, disturbing piece, Robin Rothman explores the aftermath of Woodstock '99 where eight women reported being raped. No charges have been filed, and one case has been dropped entirely due to lack of evidence. The assaults have evoked strong reactions from the National Organization for Women and the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network. Most interesting, however, is Rothman's analysis of how the young women themselves helped support the sexist atmosphere of the concert dubbed, alternately, "Rapestock," "Tittystock" and "Boobstock": "Nobody asks, or deserves, to be sexually assaulted. But it's discouraging when a woman chooses to transfer responsibility for her own well-being to a group of strangers without assessing the danger of the environment and considering the consequences." (Village Voice, Nov. 3-9)

"A quarter of the world's women live in China, but, according to Women's International Network News (Spring 1999), the country is home to more than half the world's female suicides -- about 500 a day." Lynette Lamb looks at the growing rates of female suicide in China and several Third World countries and theorizes that a "collision of Western-style development and traditional culture" is partly to blame. (Utne Reader Online, Nov. 3)

New York Observer, Week of Nov. 8, 1999

"Enough!" by Alexandra Jacobs

Despised mayor Rudolph Giuliani may have taken sex out of Times Square, but it has come back tenfold just about everywhere else. Alexandra Jacobs decries the recent explosion of TV shows ("Sex in the City"), columns (two in Salon alone!), advertisements (too many to list), magazine covers (Maxim and its imitators, the upcoming print version of Nerve) and political scandals (Lewinsky, Lewinsky, Lewinsky) focused on the horizontal mambo. All this media attention serves to cheapen and dull what should be a private, beautiful act. This is not yet another ill-conceived Wendy Shalit-esque plea for Victorian restraint, but a sharp, snarky request to simply cool off for a bit. People do it. We know, already! The bad news for Jacobs and those of us who agree with her is that sex continues to sell better than other topics -- say nuclear test-ban treaties or genocide. And until that changes (ha!), expect more of the same, sleazy stuff. God bless America.

Willamette Week (Portland, Ore.), Nov. 3-9

"Sweeps Stakes" by Patty Wentz

"Television news -- it sucks, right? It's vapid yet sensationalistic, dazzling yet monochromatic. But each night, television news enters the homes of some quarter-million Portland metro-area viewers. What's more, the majority of Americans use television as their main news source." This fast-moving, entertaining piece looks at why.
salon.com | Nov. 5, 1999

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About the writer
Jenn Shreve is a writer in Oakland, Calif. Her Alt column appears every Friday in Salon Media.

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