Please tell me this is not another case of "Women are more equal then men."

This is tricky. I was having a very similar conversation with a male friend of mine yesterday about all-women business conferences.

I consider myself a solid feminist, but theoretically, it's definitely hard for me to argue that women (and minorities of all kinds) excluding majority members isn't reverse discrimination. Because here's the thing: it IS reverse discrimination.

However - that being said - I mentioned in an earlier comment that we live and have lived for well over two thousand years in an extreme patriarchy. Minority grouping to discuss minority issues is one way to shed light on political, personal, psychological, legal (etc) issues that demonstrate the ways in which out society still needs to move forward to become more equitable. I take issue with the fact that men are not involved in writing for XX Factor, because men who are feminists and/or allies for women should certainly be a part of this important forum.

Generally speaking, most news today - and especially mainstream news and news that gets reported most on CNN, NBC, FOX, etc. - reports primarily on subject matter that deals directly with men. Whether the people being discussed are men (so, for example, almost all Bush Administration news) or whether the people who are most interested in that news are men. Subjects like birth control (the newly appointed Susan Orr), women's health (with the exception of breast cancer, which is also an upper-class-related disease, but that's a whole other post), clitorectomies, honor killings, international women leaders, and every form of legislation that primarily effects women (save abortion - and that is in the news because, in my opinion, it's about men and men-empathizers controlling women's bodies) is quietly pushed out of the news and publications that most people expose themselves to/are exposed to.

For that reason, I believe it is important for publications/news sources of all kinds to ask themselves "Are we reporting fairly and equally the important news that has to do with/effects women (and other minorities)?" Nine times out of ten, the answer is no. While I would also like to see subject matter discussed on the XX Factor (and on salon.com's Broadsheet) integrated as news material (and NOT just blog/opinion material) on the main page of slate.com, I also value the attention given to issues concerning women, which are currently and historically actively pushedd out of mainstream news - either by design or by 'accident.' Women and political issues concerning their well-being and their rights are not 'news' in this country. I think publications like salon.com and slate.com are trying to assert that they ARE news.

A leader in op/eds about women's issues - someone who has always had her eye on news effecting women's lives in the U.S. and other parts of the world is Katha Pollitt, over at thenation.com. Check her stuff out.

Ultimately, it is my belief that women's news is also men's news. Just like men's news at least by proxy should be of concern to women. But until I see widespread mainstream attention given to the important news stories that directly effect women's well-being and rights on every station in this country, I believe forums like XX Factor and Broadsheet help to signal that "Hey, women's lives matter, too. And there's news about women's lives all the time."

The xy blog.

Yikes...do you actually believe this nonsense?

None of the people who contribute to and read this forum have ever lived in an "extreme patriarchy".

Women like to tack themselves on to Native Americans in Wheelchairs, but the truth is women are not a minority; nor are they especially disadvantaged. Women make up the majority of college and postgraduate students. When they put their reproductive years on hold they advance as fast and are paid as much as men. They feel freer to work part-time or not at all. They have more choices than men. Men work more hours, more dangerous jobs, travel more for their jobs etc. etc. They die several years younger. They are horribly discriminated against in family court. They have no reproductive rights in the Western World. They are portrayed horribly in the media.

Television, the most pervasive medium in the US, is overwhelmingly female oriented. You claim that most important media is male dominated. Tell me what you mean? Wars, Business, Politics? These are not women's issues? That's nonsense. What specifically male issues, other than sports, are you talking about exactly?

The XX factor should be changed to allow the female contributors a chance to see that their insulated feminist opinions, born out of feminist studies in colleges everywhere, just don't hold water.