Author Archives: Echidne

Austerity: For You But Not For Me

Posted on July 1, 2010 by Echidne

[Reprinted from Echidne of the Snakes, with Echidne’s kind permission.] This European opinion piece on the need for austerity politics has the usual stuff: That’s fine as far as it goes. But how should full employment be defined? Should we … Continue reading →

Posted in Class, poverty, labor, & related issues, crossposted on TADA, Economics and the like | 9 Comments

Reading Elle

Posted on February 13, 2005 by Echidne

I don’t buy women’s magazines very often. But I recently bought the two latest issues of Elle, to find out what the magazine is all about. My initial impression was one of shock. All these women in the photographs appear to be ready to orgasm! Half-closed eyes, swollen half-open lips. Indeed, almost every one of the models pictured was portrayed in a sexually appealing manner. This is interesting, given that the presumed readers of the magazine are mostly women. I wonder if women in our society learn to have a certain kind of self-eroticism? Is what turns us on, whether gay or straight, the pictures of our own sexuality? Continue reading →

Posted in Popular (and unpopular) culture | 44 Comments

The Deep Throat and Catherine McKinnon

Posted on February 10, 2005 by Echidne

The 1970’s porn movie Deep Throat is coming to movie theaters near you:


Deep Throat,” the infamous 1972 adult film that led to a government crackdown on pornography, is being re-released in theaters as a new generation of lawmakers wages a renewed assault on smut, trade paper Daily Variety reported in its Tuesday edition.

The release of the Linda Lovelace opus, which was banned at the time in 23 states, coincides with the premiere of the documentary “Inside Deep Throat,” which hits theaters in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Boston on Friday.

The original film, which was made in six days for $25,000 and has grossed over $600 million, will not be ready until at least Feb. 18, the paper said. Las Vegas-based Arrow Prods., which owns the rights to the mob-funded “Deep Throat,” started striking 10 prints on Monday, it added. Five of the prints will be edited to garner an “R” rating, which allows admission to children aged under 17 if accompanied by an adult.

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Posted in Feminism, sexism, etc, Sex work, porn, etc | 181 Comments

The Thoughtful Steven Pinker

Posted on February 9, 2005 by Echidne

He has deigned to give a few carefully formed comments on the hullabaloo that ensued from the careless statements of Lawrence Summers, the president of Harvard University, at a conference about how to get more women into the hard sciences. I blogged about this earlier if you are interested in the details. For now I want to talk to Professor Pinker, because he is an interesting man to talk to. Continue reading →

Posted in Feminism, sexism, etc | 50 Comments

The Winter of My Discontent

Posted on January 24, 2005 by Echidne

January has been a tough month for women in the field of gender science. This field contains a mixture of subfields ranging from microbiology to various origin myths in the shadier kinds of evolutionary psychology. Though the proponents of gender science view it as a pure, objective form of science which will tell us all the definite answer to any questions we might have about sex or gender differences, I am concerned with its almost complete lack of interest in cultural or environmental explanations and also with the whole question of objectivity in a field where every researcher is both part of the subject matter and an individual with particular biases, values and personal experiences. Trying to be neutral is important in sciences but I doubt that it is completely feasible here. Just leafing through some of the literature in evolutionary psychology has me pretty convinced that this particular subspecialty attracts a large number of people with conservative and anti-feminist values. These individuals might argue that it is their science which informs their opinions, but these things tend to go in circles. Continue reading →

Posted in Feminism, sexism, etc | 53 Comments