Iceland has taken a critical step to ban online pornography – and if successful it will be the first Western industrial nation to do so.
According to Icelandic interior minister Ogmundur Jonasson, the…
The world is definitely a mess, but women aren’t the ones to blame.
AAP Image
Without really knowing what he was saying, Alan Jones was right – we are “destroying the joint”.
Any dispassionate assessment of the state of “the joint”, both the corner we occupy and the planet as a…
Women all over the Western world, such as these protestors in Paris in1972, have had to fight for abortion rights.
Marina Urquidi
Tuesday marked the 40th anniversary of the US Supreme Court decision in Roe v Wade (410 U.S. 113 (1973)), which found that Texas State law prohibiting abortion was unconstitutional. The landmark decision…
It would be truly wonderful to live in the world inhabited solely by proponents of porn. In this apparently post-capitalist world, where sexual freedoms abound, there is no need to worry about violence…
Anne Summers has spoken about her own experience with a backyard abortion.
AAP Image/Luis Enrique Ascui
When Prime Minister Julia Gillard spoke out against sexism and misogyny in the parliament last month, her words had resonance far beyond the political context of the moment.
It was a reminder that women…
Macquarie is changing its definition of misogyny… but it still applies to the leader of the opposition.
AAP/Pan Macmillan
As an academic, I often become obsessed with the meaning of words. They lure me in with their conceptual promise, and then I get hooked and tangled on distinctions and disciplinary nuance.
Perhaps unsurprisingly…
Julia Gillard attacked Tony Abbott’s past comments about women in a passionate speech during Question Time.
AAP/Lukas Coch
Peter Slipper has resigned. The sexist text messages mentioning female genitalia published as part of a civil court case were suddenly the bridge too far for Her Majesty’s Opposition.
But the Opposition…
Is Tony Abbott’s blokey personality at risk of costing him votes among women?
AAP
The Labor government appears to have a spring in its step. After months of poor polls and difficulty passing legislation, things now seem to be going Labor’s way. In recent weeks, the government has been…
Former Cosmopolitan editor Helen Gurley Brown has passed away aged 90.
Hearst Corporation
The opening round of respectful tributes have been flowing through the media after the death of Helen Gurley Brown.
The original Sex and the City girl died in New York on Monday, aged 90. Long-reigning…
Women now compete in every sport at the Summer Olympics, and every country is sending a female athlete.
EPA/Diego Azubel
This trend will continue into the 2014 Winter Olympics with women permitted for the first time to compete in ski jumping.
Since their inclusion in the modern Olympics in Paris in 1900, female participation…
The history of the vibrator is improbable, with some fascinating milestones.
Giampaolo Squarcina
Vibrators have been causing a buzz for as long as they’ve existed: sometimes this happens behind closed doors, and sometimes in the public sphere. But as the new film Hysteria shows, there’s still fascination…
Trials of a working mother: Kirstie Marshall was at the centre of controversy after she breastfed her 11-day-old baby in state parliament in 2003.
AAP
Who said we could have it all, anyway?
This notion is a media myth that somehow translated the idea that women should not be excluded from any sphere on the basis of sex into the sexy but fallacious view…
Two-thirds more men than women have been paid for sex in Australia, and all sex workers have rights.
Jason Pier in DC
When one reads an opinion piece littered with references to “liberal elites”, it is usually a safe bet that one is reading an inherently conservative point of view dressed up to look progressive. So it…
The Lingerie Football League is coming to Australia … and it needs you to be outraged to pay the bills.
AAP Image/Wayne Heming
I’m a fan of the retention of pubic hair. I don’t much like the idea of breast implants. Thoughts of vaginoplasty coax me into an involuntary Kegel exercise. I’ve no idea why any woman would bleach her…
Why are Rachel Griffith’s parenting decisions making headlines?
AAP/Tracey Nearmy
The front page of Saturday’s edition of the Sydney Morning Herald on the weekend was dominated by a story about the actor Rachel Griffiths and her husband, artist Andrew Taylor “playing swapsies” with…
The health and finance sectors have the largest gender wage gaps, of more than 30%.
Jerry Bunkers
Equal pay was, and still is, one of the key demands of feminists. Basic to any idea of gender equity should be that paid work is fairly rewarded, whether it’s undertaken by a male or female.
In early…
Opting out of porn may be the most progressive thing we can do.
Colin Brown
It is time we recognised pornography as part of popular culture. Millions of people watch the content the porn industry produces. And make no mistake, it produces a lot of content.
According to prominent…
Is there a genuine rise in the appeal for sadomasochist behaviour among women in 2012?
flickr/Jeremy Brook
The poster for Secretary is up on my wall at work. I actually paid to see A Dangerous Method purely for Jung’s novel approach to therapy (and God do I hate period films.) While I probably won’t read all…
Our debates about porn are stuck in the past.
x-ray delta one
It seems Australians aren’t ready for a real debate on porn and sex. Yet.
The Australian reported last month that Telstra was offering “soft-core pornography” with titles like “Dirty Housewife and Hot…
It’s crucial we support women’s rights across the globe.
Al Jazeera English
US conservative radio show host Rush Limbaugh apologised to a young woman this week. His apology to law student Sandra Fluke is unusual for a number of reasons, chiefly because shock jocks are rarely called…
What’s gender got to do with it? We asked Cheryl Kernot.
AAP/Julian Smith/Lukas Coch
As one of the few women to have run a political party in this country Cheryl Kernot is well aware of the role gender plays in the Australian political landscape.
In the wake of Bob Brown’s claim this…
Women will be the key to dealing with the growth in population.
Flickr/PhotograTree
SEVEN BILLION PEOPLE: I had better write fast. Sometime between my deadline to submit this story and the time it goes live, the estimated world population will exceed 7 billion for the first time ever…
Chinese women have always worked, but now they’re making waves in business.
Flickr/IISG
There’s a new generation of women quietly getting things done in China. They are insiders: well connected in the Communist Party, and flourishing in the business world.
In Chinese, capable and shrewd…
An Australian soldier in Afghanistan: women will now have the chance to join combat units.
AAP
Defence Minister Stephen Smith has announced the Australian Defence Force will open up full employment opportunities for women.
In a decision made by Cabinet on Monday night, with the full support of…
Women rushed to change their lives in the 60s and 70s, but their progress has stalled now.
Flickr/Maciek Zygmunt
No one is too surprised today if a young woman becomes a doctor, lawyer, or executive. But eyebrows are raised just about as much today as in decades past if a couple features a tall woman and short man…
Porn allows us to explore desire safely and anonymously.
nasty days/flickr
Pornography is hardly an under-theorised medium.
For decades, radical feminists have decried its imagery as an instruction manual for rape. As women being objectified, humiliated, tortured. As men receiving…
Stars like Jiz Lee and Dallas Fivestar are redefining porn for feminists.
violet.blue/flickr
I was recently approached by a young journalist, who asked for my comments on the Feminist Porn Awards.
In the course of the interview, she asked if I thought feminists should watch porn. I replied that…
Canadian women defend their right to safety, no matter what they wear.
flickr/Anton Bielousov
Skimpy, scanty and suggestive attire have been one of the higher profile issues dividing feminists in recent years.
In one camp, feminists of the second-wave, radical ilk have loudly decried the “sexualised…
