Women's Day

I am a feminist, and not afraid to say it out loud. On this international Women's Day, I blog against sexism because:

- Ads still show women swooning for any man who happens to own a large car;

- Advertisers assume that their idiotic ads for washing powder actually appeal to women, thus greatly insulting our intelligence as a gender;

- People seem to think it is perfectly okay that rappers in video clips surround themselves with adoring harems of scantily-clad women, setting a nice example to boys;

- Medicine as a profession 'loses standing' because of the increasing number of women who take it up;

- Female researchers in science departments at universities are frequently subjected to (sexual) harassment;

- In spite of the large numbers of female graduates in all departments, women are still a minority among tenured staff;

- My favourite professor felt compelled to start anti-sexist speeches with, 'I'm not a die-hard feminist, but...';

- Students, even female ones, to this day complain about there being too many female authors on the English Literature programme, because they haven't heard of them before so they can't be that good, can they;

- Women were severely underrepresented among the keynote speakers at Lumos 2006, whereas men are severely underrepresented in Potter fandom;

- Women still earn less than men in comparable professions, and have a harder time reaching the top;

- Men are frowned upon by their employers and colleagues when they don't want a full-time job, and have difficulty securing one;

- Some men still refuse to board a plane flown by a female pilot;

- Hollywood has little to no interest in actresses above the age of forty, because obviously in women it is only their (youthful) looks that count;

- J. K. Rowling was advised not to publish her books under her real name of 'Joanne Rowling' because boys wouldn't want to read books written by a woman;

- Recent statistics show that a large majority of men generally prefers to read books written by other men;

- Women complaining about sexist behaviour in men get accused of having no sense of humour.

Grow up, boys.