Quotable - game changing moment in film biz

"Women and girls are looking for material that they connect with just as much as guys and boys are, but the thing that blows me away about the success of New Moon and even The Blind Side is that the theatres were just packed with women not caring if the guys came with them. This was a weekend where the gals went in bunches and left the guys home cause they wanted to see this movie more than they wanted to see whatever their boyfriends or guyfriends wanted to see."

~ Melissa Silverstein, New Moon Brings a New Dawn in Hollywood

That's what she said

"Girls, if boys say something that's not funny,
you don't have to laugh." ~ Amy Poehler

Quotable

"I can remember reading an interview in Life Magazine with Margaret Chase Smith, Senator from Maine, that illustrates the thinking of women in politics when I was growing up. The interviewer asked Senator Smith what she would do if she woke up in the White House one day. She answered: “I’d apologize to Bess Truman immediately and leave.” It just shows how self-effacing a female politician had to be in those days – the idea that she might want to run for higher office was just too threatening. If you asked Hillary Clinton or Nancy Pelosi what they would do, they’d have a list."

~ Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney in an interview with madamab via The Confluence

Yes, you are

Violet at Reclusive Left takes notice of the five year anniversary of a legendary post at Tomato Nation about defining feminism and asks "What the hell happened?"

Yes. You are. You are a feminist. If you believe in, support, look fondly on, hope for, and/or work towards equality of the sexes, you are a feminist. Period. It's more complicated than that —
of course it is. And yet…it's exactly that simple.

Big Tent Feminism

It appears reports of feminism's death have been wildly exaggerated. This election cycle has prompted many to examine their beliefs about gender equality, especially as they may have been challenged over their support or nonsupport of Senator Hillary Clinton's historic candidacy.

Here's a brief sampling of some provocative writings on the status feminism in light of Senator Clinton's and Governor Palin's involvement in this election cycle:

Camille Paglia (Salon)

Now that's the Sarah Palin brand of can-do, no-excuses, moose-hunting feminism -- a world away from the whining, sniping, wearily ironic mode of the establishment feminism represented by Gloria Steinem, a Hillary Clinton supporter whose shameless Democratic partisanship over the past four decades has severely limited American feminism and not allowed it to become the big tent it can and should be. Sarah Palin, if her reputation survives the punishing next two months, may be breaking down those barriers. Feminism, which should be about equal rights and equal opportunity, should not be a closed club requiring an ideological litmus test for membership.

Violet (Reclusive Leftist)

Pro-choice women will never agree with pro-life women on abortion, but they do agree on equal pay and healthcare and domestic violence. In The New Agenda tent, those are the things they can work on together. The Hothead Paisan lesbians and the feminists-for-Christ probably won’t be joining each other’s social clubs anytime soon, but in The New Agenda tent they can put their heads together to figure out how to combat sexism in the media.

The idea is to create a place where we can join forces on the many issues that unite us, instead of remaining always divided by the issues that separate us.

Rebecca Traister (Zombie feminists of the RNC - Salon)

I have been writing about feminism for more than five years; I have been covering the gender politics of the 2008 presidential election for more than two. And I am absolutely gobsmacked by the intensity of my feelings about Sarah Palin. I am stunned not only by the way in which her candidacy has changed the rules in the gender debate, or how it is twisting and garbling the fight for women's progress. But I'm also startled by how Palin herself is testing my own beliefs about how I react to women in power.