Women's Views on News

Democratic members walk out of contraception hearing
Size 16 student wins Ann Summers modelling competition
Championing women who want to work part time
Fox News pundit Trotta says rape in military to be “expected”
Survey seeks UK women’s views on football
Human hourglass or media obsession with unattainable ideals?
Story links, February 17, 2012

Democratic members walk out of contraception hearing

Posted: 17 Feb 2012 11:30 AM PST

Rachel Salmon
WVoN co-editor

Two Democratic members of the US House of Representatives have walked out of a hearing about contraception in protest at the chairman's refusal to allow a woman to testify.

Democratic Representatives Carolyn Maloney and Eleanor Holmes Norton left a hearing of the House Oversight Committee, after the chairman, Republican Darrell Issa, refused to allow a female college student to testify.

The hearing is looking into a regulation introduced by the Obama administration, compelling employers and health insurers to provide contraceptive coverage.

The first batch of witnesses were all male religious leaders opposed to the new rule.

Democratic Ranking Member Elijah E. Cummings requested that college student Sandra Fluke be allowed to put the case for greater coverage.

Issa said that, as a college student, Ms Fluke did not have the 'appropriate credentials' to testify in front of his hearing.

He added the hearing 'was not about reproductive rights and contraception but about the Administration's actions as they related to freedom of religion and conscience'.

Holmes Norton said she would not return, calling Issa's chairmanship an 'autocratic regime'.

Size 16 student wins Ann Summers modelling competition

Posted: 17 Feb 2012 10:00 AM PST

Lucy Moore, a 20 year-old criminal justice student has won an Ann Summers competition to find the ‘sexiest face in the UK’.

The competition was publicised on national TV as part of a rebranding exercise with the help of ITV’s ‘The Only Way is Essex’

Lucy is a size 16, the average size of UK women and was chosen from 4,000 entrants and won 22% of the national vote.

Lucy now stars on their website, on the cover of their Valentine’s catalogue giving lingerie buying tips, and in their shop windows.

According to the Ann Summers website "Lingerie-loving Lucy is a Criminal Justice student who entered the model search without knowing where it would take her.

“She knows that sexy is not worrying about yourself and what others think about you. She’s confident yet modest, she’s strong and sexy, and she’s our new face as voted by YOU!”

Alongside this re-branding campaign, Ann Summers is also partnering with the relationship charity Relate to launch a ‘sex census’.

I can’t wait!

Championing women who want to work part time

Posted: 17 Feb 2012 08:00 AM PST

Julie Tomlin
WVoN co-editor

Judging by the media coverage of the recent employment figures in the UK, part time work is still considered the 'sloppy seconds' of the jobs market.

An increase in overall employment by 60,000 was due to an increase in part time jobs, journalists explained dismissively when the figures were released on Wednesday.

On top of this, more people than ever – 1.35 million of the 7.9 million total – would prefer full time jobs. This only served to reinforce the notion that full time jobs are what really count.

But that's a notion Emma Stewart MBE of women's recruitment service Women Like Us spends a lot of her time trying to dispel. What about the 'hidden' 78 per cent, or 5.13million people who are happy with part time work?

"The media coverage tends to focus on it being the lesser choice, but we would certainly argue that many women are proactively choosing part time work as their preferred work pattern for a variety of reasons," says Stewart, who set up Women Like Us with business partner Karen Mattison MBE in 2005.

That's not to say that things aren't bad for women – they made up two thirds of the 48,000 rise in unemployment in the three months to December, and cuts in public sector jobs are likely to hit them the hardest in months to come.

On top of that, cuts in working tax credits and childcare costs are already affecting women's ability to work:

"We are starting to see some women seriously considering walking away from work because they can't afford to stay," says Stewart.

But although there are a growing number of people who are working part time because they have been asked to cut back their hours or can't find a full time post, it's important that we don't dismiss part time work as part of the problem, insists Stewart, who has built a business around the positives of part time work.

It's not only too big a leap to assume that everyone doing a part time job would somehow prefer full time work, but even those who say they would prefer longer hours could actually be saying something more complex, argues Stewart:

"People need to bring in a decent household income and if they think working more hours is the only option, then of course they will opt for that," she says.

But what if they could get a part time job that matched their skills and paid well?

This is the "quality" part time jobs market that Women Like Us is working to stimulate.

Part time jobs work for women – and men – who want to shape their working lives around child care, caring for elderly relatives, build a "portfolio" career or create a better work-life balance.

In the current climate, businesses could also benefit, particularly smaller businesses, because they can afford to recruit the talent they need.

"They can really open up their candidate pool by thinking about part time because they can get really good candidates for less budget," says Stewart.

Women Like Us was set up to address – in London at least – the disconnect that exists between businesses that want part time staff and those who want the jobs.

Part of the problem is that recruitment agencies working on commission tend to keep away from part time jobs and Job Centre Plus tends only to deal with the lower-skilled positions.

"In the very beginning, one of the things that drove us to doing it was meeting an ex website editor who had been working for a big publishing company before she had children.

“She told us she hadn't been able to find any work that used her skills and was seriously considering a job as a school meals supervisor because she didn't know where else to go that she could fit around her children," says Stewart.

"We need to give people better choice by creating a more visible and agile quality part time recruitment market that women can move around in."

There's no doubt that the months and years ahead could be tough for women as they bear the brunt of cuts in the home and in the workplace.

Stewart says there has been a marked increase in the number of women signing up to the agency in the last six months and there are signs too that more and more women in the lower income brackets are getting squeezed out of the market by women who are "downgrading" because they can't find work that matches their skills.

"There's no doubt that it's a challenging time for everybody," says Stewart. "But it's a time that requires different and creative thinking. The solution is out there and part time work could be part of the solution."

Fox News pundit Trotta says rape in military to be “expected”

Posted: 17 Feb 2012 06:30 AM PST

Emine Dilek
WVoN co-editor

Fox News pundit Liz Trotta is clearly not afraid of controversy.

Nor is she concerned about the epidemic levels of sexual assaults on US military personnel by their own comrades.

Instead, during an appearance on the network on February 12, she said women soldiers should just stop complaining about the attacks.

She also criticised the Department of Defense for increasing spending on support programs for victims of sexual assault and blamed the "feminists" for advocating these programs.

She added, in reference to a Pentagon report showing a 64% increase in violent sexual assaults since 2006: "Now, what did they expect? These people are in close contact."

She continued: "you have this whole bureaucracy upon bureaucracy being built up with all kinds of levels of people to support women in the military who are now being raped too much."

Apart from the total insensitivity of her comments, Trotta did not mention that the study was not gender specific and included the numbers of male military personnel who had been sexually assaulted since 2006.

She also insulted male army personnel by insinuating that they are incapable of controlling themselves when in close contact with women.

Not surprisingly, she herself has come under fire (sorry, terrible pun) for her comments, but has yet to issue an apology.

I would like to ask her one question: “how much rape is too much, Ms Trotta?”

Survey seeks UK women’s views on football

Posted: 17 Feb 2012 05:00 AM PST

Rachel Salmon
WVoN co-editor

A football think-tank in England has launched a major online survey to find out what women think about the game, and ascertain their standing within it.

Football Insights, a newly-formed company which researches fans' views, is inviting women to fill in an online questionnaire, seeking their opinions on everything from facilities for female supporters, sexism, coaching, television coverage and participation in the women's game.

Founder Paul Goodwin, said: "Up until now no-one has undertaken broad reaching research into females' attitudes and involvement in the game from grassroots to the elite levels.

“A comprehensive survey will provide valuable insight for everyone with an interest in the future of the game including the game's authorities, clubs and sponsors."

Last year a survey by Sport England called Active People found that 275,000 adult women played football, making the women's game the third largest participation sport, behind men's football and men's cricket.

Football Insight's account director Scott Grant said there was no doubt the women's game had grown, with magazines like She Kicks raising its profile.

"The new Women's Super League was launched last year, it's an important step to the women's game becoming more professionalised.

"I watched the youth Football Scotland, under 17s Girls Cup Final and was really surprised by the competitiveness of these young girls," he said.

He said the survey had so far received support from 11 league clubs, including Portsmouth and Derby County, but admitted it had sometimes proved difficult to get others interested.

"A lot more are waiting to see what happens," he said.

Human hourglass or media obsession with unattainable ideals?

Posted: 17 Feb 2012 03:00 AM PST

Heather Green
Freelance writer*

The Internet and celebrity news programmes have been buzzing about model Ioana Spangenberg, who claims to have a naturally occurring 20-inch waist.

You heard that right. Without the aid of corsets, extreme dieting, or surgery, this Romanian-born model claims to have a waist that’s not much bigger than a compact disc.

Not only does she claim that her waist size is naturally occurring, but she also claims that no matter what she does, she just can’t pad her middle.

“No one seems to believe it, but every day I eat three big meals and I snack on chocolate and crisps all the time. I just have a small stomach,” she told The Sun.

Um, no, I don’t believe it. In addition to having unnatural proportions, the 5-foot-6-inch model weighs only 84 pounds.

This is not the figure that you get snacking on “chocolate and crisps all the time” — unless you have a medical condition or you’re hovering over a toilet bowl post-meal. A high metabolism would not lead to being so severely underweight.

What is even more disturbing than the image of this woman is the reaction that the media has given her. The attention she has garnered could be a result of novelty. It is a curious thing to see what amounts to a living skeleton.

Even more noteworthy is the kind of attention she’s not getting. There has been no outcry from media outlets about the unhealthy body image that this model is promoting, and no one has questioned her claims that her size is the result of her natural body chemistry.

I mean, they asked, and she said she doesn’t diet. What else is there? The lack of skepticism suggests an admiration for her size. We don’t want to question her. We want to believe that such victories in thinness are possible.

The fact that Spangenberg is modeling at all and is not a circus act instead is cause for concern. Models are held up as ideals for feminine beauty. They are meant to showcase the possibilities for fashion if worn by the right shape in the right way.

Promoting this unnaturally thin form can lead to unhealthy habits and ideals in young girls and women.

Rader Programs, which specializes in treating eating disorders, reports that 20 years ago, the average fashion model weighed eight percent less than the average woman, and today, she weighs 23 percent less.

The institute also reports that 79 percent of teenage girls who vomit and 73 percent of teenage girls who use diet pills are frequent readers of women's health and fitness magazines.

Over the years, the models have gotten thinner and eating disorders and body image issues have become more prevalent in our society. Is this just a coincidence?

What are your thoughts about this “human hourglass” model? Do you believe her claims about her eating habits and her naturally unnatural shape? Do you think images of women like this are harmful to other women and young girls?

Tell us your thoughts in the comments!

*Heather Green is a freelance writer for several regional magazines in North Carolina as well as a resident blogger for onlinenursingdegrees.org. Her writing experience includes fashion, business, health, agriculture and a wide range of other topics.

Story links, February 17, 2012

Posted: 17 Feb 2012 01:30 AM PST

Every day we'll post up a number of story links that we think are interesting.