I'll take an Angelina Jolie op-ed over the tomfoolery of David Brooks and Tom Friedman any day.

I, for one, am grateful that she speaks so publicly about these health issues and choices. She is doing a lot of good by normalizing talk about women's health decisions. I think it's especially powerful since so much of her identity was wrapped in "sexiest woman alive" characterizations. It has to make women in her…

Several women in my family died of ovarian cancer and of the 5 girls in my family, 4 had ovaries removed and 1 had them removed with the diagnosis of ovarian cancer at 32. Her writing an OpEd piece is so helpful to the woman who struggle with these choices; not because we see her as a role model, but because she…

Er, she's written two op-eds. One for when she had her breasts removed and this one, which is a follow-up. As other comments have pointed out, the tone of the article is not self-centered at all. It comes off as more that she understands that she is in a position where she has a voice, so she is sharing her…

See also: "Well-behaved women rarely make history."

It is frankly astounding how much more coverage healthcare issues get if someone people recognise fronts the campaign. You don't have to like Jolie, and you don't have to like the fact that people pay more attention to celebrities than they do to recent developments in oncology, but it is absolutely indisputable that…

Or maybe it's her way of controlling the narrative surrounding her medical decisions rather than having them reported piecemeal by gossip magazines and clickbait websites. Getting it all out there in one go, presenting the facts in her own voice, and leaving nothing else up to speculation. It's a really solid PR move.

It's the weird people who tend to make history.

and at least one study showed that Jolie had been the impetus for a dramatic increase in women researching whether they too were carriers.

She wrote the op-ed because she is one of the highest profile women in the world and therefore is in a unique position to raise awareness about a condition that could become fatal for millions of women... But you're totally right. "Sit down and shut up, woman" is a much more appropriate stance to make. Ugh.

Didn't we all do iffy stuff when we were young?

Thanks. It was long ago, so I've recovered.

More like "We're a good normal Muslim family, we don't burn Korans. She was just crazy. Please don't kill us all."

It is entirely possible for people to care about more than one issue at the same time. It is not necessary to choose between them.

God knows we can't talk about more than one thing at a time.

Ughhh. I had a similar thing happen at MAC, when a boyfriend took me to the mall for valentine's day and told me he'd buy me whatever makeup I wanted. I got a free makeover and, knowing that the "free" implies "you should really buy some shit," semi-reluctantly decided to get two eyeshadows and two eyeliners. For…

Omg that's just evil.

It's seriously one of my favorite stories now but it was SO TRAUMATIZING back then, that woman was evil incarnate. She had to be new at it or under some sort of sales quota that she was close to missing, or maybe she was just the worst person ever? I remember I had sparkly emerald green eyeshadow up to my eyebrow. On…

HAHAHA That is horrific. Are they allowed to do that?! What a dick move. I can't even fathom.

Best (by which I mean worst) experience ever, I was maybe 16 or 17 and wanted a new eyeshadow. I forget what counter I went to but the woman basically did half of my face, full-on club makeup and then refused to do the other half unless I bought something. I really didn't want the $20+ eyeshadow she was pushing so I…