Wow. I didn't know that. I remember Streep (I think it was her) saying that the best way to have better female characters is to simply take your screenplay and keep it exactly as it is except change the male character to a female one. I think this is a simplification but I get the point she's making. I think having…

There are a lot of women who have gotten experience as writers inn Hollywood by being hired to go through a screenplay (written by a man) to fix the female characters’ dialogue so that they sounded like, y’know, people. Certainly, not all screenplays written by men require that treatment, but it seems that studios…

Yes this makes sense. I was thinking about something similar recently about male writers who can't write female characters very well vs female writers who can't write male characters very well. Perhaps I wouldn't notice the deficiency as well when female writers do it poorly (because I'm not a man) but I always notice…

This is a good analogy.

I heard a story from a friend who teaches middle school that she would sometimes have her students do an exercise where they had to write a piece imagining a day living as the opposite gender. She said that the girls often produced long pieces full of clear detail, having clearly considered what life as a boy must be…

In the mid 80s a college professor told me a (possibly apocryphal) story about a male student who wrote an essay arguing that women were inherently less rigorous writers- using George Eliot’s work as an example of the epitome of said rigorous male writing that no woman could match.

Is it? I thought it was female writers who inspired him. But even so, Gloria Steinem wrote her Playboy piece in 63.

Yeah, it's wild. Thing is, I think some men have trouble relating to anything that is not in reference to their own experience. Women don't have this problem as much since most literature/music are not from the point of view of women.

This reminded me of a conversation my female relations and I had with a male cousin. We were talking about our favorite actresses and we asked him who he liked. He said he didn’t like any actresses. I knew he was a big Harry Potter fan and I asked him about Emma Watson. That was a no, too. I don’t know if he was…

It’s amazing that he’s managed to reach that age and has somehow never met a single woman.

i miss dating subtractions in newspapers

OK. So here’s an embarrassing yoga-hockey celeb story the DS peeps should appreciate. I live in Toronto and was taking yoga classes at a studio down the street from my house. Classes were very small, like 6 people not including the instructor. About halfway through the sessions, the instructor’s sister starts coming…

Uh oh. I accidentally saw an email last night that my cat sent to this photgrapher setting up a special photography session with his wonderful owner NEXT WEEK.

Now I’m confused because Europe uses the metric system; maybe I’m only a 6 in America, but it converts to a 10 overseas?

Heartburn happens because you are pregnant, period. Where the baby is positioned affects it, but not their hair. Yes, most babies will lose some, but usually not all of it, and most of what they lose gets rubbed off on the back of their head from the amount of time spent in car seats, cribs, and swings. My oldest was…

Which is so weird because toddlers are known for their grace and excellent coordination.

Or, it’s just a short conversation.

The conversation, as it stands right now, is that CHILDREN ARE FUCKING DYING OF EASILY PREVENTABLE DISEASES AND VACCINES DO NOT CAUSE AUTISM YOU FUCKING IGNORANT FLAMING COCKGERBIL

Yeah, I love how people keep saying “we need to have the discussion” as if to imply there’s been silence and suppression of ideas up to this point. No! The discussion has been had. It was determined to be total bullshit. Move on!