Monday Linkage: gender x

4 November 2013, 0050 EST

  • The world is buzzing with news that Germany has introduced a ‘third sex‘- or, the option to leave a child’s gender as indeterminate. This raises a slough of questions and long-overdue discussion.
  • Speaking of gender, Californians are debating a new law in California (AB 1266) that would allow trans-gender students to choose their preferred gender pronoun and identity. Critics worry that it would result in a violation of privacy (most of the concerns seem to be about boys using female bathrooms).
  • Obama is pushing Congress to pass a bill that would prevent employers from discriminating on the basis of gender identity (hello, is it 1970?? why hasn’t such a bill been passed already?!)
  • There has been quite a bit of discussion and sharing of  the ‘Switcheroo’ Photo series by Hana Pesut (basically it is photos of couples that switch outfits- I don’t really see it as a huge gender statement..maybe I don’t get it).
  • The World Economic Forum ranked the US 23 out of 126 countries in terms of gender equality- PBS has an interesting discussion of the fall from grace here.