• Josef Fritzl, the Austrian man who imprisoned and raped his daughter for 24 years in his basement, has been declared clinically sane, according to an Austrian psychiatric report to be presented when he comes to trial sometime next year. • Honor Blackman, the actress who played Pussy Galore in the film Goldfinger, says that her Bond girl was "no bimbo" but a "career woman" who fell in love with Bond. • Are you prone to shedding tears on your pillow? Now there's a pillow that is specially designed for bedtime-weepers. • Two Icelandic women have been put in charge of two nationalized banks that helped push Iceland's economy to the edge of bankruptcy. • A 24-year-old Australian woman who hid in her lover's house 10 years ago for 5 years and led her family to believe she was dead has recently married the man who helped hide her. • A new exercise program is being developed by researchers to reduce knee injury in the anterior cruciate ligament in women, which often sidelines female athletes. • A Florida grand jury issued a sealed murder indictment today in the murder of missing 3-year-old Caylee Anthony. • A 68-year-old former cross-country champion ran after and caught a 15-year-old boy who stole her handbag in England. • Some young Muslim women in Turkey are rebelling against against the secular Turkish state, which forces them to drop out of college if they wear headscarves. • Actress Maggie Quigley (or Maggie Q) describes the stereotypes in Hollywood about Asians and the difficulty she has in Hollywood due to her biracial background. • The California Association of Clerks and Election Officials wants to delay the change on marriage licenses from "Party A" and "Party B" to a "bride" and "groom" which is supposed to go into effect on November 17 since the clerks are currently overloaded with Election paperwork. •

• A recent study has found that children who have less than 3 family dinners a week are two and a half times likelier to smoke pot and tobacco than children who have family dinners 5 or more times a week. • A survey of 3,000 people in England has revealed that "phenomenon" is the most mispronounced word. • A UK study has found a small number (35 out of 769) of cerebral palsy cases in children whose mothers were given the antibiotics erthromycin and co-amoxiclav due to premature labor, but researchers maintain that the development of cerebral palsy was not directly related to the antibiotics. • A synagogue in San Francisco has created a prayer for anonymous sex (or "unexpected intimacy") which is meant to be read after the encounter. • Female conservative politicians in Spain were outraged when a male Spanish politician recounted the loss of his virginity in a brothel to a television interviewer, thereby "encouraging" young people to patronize prostitutes. • A female Saudi journalist asks the Saudi government to hire Saudi female nurses and encourage women to go into the nursing profession instead of bringing in nurses from overseas. • British and U.S. scientists report that there are nearly 7 million pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa who are infected with hookworms (a parasitic worm that lives in the intestines) and are thus at risk of maternal anemia. •

For some reason, Mr. Clean doesn't seem as troubling as Gwen Stefani's bukkake-esque L.A.M.B ad, in which she whispers, "I Want You All Over Me"? But maybe her ad isn't sexist. Just sexy.

Tracy-Clark Flory wonders, if advertisers are banned from showing gender stereotypes, would they use "anti-stereotypes"? "An apron-clad man putting dinner on the table or a woman in grease-covered overalls rolling out from under her pickup, wrench in hand?" She writes: "I would love to see those images and advertisers should be pressured to upend gender stereotypes. But we all know that stereotypes are true some of the time: Some women bake, some men fix cars."

The truth is, ads are often gross generalizations to reach wide audiences. But the bottom line is: They want you to buy their product. Eva-Britt Svensson, a Swedish member of Parliament and author of the report on advertising images, says consumers can — and should— get in on the action. "If they have more information and awareness about the impact of gender stereotypes," she tells IHT, "they can start boycotting products." Seeing as how some probably find Mr.Clean harmless and Dolce & Gabbana offensive — and vice versa — it would be impossible to find common ground. But boycotting leaves the decision in the hands of the consumer. Wouldn't that be smarter — and more effective — than a ban? (And isn't banning just censorship?)

EU takes shot at gender stereotypes [International Herald Tribune]
Britain To Ban Sexist Ads? [Salon]
Earlier: Advertising Taking Cues From Porn: What Is The World Cumming To?
Bukkake Alert

• A reflexologist in England is on trial for allegedly sexually groping his female patients with his hands and using "illegal" vibrators as medical treatment. • A UN committee says that sexual discrimination against women is strong in the UK where women are underrepresented in Parliament, paid less than men, and being arrested and imprisoned for minor offenses. • A former porn addict and Christian pastor has created a website and number of sermons encouraging worshippers to have great sex because Jesus wants them to. • A new book titled Taking Care Of Your Girls aims to educate young women about breast health to ease fears about breast cancer in the future .• Holly Brudge, a 29-year-old woman from England, plans on becoming the first woman to skydive over Mount Everest. • A couple got married at the Starks and Menchinger Family Funeral Home in Michigan where the bridegroom works as the funeral director. (The couple had to reassure guests that no corpses would be in or near the wedding.) • A reunion of about 100 former Playboy bunnies (the women who worked at Playboy Clubs) took place in Chicago on Monday. Not surprisingly, Gloria Steinem didn't make an appearance. • Puppy videos are back! Watch this little gray Schnauzer play with his beloved toys.

• The U.S. military has announced that it has arrested an al Qaeda figure who helped in the 2006 kidnapping of journalist Jill Carroll. • A black female physician was blocked from seeking a DNA test to prove her direct relation to U.S. founding father James Madison by Madison's recognized/white descendants. • With Proposition 8 looming in CA to ban gay marriage, some Mormons are going on the internet to voice their support for gay marriage. • A new study conducted by an economics professor at UC Berkeley says that economic, environmental, and war-related stress causes pregnant women to release more hormones and give birth to more girls. • The creator of The Secret Life of the American Teenager is upset that a PSA urging parents to discuss sex with their kids is put on at the end of each episode. • Hot Cartoons And The Women Who Could Play Them: Megan Fox as Pocahontas? Really? • Angelica Alfaro defied the odds and stereotypes surrounding children of Mexican immigrants by attending and graduating from a college and not having children. • A guideline for members of district councils in England has cautioned council-members against using phrases like "man on the street" and "manning the switchboard" because they are "offensive" to women. • Rosie Swale Pope, a 61-year-old grandmother in England has just returned from her 5-year, 20,000-mile run around the world. • The president of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, has pardoned 3 men accused of brutally gang raping a woman with a bayonet after she complained that they kidnapped her son. •

• Two women have been charged in the murder of a British couple honeymooning in Antigua and Barbuda. • The Maricopa County Sheriff in Arizona has violated a ruling that he is not allowed to require female inmates to receive a court order before they are granted an abortion. • In (somewhat) related news, there is a new program at the Ohio Reformatory for Women that allows inmates to raise their children in their cells and in in-house prisons to keep the bond between mother and child tight. • More than 80% of women in the Air Force in Iraq reported persistent fatigue, difficulty concentrating and nearly 20% reported one symptom of PTSD. • Meanwhile in the region, a man has been arrested in Jerusalem for helping beat, threaten, and rob a divorced Israeli woman under the self-proclaimed title of "chastity guards." •

In response, Helen told the Telegraph, "It felt like I was being punished for having the audacity to step up and say: 'I don't think this should have happened to me'…Which 25 per cent did they think I was responsible for?"

This initial turn of events is particularly upsetting because the UK has such an abysmal rape conviction rate in the first place. As we previously reported, fewer than 6% of rapes reported in England lead to convictions — and that's out of as few as 10% of rapes that are reported in the first place.

Though A CICA spokesperson's initial response to Helen's shock and disgust was "CICA makes decisions on conduct issues in good faith, based on the facts available to them in each individual case, and any applicants unhappy with the decision in their claim can ask for a review by a more senior member of staff," The Guardian reports, they've since gone back and apologized. And, according to the BBC, Helen, and the 14 other rape victims who were stiffed 25% because they had been drinking, will receive full compensation. It's a happy ending to a terrible, avoidable situation.

Rape Victims Awarded Less Compensation For Drinking Before Attack [Telegraph]
Rape Victims Told Alcohol Consumption May Cost Them Compensation [Guardian]
Rape Compensation Cut Overturned [BBC]

Earlier: The Rape Conviction Rate In Britain Is Pathetically Low

• Check out the GoateeSaver, a device that one bites onto while shaving to create the perfect goatee every time. • Mothers are launching their own businesses in the UK after they become fed up with the lack of flexibility to spend time with their family in their old jobs. • Gamma-butyrolactone and 1,4 butanedoil may be banned in the UK where they convert into the date-rape drug GHB when ingested rapidly. • Working-age singles in Australia report having "low life satisfaction," and are only happier on average than marginalized groups like the unemployed and single parents. Is this another study trying to scare single people into getting married? • A new law may be forming in Kuwait that will require that all gyms become gender-segregated. • A 90 year-old woman had her biggest wish come true when a male staffer at her assisted living facility volunteered to serve her fish and chips in a thong. Some staffers complained that it wouldn't have happened if the genders had been reversed.

(Image via B12 Solipsism.)

Matilda of Mayfair says: "A good spanking and whipping never did anyone any harm." Jimmy Timminover from Hartlepool writes: "There is nothing better after a hard week, than standing in the bath, and having your wife whip you, with a yard of fresh, raw tripe.
It's exciting, good for the circulation, keeps you fit, and afterwards, you can fry the tripe with a few onions, and a glass of white wine, for supper, perfect."

Unfortunately, not everyone is psyched to discuss domination. "It's clear to me that England is becoming more Satanic in nature every day, and the people who work for the BBC must take some responsibility for that," Dean from Reading declares. And Zax from Amersham sighs: "Frankly, it scares me to know what people will do in the name of recreation. How can physical aggression, bleeding wounds, broken bones, dirt, humiliation, orchestrated and ritualised violence and even deaths have any place in the psyche of any rational adult? Anyway, so much for rugby. And boxing, wrestling, judo and any other competitive contact sport you care to name, all of which are essentially substitutes for sex anyway. BDSM sounds much safer, plus there's at least a chance you'll find your fellow participants sexually attractive, unlike rugby. Er, presumably." Here's a question: Is something still "kinky" if everyone is doing it?

Why do so many of us like kinky sex? [Times]
Britain's Secretive S&M Scene [BBC News]

I'm in a muuuuuch better mood right now, having spent last night at a fancier hotel and drinking beer and trading Notes — don't be dissuaded! It ends so happily — for British women's magazines, which I'll be filling you in on as the day progresses. But before I do:

1. Free shit: An old friend of mine at the Journal who covered the fast food industry once told me the watershed moment in the McDonald's corporate history was the invention of the Happy Meal. The promise of a cheap heavily-advertised ever-revolving toy instantly turned the restaurant into the favored purveyor of crying children and by extension their parents and as a bonus instilled at the most impressionable age a taste for the company's distinctive brand of caloric substance. I mean, duh, but still. Anyway every magazine in the UK seems to come with a free toy. Eve and ELLE came with canvas tote bags that smell vaguely of petrochemicals, COMPANY came with a novel called "Angel" ("But then she meets Mickey, the lead singer of a boy band, who is as irresistible as he is dangerous, and Angel realises that a rising star can just as quickly fall…"), Tatler came with a pair of sunglasses, and some other magazine I didn't buy came with flip-flops. Which brings me to a thought: I don't really want free shit with my women's magazines, but I always thought incorporating more free shit into the shrink wrap section of the Sunday papers — you know, little packs of cereal, large samples of warming pore cleansers, cigarettes or something mildly addictive — could be the business move that saved the newspaper industry. Maybe I should discuss this at tonight's panel…

2. Beer: I like beers wherein the bitterness manages to seep through to my blunted taste buds. IPAs, etc. Not sure what to drink here.

3. I am not saying this because they paid for me to be here but: I highly enjoyed this story.

[ Image via INFDaily].

Mr. Leith believes that men and women simply want different things — not just in their 30s but all the time. "Just ask any man to remember what it was like being a teenager," he writes. A regular, 17-year-old boy may have a crush on a 17-year-old girl in his class, but she may not even notice him. Because she can choose from "not only the coolest 17-year-olds but some of the coolest 18, 19, and 20-year-olds, too. And guys in their early twenties, with cars and motorbikes, and money to buy tickets for concerts and festivals." Leith says this continues for years: "Who dates the attractive 23-year-old woman as she settles into her first job? The 35-year-old who runs the company, that's who. Not the 23-year-old guy who met her at the interview and blushes every time she passes him in the corridor." But, he says, single guys in their thirties are just ordinary blokes:

The guys who were nothing special, the dorks who were passed over in favor of the cool, attractive guys when they were younger. And now, possibly for the first time in history, they find themselves in an unreal bubble. Women are no longer being cautious and picky - they are competing for their attentions. This is a genuine turning point in the history of gender relations. For the first time ever, geeks and bozos have pulling power. Can you blame them, after thousands of years of competing for female attention, for letting it go to their heads?

So what are thirty-something single women to do if the good ones are taken and the ordinary ones are too busy fucking around (with younger women) and buying video games with their hard-earned loot to think about settling down? "Settle" themselves? Because if Leith's logic is correct, 17-year-old boys appear to be the answer, and that can't be right.

Where Have All The Men Gone?, Revenge Of The Geek [Times]

Earlier: Settle For Mr. "Just OK" — While Your "Marital Value Is Still At Its Peak!"

The Today show sure thinks so: This morning saw a segment called "Scruffy Man Makeovers" in which the hosts dragged out grizzly, bearded dudes in need of shaves and haircuts. After the "afters", the women in their lives gushed about how handsome they were, and every single guy had the same, that was a fun thing I don't have to do again for awhile expression on his face. There's no way these men were reformed — or want to be! A man either sees the point of upkeep or doesn't. There's a difference between vanity and hygiene, and there's a difference between a makeover and an ambush on someone's personal choices (or lack thereof.) If a guy doesn't want to cut his hair or spend any time shaving, so what? Wouldn't most women would love to cut down on the time they spend primping? Why do we feel the need to change a man who's living the ready-in-no-time dream?

A Half-Hour To Groom? Guys Are Becoming More Vain [Daily Mail]
Scruffy Man Makeovers [Today]

Vanessa Muscara, 31, hails from Rome but lives in on and off in London. She says she she'll never settle down with an Englishman: "They never flatter you," she points out. "However much of an effort I made for my ex, he never said, 'You look great.' The best I'd get was, 'You look well.' It drove me crazy. Women complain about Italian men being sleazy, but what's wrong with a 'Ciao, bella' when you're looking your best?"

Ms. Llewellyn Smith calls British men "emotionally constipated" and notes that they have fully "embraced the cowardly art of text-messaging." The women she interviewes do try and muster up some praise for the Brits: "British men are more articulate and amusing than Americans," Jennifer Rohn admits. Adds Maryam, 31, who moved to London from Iran four years ago: "They have what we call 'clean eyes.' They don't stare at other women when their wife isn't there - unlike the Spanish." She also says: "If they weren't so lazy, they'd be fantastic." So what's up across the pond? Are the guys really so terrible? Do we have James Bond to blame for our unrealistic image of the Brit as a dashing charmer? Sure, it's a sweeping generalization, but between Tad Safran, Jude Law and the men the ladies in the article had the misfortune of encountering, are British men the worst? Guess a foxy accent isn't nearly enough.

The trouble with British men [Telegraph]
Earlier: British Lass Responds To Lady-Basher Tad Safran
"Sexist Of The Year" Tad Safran Has No Shame
Man Named "Tad" Insults Women On Both Sides Of Pond

He admits that beauty treatments are "vastly more expensive" in England, but puts the blame on proper English manners:

American women have no qualms about telling their friends, in no uncertain terms, when they look like crap, or have put on weight, or are dressed like a bag-lady. They talk of the top aestheticians with a reverence usually reserved for Nobel laureates and trade cosmetic surgeon business cards the way that boys in playgrounds trade football cards. In Britain, women are too polite to set their friends straight. For some reason, being seen to make an effort with one's appearance is regarded as shameful among British women.

So who is this misogynistic, sexist slug known as Tad Safran? "The author is a screenwriter (single) who divides his time between London and Los Angeles," the Times tells us. Single? You don't say! A quick search reveals that Safran was one of nine writers credited with the screenplay for a crappy animated film called Doogal, which IMDB user "stinkyuu" claims "was the all-time boringest movie I have ever seen in my short life." 'Nuff said.

American Beauty? [Times]

In fact, recent research shows that children from affluent homes — where the income is more than $127,000 a year — are three times more likely to suffer anxiety and depression than ordinary teenagers and cutting is one of the ways anxious or depressed feelings can manifest themselves in adolescents.

For Tor, it only got worse as she got older. By the time she went to college, she was burning herself with cigarettes and punching walls, and in her second year of schooling, she was admitted to the hospital some 20 times. And although Tor is now doing better — she says she can't remember the last time she cut herself — why is it that even though 1 in 15 young people in the UK are harming themselves, parents like Tor's think it's not that big of a deal? Dr. Petra Boynton, a lecturer in health services research, says cutting "isn't always taken seriously. I've heard teachers talking about 'silly' girls who cut themselves."

According to Dr. Andrew McCulloch of the Mental Health Foundation, many young people grow out of self-harm. But, he warns, "If you have a child who is already self-motivated, be careful — surely you want your child to be well, rather than in a particular school?" And even though research shows that there's no significant difference in frequency of cutting between genders, why do we hear more about girls harming themselves? And why do people dare to call a girl who's cut herself "silly"?

Self-Harm: 'I Cut Myself To Feel Better' [Telegraph]

• Is Kate Moss sending a bad message to Britain's schoolgirls? Some teachers think that England's failure to prosecute Kate for her documented cocaine use in 2005 undermined the country's anti-drug efforts. "Teenagers need to see people who have broken the law suffer the consequences,' said Pat Langham, president of the Girls' Schools Association. [Daily Mail]
  
• Don't hate inveterate cads like P. Diddy for having a wandering eye. According to new research from Florida State University, ogling is inevitable — to a degree. [MSNBC]
  
• Wondering whether to have kids? Do the math. Two researchers from Duke's business school created a mathematical model that helps women determine the best age to have children. It takes into consideration, career, social and family objectives. [MSNBC]
  
• According to a new book called Mommies Who Drink, the secret to sane motherhood is frequent cocktails. My mom could have told you that 25 years ago. [Independent]

• New statistics show that women are "breaking the stained glass ceiling" and starting to take more jobs as church leaders. Currently no denomination has more than a 25% female clergy. [CBS News]
• Good news for UK readers: Tory leader David Cameron has vowed to increase the rape conviction rate in England, which is currently the lowest in Europe. Cameron also pledged to get more funding for rape crisis centers. [Daily Mail]
• Amnesty International helped lead a protest outside the Japanese embassy in London over the women forced into sex slavery by the Japanese military in the 30s and 40s. These former so-called "comfort women" are asking for apologies and reparations from the Japanese government. [Breitbart]