In April, HBO announced plans for a show titled Women's Studies, which would focus on a feminist "it"-girl-turned-professor. This is also the network which airs The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, a female-driven series and one of only two prime-time dramas with an African-American woman as its star. (The other is HawthoRNe). Perhaps HBO is trying to do penance for or regain female viewers lost after Sex And The City went off the air? In any case, Marti Noxon says she's wanted to do a show that touches on feminism for a while; she was 12 when her mom came out as a radical feminist lesbian and had to juggle her mom's beliefs with her own interests: "I wanted to be a gal, I was very interested in men, and I wanted to shave my legs," Noxon says. The concept of the Diane Keaton project — an older lady working at a porn mag — sounds awesome. As long as they don't call it Hot Flash.

Diane Keaton To Star In HBO Comedy Series [Reuters]
Earlier: HBO Majors In Women's Studies

In French's view, the answer is yes, and that history is a long, long catalogue of oppression and injustice. Writing in the New York Review of Books, Mantel summarizes:

In Aristotle's thought, French says, women were "deformed" men. In feudal Japan they were barred from climbing Mount Fuji because they would pollute it, and "unhappily married women were expected to commit suicide." A Buddhist text describes woman as the "emissary of hell." Her oppression is universal, her story cyclical; construed less as a human being than as an animal or force of nature, her place is outside history.

Historically, women haven't been able to get a break — "if somehow a woman does manage to impose herself on the culture, her achievements will be appropriated by men or dismissed as freakish" and (here Mantel quotes French directly) "no revolutionary struggle, no matter how vocal its commitment to sexual equality, actually achieved it." If we take French at her word, the history of women is essentially a history of abuse at the hands of men.

But Mantel doesn't take French at her word. She notes that From Eve to Dawn is rife with contradictions — French sets up the Catholic Church as "one of the most effective misogyny machines ever devised" and then says it "exalted nurture and valued the contributions of women." She says that "feminism has changed the discourse," but also that "even intellectual men write about history and literature as if feminism had never occurred." More damningly, French refers to "men's deep and unacknowledged hatred of women" but fails to get to the roots of this hatred or even prove that it exists.

Could French have done a better job? Can anyone — even in four volumes — cover the vast history of half the human race without slipping up occasionally? And is any project as general as a history of women bound to have an overgeneralized villain — in this case, men?

Don't get us wrong — a lot of women's suffering throughout history can be traced back pretty directly to dudes. But did men really bar women from Mt. Fuji, deny them the right to vote, and ignore their contributions to history and literature simply because they hate us? Or is every instance of oppression precipitated by a unique set of circumstances, circumstances which may include hate? A book that addressed all these circumstances would have to be a history of men as well as a history of women — a history, really, of everyone.

The War Against Women [New York Review of Books]

“The long-range goal of my law suits is that I am, in my own small way, trying to give all those feminists equality - not the equality of all the best in life, but the equality of the worst in life.

“Make them register for the draft, make them go to war and die, make them work in the worst occupations,” he said.

“They do not want equality. They want preferential treatment. It’s just the same old pedastal. they say, ’I am a female. I want to be the CEO of a company.’ I want to be on a pedestal.”

Actually, asshole, women are going to war and dying, not that you ever have.

“Now all I am looking for is superficial temporary escapades with pretty young ladies,” he said. “It’s harder than it was when I was younger. I only go after girls who are in their athletic prime. But it’s okay.”

I actually feel like it's a bit of a credit to our gender that Roy Den Hollander has trouble getting laid in New York, but even someone as lame as this can probably save up his money.

Anyway, just for your reading pleasure, Rick-not-Roy e-mailed us a prescient criticism of my earlier piece that I thought was also worth sharing.

Hi, I read the article written about Roy Den Hollander and came to the conclusion that you are a bitter woman. Grow the fuck up! It never surprises me that women claim to be champions of equality, get pissed when someone exposes their hypocrisy . You call this guy creepy, but ignore his story. You mock him and his tragedy because someone is finally telling feminist jerks to practice what they preach. The woman who married him was able to use Violence Against Women Act (Unconstitutional) to clean him out. There is no evidence of domestic abuse or any plausible reason for her to divorce him other than her gold digging ways. Why don’t you write about that? I guess the truth hurts.

Additionally, you love to paint guys like Roy as toxic, misogynistic or over [sic] to fuck women half his age (are you in the fucking stone age). What has his dating habits to do with exposing female assholes who want unfair elitist rights? Your vile remarks show how fucking stupid you are. The comments about your father show another example of your bitter attitude. Speak for your self, you are the jerk! He never mentioned women to be inferior or second class (that’s your assumption). Women who feel threatened by Roy’s lawsuits show how weak they are. Once again, grow the fuck up and pull your head out of your rectum!

Rick

Me and my elitist ways, trying to keep Roy Den Hollander from getting the younger pussy he tells everyone he wants and so obviously deserves so that womankind can make up for the "tragedy" of his younger, Russian wife reporting his abuse of her to authorities and thereby being allowed to stay in this country. What a fucked-up, unconstitutional law, making sure that victims of domestic violence don't have to risk deportation by reporting to authorities that they're being abused. And how dare I think myself any man's better. Gosh, I'll probably try harder next time.

Lawyer Roy Den Hollander Plans 'Jihad' Against University Feminism [The Times of London]

"As far as I know," Professor Howe said in a phone interview, women's studies departments in the States "are not declining. The only one that I know of that's under some threat right now is at South Florida. There's been budget cuts and the dean wants to take away their autonomous status." Otherwise, Howe notes, the enrollment for her women's studies classes at WVU is strong, and they retain popularity because word of mouth is so potent. "What i see at West Virginia, is that people will get really excited about material and then they will recruit their friends. We can encourage them as teachers only so much," but it's the enthusiasm of the students that keeps 'em coming back.

She then told this anecdote about a student she had a few years ago. "She must have been 18 or 19 at the time. We were talking about Title IX in class, and this student asked 'Why hasn't anyone told me about this before?' She was furious that no one had told her about Title IX. But Title IX was her birthright, and she had been reaping the benefits of it without knowing its name. It's our obligation as women's studies scholars to point out the benefits, but also to point out that they need to protect them."

[Image via George Mason University Women's Studies Department.]