Post by Moses on May 12, 2004 17:35:03 GMT -5
When the Electoral Commission discovered last month that women don't involve themselves in party politics - preferring to vote, sign petitions and talk behind the scenes - worried female columnists in Westminster came up with a variety of explanations.
Women don't like joining groups; they don't like swallowing a party manifesto whole; they think there are too many men in the game, and too few women. These are plausible enough explanations. But the one that caught my eye turned up a few paragraphs down the reports, noted slightly shamefacedly: women have relatively little confidence in their ability to influence the political process.
Never mind the guff about women preferring to vote for women: this is the key finding. Unfortunately, there's no easy fix for a lack of self-belief. Even more depressingly, women's reticence is evident in the bright new playground which the fringes of Westminster are beginning to notice: that of political blogs.
Women do blog. According to a BlogCensus survey last August, just under 40% of English-language weblogs were owned by men and 36.3% by women (the rest belonged to groups, or were of unknown origin). But BlogCensus also found that nearly half the weblogs surveyed were personal diaries - and in that category, women outnumbered men by about two to one. Fewer than one in 20 of the political blogs was written by a woman.
"Disproportionate numbers of men are blogging about politics and technology," says Jane Perrone, the editor of the Guardian's weblog. "The uneven gender split is matched in the offline world."
That tallies with the latest SiteMeter blog popularity rankings in the US. Of the top 20, only one - the satirical Washington blog Wonkette - is written by a woman. Male-dominated networks and inflexible working hours have traditionally hindered the progress of female politicians. Neither affects women's ability to join in the political blogging community.
Yet very few do. In January, Guardian Unlimited Politics invited readers to nominate their favourite political blogs and vote for a shortlist. Of all the blogs proposed, only two were written by women: Lynne Featherstone's GLA and Haringey diary, and the Illinois-based Karmalised.
"I personally hate making statements about women versus men," says Wonkette, Ana Marie Cox, when I ask her why females are so under-represented in the field. "Gender essentialism is bad. I will make some grand assumptions and hope that you understand. Female political bloggers that get linked to tend to write in a more frankly personal way - sometimes even a flirtatious way. I don't know if all women bloggers do."
Many of the prominent female bloggers in the US, she adds, are right-wing - "what we call war bloggers" - women who first started to write after September 11. A number make a point of supporting US soldiers abroad and consider their blogging a fundamentally patriotic, morale-boosting exercise. That particular impulse, characteristic of US politics, was briefly mirrored by Democrats who built blogs to support the short-lived candidacy of Howard Dean.
Cox herself admits she has been criticised by other female bloggers for "talking like a sailor" on Wonkette, whose running jokes about the size of John Kerry's manhood and George Bush's camper bodily postures sit alongside searing attacks on each man's political conduct.
Yet, she says, if you look carefully, "I don't actually write about sex. People think that I'm writing about myself, but if anyone tried to find out about me they'd have a difficult job."
Clues to the Wonkette persona lie in the sketch at the top of the blog. It shows a feisty young woman in boots and spectacles stretched out on a desk next to a cat. There's a little Stars and Stripes tucked into her pencil mug. Think Maggie Gyllenhaal in Secretary crossed with Martha Gellhorn, and then add a pinch of irony.
Cox points out that many of the more popular political bloggers are established journalists. "I mean, I've been a journalist for ten years." And it's worth noting that most journalists are very good at hiding behind their copy - revealing just enough to intrigue the reader, making their point, and dashing offstage without taking questions. True, some British female columnists have become a great deal more forthcoming about their private lives over the past decade. Many, however, have not. Take Melanie Phillips, the Daily Mail columnist and blogger. Phillips does forceful, detached outrage as well as any man, and her private life is most definitely off-limits.
While you don't have to be Madame de Pompadour to win over the rest of the blogging community, an element of titillation certainly appears to help. And if, as the Electoral Commission says, women remain firmly outside the political establishment, then provocation may be the best device for getting Westminster and Washington's attention. "The good news is that women are starting to use weblogs as leverage to increase their influence," says Perrone. "I think things will change," agrees Cox. And many male MPs might well agree. Who wants to be sitting meekly in the Commons chamber, when you can be the star of the tearoom?
politics.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,9115,1214393,00.html
Women don't like joining groups; they don't like swallowing a party manifesto whole; they think there are too many men in the game, and too few women. These are plausible enough explanations. But the one that caught my eye turned up a few paragraphs down the reports, noted slightly shamefacedly: women have relatively little confidence in their ability to influence the political process.
Never mind the guff about women preferring to vote for women: this is the key finding. Unfortunately, there's no easy fix for a lack of self-belief. Even more depressingly, women's reticence is evident in the bright new playground which the fringes of Westminster are beginning to notice: that of political blogs.
Women do blog. According to a BlogCensus survey last August, just under 40% of English-language weblogs were owned by men and 36.3% by women (the rest belonged to groups, or were of unknown origin). But BlogCensus also found that nearly half the weblogs surveyed were personal diaries - and in that category, women outnumbered men by about two to one. Fewer than one in 20 of the political blogs was written by a woman.
"Disproportionate numbers of men are blogging about politics and technology," says Jane Perrone, the editor of the Guardian's weblog. "The uneven gender split is matched in the offline world."
That tallies with the latest SiteMeter blog popularity rankings in the US. Of the top 20, only one - the satirical Washington blog Wonkette - is written by a woman. Male-dominated networks and inflexible working hours have traditionally hindered the progress of female politicians. Neither affects women's ability to join in the political blogging community.
Yet very few do. In January, Guardian Unlimited Politics invited readers to nominate their favourite political blogs and vote for a shortlist. Of all the blogs proposed, only two were written by women: Lynne Featherstone's GLA and Haringey diary, and the Illinois-based Karmalised.
"I personally hate making statements about women versus men," says Wonkette, Ana Marie Cox, when I ask her why females are so under-represented in the field. "Gender essentialism is bad. I will make some grand assumptions and hope that you understand. Female political bloggers that get linked to tend to write in a more frankly personal way - sometimes even a flirtatious way. I don't know if all women bloggers do."
Many of the prominent female bloggers in the US, she adds, are right-wing - "what we call war bloggers" - women who first started to write after September 11. A number make a point of supporting US soldiers abroad and consider their blogging a fundamentally patriotic, morale-boosting exercise. That particular impulse, characteristic of US politics, was briefly mirrored by Democrats who built blogs to support the short-lived candidacy of Howard Dean.
Cox herself admits she has been criticised by other female bloggers for "talking like a sailor" on Wonkette, whose running jokes about the size of John Kerry's manhood and George Bush's camper bodily postures sit alongside searing attacks on each man's political conduct.
Yet, she says, if you look carefully, "I don't actually write about sex. People think that I'm writing about myself, but if anyone tried to find out about me they'd have a difficult job."
Clues to the Wonkette persona lie in the sketch at the top of the blog. It shows a feisty young woman in boots and spectacles stretched out on a desk next to a cat. There's a little Stars and Stripes tucked into her pencil mug. Think Maggie Gyllenhaal in Secretary crossed with Martha Gellhorn, and then add a pinch of irony.
Cox points out that many of the more popular political bloggers are established journalists. "I mean, I've been a journalist for ten years." And it's worth noting that most journalists are very good at hiding behind their copy - revealing just enough to intrigue the reader, making their point, and dashing offstage without taking questions. True, some British female columnists have become a great deal more forthcoming about their private lives over the past decade. Many, however, have not. Take Melanie Phillips, the Daily Mail columnist and blogger. Phillips does forceful, detached outrage as well as any man, and her private life is most definitely off-limits.
While you don't have to be Madame de Pompadour to win over the rest of the blogging community, an element of titillation certainly appears to help. And if, as the Electoral Commission says, women remain firmly outside the political establishment, then provocation may be the best device for getting Westminster and Washington's attention. "The good news is that women are starting to use weblogs as leverage to increase their influence," says Perrone. "I think things will change," agrees Cox. And many male MPs might well agree. Who wants to be sitting meekly in the Commons chamber, when you can be the star of the tearoom?
politics.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,9115,1214393,00.html