the gender card

Clippings: Steinem on Hillary

Submitted by jessie

Gloria Steinem's NYT column, "Women Are Never Front-Runners" completely blew me away. No matter what your political background I recommend her fresh analysis of the coverage of Obama and Clinton and the role of gender in this election. As Steinem writes,

... what worries me is that he is seen as unifying by his race while she is seen as divisive by her sex. What worries me is that she is accused of “playing the gender card” when citing the old boys’ club, while he is seen as unifying by citing civil rights confrontations. What worries me is that male Iowa voters were seen as gender-free when supporting their own, while female voters were seen as biased if they did and disloyal if they didn’t.

Topic: Women and Law in the Media
Optional tags: the gender card, politics, Ms. JD clippings, Hillary Clinton, Gloria Steinem

I am well aware of my female-ness

Submitted by Peg

I have an interesting story from my interview experience when I was a 2L looking for a summer associate job. I went on call-backs to many, many large firms in the city I was interested in. About half way through the “season” of callbacks I had a great set of interviews at a mid-sized office of a very large international firm. The day went very well and for the only time in the season, the office chair offered me a job on the spot.

I was impressed. I felt like this was a good indicator that they really wanted me to work there and, given how every large firm seems to look and feel pretty much the same, this was an instant boost for this particular firm in my eyes.

However, he followed up the offer sentence with something that went like this, “You’ve probably noticed that we only have one woman attorney in this office. I want you to know that we are trying to fix that.”

Topic: Sexism, Sexual Harassment, and Other Forms of Discrimination
Optional tags: the gender card

Playing "the gender card" in the courtroom

Submitted by Carol Simpson

This past week I attended court for the first time in my three years in law school. Actually attending a real court has not been part of any of my courses to date, so this was an event that was particularly interesting. I was attending an evidentiary hearing in federal court, after having written the analysis of an important change of facts in the case. The hearing was before a female judge, and both the plaintiffs’ attorneys are female, as well. When the defendant’s attorneys arrived, there were two men and one woman. It was obvious that their plan was to have the woman speak for the group. It was also obvious that she was the less-experienced attorney of the team, and her male colleagues essentially fed her arguments as the hearing progressed. While every young attorney must have her first chance at first chair, I couldn’t help but wonder if this strategy was playing “the gender card.”