Get out of your own way please

Have you heard? Apparently institutional sexism, gender stereotyping, and social pressure NO LONGER MATTER! WHEEEEEEEEE! Glass ceilings only exist because we obey them! USA! HOPE! CHANGE! WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! ::spins frantically and falls down::

According to Rachel Simmons, author of a new book about how oppression is totes the fault of the oppressed, we ladies are just "pressuring ourselves" to fit the mold of "good girl." The article writer PROVE IT with her RIVETING ANECDOTES!

The book's author and the article writer almost get it, but then back right down. Girls and women face particular pressures that are contradictory, so its our fault that we don't succeed? WHAT? To a point, yes, we all have to take a certain amount of responsibility for the choices we make in our lives, but if we brush off the pressures of society and how that influences our choices and the consequences of those choices then we are not actually going to see a change in the structures that continue these situations.

There was also the delicious irony of the ads on the page while I was reading the article. Particularly the Accuquote life insurance ad:



(If you can't see/read it, the ad is a picture of a little girl, bent over a grave that says "FATHER" on it, and the copy reads: "If you died today, who would take care of your family?")

The irony is almost enough to make my head explode.