Free Republic

Last spring, I told you that Jenna Lyons, J. Crew’s president and creative director, wasn’t just having a little, harmless fun with her son Beckett when she published a photograph of herself painting his toenails hot pink in a J. Crew catalogue—a catalogue distributed to millions of people. The quote accompanying the image of Beckett read, “Lucky for me, I ended up with a boy whose favorite color is pink. Toenail painting is way more fun in neon.” I said Lyons was making a cultural statement about masculinity no longer being important to boys—that she was, essentially, uncomfortable with his...

Modern women balk at any suggestion that men should be able to tell women how to behave. Many believe that a woman should be able to do whatever she likes without worrying “what women are supposed to do.” When feminists talk to men, they pretend to offer the same sort of freedom from social expectations attached to one’s sex. But this talk of freedom is always a lie. This new, “free” model of manhood approved by feminists must, after all, serve the interests of feminism. Many traditionally masculine behaviors and ideas are clearly “off limits.” So, while the new woman...

A retired space cowboy takes on a neutered age. If you’re a man of a certain age, it’s impossible not to harbor affection for actor Dirk Benedict. While he is a veteran of a number of serious films and impressive stage productions, he’s best known for two roles — Lt. Starbuck, the roguish, cigar-chomping space cowboy always ready with a quip on the original Battlestar Galactica; and Lt. Templeton “Faceman” Peck on The A-Team — not coincidentally, a roguish, quip-ready soldier-of-fortune who had one arm wrapped around the waist of a different babe every week. Neither show lasted very long,...

All Michael Buday wanted to do was take the last name of his wife, Diana Bijon, when they married. But it took two years, a lawsuit alleging sex discrimination and a change in California law before he picked up his new drivers license in the name of Michael Bijon on Monday. "It was personal. I feel much closer to (Diana's) father than I do mine. She asked me to take her name and I thought it would be very simple. I never imagined the state would make it so difficult," Michael Bijon, 31, told reporters. He discovered it would take...

Global Warming: Moving Towards Metrosexuals -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The latest point of emphasis in the global warming movement is that cattle farming endangers the planet by producing too much methane. So now, steaks and hamburgers are classified as instruments of destruction, along with large vehicles, lawn mowers, and charcoal grills. It can't be much longer before cowboy movies, cigars and hockey are held to be enemies of the earth as well. This has got to be the most blatant assault on guyhood since ABC moved Coach to the same night as Roseanne, and turned Hayden Fox into Phil Donahue. It's a wonder...

More Men Report Sexual Harassment at Work Robert DiGiacomo, for Yahoo! HotJobs Defying assumptions about sexual harassment in the workplace, a record number of men reported being harassed by male colleagues last year, according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Cases filed by men made up 15.4 percent of the 12,025 sexual harassment charges in fiscal year 2006, compared to about 11 percent a decade ago, according to the EEOC. New Realities in the Workplace "There's no question this is not only a growing category of claims, but also a large societal problem of which we are just starting to...

In the name of the fatherhttp://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/opinion.cfm?id=1033732006 http://tinyurl.com/ozefu DANI GARAVELLI Sun 16 Jul 2006 ONCE upon a time, I believed it didn't matter a whit whether a baby was born into a family with one parent or two. Or with two mothers or two fathers rather than a mother and a father. Why should it? What was important was not the number or gender of the parents, but whether or not they were loving and attentive. That was, of course, before I had any of my own. Now I realise that bringing up children is a challenge even for two well-meaning...

Alex Rider: the proof that boys should be boyshttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,923-2269130,00.html http://tinyurl.com/m5dsl The Times July 15, 2006 As Stormbreaker, the first film about children’s favourite junior spy, opens in cinemas, Amanda Craig talks to his creator, Anthony Horowitz, about adventures, kissing and growing up “I STILL REMEMBER THE tremendous exuberance of being a boy,” Anthony Horowitz, the creator of Alex Rider, says. “It has an almost abstract quality that you can’t create by artificial means.” I reflect on this as I walk round my local park every morning and see my son slay an entire Roman legion with a sword, track rabbits...

In the leak scandal that led to five indictments for a top-level White House official, reports this week cite that former US Central Intelligence Agency employee Valerie Plame was allegedly following Iran's nuclear activities before her identity was revealed. Democrat Party Senator Frank Lautenberg, in a letter to CIA Director Porter Goss, asked for an evaluation of the harm outing Plame has caused. In the letter, the Senator reminds Director Goss of recent news stories which report that before Plame was outed, she participated in intelligence works on the Iranian nuclear dossier, and her subsequent outing gravely jeopardized the US’...

A billy goat did some rough, instant justice to the President when his motorcade stopped to refuel en-route to the eastern resorts of Nyanga. The president, popularly known as Bob got out to stretch his legs, and speak to a couple locals. He was holding a bottle of water, when a Billy goat developed a profound interest and chose to pursue it. Whilst Bob swung the bottle at the goat, it quickly and sharply pierced Bob's scrotum, and large bowel.

So I have been trying to rent an apartment in my home...and all I have answering the ads are boyfriends and girlfriends. No matter what social status, no matter what income level, I am seeing unmarried twenty, thirty and forty year old couples who want to live together. If I question them, they don't even understand why I am asking. These are Christians and Jews. I was so surprised to find that it would be so difficult to find a young married couple. Tell me Dear Freeper...am I totally out of the ballgame to expect to find a young married...

PROVO - There is a new coffee shop in town, but it's no Starbucks. The entry is framed with little white Christmas lights, there are half-a-dozen couches to go along with a few tables, and the walls are yellow, red, green and purple. Opposite a faux-brick wall there is a wall dedicated to nonsense. "Girls are like ladders," one customer wrote. Another scribbled: "I love yellow people." It's all the same to owner Christin Johnson. She's just happy the people who jotted down the messages wanted to stick around in her Vermillion Skies De-cafe and Lounge long enough to pen...

The Bolton delay: Self-emasculated GOP Sunday, April 24, 2005 Democrats think John Bolton shouldn't be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations; he's a snarling grizzly when people cross him. We think that's the ideal qualification for working in that vertical swamp at Turtle Bay. But Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee were blindsided by Sen. George V. Voinovich of Ohio. Jelly-bellied, he said he would not vote for Mr. Bolton because he might not be a nice man. That would have produced a 9-9 tie. The vote is delayed until May 12; other Republicans began expressing misgivings about Bolton....

66 PEDOPHILES STAND TRIAL – BIGGEST CASE EVER IN FRANCE In the French City of Angers an exceptional pedophile trial starts today. Exceptional due to the high number of defendants: 66 adults from a marginal area in Angers. They are accused of having molested 45 young children (often their own). But also exceptional because of the atrocities the victims suffered (a mother let rape her 10 year old son for a new tire); 39 different persons raped a girl the same age. The youngest molested child was 6 months, the oldest 14 years. The boys and girls were videotaped during...

Feb 5, 2005 Guys in US are taking up knitting CHICAGO - ERIC Garcia and Matthew Kane are holed up in a classroom corner, chatting casually as they each knit a sock for a school project. They ponder the thought that their actions might be a little, well, unexpected. 'Girls can be truckers,' said 11-year-old Eric. 'Yeah, girls can be truckers,' echoed Matthew, who's also 11. 'So why can't guys be knitters?' A lot of guys are taking up knitting today, especially as the hobby surges in popularity on college campuses, in coffee shops and at the many yarn stores...