"I Will Not Be Afraid of Women"

This is one of my favorite Dar Williams songs, so they had me at hello. The statistics here are solid, so what do they tell us?

'Skins,' Who Wins?

MTV has a provocative new drama about teenagers doing drugs, having sex, and abusing themselves--and each other--to the point of no return. I haven't seen it, but perhaps others have. Advertisers are scared, so it looks as if the show might be canceled.

David Carr discusses it in a NY Times column:

Now that MTV is back on its heels, you will hear arguments that “Skins” merely describes the world that we already live in. There’s something to that. MTV didn’t invent “friends with benefits,” oral sex as the new kiss or stripper chic as a teenage fashion aspiration.

This argument is common among people in the media industry who disavow responsibility for what they show, but I'm not so sure MTV didn't help create these trends. And the network definitely reinforces them ... right?

A lot of news coverage has focused on whether "Skins" amounts to child pornography, but here Ms. Magazine addresses sexism on the show, which has gotten very little attention. What do you think?

"To Protect Young Shoppers" ... From What?

From Shakesville ...