Tag Archives: feminism

Megan Amram brings the sadlaughs on women and science

by GenaWatkins Posted on August 3, 2015

she went to Harvard

Megan Amram brings the sadlaughs on women and science

By on 3 Aug 2015commentsShare

Comedian, author, and self-advertised Harvard graduate Megan Amram is at it again — on her quest to bring science to us hot hobos, also known as women, she is launching a video series on “sexy science.” In the first episode of Experimenting with Megan Amram, Amram builds a (biological) potato clock and, more saliently, interviews engineer and Caltech aeronautics professor Beverley McKeon. Topics include: What’s it like to be the first female director of the Graduate Aerospace Laboratories at the California Institute of Technology? and, Do they have Miami in England? What about Beyoncé?

The bigger question in all this is: Is something like fluid dynamics easier for women to understand when framed as a discussion on air-drying your nails? Probably not! If anything, Amram’s antics draw attention to the clarity and confidence of her expert guest, and serve as a refutation of the perniciously prevalent idea that women can’t understand science and are really just around to look good.

Source:
SERIES PREMIERE: EXPERIMENTING WITH MEGAN AMRAM

, Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls.

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Megan Amram brings the sadlaughs on women and science

Posted in alo, Anchor, Everyone, FF, G & F, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Radius, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Megan Amram brings the sadlaughs on women and science

No, really, your birth control is supposed to be free now

by StewartDiehl Posted on May 11, 2015

put a (nuva) ring on it

No, really, your birth control is supposed to be free now

By on 11 May 2015commentsShare

For National Women’s Health Week, we’ll be highlighting women’s health issues in the United States.

Let’s play an American history game: Where Were You when you realized that the Affordable Care Act really, actually meant that you wouldn’t have to pay a copay for your birth control?

For me, it was a Walgreens on the north end of Seattle in February 2014, staring dumbfoundedly at a pharmacist who assured me that no, really, there was no charge for those pills.

This was a very happy moment, but one that not all privately insured, contraception-using women have had yet — which is really not OK. So new White House regulations, just issued today, will firmly remind health insurers that, yes, they are required to provide birth control to women at no cost.

Why is this reminder necessary? Vox reports:

Two recent investigations — one by the Kaiser Family Foundation and another by the National Women’s Law Center — found that not all insurance plans were abiding by these rules.

Some insurers seemed to blatantly disregard the Obamacare mandate. The KFF study — which looked at a sample of 20 insurers in five states — found one that simply didn’t cover the birth control ring and four that “couldn’t ascertain” whether they covered birth control implants. These are potential violations of the law.

This is really not complicated: Provide free, easy-to-get birth control, and women’s lives will universally improve. Fail to do so, and life becomes an Amy Schumer sketch — but way less fun. The birth control mandate of the Affordable Care Act has already had real, positive effects on women’s access to contraception. The percentages of privately insured women who have had no copays on their birth control have increased dramatically — in the case of birth control pills, for example, from 15 percent to 67 percent.

Basically, insurance companies, like surly teens, just need to be constantly reminded of what they’re supposed to do. If yours isn’t cooperating, call it every day until it does — or, alternatively, until it lashes out and gets a small, regrettable ankle tattoo.

Source:
The White House just got aggressive enforcing Obamacare’s birth control mandate

, Vox.

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No, really, your birth control is supposed to be free now

Posted in Anchor, FF, GE, LG, Mop, ONA, organic, Radius, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on No, really, your birth control is supposed to be free now

LEGO Reveals a Female Scientist Minifigure

by nowabazaBS1 Posted on September 3, 2013

Image: LEGO

It is the summer of lady scientist toys, it seems. Just a few weeks ago Barbie released their “Mars Explorer” doll. And today LEGO unleashed their female scientist block figurine.

Maia Weinstock was there for the release of the toy. She writes, at Scientific American’s Guest Blog:

Today is release day for Minifigure Series 11, and I am here for the Scientist.

Finding her will take a bit of doing, but I’ve done my homework. Each of the Kelly green pouches looks the same, so most customers will simply grope the bags and try to guess which fig lurks inside. Thanks to advanced scouting from fellow adult fans of LEGO, however, I know precisely what to feel for—two tiny Erlenmeyer flasks—as well as what hidden code to look for on the backs of the packages.

Weinstock hits gold on her first bag, unveiling the tiny block lady holding two little flasks and boasting a sly grin. This isn’t the first time LEGO has made a scientist, but often they’re steeped in “nerdy male mad scientist” imagery. There is actually a “Crazy Scientist” with the wild hair. The Computer Programmer dude actually has broken glasses. Very few of them have been women. Weinstock writes:

One collectible minifig is a surgeon, complete with mask, syringe, and X-ray slide. If you consider wild animal care a branch of science, then you can include the Zookeeper among LEGO’s STEM professionals. Several generic female “scientists” were also released as part of the FIRST LEGO League, but they and their male partners were scientists in name only; their clothes had no markings, nor did they carry any scientific instruments.

Lego describes the Scientist this way:

I wonder what will happen if I put THIS together with THAT…”

The brilliant Scientist’s specialty is finding new and interesting ways to combine things together. She’ll spend all night in her lab analyzing how to connect bricks of different sizes and shapes (she won the coveted Nobrick Prize for her discovery of the theoretical System/DUPLO® Interface!), or how to mix two colors in one element.

Thanks to the Scientist’s tireless research, Minifigures that have misplaced their legs can now attach new pieces to let them swim like fish, slither like snakes, and stomp around like robots. Her studies of a certain outer dimension have even perfected a method for swapping body parts at will!

Weinstock hopes there will be more women figurines with more specific specialties, but so far Lego is doing better than Mattel, which sent Mars Explorer Barbie to space in a pink space suit without gloves.

More from Smithsonian.com:

Celebrating 80 Years of LEGO
Lego Faces Are Getting Angrier

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LEGO Reveals a Female Scientist Minifigure

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