Give Me That Old-Time Feminism

Barbara Ehrenreich can get a bit feisty. Having written a blurb for Katha Pollitt's book Virginity or Death! And Other Social and Political Issues of Our Times, she defends the author when she is criticized by blogger Ana Marie Cox for complaining about "pink-ectomy" -- women having their little toes amputated so they can squeeze into stilettos. Ehrenreich sees this as part of the latest wave of post-feminism. Women are not faring well in the world these days. In America, the war against their reproductive rights continues, and in various Islamic countries where fundamentalists are in power, women are degraded and persecuted -- insufficiently covered women in the streets of Somalia are attacked, and in some regions of Indonesia those lacking head scarves or wearing cosmetics are arrested for prostitution.