Jessica Bennett

It may be a man's world, but in the new millennium, it's the women who are controlling the wallets. Yet mainstream retailers continue to largely ignore female consumers.

When historians write about the great recession of 2007–08, they may very well have a new name for it: the Mancession. It's a term already being bandied about in the popular media as business writers chronicle the sad tales of the main victims of the recession: men.

Fat kids stuck at fat camp may be "the heart of America," as 'Huge' star Nikki Blonsky has put it, but just because the show is the only nonreality series featuring actual fat people, don't expect it to empower the big-boned.

It's worth a laugh, but if you think the unenlightened will learn anything about "real" mainstream lesbian life from "The Real L Word," think again.

Politico tackles Sunday talk shows' gender disparity. But just so we don't let the media get away squeaky-clean, a quick rundown of exactly how bad we're all doing when it comes to showcasing women.

Sure, some weddings are fun—but too often they're a formulaic, overpriced, fraught rite of passage, marking entry into an institution that sociologists describe as "broken." Should smart women say "I don't"?

We get it: girl-on-girl Frenching is, like, so superhot. But can we say enough already with the faux lesbianism?

It's the story the TV press just can't wait to eat up: curvy, attractive brunette, single mom, fired from Citibank because her bosses "couldn't concentrate" around her—she was simply too hot.

It may begin with a big, fabulous, gay wedding, but SATC 2 is more 1950s gender roles than lipstick-and-Manolos feminism.

Tied up in the assessment of style, writes the Washington Post, is the awkward, fumbling attempt to suss out who a person is." It's true--but in Kagan's case, Robin Givhan's attempt is just plain offensive.

Though Yeardley Love never filed a restraining order against him, it's clear that George Huguely, charged with first-degree murder in his former girlfriend's death, had a violent past.

President Obama's Supreme Court shortlist may be packed with women, but on Capitol Hill, as in business, and media, the second sex still struggles to obtain elite staff positions.

In honor of equal pay day, 12 sobering figures about men, women, and work.

For the Catsouras family, the fight to get images of their daughter's death off the web has been an ongoing battle. But legal victories are inching them closer.

New research shows that women who are made to feel jealous can't spot targets on a computer screen. In other words, jealousy is (literally) blinding.

The teen birthrate in the United States may be down 2 percent, but Americans still have the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the industrialized world—and Bristol Palin, apparently, is trying to do something about it.

A November ballot initiative could make California the first state in the nation to legalize marijuana. Hadn't they done that already? Not quite.

For all the talk about feminism as passe, mine wasn't a generation that rejected it for its militant, man-hating connotation—but because of its success. Women were equal—duh—so why did we need feminism?

In 1970, 46 women filed a landmark gender-discrimination case against NEWSWEEK. Forty years later, their contemporary counterparts question how much has actually changed.

It seems an ever-more common scenario: a death is captured in a photograph or video. The images are uploaded onto the Web. Within days, thousands, if not millions, of strangers have pierced their way into a family's grief—gawking at the final moments of a life that were never meant to be public.

On the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day, some sobering news: workplace equality is still a myth.

When grisly images of their daughter's death went viral on the Web, the Catsouras family fought back. Two years later, a court rules in their favor.

 

They call themselves 'preppers.' They are regular people with homes and families. But like the survivalists that came before them, they're preparing for the worst.

A woman in her mid-30s needed a job—and fast. So she turned to the Web, started a business, and hit a wall. "I was having a hard time landing jobs," she says. So the woman did what many female writers have often wondered about: she changed her name.

Best known for his 1995 rap album, Gangsta's Paradise, Compton-born rapper Coolio has a new cookbook that will teach you how to pimp your skills.

More than 100 million Americans have smoked pot. Thirteen states have medical marijuana laws on the books, and a dozen more are considering legislation. Studies have shown that the substance can stimulate appetite, ease muscle spasms and numb pain.

A nine-block section of downtown Oakland, Calif., has become a modern marijuana mecca—and a model for what a legalized-drug America could look like. Why the stars are aligning for the pro-weed movement.

What turns women on has long been an elusive question. The authors of a new book hope that understanding why women have sex in the first place could go a long way toward answering it.

It's easy to look at today's women and think we've come a long way. But ribbons and medals don't translate to the real world if women are too afraid to ask for what they deserve.