By Angela Hayden

Where do you think you are? In America? Some men believe its a pain in the ass for women to want equal rights. Hell, my mama raised five kids on her own after my drunken, abusive father left. He broke her nose twice and nearly killed me. She didn't have time to think about being a feminist. She was just a poor woman trying to survive in our society.

Working people face these issues every day. But all too often, women especially don’t have the resources or support to help meet these challenges.

Working America and the AFL-CIO are conducting a nationwide survey on what it's like to be a working woman. If you’re a working woman, your opinion matters greatly. Please take a moment to complete the Ask a Working Woman survey and share your thoughts and experiences.

It's no secret that feminists are on both sides of the fence in the Democratic primary.

Despite the media stereotype of a vast leftwing feminist conspiracy made up of goose-stepping fembots, the actual women's equality movement is very diverse. Being the independent-minded people that we are, feminists tend to resist being forced to toe a party line.

Ellen Bravo wrote this article which was posted on the AFL-CIO blog. She is former director of 9to5, National Association of Working Women and author of Taking on the Big Boys: Or Why Feminism Is Good for Families, Business and the Nation.

Congratulations, working women! As of today, your salary since January 1, 2007, has finally reached the total earned by your male colleagues in 2007 alone. What’s more, this pay gap is all your fault!

According to the media, the problem is that women just don’t ask. If we learned to speak up in salary negotiations, pay equity would be a hard fact.

Anyone who has ever had a conversation with a know-it-all knows how flustering and frustrating that can be. But somehow, the know-it-all man comes equipped his own special brand of arrogance and aggravation.

In her blog post entitled "Men Explain Things to Me" over at AlterNet , Rebecca Solnit relates her experiences with men who hold forth with great authority on subjects that they know nothing about.

Feministing.com is a bold brash feminist blog site where many women and some men start their day by reading the articles and opinion pieces and then posting their comments.

The youngish organizers of Feministing represent a generation of women who are fighting the complex 21st century battle for gender equality. They are web-savvy, very smart and refreshingly outspoken.

Now they are trying to create network of likeminded groups through an online initiative called the Feministing Alliance.

As part of its Women's History Month celebration the Chicago History Museum will feature a program on March 6th called "Women On The Move: We Can Do It!" Among the presenters will be Suzanne Davenport of the CWLU Herstory Project . Suzanne was active in the Chicago Women's Liberation Union and has been a film maker and educational reformer.

Faculty from nine universities and colleges will hold the largest ever conference on black and Latina/o sexuality on April 11-12 at the University of Illinois at Chicago. "Race, Sex, Power: New Movements in Black and Latina/o Sexualities," the culmination of more than two years of planning, will bring together academics, activists, and artists to address topics ranging from intimacy and desire to HIV/AIDS and teen pregnancy to humor and Hip Hop. 

Organizer Cathy Cohen, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, calls the conference "a bold effort to rethink what sexuality means for the two largest racial minorities in the US." Dr. Jocelyn Elders, the former United States Surgeon General appointed by President Clinton, will open the conference on Friday morning, April 11.

When did feminism become the "F" word in todays modern world? Film maker Therese Schecter tries to answer that question in her movie, 'I was a Teenage Feminist". Armed with interviews and music by Ani DiFranco, Gina Young, Moxie Starpark and Helen Reddy, the film has earned great reviews from Bitch Magazine, Yahoo Movies, Educational Media Review and our good friend Paula Kamen.

To view the entire film online, please visit Free Speech TV. For more info on how to purchase the film or to arrange a showing, please visit Trixie Films.

You can watch a preview clip below:

The Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls is a place where 8-18 year olds come from all over the country to learn Rock DIY-style--forming bands, writing songs and building community, and “Girls Rock !” is the movie about their journey.

Film makers Arne Johnson and Shane King  have put together a story that focuses on 4 girls  at the camp learning how to be the people they really are as they make a whole lot of joyful noise.

The film opens in Chicago at the Music Box Theater at 3733 North Southport.

Join the National Organization for Women Foundation, National Council of Negro Women, and the Institute for Women's Policy Research for the 2008 Summit on Economic Justice for Women, April 11-12 in Atlanta, Georgia. The summit is dedicated to "Bringing Together Research and Advocacy--from Local to Global--to Advance Economic Justice and Empowerment for Women"

Don't miss the reduced early registration fee. Make your plans now to join with grassroots activists, researchers, and academics to address the critical economic issues facing women in the U.S. and abroad.

Some of you may remember when the Herstory Project was contacted about being on the ABC TV show Wife Swap, when moms get to change families. They wanted a "feminist" and we politely ignored them.

Well apparently they found their feminist if the season premiere is any indication. For the terminally curious, you can see a preview here. It's feminist mom vrs. spoiled teenage beauty pageant princess.

Oh joy. 

I'm reminded of what Gandhi once said about Western Civilization,"I think it would be a good idea."

Beyondmedia Education is embroiled in a censorship battle with Chicago Public Television station WTTW over their refusal to air the documentary Turning a Corner. This video recently won the Chicago Reporter’s John A. McDermott Documentary (short) Film Competition. As part of the award, Turning a Corner was to be screened on WTTW’s Image Union program. The station is refusing to air the video, citing its sensitive subject matter.

Turning a Corner tells the personal stories of women formerly involved in the sex trade in Chicago – through their own voices – and follows their efforts to raise public awareness and promote legislative reforms.

If you are working in the fields of human trafficking, HIV/AIDS, and water sustainablity, PulseWire welcomes you to their founding online community.

Here, any woman with access to a basic computer, and eventually a cell phone, can speak her truth, ask for what she needs and share her solutions through pictures, audio, video and the written word.

Please visit Pulsewire to learn more.

Paula Kamen's bio of writer Iris Chang is due in the bookstores on October 22. Iris Chang committed suicide in November 2004 after a long battle with depression.

Iris Chang's best known book was The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II. The book tells the story of the infamous 1937-1938 Nanking massacre which took place during the Sino-Japanese War.

For the past 17 years, students at the University of Maryland have participated in a rape awareness program where victims and advocates against sexual violence hang T-shirts along a huge clothesline on campus. Some victims also write the names of their assailants on their shirts.

Adam Ayd sent us this essay that he wrote for a school assignment back in 1995. Please feel free to comment, but to be fair, make sure you read it all the way to the end.