Real women went the way of real men. Now they are both as rare as hens teeth. What we have left is the ephemeral remains of past glories and a heavy reliance on our excuses and prevarications. We have failed miserably. We know this by the amount of sexual frustration, anger, and oneupmanship we promote as equal rights activism and the narcissistic attention we give to our sexual identities 47 odd years after the heyday of social-sexual freedom. Condi and Hillary are no more sexual decoys for democracy than Al Gore or Al Sharpton. As a man I wouldn't aspire to emulate either of the gentleman.

To Turnrightthenleft Part One.

You say:
"employing the same logic, poverty exists in the third world, so we shouldn't be at all concerned with poverty in Australia. The same goes for STDs, malnutrition, in fact, almost any health issue you care to name".

You are deliberately missing my point, which clearly was that the issues of inequality, racial & sexual abuses, outright human rights abuses by official bodies etc. are all much worse in non-western nations than they are in western nations, and that it therefore follows that we should focus proportionately more attention to the non-western problems. In fact, the problems in these countries is so much more serious than they are in western nations, that to focus any more than 5-10% of our efforts on western countries would be criminal. I did not imply that we should not focus on, or do anything about, the inequalities that still exist in western nations, but just that if one finds oneself writing articles about these problems at all, that they would obviously be focusing on the worst cases first (similar to a triage nurse).
"At present, short of all out warfare, there is little we can do about the gender issues in these nations, and as evidenced by the Iraq war, combat has the potential to bring greater misery with no guarantee of remedying such human rights abuses."

Part Two to Turnlefthenright,

In regards to this point, as I stated in my original post (I think), I totally agree. What is needed is a world wide military humanitarian intervention to get rid of all brutal dictatorships and run them ourselves, so that through force we can institute a free media, democratic elections, free and open (and unbiased) schooling, etc. To do this would require a Soviet style police state, as is evidenced with the current Iraq situation, a people that have been abused and brainwashed to hate the "other" for generations such as they have in many Muslim countries due to leaders that constantly play the race card, and blame all their economic/social problems on the Zionists and bikini clad westerners in general. To say that it is worse that the US got rid of Saddam Hussein is a joke, even though (yes) there are massive problems. Would you have said the same thing if, when the allied forces defeated the Nazis, Germany descended into civil war with brutal murder happening constantly? I wonder. What really needs to happen is that the rest of the selfish world needs to help in Iraq, Iran and elsewhere.

Lastly, I agree that gender inequalities in the West "hasn't been eliminated entirely. Men still earn consistently more than women" in many jobs. Poor white people also haven't yet had there justice. People descended from convicts are put in the same basket as the wealthier white people and asked to say sorry to the aborigines, told that they are racist, have no culture etc. when in fact this class of people have inherited a myriad of problems from their abused convict ancestors.Compared to these people and the aborigines who leftwing people are keeping down by not giving them back their agency (by not allowing kids to be taken from abusive parents), women and gays in the west are extremely well off.

It is wrong to talk about the situation in the western world, as I believe that there is ZERO discrimination against women in western societies like Australia.

No, I take that back. We do have a serious problem with it in minority communities, especially the Islamic community - where some misoginist husbands don't let their piece of 'meat' outside lest some Islamic cats get at it.

By covering women in bedsheets, Islam relegates women to nothing more than sex objects. Yet your article doesn't focus on this even once!

You're either a cultural relativist, which, if so, means your lacking in reasoning skills - as all cultures are NOT equal, or ignorant.

Despite desperate attempts by the leftist nutters who dominate our education institutions, we all know that western values are totally superior to those of tribal cultures.

This article should have focused on this, not western women. Non-whites are people too, you know. We need to confront the barbarism of Islam, to free women, half a billion in fact.

This is a worthy goal, this will help women, this will do good in the third world.

People shouldn't be afraid of this, I mean, I know you risk getting killed (which just goes to show how vile many Muslims are for such cowards to crop up so often in their communities - Theo van Gogh for starters, not to mention the hundreds of writers in the Muslim world.

They need our support, as does Hirsi Ali. One notices ALL the Muslim 'moderates' not supporting her - which says everything for a start that there are NO moderates - and is ALL THE MORE REASON WRITERS NEED TO EXPOSED THE UTTER BARBARITY OF MUSLIM VALUES WHEN IT COMES TO WOMEN.

Congratulations Benjamin, on managing to turn a discussion on the gender politics surrounding two major United States political figures, into a gratuitous polemic against Islam.

You have won this week's "Boaz_David Islamophobia for Dummies" trophy.

It is awarded to the poster who achieves the topic-switch with the least evidence of shame or self-awareness, and the maximum of blatant, brazen non-sequitur.

You did lose marks for the total absence of glowing Bible stories, and the frankly disturbing omission of a tirade of abuse aimed at carefully selected quotes from the Qur'an.

Your careful use of capital letters for your key points, however, easily made up for these shortcomings.

It is a beautiful trophy, suitable for installing on your mantlepiece at home, or attaching to your lapel when you front the RSL for your weekly prawn dinner.

Wear it with pride. It is a really lovely shade of yellow.

Some of the sparks generated, by this article’s attempt to weave a plausible thread about feminist activism around Condoleeza and Hilary’s place in it, need a dose of perspective.

Emancipation for many women in Australia is far from ideal. The most glaring example is Brian Harradine’s heavy political hand - which had been clasping, uninvited, their genitalia for many years. Our Health Minister Tony Abbott’s political hand is now in that position.

Then, to say that Australian women’s emancipation is so advanced in relation to less developed countries as to be a non-issue, is a gross misrepresentation of the situation. It sidelines the fact that Harradine’s influence extended to those countries as well. This same influence continues through our present Government.

The result of such influence is a near-cessation of overseas aid that Australia had initially agreed to provide for women’s health and well-being. This cessation has impacted negatively on their, and their society’s, problems such as transmission of sexual diseases; social impediments; and general health.
Without assistance to say no to unwanted fertility, women there become the beasts of burden for expansion of populations to the stage where food production is compromised. In many communities a bare minimum of food from the depleted soils can be obtained only through Cassava, a plant of South American origin. In parts of Africa it provides for 80% of their meals – all laced with Hydrogen Cyanide. The food is processed insufficiently to mitigate against serious medical afflictions from the cyanide; but without it they starve.

The article itself is no more than a fart in the windstorm of expansion of human numbers. Gender issues are a fundamentally important part in addressing that storm. But, whether or not Condy or Hilary are being “Uncle Toms” in the issue of male domination is hardly worth a brass razoo.