I don’t know how old Ms O’Brien is or how much TV history she has studied in her BA in Communication. However, this has all been said and done before – and many times over.

Every so often, a series or series trend comes around, which breaks out of the TV comfort zone of women as newsreaders, lifestyle (aka weight loss gizmo) presenters, panel padding (you know ... the token female who is mainly there to laugh at all the men's jokes) or UST stooges.

In these 'groundbreaking' series, women are either the rare creative force or are featured on-camera in intelligent roles where they might actually talk to one another about something other than attracting a man.

The series/trend then receives lots and lots of media coverage of the ‘oh-look-a- strong-female-role-model’ kind. Then comes the inevitable backlash.

It happens from without – lots of ‘has-the-pendulum-gone-too-far’ and ‘are-men-losing-out’ stories in the media. And it happens from within – TV executives and advertising directors declaring that viewers are ‘just not interested’ in strong women kicking intelligent butt, despite poll after poll revealing otherwise. The series either gets pulled, banished to an unwatchable timeslot or sanitized for patriarchal consumption.

The list is as long as it is tragic – Cagney and Lacey (destroyed by stealth despite a swag of Emmys), the Golden Girls, Roseanne (most hated woman in America) Barr, Murphy Brown, Designing Women. Others – like The X-files and Moonlighting – start off with intelligent, feisty secondary female characters, only to gradually disempower them as the series unfolds.

At least the US has tried several times and failed. Britain and Australia barely even bother. Kath and Kim was a rarity and the talented Linda La Plante forged her success on the solid formula of female mutilation-murder.

It will be interesting to see if Oprah and Whoopi are able to keep their considerable amount of money where their mouths are ... or whether they will bow out gracefully when the media inevitably turns against them and/or their executive producers suggest that ‘viewers don’t want’ to hear minority women talking politics anymore

What has changed in the decades since I was a teenager.

Very little.

Pretty girls in magazines, feminists complaining about body image.

Probably will be the same in another 30 years.

There have been a few intellectual role models for women in Geraldine Doogue, Caroline Jones and Jenny Brockie just to name three - the real problem is in magazines and on catwalks within the fashion industry.

Advertising standards have slipped. 'Slim' is no longer a healthy curvy girl in the likes of Marilyn Monroe who was a size 14 (I believe). The anorexic waif-like image has become the standard for some in the fasion and advertising industry. There has also been an increase in boys affected by anorexia in an attempt to conform to a distorted 'social' idea of beauty.

On one hand we have the problem of anorexia and on the other of childhood obesity.

The real issue is what to do about it? It looks like the big end of town is not too concerned with the social issues, whether it be junk food or fashion, so maybe some government intervention in this case is required for the collective health of our youth.

One day we will be smart enough to work out that our problems are just as much spiritual as natural. The more spiritually dead we are the more emphasis we put on external things. An acceptance of secularism and evolution (both flawed philosophies) has led us to a place where the external looks of someone is far more important than character. Unfortunately flawed feminism champions the right for women to dress seductively and then screams the loudest when women are measured by the shape of their body. The winners of course are men who have plenty of women who are keen to prove themselves and then the Counselors who get paid big bucks to try and mend emotional wrecks.

It seems we have one brand of women trying to dress and look like men while another brand dressing as seductively as they can. Parents can solve a lot of pain by allowing girls to be girls and boys to be boys. They can teach their children to dress modestly and to grow into the man or woman they were created to be rather than the slut or stud they see on TV.

This is a tired old discussion, isn't it. As a feminist I don't know which I despair of more - men who blame women for everything or women who blame men for everything. Then, of course there're the women who blame women for being feminist instead of good little feminine girls.
we don't live in utopia unfortunately, and I feel this thread could go on until 3008.I think we should all stop hammering the same old stuff if there are no genuinely new ideas to add to the genuinely old ideas.
This reminds me of that feeling when you see the news headlines,with the predictable annual articles about school fees being too high, schools banning some game because it's too rough, insufficient childcare places, and health alerts telling us (shock, horror) that there is a growing problem in Australia about obesity, etc etc. Let's talk about things we haven't already talked about ad nauseum.
I totally agree that there are a lot of inequities in patriarchal perceptions of female gender issues. But think up some new ideas about addressing it rather than observing that they exist. I think most people male or female know that pretty well already. Those who don't never will!

hocuspocus

All discussions are tired old discussions. There is nothing new under the sun, it has all been done before - the real issue is that we never learn from history. Obesity/anorexia might be the newest health problems but the approaches won't be new or innovative.

Part of the issue is that a lot comes down to personal responsibility as far as adults are concerned. Children are a bit different in that they are still blooming flowers (so to speak) who are still developing and maturing and much more succeptible to social pressures.

The discussion will always be the same - those advocating for some government intervention and those for complete freedom to the private sector and some with shades of grey in-between.