FEMALE MARINES SUCCEED WHERE MALES CANNOT IN AFGHANISTAN

Asia Pacific

In Camouflage or Afghan Veil, a Fragile Bond

Lynsey Addario for The New York Times

Cpl. Lisa Gardner is part of a team of female Marines that aims to win over Afghan women. In Lakari village this month she helped diagnose women’s ailments. More Photos »

By ELISABETH BUMILLER

Published: May 29, 2010

• E-Mail
• Print
• Reprints

ABDUL GHAYAS, Afghanistan — Two young female Marines trudged along with an infantry patrol in the 102-degree heat, soaked through their camouflage uniforms under 60 pounds of gear. But only when they reached this speck of a village in the Taliban heartland on a recent afternoon did their hard work begin.

Notes from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq and other areas of conflict in the post-9/11 era.

Go to the Blog »

Multimedia

Slide Show

Reaching Out to Afghan Women

Related

• At War Blog: Redefining Gender Roles in Combat (May 29, 2010)

• Letting Women Reach Women in Afghan War (March 7, 2010)

For two hours inside a mud-walled compound, the Marines, Cpl. Diana Amaya, 23, and Cpl. Lisa Gardner, 28, set aside their rifles and body armor and tried to connect with four nervous Afghan women wearing veils. Over multiple cups of tea, the Americans made small talk through a military interpreter or in their own beginner’s Pashtu. Then they encouraged the Afghans, who by now had shyly uncovered their faces, to sew handicrafts that could be sold at a local bazaar.

“We just need a couple of strong women,” Corporal Amaya said, in hopes of enlisting them to bring a measure of local commerce to the perilous world outside their door.

Corporal Amaya’s words could also describe her own daunting mission, part of a program intended to help improve the prospects for the United States in Afghanistan — and also, perhaps, to redefine gender roles in combat.

Three months ago, Corporal Amaya was one of 40 female Marines training at Camp Pendleton , Calif., in an edgy experiment: sending full-time “female engagement teams” to accompany all-male foot patrols in Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan to win over the Afghan women who are culturally off limits to American men. Enthusiasm reigned. “We know we can make a difference,” Capt. Emily Naslund, 27, the team’s executive officer, said then in an interview.

Now, just weeks into a seven-month deployment that has sent them in twos and threes to 16 outposts across Helmand, including Marja and other spots where fighting continues, the women have met with inevitable hurdles — not only posed by Afghan women but also by some male Marines and American commanders skeptical about the teams’ purpose.

The women are taking it in stride. “If it were easy, it wouldn’t be interesting,” Captain Naslund said.

No one disagrees that the teams have potential and that female Marines are desperately needed, especially at medical clinics, as part of Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal ’s counterinsurgency campaign. As his officers say, you can’t swing the population to your side if you talk to only half of it. But interviews and foot patrols with Marines during two recent weeks in Helmand show that the teams, which have had gained access to some of the most isolated women in the world, remain a work in progress.

One trip in early May to offer medical care to Afghan women in the village of Lakari showed the program’s promise, problems and dangers. The trip was delayed because of reports that the Taliban had put a bomb in the intended clinic building; although nothing was found, the Marines moved to another place. Then the struggles started in earnest.

Corporal Gardner, a helicopter mechanic who was working with the female Marines from Pendleton but had not trained with them, found herself as the lone woman dealing with five ailing Afghan women. There was no female interpreter or medical officer — there are chronic shortages of both — and the Afghans refused to leave their compound or let the male interpreter and medical officer come to them. Corporal Gardner devised a cumbersome solution. “Some of these women would rather die than be touched by a male,” she said. “So we’ll diagnose by proxy.”

She took the women’s vital signs herself. Then she had an older Afghan woman come outside with her to describe the women’s symptoms, chiefly headaches and stomachaches, to the male interpreter. He translated them for the American male medical officer. (The American men were partly obscured from the older woman by a mud wall to respect her modesty.) Eventually medication — the painkiller ibuprofen — was handed over to the older woman to distribute.

By the end of the day, an Afghan woman was trusting enough to hand her baby to Corporal Gardner to take to the medical officer, who diagnosed digestive problems from a diet of sheep and goat milk.

Sgt. Gabriel Faiivae, 25, the patrol leader, who had kept watch outside the clinic, and whose ears were still ringing from a homemade bomb that had blown the doors off his armored truck the day before, acknowledged that the labyrinthine logistics had to be fixed. “But as far as building trust, it was really good,” he said.

Other trips over the two weeks were get-to-know-you sessions that showed the chasm between two cultures.

“Do you ever fast?” one Afghan woman asked Captain Naslund in the northern Helmand village of Soorkano, apparently speaking of the custom during the Muslim festival of Ramadan.

“Sometimes, when I think I’m getting fat,” Captain Naslund replied, to a curious look. “American men like skinny girls.”

Villagers are often stunned, if not disbelieving, to see women underneath the body armor. Inside compounds, the female Marines say they have been poked in intimate places by Afghan women who want to make sure they are really women.

One morning in the village of Mamor, as Corporal Amaya and Corporal Gardner asked an Afghan woman if she would be willing to teach in a new school, other women and children — who said they had never seen non-Pashtun women — repeatedly asked two American women, a photographer and a reporter, to lift their shirts and pant legs so they could see what was underneath.

Other cultural gaps exist among the Marines themselves. Along with their male counterparts, the female Marines live on rugged bases, often without showers, bathe with bottled water or baby wipes, use makeshift latrines and sleep in hot tents or outside in the dirt.

But team leaders say that some male Marine commanders have been reluctant to send the women on patrols, fearing either for their safety or that they will get in the way. (Women, who make up only 6 percent of the Marine Corps, are officially barred from combat branches like the infantry. In a bureaucratic side step commonly used in Iraq for women needed for jobs like bomb disposal or intelligence, the female engagement teams are added to the all-male infantry patrols.)

The women, who carry the same weapons and receive the same combat training as the men, cannot leave the bases unless the men escort them. Lt. Natalie Kronschnabel, one of the team leaders, said she had to push a Marine captain to let her team go on a five-hour patrol.

“It wasn’t that hard, it was only four or five clicks,” said Lieutenant Kronschnabel, 26, using slang for kilometers. “And they kept asking, ‘Are you doing O.K.? Are you breathing hard?’ ”

Like the other women, Lieutenant Kronschnabel, a high school athlete in soccer, softball and gymnastics, had to meet rigorous physical requirements in the Marines. When she got back that day, she said the captain told her, “ ‘O.K., we’ll start getting your girls scheduled for more patrols.’ ”

Other male Marines, who consider themselves the most aggressive fighters in the armed services, have been won over by the female engagement teams, referred to as fets. “I was skeptical 100 percent,” said Sgt. Jeremy Latimer, 24, a platoon leader in Company F of the Second Battalion, Second Marine Regiment, who is based at Patrol Base Amir, an outpost in central Helmand. “I didn’t like taking anybody who wasn’t infantry. Basically, I was worried about getting shot at with fet Marines. I didn’t want to leave them behind.”

But he changed his mind after he took two of the women into a village elder’s home so they could smooth the way for a male medical officer to treat the Afghan’s ailing wife and daughters — again, from the other side of a wall. Sergeant Latimer said the favor was important, because the elder had become an informant about the Taliban. The sergeant said he could hear through the wall that the female Marines and the elder’s wife and daughters, who turned out to be only moderately ill, got along.

“It was a normal, girls-just-hanging-out type of conversation, giggling and everything,” he said.

Since then, Sergeant Latimer said, Afghans have been more receptive when his patrols included the female Marines, who hand out stuffed animals to village children. When male Marines try that, he said, “It’s just a bunch of guys with rockets and machine guns trying to hand out a bear to a kid, and he starts to cry.”

But what do all the visits and talk add up to? Master Sgt. Julia Watson, who helped create an earlier version of the female engagement teams in Iraq and has been working in Helmand, said that the women had to move beyond handing out teddy bears and medicine and use what they learn from Afghan women to develop plans for income-generating projects, schools and clinics. “You have to have an end state,” she said.

Capt. Jason C. Brezler, a commander who has worked with the female Marines in the village of Now Zad, agreed. “To leverage a relationship, you have to have something of value to the Afghans,” he said. “And it has to be more than just, ‘I’m a girl.’ ”

A version of this article appeared in print on May 30, 2010, on page A1 of the New York edition.

what's this?

• Letting Women Reach Women In Afghan War (March 7, 2010)

A Toolkit for Women Seeking a Raise, Tara Siegel Bernard

Tools for Asking for a Raise. What do you think?
>
> May 2010 Email
> WICB Network Message 2
> Subject: New York Times Article, May 14, 2010, A Toolkit for Women Seeking a Raise
> By Tara Siegel Bernard
>
> Even now, when women represent half the work force, they’re still paid considerably less then men — and part of that pay gap may be a result of what happens at the salary negotiation table.
>
> That’s assuming that women make it to the table, since research shows that they are less likely to ask for raises. Even when they do, their requests may be perceived as overly demanding or less agreeable.
>
> “We have found that if a man and a woman both attempt to negotiate for higher pay, people find a women who does this, compared to one who does not, significantly less attractive,” said Hannah Riley Bowles, an associate professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, who has conducted numerous studies on gender, negotiation and leadership. “Whereas with the guy, it doesn’t seem to matter.”
>
> So what’s a woman to do if she feels her work merits a raise?
>
> A new study concludes that women need to take a different approach than men. Women, it suggests, should frame their requests in more nuanced ways to avoid undermining their relationship with their boss.
>
> You may be asking yourself, as I did, whether negotiating in ways more favorable for women means that we’re just succumbing to stereotypes — or whether the ends justify the means.
>
> “People associate men with higher pay because men tend to hold higher-paying and higher-level positions than women,” Ms. Riley Bowles said. “When a woman negotiates persuasively for higher compensation, she clears the path for other women to follow.”
>
> Even though working women tend to be more educated, on average, than working men, females who work full time only earn about 77 cents for every dollar that men earn annually, according to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. That’s up from about 59 cents in 1965.
>
> Part of the pay gap can be easily explained away. Women are more likely to leave the work force to care for children, for example, so they end up with fewer years of experience. Men also tend to work in higher-paying occupations and industries.
>
> “But what you find is that when you pull out all of those factors, you still have about 40 percent of the wage gap — or 9.2 cents — unexplained,” said Ariane Hegewisch, a study director at the institute.
>
> Academic research on gender and negotiation suggests that part of the unexplained gap may be tied, at least in part, to the negotiating process itself. It may be that some women have lower pay expectations. Men, on the other hand, have been found to be more likely to negotiate higher starting salaries.
>
> The work by Ms. Riley Bowles and her peers suggests that women in the work force can use specific advice. Here are some of their suggestions:
>
> BE PROACTIVE If you believe you deserve a raise, don’t sit around and wait for someone to notice. “A lot of women, and this is quite commonly found, think, ‘As long as I work really, really hard, someone will notice and they will pay me more,’ ” said Karen J. Pine, a psychology professor at the University of Hertfordshire in Britain and co-author of “Sheconomics” (Headline Publishing Group, 2009). But “people don’t come and notice.”
>
> You also want to think about the best time to approach your boss. It may make sense to approach him or her after an annual performance review, said Evelyn F. Murphy, president of the WAGE Project, a nonprofit organization, who runs negotiation seminars for women. “Or, if you just took on a major responsibility or won an award.”
>
> BE PREPARED Doing your research pays, literally. A study found that men and women who recently earned a master’s degree in business negotiated similar salaries when they had clear information about how much to ask for.
>
> But in industries where salary standards were ambiguous, women accepted pay that was 10 percent lower, on average, than men. “In our experiments, we found that with ambiguous information, women set less ambitious goals,” said Ms. Riley Bowles, who ran the study. “They asked for less in a competitive negotiation and got less.”
>
> That theory also holds in other areas where there aren’t set expectations, like executive bonuses and stock options. “You get bigger gender gaps in those less standard forms of pay,” she added.
>
> That’s why you need to be prepared. Informational Web sites like Payscale.com and Salary.com can help uncover what people are being paid for a particular position in your geographic area. And Glassdoor.com and Vault.com provide intelligence on pay inside a company — employees share their salaries online.
>
> Part of your preparation may also include talking to peers. But remember that women tend to be less connected to male networks in the workplace and are more likely to compare themselves to people they think are similar, Ms. Riley Bowles said. That means they may be comparing their salaries with other women.
>
> “If a woman asks her girlfriends how much they are paid and a guy asks his guy friends, Jane and Jim will come up with different numbers,” Ms. Riley Bowles added.
>
> TAILOR NEGOTIATIONS This is where the women may want to use a different strategy. A new study by Ms. Riley Bowles shows that women are more likely to be successful if they explain why their request is appropriate, but in terms that also communicate that they care about maintaining good relationships at work. “The trick is trying to do both of these things at the same time and in a way that feels authentic and fits within the norms of the company,” she added.
>
> Using this approach, the study found, women were more likely to be granted a raise without harming relationships, at least in an experimental setting. The results were consistent for women negotiating with other women and with men.
>
> Some of the language used in the study provided an explanation on how to explain why you’re making the request now — “My team leader advised me to do this” — while at the same time communicating that you are taking the boss’s position into account: “What do you think?”
>
> The study doesn’t suggest specific language, but offers some general outlines.
>
> Instead of explaining why you deserve a raise directly, for instance, frame it in terms of why it makes sense for the organization or the person you’re trying to persuade. “Make the company the focus,” she said.
>
> And if you’re thinking about using an outside offer to help negotiate a raise, take heed. It’s effective, but Ms. Riley Bowles said her studies have found that it tends to leave a more negative impression on women. “Women may need to be more strategic than men about how they raise an outside offer so that it doesn’t put them in a negative light,” she added.
>
> ANTICIPATE Try to envision what kinds of objections your boss may have, Ms. Murphy said, and think about what your response might be. “There is no single way through this,” she added. “It’s largely reactive once you start the process.”
>
> If you’re unsuccessful, ask your boss for recommendations on what you could do to move to the next level in your job. That way, “you are still in control and are still being constructive,” Ms. Murphy said. “If you trust your own language and your own ability to perceive these potential roadblocks or damaging outcomes, then you will find your way through them.”
>
> NEGOTIATE AT HOME Before you even start negotiating for a raise, or a promotion, consider how it might affect your life at home — but don’t assume that one has to come at the expense of the other. Working women who double as caregivers still carry a disproportionate load of household chores, even as men have begun shouldering more responsibilities. Try to re-examine some of these roles and think about how new divisions of household labor may help each partner’s situation at work, Ms. Riley Bowles suggested.
>
> Some people believe the negotiations at home may be more challenging then those in the workplace. “That is the big secret in our culture,” said Paula Hogan, a Milwaukee-based financial planner who works with a career counselor in her practice. “The workplace has become increasingly gender-neutral and at home there is still a lot of old thinking.”
>
> BE CREATIVE If you have family responsibilities, it helps to consider alternatives like flexible work schedules. “Be sure you are thinking as creatively as possible for win-win solutions,” Ms. Riley Bowles said.
>
> And remember that it’s your responsibility to suggest these solutions (or to seek out companies known for considering them). “They are not going to come to you and say, ‘Gosh, I notice you have three kids now. Would you like Tuesdays off?’ ” said Ms. Hogan. “It’s your job to present the business plan.”
> Ron Lieber is on assignment.
>
> ------------

-------------------------------------------------
>
> May 2010 Email
> WICB Network Message 3
> Subject: ASCB Newsletter WICB Column, July 2006, How to Ask Your Chair for a Raise, by Victor L. Shuster and Sandra K. Masur
>
> http://www.ascb.org/files/0607wicb.pdf
>

WHY WE NEED THE ERA, Tara Laxer, Regional Dir, SE Florida

HOORAY, WE HAVE SOMEONE WRITING FOR OUR BLOG !
...and it's our own Tara Laxer in Broward County !

Tara has teased out of our list of past ERA bill co-sponsors (We've had ERA bills filed EVERY YEAR since 2003, but the Florida House refuses even to hear it, even to give it a fair hearing for the public, even to vote it up or down. We suspect it's because they know, once heard, the bills will pass!)

HAVE AT IT, EVERYONE, HERE'S A LIST OF THOSE FLORIDA STATE LEGISLATORS WHO HAVE NEVER, EVER COSPONSORED AN ERA BILL HERE IN FLORIDA though they get full info every year. We even go to the trouble of speaking before them at Legislative Delegation meetings IN EVERY SINGLE OF THE 67 COUNTIES! FIND YOUR OWN LEGISLATOR AND CALL HIM/HER FOR AN APPOINTMENT TO FIND OUT why they are against equality for all Americans, male and female alike! Write me for the answer, SandyO@passERA.org. List follows.

STATE REPS AND STATE SENATORS THAT NEVER SUPPORTED THE ERA!

Share

by Tara Laxer (notes) Wednesday at 6:03pm

*THE NAMES (Current FL Senators & House Members Who Have NEVER Sponsored ERA Bills)

*Over the past eight legislative sessions, bills to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment have been filed in the Florida Legislature. *No House Committee has ever heard the bill – it has not been discussed, work-shopped or discussed on the floor in any shape or form. And only in 2003 and 2008 were the bills heard in Senate, when they passed positively out of the Judiciary Committee.* Legislative leadership seems to want to shield members from voting on the issue rather than forward women’s rights. *But as far as Florida women are concerned no vote is a vote against equal rights for women!* It is very important that during the 2010 election season voters are aware of which legislators of both houses have NEVER co-sponsored an ERA bill during their time in Tallahassee. *Here are THE NAMES WHO HAVE VOTED AGAINST ERA by their silence, have refused to co-sponsor after years of our lobbying them-- please post this information to others via email and also use on any literature that may serve to educate the voting public as to where a candidate stands on women’s rights: **

FLORIDA SENATE: *JD Alexander, Thad Altman , Jeff Atwater, Carey Baker, Lee Constantine, Victor D. Christ, "Charlie" Dean, Alex Diaz de la Portilla, Paula Dockery, (Mike Fasano, Don Gaetz; BUT BOTH OF THESE DID VOTE FOR IT RECENTLY!) Rudy Garcia, Andy Gardiner, Mike Haridopolos, Joe Negron (Chair 2010 #1 Committee), Steve Oelrich, Durell Peaden Jr, Garrett S. Richter, Ronda Storms (SHE HATES ERA), John Thrasher, Alex J. Villalobos (Chaired Judiciary Committee both times bill heard in Senate, and so HE VOTED FOR IT TWICE!), Stephen R. Wise.*

FLORIDA HOUSE: *"Sandy" Adams, Janet H. Adkins, Kevin C. Ambler, "Tom" Anderson, Gary Aubuchon, Leonard L. Bembry, "Mack" Bernard, Ellyn Setnor Bogdanoff, Esteban L. Bovo Jr, Debbie Boyd, Rachel V. Burgin, James Bush III, Dean Cannon, Jennifer Carroll, "Chuck" Chestnut IV, "Gwyn" Clarke-Reed, Marti Coley, Larry Cretul, Steve Crisafulli, Janet Cruz (elected mid-term), Carl J. Domino (Chair 2101 #1 Committee), Chris Dorworth, Brad Drake, Eric Eisnaugle, Greg Evers, Anitere Flores (SHE'S WORRIED THAT IT WILL FOSTER ABORTIONS! but ERA doesn't regulate that, nor same-sex anything!), Clay Ford, Erik Fresen, "Jim" Frishe (HARD RIGHTIST!), Matt Gaetz, Bill Galvano, "Rich" Glorioso, "Eddy" Gonzalez, Tom Grady, Denise Grimsley, Adam Hasner, Alan D. Hayes, Doug Holder, Ed Hooper (REFUSES ME), Mike Horner, Matt Hudson, Dorothy L. Hukill, Kurt Kelly, Paige Kreegel, John Legg, Marcelo Llorente, Debbie Mayfield, Charles McBurney, Seth McKeel, Dave Murzin, Bryan Nelson, Marlene H. O'Toole, Jimmy Patronis, Pat Patterson, Scott Plakon, Ralph Poppell, Stephen L. Precourt, "Bill" Proctor, Lake Ray, Ron Reagan, Michelle Rehwinkel Vasilinda (ANOTHER WHO BELIEVES ERA = ABORTION!), "Doc" Renuart, "Ken" Roberson, Maria Lorts Sachs, "Rob" Schenck, Ron Schultz, William D. Snyder, Kelli Stargel, Dwayne L. Taylor, "Nick" Thompson, Perry E. Thurston, John Tobia, Baxter G. Troutman, Charles E. Van Zant, Will W. Weatherford, "Mike" Weinstein, Trudi K. Williams, John Wood, Ritch Workman.

Updated on Wednesday · Comment ·

Tara Laxer

I am for fair districts but things they way they are ...if we can't do more than one thing at one time we are in trouble. I think equal rights in the law is a pressing issue. Regardless if it comes from gender rights from the ERA, privacy rights with the ultrasound bill that the Governor is waiting on because of politics or the current repeal of ... See MoreDADT.
Equality is a right.

It is necessary to have specific language in the Constitution affirming the principle of equal rights on the basis of sex because for more than two centuries, women have had to fight long and hard political battles to win rights that men (at first certain white men, eventually all men) possessed automatically because they were male. The first – and still the only – right that the Constitution specifically affirms equally for women and men is the right to vote. Alice Paul introduced the ERA in 1923 to expand that affirmation to all the rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

Yesterday at 10:10pm

Sandy Oestreich

GREAT JOB, TARA (FL ERA Inc's Regional Director!)

To Meta C: Neither the 14th Amendment, Laws nor the FL constitution's ERA clause do the job the ERA would. Needed today more than ever (almost 3/4 of the States have already ratified, we just need 3 more to put ERA in Constituiton (for men as well as women). Simply, you know if you are not ... See Morementioned in a contract, you have no rights therein--women are not mentioned in the nation's contract with its people!! The only incontestable right we have there is THE RIGHT TO VOTE, and we had to be jailed, hung, beaten and forcefed to get that, a full 50 yrs after all MEN received it, no sweat. Please see my site as ERA spearhead of FL ERA before the legislature: www.ratifyERAflorida.net. Click on ERA for Women to see some of how we are beset with inequities that ERA would correct, e.g., we lose sex discrimination cases because we don't have an ERA; we lose on avg $22 for every $100 a man is paid for same job! It takes us until April each year to accrue the same earnings a man sitting next to us was paid by December 31, the year before. This means 1 of 7 elderly women are in poverty from lower SocSec and pensions and savings~! What do you think the pending Paycheck Fairness Act is about or the Lilly Ledbetter Sup. Ct. case was about??The glass ceiling; paid quality day care. Generally, we are denied men's rights to full personhood and self-determination. Men would not lose as many child custody cases in divorce; also issues of the draft, immigration, consensual teen sex, etc. Please see my site for ERA for Men, ERA for Moms, ERA en Espanol, etc.

I think Fair Districting is MUCH IMPORTANT, TOO..am door to door on that one, too. Just that when I see "all nations since wwII have an ERA (Ruth Bader Ginsburg), I want to SCREAAAAMM AT THE UNFAIRNESS.
If Tara and I haven't ans. your questions, please see our ERA site, and then email me.

It's ok. Funny, I had the same questions you do at first, and I had marched in the ERA protests in the 70s!! Sandy Oestreich, Pres/Founder of Equal Rights Alliance, Inc., of FL; Prof Emerita; Coauthor, internationally distrib. pharmacology reference texts; nurse practitioner, Chief Agitator for ERA

43 seconds ago ·

THANK YOU, TARA !!

Write a comment...

Computer Science + Mech. Engineering degree= NEW JOBS FOR WOMEN

Engineer Says Robotics Can Use a Woman's Touch
----------------------------------------------
By Marsha Walton
WeNews correspondent
Monday, May 17, 2010

Robin Murphy is pioneering the field of rescue robotics, a key part
of the response to earthquakes, hurricanes, mining accidents and
terrorist attacks. Women, she says, have a wide open opportunity in
this emerging and highly sensitive field.

(WOMENSENEWS)--Robin Murphy's robots don't look human. Nor do they
act like R2D2, or Rosie from "The Jetsons."

Instead they are small and flexible; built to slither through
collapsed buildings, fly over wildfires or floods, and check the
integrity of a bridge from underwater, sending back live video and
audio.

"We've gone from things that look like a camera on wheels to
things that look like an eight-foot long caterpillar," said
Murphy, 52, Raytheon professor of computer science and engineering at
Texas A and M at College Station. She's a pioneer in the field of
rescue robotics, a new and key tool for responding to earthquakes,
hurricanes, mining accidents, even terrorist attacks.

Murphy, director of the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue,
sent robots into the rubble of the World Trade Center after 9-11. The
center had been in existence for just 10 days. That nightmarish
situation taught the team a vast amount about what kind of machines
work best.

Lesson No. 1: slinky and agile, like the caterpillar robot, trumps
big and powerful. That's because "snakebots" can enter very
confined spaces without further disturbing rubble. They are also being
designed to disarm bombs and landmines without detonating them.

Being fast on the scene is also critical. While it may take days to
move in heavy equipment, robotic aircraft can fit in a couple of
suitcases and be assembled and launched in 15 minutes.

Expanding Role in Disasters

With those basic rules in place, plans are underway for robots to
play an expanding role in other aspects of disaster relief. After an
earthquake, for instance, a small flying robot could help in long
range planning for survivors by providing information about the
surrounding area and how people are using it.

"Just understanding things like land use, where are refugees
going to go?" said Murphy. "So we're designing aerial
vehicles that help more quickly ascertain that. A good decision early
in the game can cut a year off of a recovery," she said.

Murphy earned a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and
graduate degrees in computer science at Georgia Tech in Atlanta. She
encourages other women with similar educations to join her in the
research because the field is so new and could benefit from
female-influenced research styles.

In 1995 she was teaching at the Colorado School of Mines in
Golden--working on artificial intelligence projects including the
design of robots for interplanetary travel--when the Murrah Federal
Building in Oklahoma City was bombed.

Career Takes New Focus

Murphy realized there was a need for robots on this planet. The
Oklahoma bombing and the Kobe, Japan, earthquake, also that year,
re-focused her career on rescue robots.

She said she quickly noticed that not enough was known about the
relationship between humans and robots, motivating her to conduct
basic research on human-robot interaction. How might accident or
terror victims respond if a robot reaches them and starts asking
questions?

"Studies show that robots can either calm you down or stress you
out. So we don't want victims being terrorized by this robot,"
said Murphy, an author or co-author of about 100 academic papers. She
also gives expert technological advice to the Pentagon on robotics as
a member of the Defense Science Board in Washington.

Within U.S. manufacturing, robotics represents a $5 billion industry
growing by around 8 percent a year, according to a 2009 study by the
Computing Community Consortium.

Women make up less than 25 percent of graduate students in
engineering and computer sciences, according to the National Science
Foundation, far below levels in biological and social sciences where
women are about 50 percent of graduate enrollment.

Murphy and her colleagues at Texas AandM, along with researchers at
Stanford University, received a $1.2 million federal stimulus grant to
create a multimedia "survivor buddy," the robot personality
that will interact with people in situations ranging from emergency
response, to hostage negotiation, to lower-keyed settings such as
healthcare assistance.



'SciGirls' Episode

For a taping of the PBS TV show "SciGirls," Murphy helped
pre-teen girls conduct experiments to come up with the best demeanor
for a rescue robot. Their findings were similar to her research: A
calm but enthusiastic voice; and no blinding lights.

The most effective design for a rescue robot designed to interact
with people is slow moving. It's painted yellow or orange, with lights
underneath so a victim can see it approaching.



Murphy's research often keeps her out of the lab, roaming through
rubble piles.

But robotics researchers can wind up virtually anywhere. In one
intriguing collaboration, Murphy's students worked with Texas AandM's
theater department to provide small robotic fairies for a production
of "A Midsummer Night's Dream." The tiny robots interacted
with both the actors and the audience.

"She and her team came to every single production meeting,"
said theater lecturer Amy Hopper, who directed the play. "They
were very open, very generous with information and easy to talk to.
The robotics students videotaped every production to gather data on
how the audience treated the robots."

Murphy sees rescue robotics and the overall field of artificial
intelligence--a branch of computer science that designs machines to
"think for themselves"--as providing a high level of
challenge, creativity, and service, especially for women.

"Where else do you find such a wide open new field of
technological challenges that will have a profound societal
impact?" said Murphy. "Where you will make a huge
difference? Everything you do is new. I also think it requires a
woman's touch," she said, "a better sensitivity, to really
put people first in designing rescue robots."

Marsha Walton covers science, technology, environment and space
issues. She was a producer for CNN's science and tech unit for more
than 10 years. Her work has also appeared on Mother Nature Network,
Appalachian Voices, and the National Science Foundation.

For more information:

Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue

http://crasar.org/2010/01/25/living-with-robots-screened-at-sundance/

Sci-Girls-to-the-rescue

http://www.theeagle.com/local/SciGirls-to-the-rescue

A Feminist Economist's Primer on How Economics Dumps on Women

DO SKIM THIS EASY READING on how to lob back when men pitch you the UNtruth that your financial complaints are just a matter of Economics 101. They definitely aren't. SandyO

P.S. We in ERA Inc. are still awaiting the research study that defines how the nation's economy would flourish under an ERA. We know it will, just don't have the statistics to back it up. They seem not to exist yet. Anyone UP for this research?

WEDNESDAY 19 MAY 2010

How to Think Like a Feminist Economist

Monday 17 May 2010

by: Susan Feiner | On the Issues

(Photo: Sergey Vladimirov / Flickr)

As a feminist economist I am constantly amazed—though I suppose I should be used to it by now—by the ways conventional analyses of economic matters completely ignore gender asymmetries.

Because I am a feminist economist, I am hypersensitive to differences in women's and men's economic circumstances. Women earn less, work in jobs with less prestige and few (if any) benefits, and do far more of society's unpaid work. These are not new realities. One is, however, hard-pressed to find discussions of economic policy that place women's disadvantage at the center.

Feminist economists understand how important it is to challenge the assumptions, and hence, the conclusions, of mainstream economics.

The economics that makes its way into the public realm consistently misrepresents the best interests of ordinary folks in their multiple roles as workers, consumers and citizens. Economics as we know it, and as it is taught in countless undergraduate courses, is little more than an apology for the status quo. Textbook economics, replete with supply and demand models demonstrating the market's natural tendency to correct shortages or surpluses, doesn't take the topic of "disadvantage" seriously.

In textbook economics, markets are markets. Competition is competition. And any economic system that encourages competition in markets will, by the very rules baked into the exercise, produce economic outcomes that duly reflect the wishes of the people. Your income is too low? Well, retrain for a job in a higher paying field. Your neighborhood is decaying? Just save more so you can move. The roads and bridges on which you drive are crumbling? Sell them to the highest bidder and let the private owner charge tolls to cover the upkeep. No problem is too large or too complicated that a good dose of market competition won't fix it. There is little in economics that is "gender neutral"

In short, there is no such thing as "disadvantage." There are only individual bad choices.

The spectacular failure of the financial sector with the attendant loss of some 20 odd million full time jobs should reveal -- even to free market economists -- major flaws in this way of thinking. But an intellectual bankruptcy rules the system, as demonstrated by critiques of every aspect of the theory -- its assumptions, claimed links of causation and the failure to match up with historical experience.

My experience as a feminist economist means that I vigilantly watch for intellectual sleights of hand that present the interests of the rich and powerful as the interests of us all. When bankers, corporate executives and their minions unite behind purported economic truths, I challenge their arguments, their logic and their appeals to the so-called "laws of the market." By looking behind and around standard economic narratives I can construct alternative stores connected to the real world, the actual historical record, and perhaps most importantly, the questions that are not being asked – many of which, it so happens, have to do with women. There is little in economics that is "gender neutral."

Taxes Are More Taxing for Working Women

Feminist economists have contributed their share to the volumes critical of mainstream economics. One of our key findings is that even a topic as seemingly "gender neutral" as taxes is loaded with implications for women's economic well being.

When we go shopping, cashiers include sales taxes regardless of our sex. Tax assessors do not value houses differently for female and male homeowners. Income tax forms do not come in pink and blue. All employees pay 6.2 percent of eligible earnings into the Social Security trust fund and all employers match that 6.2 percent. While tax rates may look gender neutral, I know that they are not. Taxes are a feminist issue.

While the hot button political catch phrase, "no new taxes," may sound like a good idea, the reality is otherwise. That's because the taxes that politicians pledge not to raise are precisely the taxes that are least relevant to women's burden of taxation.

You will be much more likely to see the gender dimensions of an economic issue if you focus on ratios rather than the pure numbers. If, for example, the evening news reported on gender differences in tax payments, they'd likely tell us that men, on average, pay more in taxes than do women (on average). Facts and figures describing the economy are almost always more meaningful when we have information on both the numerator and the denominator. In the preceding example, the raw number "dollars paid in taxes" is the numerator. But if taxes paid are put in relation to income earned (the denominator) we will realize that because women still earn 80 cents for every dollar earned by men, women pay a greater share of their income in taxes.

For me, thinking about taxes in terms of tax burdens -- who pays how much of their income in each type of tax -- is necessary to cut through the political brou-ha-ha about the virtues of tax cutting.

Politicians, pundits, and professors generally ignore the way tax cuts impact the well being of different income groups. Doing this allows them to create the false impression that reducing taxes benefits women as well as men. Not so.

Understanding women's relationship to the U.S. tax system is critical to any advocacy work on behalf of economic equality.

Not only are there many types of taxes, the various levels of government—federal, state and local—impose different taxes on different goods and services.

The broad categories of taxes include sales (and excise) taxes, income taxes, payroll taxes and property taxes.

Sales taxes, payroll taxes and property taxes are regressive. This means that as incomes rise, less is paid in each of these types of taxes. The tax burden shifts downward, the well-to-do pay less, and the folks lower down the income ladder pay more. As a result, women—who earn less than men—pay a greater share of their income in sales, property and payroll taxes.

Because income taxes are progressive, the incidence of taxation rises as income rises. Because women earn less than men, federal and state income taxes help correct gender differences in wage income.

Sales and property taxes, which are levied by state or local governments, are regressive. But, these are not the most regressive taxes: this honor goes to payroll taxes.

Earning Less, Paying More

Every time a worker gets paid, the number at the top of the check -- gross earnings -- is larger, often much larger, than the actual amount that can be deposited in the bank -- the net earnings. Some payroll deductions have little to do with taxes, such as pension or health care contributions.

But for most women in the U.S., the lioness' share of monies deducted from each paycheck goes to contributions to Social Security and Medicare. In fact, the amounts a woman pays annually into Social Security and Medicare are likely to exceed any income tax owed to the federal government. Women in the United States do not need more "tax cuts"

For every $1,000 the typical woman earns in wages, her employer withholds $62 as the woman's contribution to Social Security (6.2 percent). Her employer's share of Social Security contributions is also 6.2 percent, so another $62 is credited to her Social Security account. All wage and salary income, up to $97,500, is subject to Social Security taxes.

Every dollar earned above $97,500 (keep dreaming, honey) is exempt from Social Security withholding. That's why this tax is so regressive. If a woman's annual earnings are $195,000, and Social Security is withheld from only the first $97,500 then the second $97,500 earned is tax free—at least relative to the Social Security tax.

Since men, on average, earn more per year than women, and are more likely to earn more than $97,500 per year, men pay less—as a share of their income—into Social Security. They, therefore, have more to spend and save as a share of their earnings.

Adding insult to injury, studies by such noted think tanks as The Urban Institute estimate that employers don't actually pay 6.2 percent of employees' earnings. Instead, they shift this cost by holding down wages and salaries. This means that everyone who earns less than $97,500 is likely paying the full 12.4 percent of Social Security withholding.

Almost two-thirds of all taxpayers in the U.S. pay more in payroll (Social Security) taxes than they do in income taxes. Virtually all the tax cuts approved by Congress in the last 30 years have been income tax cuts, and the largest such cuts have gone to the top 5 percent of earners -- those folks lucky enough to live in households with average incomes exceeding $172,000 per year. Very few women earn this much in a year.

Social Security is definitely important to women. For 80 percent or more of women over 65, Social Security constitutes all of their income. To be gender-equitable, the way the government finances Social Security needs to be changed.

A critically important progressive reform would make all income -- including those hedge fund bonuses out in the stratosphere -- subject to Social Security withholding.

Thinking like a feminist economist, reveals this stark conclusion: Women in the United States do not need more "tax cuts." What all of us need is a shift away from taxes on work (payroll taxes) and a significant increase in the taxes on the highest income earners—virtually all of whom are men.

A similar gender analysis can be applied to every tax issue and almost every policy issue that the country faces. But, unveiling the gender dimensions of our economic problems and the variously proposed solutions requires a rejection of a standard, gender blind analyses, and to do this, we dig below a seemingly gender neutral surface. Thinking like a feminist economist, it turns out, can be an exceedingly valuable tool for the most critical public decisions in the U.S. and across the globe today.

Susan F. Feiner is Professor of Women's and Gender Studies and Professor of Economics at the University of Southern Maine. She is one of the founding scholars in the field of feminist economics and the author of the award-winning Liberating Economics: Feminist Perspectives on Families, Work and Globalization (with Professor D. Barker, University of Michigan Press, 2004). She has written for Women's Enews, Dollars & Sense and The Women's Review of Books. Over the years she has written about gender and race bias in economics education, U.S. economic history, psychoanalysis and economics, and religion and economics, and teaches courses on gender and economics, feminism and Marxism, political economy, among others.

All republished content that appears on Truthout has been obtained by permission or license.

Another Explanation of ERA's Need for Just 3 More States

Dear Governor Crist:

In the event there is a special session called, I urge you to include taking up the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) and getting it "off the table". It has been introduced every year since 2003.

It is now an election issue with the supporters of the ERA. Ms. Morilla has explained it much better than I could and is as following.....Denny Wood, www.dignity4disabled.com, www.dennywood.net CC: SUPPORTERS, MEDIA, LEGISLATURE, OTHERS.

----- Original Message -----
From: Morilla, Laura C. (Advocacy)
To: dignity4@comcast.net
Sent: Friday, May 07, 2010 1:30 PM
Subject: ERA info
Good afternoon Mr. Wood. Per our earlier phone conversation, here is some information about the ERA “Three State Strategy.”

In 1972, Congress finally passed the ERA and sent it to the states for ratification, but with a ratification deadline of 1979. In 1978, when only 35 of the necessary 38 states had ratified the ERA, Congress extended the deadline to 1982. The ratification deadline expired on June 30, 1982, still with only 35 states. On May 7, 1992, the “Madison Amendment,” which deals with Congressional pay raises, became the 27th amendment to the Constitution when Michigan became the 38th state to ratify it. Congress submitted the Madison Amendment to the states as part of the original Bill of Rights on September 25, 1789, but it was not ratified until 203 years later in 1992.

The ratification of the Madison Amendment acted as a catalyst for ERA supporters because it called into question the legality of the ratification deadlines imposed on the ERA, and also highlighted Congress ability to accept an amendment long after the fact. ERA supporters developed a “Three State Strategy” for ratification based on the legal theory that the ratification by the previous 35 states is still viable and that the ratification deadline was improper or could be extended again or abolished altogether. Simply put, the idea is to get three more states to ratify the ERA, then throw the matter to Congress and get Congress to lift the deadline and, voila, we have at ERA in the Constitution. Since Florida is one of 15 states that has not ratified the ERA, that’s why there has been a focus on Florida for the past few years as part of the Three State Strategy.

PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT: Spreading Oil

IF/WHEN THE OIL COATS OUR GULF OF MEXICO COASTLINE,

Here is a list of Deepwater Horizon Response Numbers that may be useful to you or someone you know. Please spread the word on this extremely important effort to do our part in keeping our beaches beautiful and protecting our way of life!

General Oil Spill Information: Visit www.deepwaterhorizonresponse.com . The Department of Environmental Protection established an email sign-up for information alerts on its website as well as a resources page containing fact sheets and tips pertaining to health, safety, wildlife, pre- and post-landfall preparations. To view tips and sign up for email updates, visit www.dep.state.fl.us/deepwaterhorizon. To view Florida's air quality data, visit www.epa.gov/bpspill/.

Volunteering: The Governor's Commission on Volunteerism & Community Services is coordinating volunteer efforts. Information for citizens is on this website: www.volunteerfloridadisaster.org . BP also has a volunteer program and has established this toll-free number: (866) 448-5816.

Reporting Oiled Shoreline: (866) 448-5816

Vendors & Ideas for Sealing the Oil Spill Leak: For general assistance and to submit alternative response technology, services including vessels contact BP sponsored hotline at (281) 366-5511. For companies wanting to get paid (Contractors/Vendors): Contact your county EMS office.