Security Barrier: Making an Entrance, Qaddafi Style By Allison Barrie FROM Fox News

"But much like a popular music icon, no entourage is complete without the right women. For Qaddafi, that means a menacing group of 30 female body guards. Easily mistaken as hopefuls for "America’s Next Model," his unit of gorgeous, gun-toting women are actually trained killers. "

Recession turns heat up for men by Sarah O’Connor FROM Financial Times

"Because men dominate the most cyclical industries, such as manufacturing, construction and finance, they are affected more than women when the economy contracts."

Why I Am Leaving Guyland Tony Dokoupil FROM Newsweek

"Kimmel's testosterone tract adds to a forest of recent research into protracted adolescents (or 'thresholders' and 'kidults,' as they've also been dubbed) and the reluctance of today's guys to don their fathers' robes—and commitments. They 'see grown-up life as such a loss,' says Kimmel, explaining why so many guys are content to sit out their 20s in duct-taped beanbag chairs. The trouble is that the very thing they're running from may be the thing they need."

Pressured to be Perfect by Claudia Kalb FROM Newsweek

Where does the pressure come from?
It's human nature in many of us to want to be the best we can. I think there's societal pressure, media pressure, partner pressure. Up until 30 years ago all the pressure really involved the home and children. The pressure on women was to be good wives and mothers. Right now that's two out of a number of things. Can you tell me any area where a woman can let go and feel comfortable?

Selected Vocabulary
obstetrics
gynecology
in the trenches
pathology
cognitive therapy
wakeup call
epidemiological research

Artificial sperm may make men redundant FROM The Age

Dr Engel says if sperm can be grown in the lab, it would be possible to take early germ cells from one woman, turn them into sperm cells, and use those to fertilise the egg of another woman.

MISS-LEADING THE TRUTH ABOUT GALS' SERIAL FIBBING from New York Post

Most females lie "more cleverly and successfully than men" about everything from infidelity and facelifts to barhopping and shopping binges, according to a new book.

"Women lie as a survival technique, but also to get what they want," said Susan Shapiro Barash, author of "Little White Lies, Deep Dark Secrets: The Truth About Why Women Lie," published by St. Martin's Press this week.

He's Not as Smart as He Thinks from Newsweek by Joan Raymond

Does any of this matter in the real world?
Men aren't more clever or smarter. But since they think they are, they are more confident about their abilities. These self-beliefs, however, may be highly adaptive. Who gets a job? A bright woman who doesn't think she's smart, or a not-so-bright man who believes he's capable of anything? Arrogance and hubris are not attractive qualities, but confident, self-belief may be. Certainly, underestimating abilities might hurt you. There's a good quote from one of your countrymen, Henry Ford. He says: "Whether you believe you can do a thing or not, you are right." And that is what is troublesome. Beliefs may be more important than actual ability in certain settings.

Men funnier than women, says scientist

FROM Breaking News English (go to their website for audio)

Men are naturally funnier than women. This is the claim of a UK male professor, Sam Shuster. He conducted research on 400 different people as he unicycled around his town. He observed the reaction of onlookers and discovered that men made more jokes about him than women, and that men’s jokes were more aggressive. He said three-quarters of male “jokers” mocked him and made nasty comments, while most women tended to tease him with a smile. He said: "The difference between the men and women was absolutely remarkable and consistent." Professor Shuster believes the male hormone testosterone is the cause of men being funnier. He found that teenage boys were aggressive in their humor and this aggression changed with older men into a funnier form of joking.

Earlier research suggests women and men use humour differently. One study said women tend to tell fewer jokes than men and male comedians outnumber female ones. Another showed men look more for a punchline. Men also use people they know as the subject of their jokes, often in a negative way. Married men seem to like hearing and making jokes about mothers-in-law. British comedian John Moloney disagreed with Professor Shuster’s findings. He said that in his 21-year career in comedy, he had never noticed that men were funnier than women. He stated: "The difference is that if a group of women were together and the conversation lulls, they don't automatically start telling jokes, which men do. It then becomes a bit of a competition, but that doesn't mean to say men are funnier."

MONGOLIA'S UNIVERSITIES: A WOMAN'S WORLD

Nomin Lhagvasuren: 2/3/02
A EurasiaNet Partner Post from Transitions Online

A walk through the corridors of Mongolia's universities and colleges can leave a visitor somewhat surprised. Almost everywhere, women's faces dominate--so much so that one might wonder if the men are hiding. But they are not. Universities in Mongolia simply do not enroll many men: Sixty percent of graduates are women, and in some places women outnumber men four to one.

Many educational analysts believe that sifting out students in the eighth grade is wrong. “Because boys are usually more daredevilish and mobile, they tend not to show the best results at school during their teenage years,” says T. Amgalan, the director of a Mongolian nongovernmental organization (NGO) called the Gender Center for Sustainable Development. “They usually become more responsible in the final grades of secondary school. Therefore it is too bad if they drop out of school at the eighth grade. The more accurate and concentrated ones stay, and as a rule, they are girls.”

Whatever the reason for such gender imbalances, they seem to be an international phenomenon.

Stress city - From The Economist print edition

Taken together, these results suggest that acute stress to a woman at the time of conception shifts the sex ratio towards girls. However, Carsten Obel, a researcher at Aarhus who was not involved in the earlier study, wondered if the same might be true of chronic stress too. In a paper just published in Human Development, he shows that it is.

Sexual Frustration Will Hurt Asia's Economies by William Pesek

QUOTES FROM:
A BLOOMBERG article by William Pesek

1. No matter what one calls it, the desire for sons in China, India and other Asian economies is causing a dangerous gender gap.
2. In China, for example, 120 boys were born for every 100 girls in 2005, according to a new United Nations report.
3. In it [their book] Valerie Hudson and Andrea den Boer warned that Asia's shortage of women is giving rise to an entire generation of young men with no prospects of finding a mate.
4. They argue that biology, sociology and history suggest the imbalance will lead to crime and social disorder.
5. Having a boy is your retirement plan and until that changes, Chinese may welcome fewer and fewer daughters.

A man's world?

Quotes FROM
an article (November 1, 20007) in the Economist:

1. In 2004 girls outnumbered boys at secondary schools [high schools] in almost half the countries of the world (84 of 171).
2. At university level, girls do better still, outnumbering boys in 83 of 141 countries.
3. Female education is closely correlated with smaller family size, so the growth in the world's population should continue to slow as countries move towards “replacement fertility” and the population stabilises.

Marital Spats, Taken to Heart by Tara Parker-Pope

From an October 2, 2007 New York Times article:

1. In men, keeping quiet during a fight didn’t have any measurable effect on health.
2. But women who didn’t speak their minds in those fights were four times as likely to die during the 10-year study period as women who always told their husbands how they felt, according to the July report in Psychosomatic Medicine.
3. Other studies . . . have linked the self-silencing trait to numerous psychological and physical health risks, including depression, eating disorders and heart disease.
4. For women, whether a husband’s arguing style was warm or hostile had the biggest effect on her heart health.
5. The level of warmth or hostility had no effect on a man’s heart health. For a man, heart risk increased if disagreements with his wife involved a battle for control.