Margaret doesn’t have a blog, you see, and here’s why: because blogging is a guy thing. “Men clearly have an urge to blog that women lack,” she says, and her proof is that she doesn’t have a blog, and neither does her friend, Sarah. So, extrapolating from that excellent sample, she is able to draw inferences regarding the urge to blog in half of the population of the planet. Frankly, I don’t know why I slogged my way through graduate statistics  and survey methodology classes, when I could just be doing this kind of incisive research design and analysis. Women don’t blog, because … well, because Margaret was shy in college and never raised her hand, and therefore women don’t feel the need to voice an opinion. Globe and Mail, I am actually a little ashamed to read you.

I had a lot to say about this, but luckily, Melissa at Shakesville said it for me, and better, so I will just add two things. One: every day, as the parent of little girls, I am confronted by a reminder that our culture will never make for them the room they deserve to just be – to just be the people they are supposed to be. That everything about them will always be subject to the kind of scrutiny and interpretation that our culture revels in, when it comes to women. And two: the obsession in tabloid journalism regarding celebrity children is  off-putting and creepy. A grown man, hiding in the bushes, snapping hundreds of photos of unsuspecting little children and selling those photos to the highest bidder. That is what this cover represents.

I am not even sure where to start, unpacking that photo. Male gaze, sexual objectification of women,  sexualizing the accoutrements of children? Or maybe it is enough to state the obvious: we live in a culture where a young woman’s paid job can be giving a simulated blowjob to a piece of candy while walking the red carpet in order to be photograhed by the media.

I don’t know why I listen, except I keep hoping that one day, Eric will grunt out one of his misogynist conversation openers, and then the air will go dead for a moment, and then Kathy will say, very quietly, “Eric, stop being such an asshole.” It never happens, and reading this interview gives a pretty good indicator why.

Here is Kathy’s job, in a nutshell: used to have her own show, WTMX decides she needs a man on her show, brings one in, she does not get any choice in the matter, is not on the hiring committee, and met Eric once in passing in hallway before he was hired. He was immediately given top billing on her show (it’s Eric & Kathy, not Kathy & Eric), and in their two room office suite, his is the inner sanctum, while she is assigned a desk in the outer office, typically where support staff sit. Eric decides on a more audience-centred format, which he defines as asking the audience to call in on questions such as, “Guys, have you ever driven a ’sissy car’?” Wrap your heads around that one while I look for more quotes.

He outearns her immediately, and pulls in a salary of over a million dollars a year. Not surprising, since he has top billing, but think about it. A million dollars a year for offering his opinion on what makes a girl a skank, or complaining about how hard it is to be a man. Kathy  says very little on air, punctuating Eric’s rants with one word answers. In her own words, this is because , “… she doesn’t always know where Ferguson wants to take a segment and doesn’t want to get in the way.” On her own show, she doesn’t want to get in the way.

“It’s challenging,” she says. “I struggle with at times sharing too much of my information or my personal opinion because Eric wants the listener to do that. He obviously knows where he’s going. He knows what he’s saying and has everything prepared ahead of time. I’ve got to think on the fly and figure out what he’s doing.” Well, God forbid she get to voice her own opinion on her own show. After all, Eric doesn’t want her to have one.That’s what he makes the big bucks for, after all – to be the one that runs the show. Her show.

This is what she has to say about the money:

“When that first contract came up that there was a huge disparity, I came to terms with it. … We kind of made an agreement that, ‘OK, I’m going to spend less time here. You’re going to have to deal with all the client meetings, all the extra hours stuff, and I’m going have the freedom to be home with my family.’

“He does a tremendous amount more than I do for this show. So — God, my agent will kill me if I say this —– but it would be unfair for us to make the same amount of money and I know that. How can I be upset about that? He does more work and I have the luxury to be able to go home and be a mom.”

I am not knocking moms here, or her decision, but it is troubling that the whole ‘I have the luxury to go home and be a mom’ part didn’t happen until AFTER he was paid a LOT more money than she was. So it wasn’t part of her deal, to say she would take less money and step away from the decision-making to be home more. Instead, it was the panacea she offered herself to get over the hurt of being paid substantially less money. The client meetings, the stuff she is missing? That’s where decisions get made, so basically, not only did she get screwed out of the money, but gave up even more power to make herself feel better about the money.

Lets end on a lighter note, shall we? WTMX is apparently owned by the Church of Latter Day Saints. Suddenly it all makes sense.

The archives though, may be lost. They were backed up onto a drive that corrupted due to fire damage (its been an exciting year!), and may be unrecoverable, which is a shame, because they go back for years, and include such gems as my prediction that blogs were a passing fad.

Watch this space: the relaunch is January 2010. And thank you in advance for your patience as I muck around with the template, etc.