Jonathan's blog

Via Slate's Today's Blogs column, from a Newsweek article of the same title by Nancy Gibbs:

The case: Ashley is a brain-damaged girl whose parents feared that as she got bigger, it would be much harder to care for her; so they set out to keep her small. Through high-dose estrogen treatment over the past two years, her growth plates were closed and her prospective height reduced by about 13 inches, to 4'5". "Ashley's smaller and lighter size," her parents write on their blog "makes it more possible to include her in the typical family life and activities that provide her with needed comfort, closeness, security and love: meal time, car trips, touch, snuggles, etc." They stress that the treatment's goal was "to improve our daughter's quality of life and not to convenience her caregivers." But the treatment went further: doctors removed her uterus to prevent potential discomfort from menstrual cramps or pregnancy in the event of rape; and also her breast tissue, because of a family history of cancer and fibrocystic disease. Not having breasts would also make the harness straps that hold her upright more comfortable. "Ashley has no need for developed breasts since she will not breast feed," her parents argue, "and their presence would only be a source of discomfort to her." The parents say that the decision to proceed with "The Ashley Treatment" was not a hard one for them, but the same cannot be said for the doctors. "This was something people hadn't thought about being a possibility, much less being done," says Diekema, who chairs the bioethics committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics and was brought in to consult on this case. For the ethics committee of Seattle Children's Hospital, which reviewed the proposed treatment, "it took time to get past the initial response-'wow, this is bizarre'- and think seriously about the reasons for the parents' request," says Diekema.

The ethics committee essentially did a cost-benefit analysis and concluded that the rewards outweighed the risks. Keeping Ashley smaller and more portable, the doctors argue, has medical as well as emotional benefits: more movement means better circulation, digestion and muscle condition, and fewer sores and infections. "If you're going to be against this," Gunther says, "you have to argue why the benefits are not worth pursuing."

Bizarre is an understatement. The family's blog is here.

Via Techcrunch, this looks interesting...Amie Street:

Amie Street, which launched in July, has a brilliant DRM-free music sales model. Bands upload music, which can then be downloaded for free by users. As songs become popular, the site starts to charge for it. They start at $0.01 and go up to $0.99. Users looking for popular new stuff go right to the more expensive songs.

Go here for a list of BookMooch's 100 most-wanted titles (the books I have no hope of mooching anytime soon).

Via TV Barn, this week The Sopranos come to A&E and The Wire comes to BET. Both are on Wednesday at 8 PM eastern. Both are popular series from HBO. Lisa and I have enjoyed the former but haven't watched the latter, so I'm going to set a season pass for The Wire. If you haven't watched The Sopranos, try it out. This edited for basic cable version may be more palatable to some than the HBO/DVD version with its graphic violence, frequent F-bombs, and scenes inside the Bada Bing.

A couple articles from a month back that address gender equality. From an article in USA Today:

When it comes to equality of the sexes, Scandinavian countries lead the world, but no nation has yet managed to bridge the gender gap completely, a report said Tuesday. Sweden, Norway, Finland and Iceland top the World Economic Forum rankings, followed by Germany in fifth place.

The nations studied had, on average, closed about 90% of the gender gap in education and health but only 50% in economic participation and opportunity, and 15% in political empowerment, said Saadia Zahidi, co-author of the report.

Denmark is rated eighth this year, while the United Kingdom comes ninth, the United States 22nd, Australia 15th and New Zealand seventh. The Philippines, which is ranked sixth, is the only Asian country in the top 10. The two countries ranked as having the biggest gender gaps by the report are Saudi Arabia and Yemen.

From an article in the NY Times titled "Gender pay gap narrows -- for unexpected reasons" by Molly Hennessy-Fiske:

Women are closing in on men when it comes to wages, but not for the reasons anticipated - or hoped for - when gender pay equity became a rallying cry in the 1970s. Data show that the pay gap has been narrowing not because women have made great strides, labor experts say, but because men's wages are eroding. The disparity in median hourly pay between men and women narrowed to 18.3% in August from 21.5% five years earlier, according to recently released census figures. In addition, the U.S. Labor Department noted recently that the wage differential in 2005 was the smallest since the department began tracking it 33 years ago, when it was 36.9%. Even when men's and women's work patterns are taken into account - men tend to work more hours - the pay gap is narrowing.

However - as the economy expanded, profits rose and unemployment fell - men's hourly wages declined a total of 2% from 2000 to 2005 while women's rose 3%, census records show. Women's gains were barely enough to keep up with inflation.

Economists say the forces behind these trends show that men and women are experiencing the economy in different ways. In the U.S., men have tended to dominate in blue-collar and manufacturing jobs, which have been disappearing - or seeing downward wage pressure - for the last few decades. Women, on the other hand, have been more prevalent in service jobs such as healthcare, which historically have been lower-paying but have seen wages rise in recent years.