Nicole Medham is a third year law student at Columbia Law School and has these thoughts about a recent 20/20 episode that caught her attention when the authors of Freakonomics were interviewed about the what and why of various implications of feminism:

Last Friday’s edition of ABC’s 20/20 featured the authors of the bestseller Freakonomics, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, who were promoting the sequel to their best seller SuperFreakonomics.  During the hour long broadcast, some time was spent on the authors’ controversial views of the women’s liberation movement.  Essentially, Levitt and Dubner argue that the principal beneficiaries of the liberation movement were not female teachers or financiers, but high end prostitutes.   To that end, both men say that those who seek to “save” women from prostitution should ask and determine why women are responding to the market and becoming [high end] prostitutes in the first place.  Additionally, the authors argue that the invention of hormonal birth control gave women more control over their future occupations; therefore, instead of having to choose an occupation like a teacher which would allow for flexibility to enter and leave the work force, they could choose to become doctors, lawyers, bankers, etc.  Because of this, Levitt and Dubner claim that the talent level of school teachers has fallen, thus leading to the seeming overall failure of the country’s public school system.

Let’s take on the prostitution issue first.  Of course to some anti-prostitution advocates, there is no need to question why women choose prostitution, as it is invariably a result of the sexist and patriarchal society we live in.  Yet, I can’t help but think that Dubner and Levitt are right in that this is question that must be asked in order to make any needed changes.  In order to solve anything, one must get to the root of why the “problem” is occurring in the first place.  The women who have supposedly benefitted aren’t the stereotypical prostitute one thinks of that sets up shop on a dingy poorly lit street corner.  These are often [well] educated, well versed women who had fairly stable upbringings.  In fact, the woman profiled on 20/20 actually had a husband, children, and stable job, all of which she left to become a [high end] prostitute, due to her claims of boredom.  So  why would someone like that and the other well educated and well traveled women not want to put their brains to use in an arguably more productive way toward society and choose to sell their bodies instead?

Maybe these women are just more frank and upfront about how some relationships involving sex works.  Arguably, what these women are doing is no different than women (or men for that matter) who date people solely for money and other material benefits.  Even in popular culture, there are some marriages that have taken place where money seems to be the only answer why a particular couple was together.   And, marrying for financial gain is a historical facet of the institution of marriage.  In those cases, however, the monetary transactions take place in a socially acceptable form of a relationship.   In any event, the fact that the woman profiled on the show made $5000 a week for 10 hours of work speaks volumes, though it may speak different things for different listeners.   But, just maybe it says that she’s smarter than many other women out there.

Dubner and Levitt’s next hypothesis argues that hormonal birth control led to truly talented women leaving the teaching profession thus leading to a decline in gifted teachers in this nation’s public school system.  First and foremost, correlation does not imply causation.  To be sure, the seven and a half minute segment didn’t really delve into the authors’ method s of reasoning and argumentation.  Thus, I’d be interested to see how they made that leap.  For the sake of argument, let’s say that they are right—that control over reproduction gave women more occupational choices and power.   How does it go from that to implicitly putting the blame on women for the failing public school system?  That’s a pretty big leap, I’d say.  Why not look at the affects of the pay these teachers receive, the environment in which some of them would have to teach had they not chosen other fields, or the affect of various federal government regulations that have left many educators frustrated?  Moreover, why not take into account the fact that men can be just as effective as teachers and that they aren’t courted as heavily into that profession. Like I said, without knowing their methodology, it’s kind of hard to argue against them.  But, from what was shown on 20/20, their reasoning is tenuous at best.

Reform of divorce laws in light of the ways in which many women end up much worse off than their ex-husbands after divorce remains a huge problem for those of us concerned about Gender Justice.

But consider the current divorce case in the news of Marie Douglas-David, the 37 year-old woman who in 2002 married George David, a 67 year-old Connecticut executive who has a reported net worth of $329 million.  Prior to the marriage Douglas-Davis was an asset manager at Lazard Asset Management (and, um, a Swedish countess) who quit her job when she married David so that she could travel and entertain with him.

When the relationship hit the rocks after two years (evidently they both had affairs – he with a woman he met at a flower shop and she with a Swedish fencing champion) they entered into a post-nuptial agreement to the effect that upon dissolution of the marriage Marie would receive a $43 million settlement.  According to the Huffington Post, “Douglas-David wants the agreement invalidated. She’s asking to be awarded about $100 million in cash and stock, plus $130,000 a month in alimony.”  She maintains that her essential weekly expenses include $250 for a personal trainer, $700 for limousine services, $4,500 for clothes, $1,000 for hair and skin treatments, $1,500 for restaurants and entertainment, $2,209 for her personal assistant, $1,570 for horse care, $600 for flowers and $8,000 for travel.  In case you missed it, these are expenses per week.  (To be fair, he claims ten times as much in weekly expense: Clothes $2,500, Yacht maintenance $95,943, Eating out $1,773, Travel $7,491, Charities $18,042, Entertainment $7,125, Wife’s residences $67,12.  Who can’t relate to the crushing burden of the weekly “yacht maintenance” bill?  Source for these numbers. )

This case makes me crazy.

When Marie Douglas married George David she seems to have morphed from a competent, even shrewd, investment banker into a vulnerable, defenseless wife who was a victim of her husband’s power and prestige. Her lawyer has argued in court that she thought she was in “a loving, sound marriage” until she found e-mails disclosing an affair between her husband and a younger woman.  Shocking, shocking!  (Oh wait, George had a previous wife with whom he had had three children, and he met Marie when she, a woman less than half his age, invested in George’s business on behalf of Lazard.  Maybe the whole “younger woman-thing” is not so shocking.)

Marie, a woman with a serious, lucrative and successful career, junked it all when she met George, more than twice her age, and became a kept housewife.  In the divorce lawsuit Marie maintains that she shouldn’t be held to the terms of the $43 million post-nup.  Her lawyer argued in his opening statement to the judge that George coerced her to sign it by preying upon her fears of being divorced and childless.  “He put a [figurative] gun to the back of her head.”

Oh please.

These sorts of cases gain lots of media attention and they undermine the problem of equity in divorce cases between regular people whom Weitzman studies in her book, The Divorce Revolution: The Unexpected Social and Economic Consequences for Women and Children in America.  As a practical matter in most divorces, the less privileged party – usually the wife – walks away impoverished, or substantially less well off, than the more privileged party – usually the husband. This data hasn’t changed substantially since 1985, when she did her research.

When a woman such as Marie Douglas-David quits her job as an investment banker to become a wife – not only in the legal sense, but in the social sense (the servant to David’s professional and social life) – she’s not an absolute victim.  She’s making a choice, and I must add, a bad choice.  She did so at her peril.  There is, as my law & economics colleagues would call it, a moral hazard problem here: to relieve Marie Douglass-David of any responsibility for her own support, because she was, after all, George David’s wife, is to solidify women as the dependents of men.  They are the breadwinners, we are the arm candy and trophy wives.  They belong in the wage labor market, we belong at home with the kids. We are the mommies, they are the masters of the universe.

This isn’t the sort of case where the couple marries young, they make a deal that they’ll invest in his career first, hers second, and then he doesn’t live up the deal and she’s left with a bunch of sunk costs – to borrow again ideas from economists.  Or where they decide that it makes most sense for her to stay home and take care of the kids since, after all, he’s able to earn more given that he’s a man and they only need one wage to live on (a middle class scenario, that leaves out many, many families/couples that can’t afford to live on one wage).

No.  This was a woman, a countess even, who had a very lucrative career when she met her husband, indeed met her future husband, a client, at the office.

The lesson from the Douglas-David divorce: why would any woman want to be a wife?  You become a withered simalcrum of your former independent agentic self: unable to support yourself, vulnerable given your dependency on your husband’s wealth and support, and somehow exploitable by the prospect of being “divorced and childless.”

How can we avoid the even worse message this case delivers: What really is the difference between cashing out two years of marriage to a mogul as legalized prostitution?  How can we make a principled distinction between what she’s demanding and front pay?

Remind me why any woman would want to be a wife?

- Katherine Franke

Grace Tabib is a third year student at Columbia Law School and offers these thoughts on the regulation of pornography – K. Franke

As in other areas of gender study, Catharine MacKinnon’s extreme view once again forecloses the possibility of women controlling their own sexual impulses. When MacKinnon argues that all pornography is abusive to women, she is taking an absolutist position akin to an unwavering pro-life position. The Model Anti-Pornography Law, of which MacKinnon was a principal drafter, bars women from consenting to participation in a pornographic performance. She essentially likens pornography to slavery and maintains that women do not have the ability to willingly participate in its production. Furthermore, in defending the Model Anti-Pornography Law from First Amendment objections, she asserts “if a woman is subjected why should it matter that the work has other value?” Catherine A. MacKinnon, Pornography, Civil Rights, and Speech, 20 Harv, Civ. Rts.-Civ. Lib. L. Rev. 1, 21 (1985). Her refusal to allow women’s consent coupled with her underlying contention that the viewing of pornography is an act of male superiority reflects a closed-mindedness that refuses to acknowledge the individuality of women to engage in sexually liberating activities not because of men’s desires, but because of their own. Sallie Tisdale captures the alternative view that women can and should be free to make free sexual thought when she writes: “What a misogynistic worldview this is, this claim that wome who make such choices cannot be making free choices at all … Feminists against pornography have done a sad and awful thing: They have made women into objects.”

Pornography is not one-sided, but it becomes so if women are not free to have their tastes and preferences reflected by it. Candida Royalle’s initiative in founding Femme Productions and catering to a women’s market allows women to explore their sexuality within their own comfort zones. In this way, viewers of Femme films can use pornography to liberate their sexual selves. Royalle argues that the key to her films is sensuality. She understands that women approach sex in a different way from men and moves the focus away from penetration and into a holistic experience. Many groups of women – whites, blacks, lesbians, transgendered – can embrace pornography to explore sexual experience without a simplified ejaculatory conclusion.

Lynn Chancer in her article Feminist Offensives: Defending Pornography and The Splitting of Sex from Sexism, reflects a more realistic view towards pornography and its potential to liberate women. She seeks to legitimate pornography while exploring other realms of society in which women are repressed. For me, pornography should not be a focal point for women’s empowerment. Other areas of media can be much more harmful to the portrayal of women and the conceptualization of women’s role in society.

Although I am embarrassed to admit it, I saw the film “He’s Just Not That Into You” last weekend with a friend. The movie portrays women as men-obsessed, naïve, weak, and pitiful. Leaving the movie, I could not understand how any of the actresses could have agreed to participate in such a project. Maybe an ordinance against He’s Just Not That Into You – like movies would be more effective towards combating female submission.

Grace Tabib