In the February issue of Elle UK, Natalie Portman says, "I've always tried to stay away from playing Jews." Then she adds, "I get like 20 Holocaust scripts a month, but I hate the genre." Because the entire interview is not online, I am going to give Portman the benefit of the doubt. I don't think she's a self-loather who doesn't want movie audiences to know she's Jewish (though she benefits from looks that are not stereotypically Semitic—her nose is small, her hair is straight). It's more that she's lamenting the lack of good Jewish roles outside of Holocaust movies. There, she has a point.

In the past ten years, I can think of only two non-Holocaust movies in which the female protagonist was explicitly Jewish: Two Lovers and Kissing Jessica Stein. It's worth noting that both these films were independent productions, and that in Two Lovers, Vinessa Shaw's Jewish character was meant to be less attractive than Gwyneth Paltrow's character, who is a shiksa (though in real life both Paltrow and Shaw are at least part Jewish). I literally cannot think of a single major studio picture with a Jewish heroine from the aughts—if you can name one, please list in the comments below. That's certainly something worth complaining about in fashion magazines.

Tags: jewish actresses, jews, natalie portman

Amanda, the Texas Monthly article on Abby Johnson shows that she’s not the hero that the right has made her out to be, but it’s worth pointing out that she’s not quite the villain that the left made her out to be, either. When her story first made news, Planned Parenthood sought a restraining order against her, and people accused her of taking private information from the clinic, with the sinister implication that she was going to bring or threaten harm to those who worked at the clinic. But at a hearing, Judge J.D. Langley ruled that Planned Parenthood offered insufficient evidence that Johnson took confidential documents from the facilities.

If I were more mean-spirited, I’d say perhaps she honed her lying skills at Planned Parenthood (since, after all, there is video of a counselor at another PP clinic telling a patient that the definitely-not-a-baby she was carrying wouldn’t have a heartbeat until 17 weeks gestation and video of a PP employee telling a patient to lie about her age). But that would be unfair. Johnson might be “obtuse and untrustworthy,” as you write. I suspect, though, that she was at least telling the truth about not realizing that she would end up on Fox News, and I would guess that the overriding character trait that fueled all this was naivete, and that she found herself in over her head when the media descended. All in all, she seems like a flawed individual with a knack for garnering attention. Which makes me wonder: When does her reality show start? What’s most disappointing for me is that if her conversion story has any truth to it—maybe along with everything else she really couldn’t take it anymore, maybe God flicked her ear and told her she was on the wrong team (and, by the way, we’d never call ourselves “Team Fetus”!)—she really didn’t need the dramatic story. She could have just said, “I’ve seen enough. I can’t do it anymore.” She’d have been welcomed with open arms.

Aside from Johnson, though, I have a question that I hope you don’t mind me asking. Your posts on abortion often, at least to my eyes, paint the issue as something utterly black and white. Pro-choicers are honorable and righteous defenders of women everywhere, and pro-lifers are woman-hating “sex-phobic” liars. Is that your impression of everyone who is anti-abortion? I’ve been against abortion for about 20 years now, ever since I was old enough to think hard about it, and that description fits almost no one I know. I don’t hate women. I’m a tomboy, and I’d rather watch a football game than sit through Bride Wars or anything involving sisterhoods of Ya-Yas or traveling pants, but women are amazing. And I think sex is pretty great, too.

Yes, there are prudish old folks who think sex is for procreation, not recreation, and I cringe whenever I see their letters to the editor in the newspaper. But abortion is not that cut and dried of an issue, and people on both sides have different motivations for their belief systems. There are people who are pro-choice because they’ve thought long and hard about it and want what they view as what’s best for women; others are pro-choice because that’s what their Womyn’s Studies 101 professor taught them; and there are yet others who are pro-choice because they don’t want to be inconvenienced by an unwanted pregnancy. (I’m sorry, but if pro-life men get knocked as sexist, why not men who cajole women to get abortions so they don’t have to “deal with” a kid or child support?) And yes, some people are pro-life because that’s what their church told them or because they think women should be barefoot and pregnant. But some of us are pro-life because we’ve had to confront the reality that our parents were young and unready for children when they conceived us and that we could have been aborted ourselves. Amazing perspective that provides, by the way. And some of us are pro-life because we believe women are strong and intelligent and independent enough to own their own sexuality and take advantage of all the ways that science has made it possible to have sex without getting pregnant. There is good and bad on both sides. There is honesty and sincerity, and there is lying and deception. If abortion were that simple, do you think we’d still be arguing about it so passionately more than 35 years after Roe v. Wade?

Tags: Abby Johnson, planned parenthood

Today, Republicans are deciding whether to water down the new proposed “purity resolution”—10 conservative principles future candidates have to agree to. I, for one, can’t get past the name. “Purity resolution” comes from the “True Love Waits” movement. It’s a pledge signed by teenagers—mostly girls—agreeing to stay virgins until married. In the context of sexuality, the word “purity” transmits a clear—and these days, transgressive—message. In the context of politics, “purity” seems squeamish and naive, with a touch of the Aryan.

Newt Gingrich’s 1994 Contract With America served the same purpose. It created a set of principles to unify Republicans. But with its emphasis on “fiscal responsibility” and “taking back our streets,” the contract had a certain kind of muscular practicality this one lacks. Gingrich took special care to avoid including abortion and other divisive social issues in his contract.

This time, the Republicans are taking the opposite approach. The name “purity resolution” was chosen by James Bopp, Jr., from Indiana, a member of the Republican National Committee who is associated with National Right to Life. The principles are a throwback to the pre-Gingrich culture war era: anti-abortion, pro-gun, anti-union, anti-immigrant. Many conservatives have pointed out that even Ronald Reagan would not pass. Bopp’s answer to this charge displays a kind of subtlety and intelligence we would want in a man helping choose our future leaders: “Ronald Reagan was the most conservative president in the last 100 years. Everyone knows this, and it is stupid to suggest otherwise.”

Tags: gop and purity resolution, james bopp, purity pledge, purity resolution, republicans and purity pledges, republicans and purity resolution

Carole Joffe’s new book, Dispatches from the Abortion Wars, chronicles the post-Roe rise of the anti-abortion movement in America and what Joffe describes as women’s epic struggle to maintain access to a lawful medical procedure. As she notes in her preface, the author intends to provide an unbalanced account, imagining herself in the trenches, “as a war correspondent, embedded with troops on one side of the conflict.” But Joffe’s book transcends the typical screed against landmark anti-choice legislation. Instead she focuses on exposing the insidiousness and ubiquity of the bias against abortion in public life. After the invasion of Iraq, for example, President George W. Bush grilled potential appointees to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad about their stance on Roe v. Wade. Joffe also highlights the plight of clinic workers—the courageous foot soldiers in her elaborate military conceit—who are both openly harassed and quietly discriminated against by local businesses.

For some, this will be a long-awaited battle cry against the shrill accusations of organizations like the National Right to Life Committee. For more moderate abortion proponents, Joffe’s rhetoric may be off-putting. She writes of patients’ profound gratitude and relief and the “deep bonds” among providers sustained by occasional gatherings and “lively Listservs." Her cloying encomiums to the forcible expulsion of unwanted endometrial tissue may unsettle some supporters of reproductive rights—the way Joffe describes it, the controversial procedure sounds more like a love-in than the termination of a pregnancy.

With the election of Barack Obama fresh in her mind, Joffe ends the book on an optimistic note. If the new administration’s disavowal of so-called pregnancy crisis centers is any indication, then Joffe and her acolytes have reason to hope.

Tags: abortion, book of the week, carole joffe, reproductive rights, right wing nuts, Roe Vs. Wade

Our discussion yesterday on password sharing touched on just how prevalent the practice is. In the past, you had to actively look for information about an ex by semi-stalking his or her friends. But if you've shared your information with each other, scorned lovers can take things a step further: They can search their exes' G-mail accounts or peruse their Facebook messages without anyone ever knowing about it. Even when your password sharing starts out as seemingly innocuous, lazy behavior (I don’t know how many times I’ve asked my boyfriend to check my e-mail for me), it can lead to a tedious and painful transition post break-up.

In a continuation of our awkward and wrong series of Internet mishaps, we’re looking for unfortunate experiences caused by sharing passwords. Did you find out your partner was cheating because of a rogue Gchat? Did you search his Twitter personal messages and find out what your ex really thought of you? Send us your uncomfortable stories.

Tags: awkward and wrong, email, Facebook, oversharing, password sharing, passwords, relationships, secrets & lies

We've spent a lot of time at DoubleX in the past few months contemplating the way men seem to be more likely than women to trash their lives and careers at the urgings of their nether regions (or, in the case of Mark Sanford, "love"). We racked our collective brains trying to come up with a woman to add to our list of Top Cads of 2009 and failed. Now Northern Ireland MP Iris Robinson—mother of three grown children and wife of the country's First Minister Peter Robinson—goes to the top of the list for 2010 scandals thus far—she resigned late last month, but it's only in the first days of 2010 that the details of her affair with a 19-year-old and her misuse of her position to help her lover fund and open a business have come out. We don't have many women-centered political sex scandals to compare her with, but when it comes to "taking it like a man," she's already shown that female politicians—or at least this particular, not otherwise overly sympathetic Irish female politician, do things differently.

Instead of waiting for the news of her financial and family troubles to break, Mrs. Robinson (known in Northern Ireland for her anti-gay stance—she described homosexuality as only slightly less "vile" than "sexually abusing innocent children") resigned in late December, and apparently attempted suicide. She didn't take the stage for the inevitable press conference, stoic husband by her side, to apologize to the nation and her family and attempt to weather the storm. Instead, she's issued an apologetic statement, but left the appearances to her husband, whose political career is also in danger because of allegations that he knew about and didn't reveal her financial transgressions. So far, he's supporting his wife and defending his marriage, but this one—a new kind of a problem for a relatively new style of political partnership—has yet to play out.

Granted, Iris Robinson is a sample of one, but it's notable that so many male politicians, faced with far more dramatic scandals or at least equally embarrassing ones, tied on their striped ties and let the media and the public take a swing at them—even while, in some cases, offering mental stresses, depression, and other excuses for their behavior. It's not necessarily more admirable, but it's certainly a different way to handle the fallout from stepping into this particular pitfall of power. Meanwhile, Mrs. Robinson, so far, stays home. Is she retiring from the spotlight to give her husband a better chance at keeping his position? Does she feel more personal guilt over her behavior—or does she believe that any form of brazening this out would only make things worse for them both? Northern Ireland's press will surely be all over this, but a little meta-scrutiny is appropriate from this side of the pond.

Tags: iris robinson, iris robinson sex scandal

Indeed, Emily Y., it would be a great boon if it turned out that the case for climate change is weak and life on our planet could hum along as usual, CO2 emissions and all. But the case isn't weak and we can't. You pointed to a new study by Wolfgang Knorr at the University of Bristol about how the oceans have absorbed CO2 since 1850. I asked Yale geologist Jeffrey Park about Knorr's findings because he also has a new paper on the topic. He wrote back:

Knorr is NOT saying that global warming isn't happening, or that CO2 levels are not increasing. Instead, he is evaluating a very specific hypothesis about the progression of Earth's carbon cycle as atmospheric-CO2 levels and global temperature both increase. There are a number of reasons, based on physics, chemistry and biology, to expect an eventual decrease in Earth's ability to absorb human CO2 emissions. Currently roughly half of what we emit gets absorbed by the oceans and the land biosphere and rock weathering. We don't understand each of these processes well enough to predict the exact division between CO2-absorption processes, but it's a good bet that the ocean is the principal sink for CO2. We also don't know enough about the processes to predict exactly when the absorption of CO2 will slow down, so scientists are devising experiments to estimate the rate, past and present. This is the context of Knorr's study.

Knorr takes estimates of human CO2 emissions since the mid-19th century and plots them on the same graph as concurrent estimates of atmospheric CO2. Knorr's result still implies that CO2 levels will continue to increase, and that the greenhouse effect will continue to increase. What he doesn't see is evidence for exhaustion of Earth's ability to sequester a constant fraction of the CO2 we emit. If his conclusion is correct, then it offers some consolation that this particular climate process is not getting worse, but the consolation is small. Warming will continue.

Knorr's focus on the long term (since 1850) is useful, but there have been other estimates that have focussed on only the last 50-60 years, and three papers were published by independent research groups in the same month that reached conclusions different from Knorr.

Park says that when you look at Knorr's data, "it becomes clear that his estimation method won't do a very good job at estimating changes in trend since 1960." Here's yet more explanation. So, sorry, however much we might wish that climate change is less likely, this one study doesn't show it.

Knorr himself doesn't say otherwise. His quote on the University of Bristol Web site: "Like all studies of this kind, there are uncertainties in the data, so rather than relying on Nature to provide a free service, soaking up our waste carbon, we need to ascertain why the proportion being absorbed has not changed." Not exactly a free pass for the CO2 emitters.

As for global temperatures, despite the cold and snow, 2010 may be on track to be the hottest year ever. Here's the Economist on the complexity. And while it doesn't look like we've had a single year as hot as 1998, the past decade was the warmest on record (hotter than the '90s, which were hotter than the '80s).

Tags: climate change, jeffrey park, wolfgang knorr