These women ROCK!!! They are the best of everything I always hoped America was. There should be statues and national holidays for senior citizens with this much energy and devotion. Especially given how little respect elderly people are accorded on a day-to-day basis.

I hope their children and grandchildren are appropriately grateful for such incredibly cool grandmothers!

which is 20% homosexual, according to the offical census. I work in an office with 6 men - 3 gay, 1 bi and 2 straight. None of these men fit Lenos stereotypes, although some of my other gay friends do. None of my lesbian/bi friends fit any of the normal "dyke" images, although some of my homosexual female collegues do.

On the other hand, some of my male, white, Christian family and friends in the states are like the "God hates Fags" people, AND SOME ARE NOT. I believe the whole point of the letter was that not all gay people are alike, yet many people, including certainly some gay hollywood insiders insist in trafficing in these stereotypes instead of allowing homosexuals to be the ultimately hetergeneous group that they, like all groups, are. Are all Christians anti-homosexual? No, and no one assumes that they are. Are all white people racist and all black people criminals? No, of course not. So why are all gay people in the public conscious "camp"? This ultimately is a debate that needs to be going on between people like Mr. Whitty, who clearly doesn't want to be stereotyped this way and those within the entertainment industry AND the gay community who insist on perpetuating these monolithic images, for whatever reason.

I agree with Amanda, how will parents know?

I was an eating disordered teen and my parents had no clue. They still don't. I got help on my own at college and consider myself recovering, although others might argue. Parents always seem to check out of their childrens lives when they hit 13, WRONG!! This is exactly when they need to put in more effort. Honestly, it's not just this either. Disaffected teens get up to all sorts of stuff, from purging to drugs to unprotected sex to armed ramapages through school buildings and the common denominator is ALWAYS disengaged parents. These are children we are talking about here, they can't and shouldn't be expected to ask for help. The help should be offered.

My family does something similiar. All of the women in my family are very strong-willed and many are also, um, heinous controlling b-tches. Sorry, really the only description. Our family curse is "I hope you have a daughter just like you!".

My mother also told me that she didn't want me and that I screwed up her life, when I was 10 and not in a fit of anger either. Just in a normal conversation. She and my father, who is completely under her thumb, continue to be controlling and interfere in my life even though I have literally moved to the other side of the planet to get away from them.

I have recieved many poisen-pen letters from them as well as some which are just plain schizo. I think Cary's advice is good. Cut loose from the expectation that your mother will change, or be willing to let you forgive her. Cut them off, write your letters or your journal entries, deal with your anger and resentment and sadness about their treatment of you however you want, reconnect with your son and move on with your life. Help him understand that this is not about him, or even really about you but ultimately about your mother and her emotional problems.

I agree with the much much earlier poster who pointed out that this article is about a loss of innocence, or maybe an overdue awakening. I was at a small liberal arts college less than 10 years ago and we had rampant date rape on campus. People (read men) were expelled but that didn't solve the problem. With one extreme exception, there was little overt violence, but plenty of threats against those women who reported incidents. Duke is anything but unique. I don't have children, but I hate to think of my younger brothers possibly seeing something like this and not being man enough to stand up and stop it. I got the authors point.

And those of you who only want to complain about the quality of the writing or who simply want to insult and irritate all of the other people on the site - it's a free country and more importantly, a pay site. Stop reading it and save your money.

Iran changed from within once, it can most certainly do it again. I'm quite confused by the tendency of Republicans and conservatives in both parties to push for war with Iran. Shouldn't they be following Reagan's example with the Soviets? Glastnost and perestroika worked much much better than all of the previous military posturing to bring down the communist states of Eastern Europe. What Shirin Ebadi is proposing sounds about like that. Engagement, so that they can't use our posturing as an excuse to crack down on their own liberals in the name of "national security" thereby allowing the liberal afctions to work for change and reform. But wait, that would actually work and wouldn't earn Halliburton any money. Hmmm....

And if the administration starts using womens rights as an excuse to attack Iran after they've left the women of Afgahnistan to fend for themselves and continue to support the Saudi regime, I will have hysterics. I mean, women in Iran can go to University, drive cars, and (presumably with the help of their families) arrange marriage contracts which protect their rights beyond what their legal system is willing to provide them. Women in Saudia Arabia aren't even allowed to drive cars!