Ok, I've never heard of BlogHer, so I suppose I'm shooting a bit in the dark here with a theory, but here goes. The nature of the coverage of each conference was different because the purpose of each conference was different, wasn't it? Netroots is about politics, about the way internet activists have changed the nature of politics. That's why politicians showed up, and that's why it got coverage in political sections of the paper. This is an election year. Politics rules.

I'm sure BlogHer was great for those who attended, offering useful and insightful information about and for women bloggers, but it sounds like it was a bit insular, as in not that relevant to people who aren't women bloggers. Did the conference make an effort to market itself as a political event?

On 'patriarchy', I agree with you that a situation with patterns that favor men over women tends to get ideological explanation that claim this is a 'natural' state of affairs, which leads to discrimination (i.e. judging a person as intelligent, or competent, or ... simply by his/her sex). I'm not sure if 'discrimination' and 'misogyny' are the same thing; as I understand it, you could be 'misogynous' (meaning you don't want to be around women -- like a misanthrope who doesn't want to live around people and prefers to be alone) without discriminating against women in any way other than avoiding their company. But I do agree that misogynous people would tend to discriminate against women and spread bad female stereotypes because they would rationalize their preference by saying women are indeed bad, stupid, incompetent (people apparently always want to offer some rationalization for their preferences...).

But I'm curious about the definition you give -- about 'patriarchy' being (the situation that obtains when) the man is the head of the household with women and children (legally? customarily? physically?) dependent on him. Is the mere pattern sufficient, or does it have to be abused -- by the creation of anti-female stereotypes to justify the pattern -- before you can say there is 'patriarchy'?

Let me give you an example of a sexual segretation pattern that, as far as I know, has never been claimed to be misogyneous (or mysandrious = anti-male either): naming. Certain names are only given to women (Mary, Jean, Laura...) and others only to men (Martin, Robert, Stephen...). As far as I know, this pattern -- the 'gender character' of names -- has never been ideologically used to claim superiority of one gender over another; so its existence has never led to, or been claimed to imply or to explain, 'discrimination'.

I don't want to be recognized for anything because I have breasts. Well, that's not entirely true, but when it comes to accomplishments, if I can't make it without some kind of step-up or mandated accolade, I don't freaking want it.

If I'm not being taken seriously, I ask myself why. I can't think of many times that I haven't been taken seriously, but when it's happened, it's been either because I'm on someone else's turf and haven't proven myself (yet!), or because I don't deserve to be taken seriously because I'm obviously out of my depth.

Then again, I don't go around expecting people to show me the utmost respect just because I'm breathing.

I wish had as much time as you to post! I actually only have a couple minutes now but I just wanted to say that I share some of your doubts about whether or not misogyny is a necessary requirement for a patriarchal system, or what the role or relationship between the two might really be. Given some of the violent reactions on BS to the use of the term patriarchy and the perception that it was synonymous with misogyny I really just wanted to make the point that they're not equivalent. Socrates always said you have to define your terms, and I do think that we're all using these terms with each other and sometimes not realizing that we are defining them very differently, and then miscommunication ensues. Maybe I've read too much Foucault or something and I have "hegemony" stuck in my head, but I tend to define patriarchy not so much in terms of the father as the head of the family, which is a totally valid definition, but more in terms of power structures and which groups dominate society and hold power and the ways this is reflected in our socio-political institutions and the ways that discriminatory treatment of women and attitudes about women become institutionalized.

And I hear your points about expression of emotion in posts, very valid!

Interesting thoughts on names. I find it fascinating, actually, that names are gendered. If you've noticed, in the last fifty years or so, names have done some crossing over between genders. I wonder if that reflects the changes in the way we see gender or if it's simply one of those faddish things that happens or both.

It goes back to that business about naming blogs that I found sort of not great in Ms. Traister's article. If women are subjugated everywhere, then the world of the Internet wouldn't be any different. So, it pretty much doesn't matter what the name of the blog is. Plus, the whole idea that some names are "feminine" while other names are "powerful" (or masculine) is a real step in the wrong direction, I think. As others have pointed out, especially when you're writing on Broadsheet.

Back to the patriarchy, the patriarchy is a structural societal formation. Misogyny, I believe, is a possible end result of that formation, quite probably inevitable if the structure is allowed to continue. Some scholars believe that it's the other way around and that, because there are misogyny and misogynists, the patriarchy has formed to subjugate that gender. I don't really buy that theory, but I could certainly be wrong about that.

I also think discrimination must necessarily apply as a term to a larger group. Anyone can be discriminated against for some reason, I'm sure.