"I agree with the person who commented that there was a gender angle to these articles, and what we expect of women versus men when it comes to "catharsis" and "sharing" etc."

This is new to you? Under Joan Walsh, women are the arbiters of culture, relationships, and human emotion, in all aspects, no matter how shallow and self-centered they are, and men handle the machines, the sports, and the politics. Cary Tennis snuck in there in a slot traditionally filled by a woman, but that's the only real exception.

Salon has been this way for a long time, with the Broadsheet you-go-girlfriend attitude crowding out real reporting and real writing more and more.

As for the bias against poorer women, well, they don't attend those New York writers' parties, do they? If they did, maybe they could catch a break once in a while.

The real question is whether Walsh's coddling of all these woman writers in seemingly identical circumstances, freelancing with no particular creative skill in the most expensive city in the country, is (a) protecting a valuable resource, and hopefully nurturing it into the next generation of cutting-edge commentary and creativity, or (b) perpetuating the illusion that this is a real or responsible lifestyle, and thus helping to keep these women in an infantile state longer than is healthy?

Salon is the safety net for lots of these women, allowing them to believe that they're actual writers, and that they have an actual future in that industry. (I note that Marisa doesn't pretend to be a creative genius or a writer of spectacular import, and she certainly seems knowledgeable in her GreenDay columns - again, this is the exception for Salon rather than the norm)

And in the meantime, Walsh herself is apparently striving to get a permanent slot as a TV bloviator, endlessly promoting Hillary Clinton at a time when such blind obedience to the Clinton brand is fast going out of style.

Perhaps she'll need a safety net herself. Perhaps an editor slot on a 'zine that is more honest about its female-centeredness.

Unemployment will take a big toll on relationships!

about one of the oldest subjects in the book -- gender, love and finance -- and the judgemental assholes come out in droves.

I'm a man, I've been in dire financial straits, I support a family now on my lonesome, and I TOTALLY understand the feelings this writer went through. Upper-Middle class coddled? Maybe, definitely to begin with.

Many of the people so quick to judge sound like they've never actually had to face that feeling. I call bullshit on most of them. They lob lots of platitudes about "real poverty" and "the rest of the world", but when it's YOUR life and it's three in the morning, Sociology 101 doesnt' mean shit.

Grow up.

Obviously some of you hate this age-old story: young creative types have to grow up and confront real life and find practical ways to deal with it. Or, hard times throw young untested idealists for a loop, and they have to figure out how to survive.

But I like this story. Glad Marissa decided to grow up and be responsible, instead of just ditching Paul.

And doesn't history have a way of repeating itself? In 1925, my grandmother married an older, very successful man and settled down to what she thought would be the happy prosperous life of a middle-class housewife, making babies, roast chicken and cookies. Five years later, they'd lost everything--right down to their wedding rings. My grandmother got a very different, harder life than she bargained for. They moved a lot (jumping rent, we suspect, though she never confessed), lived apart when he found work out of town, and all the kids learned how to crawl under the house and get the power and water back on after they'd been turned off. But they had a good life, rich in friends and family. (And lots of good stories too.)

Now that the next great Depression is upon us, Marisa and Paul's story will not be unusual. Welcome to the real world, newlyweds!

........a well to do upper middle class (which covers a lot of ground....I can lay claim to it too, but have had to pay for my own grad school and exotic vacations, as mommy and daddy certainly weren't going to) white girl shockingly discovers that she actually doesn't get to have her cake and eat it, getting a fun boy toy AND finding out that the money she's freely availed herself of all these years actually doesn't grow on tree, and is necessary for life.....particularly when very typically, one wants to have "choices, not obligations".

The real victim of this is the yet to be named hardworking cricket that she is going to (unless "true love" perseveres-smirk) find to replace grasshopper that got tricked into cleaning up the mess for the bag of cynical, more wrinkled, fatter, used goods she's going to become.

V V

Of course, even those run out of money every once in a while.

"the bag of cynical, more wrinkled, fatter, used goods she's going to become."

Yike!

You're taking just a little too much joy, I think, in the entropy of someone you don't even know. That is, you're projecting on a level that this particular person doesn't seem to deserve.

For one thing, she's staying with grasshopper. I agree that cricket is always well-advised to stay away from grasshopper's leftovers, but in this case, this guy might be altogether decent, and not just some sort of pretty boy. Anyone who works with children gets points in my book.

I am curious, though, about the world as Salon depicts it. It really does sound as if I could drive my paid-for car through Manhattan, with a big speaker on top blaring "I have an actual job and a career!" and all these attractive, young, freelance-writing females would pour out into the streets and fight over the right to be supported by me.

Is the real world like that? Really?

It was once stated to me by female friends:

"I will be abused by a man no matter what man I am with. Might as well be a rich man"

"I've been with rich and I've been with poor men. Rich is better"

"It is easier to love a rich man, than to love a poor one"