Read Courtney on the Wapo Next Pundit Competition

As usual she brings it with personal experience and feminist authority in her measured, thoughtful and generous way.

Being a part of the WaPo’s contest didn’t change how I feel about the value of training women to enter public debate in greater numbers. It did, however, remind me of just how deeply the gender imbalance on op-ed pages is rooted. It’s not all about submission rates or saying yes when producers call; it’s also about old, tired, and stubbornly persistent perceptions of gender and authority.
Reading the comments that amassed following my writing throughout the three-week experience and, especially, after my video appearance, was a sobering reality check about how far we still have to go in changing cultural mores on who gets to speak about “political issues” and how they get to speak about them.

Please go read the rest.