Would you say that men and women take a different approach to Weblogging? In this big an' crazy world you're bound to find exceptions on both sides of the fence, I'll grant that, but let's say for the moment that gender does make a difference where the fingers meet the keyboard.

If this hypothesis is correct, we ought to be able to say with some confidence what gender-specific traits might arise in a given instance, and like a Turing test, we could read samples of writing and based on what we know about the different perspectives of male and female writers we could say, "Why, this piece here, this was written by a man, because of such-and-such."

So why would this be important, even if it were true? Well I'd say that in and of itself it probably wouldn't be. But I started thinking about these matters the other day when I was looking over Virginia Postrel's Dynamist Blog, which I admire quite much, and I wondered if the feminist critic and poet Adrienne Rich might accuse Ms. Postrel of writing in a mannish vein, what for her war-blogging and competitive edge, which doesn't gibe with conventional ideas about women's ways of knowing and modes of self-expression. After all, aren't women supposed to tend toward collaboration, cooperation, and engaging in textual hagiography per de Beauvoir?

A logically constructed essay is, in a feminist's eyes, a more masculine enterprise in its goal-orientation of reaching a destination as opposed to enjoying the scenery along the way. Which brings us, in a roundabout way, to the subject of war.

Combat is the definitive province of the male psyche—office politics aside—and I can't help but question whether the war in Iraq is in some way a war against female values. There's certainly an argument for the masculine tone in this LA Times headline: U.S. Armored Forces Thrust Deep Into Baghdad, which stresses the sense of our penetration of the enemy's defenses as being not unlike the beery-drunk advances of a loutish prom date toward some chaste and struggling debuttante.

Chemical Free

You'll no doubt appreciate being spared a running play-by-play commentary as we whittle down the numbers of the Iraqi leadership, but it is important to note this development: Chemical Ali found dead in Basra.

Nobody's shedding tears at the demise of Ali Hassan al-Majid, who initiated a gas attack in 1988 that killed thousands of Kurds. Since the death of anyone, even someone this brutal and ruthless, is no cause for jubilation, in this case the appropriate emotion is a grave and stern recognition that in this case, anyway, justice has been rendered.

Al-Majid apparently was killed on Saturday when two coalition aircraft used laser-guided munitions to attack his house in Basra. Jackson said a body that was thought to be his was found along with that of his bodyguard and the head of Iraqi intelligence services in Basra.

Playing Rough

That's how they do it in Oakland, California. I've been running across stories all day about the savage suppression of an anti-war protest at the Port of Oakland this morning. This time around, the cops eschewed the twist-tie approach and simply opened fire with non-lethal projectiles. Exacerbating this incident was the fact that six longshoremen got caught in the crossfire between the police and the rock-and-bolt-throwing protestors.

Police spokeswoman Danielle Ashford said officers fired bean-bag rounds and wooden dowels. They also used "sting balls," which send out a spray of BB-sized rubber pellets and a cloud of tear gas.

The Agonist and the Ecstasy

Salon blogger Douglas Anders's page, The Agora, has picked up a bit of traffic recently thanks to his being blogrolled by fellow-Hellene Sean-Paul Kelley, whose warblogging site The Agonist is currently embroiled in a plagiarism scandal. In a story at Wired titled, "Noted War Blogger Cops to Copying," it comes to light that Kelley had subscribed to a paid news service run by the commercial intelligence firm Strategic Forecasting, who for their part were somewhat miffed at Kelley's wholesale cut 'n' paste shenanigans with their content.

"Many postings on the (Agonist) pages I looked at are word-for-word verbatim," said Stratfor chief analyst Matthew Baker.

"You got me, I admit it....I made a mistake," Kelley said. "It was stupid."

By the way, one of the things we here at Salonblogs can take pride in is our self-administered ethic of full attribution. Kriselda at Different Strings is particularly assiduous in this regard and leads by example.

See How You Like It

If you have time, there's a fun story at the Washington Post that's worth the click: Marketer Challenges Anti-Spam Crusader.

Meet Francis Uy, who got so tired of spam in his in-box that he took action against the worst offenders. One of his targets, George Allen Moore Jr. of Linthicum, got so upset at Uy that he filed a harrassment lawsuit trying to stop him. What was it that Uy did to get Moore so riled up? Uy just listed Moore's home address and phone number on a Website.

In court filings, Moore claims he received about 70 packages and 200 magazines at his house because of Uy's site, as well as numerous phone calls with threatening messages such as "we are watching you" and "don't start your car."

5:15:19 PM