I don’t read Copyblogger regularly, although I know a lot of folks who do, and who love it.  But today my friend Meagan Francis pointed my attention to a post there by someone who appears to be one of the site’s regular bloggers, someone who goes by “James Chartrand.”

In the post, Chartrand reveals (GASP!) that HE is actually a SHE.

Why has “James Chartrand” kept up this charade of adopting a male online persona rather than revealing herself to be female? In his/her own words:

I had high-quality skills and a good education. I was fast on turnaround and very professional. I hustled and I delivered on my promises, every single time. I worked hard and built the business, putting in long hours and reinvesting a lot of the money I made.

I really, really wanted to make this work.

But I was still having a hard time landing jobs. I was being turned down for gigs I should’ve gotten, for reasons I couldn’t put a finger on.

My pay rate had hit a plateau, too. I knew I should be earning more. Others were, and I soaked up everything they could teach me, but still, there was something strange about it . . .

It wasn’t my skills, it wasn’t my work. So what were those others doing that I wasn’t?

One day, I tossed out a pen name, because I didn’t want to be associated with my current business, the one that was still struggling to grow. I picked a name that sounded to me like it might convey a good business image. Like it might command respect.
My life changed that day

Instantly, jobs became easier to get.

There was no haggling. There were compliments, there was respect. Clients hired me quickly, and when they received their work, they liked it just as quickly. There were fewer requests for revisions — often none at all.

Customer satisfaction shot through the roof. So did my pay rate.

And I was thankful. I finally stopped worrying about how I would feed my girls. We were warm. Well-fed. Safe. No one at school would ever tease my kids about being poor.

I was still bringing in work with the other business, the one I ran under my real name. I was still marketing it. I was still applying for jobs — sometimes for the same jobs that I applied for using my pen name.

I landed clients and got work under both names. But it was much easier to do when I used my pen name.

Understand, I hadn’t advertised more effectively or used social media — I hadn’t figured that part out yet. I was applying in the same places. I was using the same methods. Even the work was the same.

In fact, everything w the same.

Except for the name.

The answer was plain. Without really thinking much about it, I tried an experiment when I chose my new pseudonym:
I became a man (in name only)

Taking a man’s name opened up a new world. It helped me earn double and triple the income of my true name, with the same work and service.

No hassles. Higher acceptance. And gratifying respect for my talents and round-the-clock work ethic.

Business opportunities fell into my lap. People asked for my advice, and they thanked me for it, too.

In other words, this person says that she instantly experienced a much higher level of success as a professional writer/copywriter as soon as she began going by a male “pen name.”

I call baloney, MAJOR baloney on this. This story simply doesn’t add up.  Now it’s possible that the person’s writing work picked up at about the same time that she began using a man’s name as her byline, but if so, that was coincidental. How can I say this with this level of certainty? Well, I can say it because I have made my living to greater or lesser degree (100% for many years and usually at least 20% of my income in any given year) as a published author, freelance writer, editor and copywriter since 1995.  And I am thoroughly female. Furthermore, I have many, many female friends who are also highly accomplished, nationally published freelancers, web designers and copywriters.  And I know a large number of the magazine and website editors who assign work to those of us who are competing for the freelance work that’s out there; at least 65% of them are female.  Last, I myself have held several online production and account executive positions that have involved assigning freelance content, design and online community management work.

Obviously, the fact that I have focused much of my own freelancing over the years in the women’s and parenting categories means that I encounter more female editors and writers, but my own editorial and copywriting work has ranged far beyond these niche areas. I’ve written about the plastics industry, business development, marketing and branding – you name it.  My motto has always pretty much been “WILL WRITE FOR FOOD.”

So I know this business well from all sides, and I’ve been involved in it for a long time;  I can say unequivocally, without hesitation and with great clarity that the type of gender bias this “James Chartrand” describes simply does not exist. Now does that mean that there aren’t a few sexist jerks out there – as there are in any field?  No, there certainly ARE some sexists in the online content and design biz,  but they are incredibly few and far between in what is arguably a female-dominated profession overall.

Another reason that Mr./Ms. Chartrand’s tale doesn’t hold water is that I am not sure how she expects those of us who have done this for a living at the level she claims to be doing it to believe that none of the editors, account execs, clients, other writers, sources, interviewees, etc with whom she has worked on all of this content she claims to be publishing for pay ever want to speak to her by phone. The fact is that even in this age of online everything, the production of editorial content for publication – on the Web or in print – still requires phone contact. Editors want to talk to you by phone. Clients want to meet you. Interviewees won’t always agree to be interviewed via email. Tracking down sources frequently requires a phone call or two. Certainly there are projects where I never use the phone, but just about anytime I work with a new editor or client, at least one phone call is involved, and many interviews still call for picking up the phone.  And if you are making the case that you have ONLY been hired or retained on a content project because the editor, online producer or account exec believes you are a guy, you can’t very well be female when you speak to the sexist pigs on the phone.

Unlike Mr./Ms. Chartrand, who states in her blog post that she “never wanted to be an activist,”  I am a feminist activist. I consider myself an outspoken advocate for pay equity, reproductive rights and gender parity in the workplace. And that’s why it irks me when I read something like this blog post.  While I cannot say for certain that Mr./Ms. Chartrand’s story is untrue – perhaps this is one of those outlier cases that simply doesn’t align with all available evidence – it seems highly, highly unlikely.  My gut feeling is that it’s some kind of attention grab, or that the story has been constructed to support Mr./Ms. Chartrand’s decision to use a pseudonym – a decision that was made and has been retained for reasons other than as an antidote to raging, explicit gender bias, but now requires some more interesting explanation than the actual reason.

If this story isn’t true,  as I suspect, it’s much like a  (far less important, meaningful or impact-laden) fake rape accusation.  It gives ammunition to the anti-feminists of the world who want to discredit the REAL gender bias issues that working women still face today. And that irritates me. I am happy for any freelancer who is able to support her family with her work, as Mr./Ms. Chartrand is apparently able to do.  I suspect, however, that any success she has achieved is due to the quality of her work, and has nothing to do with whether her name is “James” or “Julie” Chartrand.

UPDATE:  In the comments below this post, you will find several readers’ own tales of gender bias in the workplace, as well as a link to an interesting piece in Salon today on L’affaire “James Chartrand”

Let me reiterate, in light of reader’s telling their own tales of workplace sexism, that I am IN NO WAY suggesting that gender bias does not exist in our offices and factories. My point is that this particular tale of gender bias rings false to me.  And I do think that when people make things up, or exaggerate  – if that’s what has happened here – it undermines the hard work many people have done and continue to do all over this country to fight real, genuine sexist inequities in our workplaces.

In re-reading James Chartrand’s post, I again find myself thinking something we sometimes say around Bell Buckle: that dog don’t hunt. I find it particularly interesting that “she” titled her entire website “Men with Pens.”  This indicates to me that the whole gender thing has been an “issue” with this person in a bigger way than just the pseudonym.  I’m just sayin’…

From my latest post over at my Babble Home/Work blog:

There was certainly a period, during the second half of the 90s and the early part of this decade, when the discourse regarding breastfeeding was somewhat reactionary. What I mean is that after many decades of information suppression and misrepresentation, a lot of women were, well – for lack of a better way to put it – kind of pissed off when we realized that as a group, we’d been misinformed, manipulated, dismissed and even lied to regarding this important and meaningful element of infant-maternal health.

We were really irritated to find out that, despite what we, our mothers and grandmothers before us had been told by the “experts,” we actually COULD breastfeed our babies successfully, and that we DID make “enough milk.” We found out that infant formula ISN’T “just like” human milk, and that women all over the world DO nurse beyond infancy. (That was a real eye opener.) In short, we discovered that the medical profession we trusted, along with infant formula manufacturers and marketers, had sold us a bill of goods about something that really mattered to us, and to our children.

Our generational response to this discovery came in the form of an unprecedented tidal wave of new articles, books, websites, online communities, organizations, and academic/medical research on the topic of breastfeeding, all within a period of only one decade. Our frustration became consciousness raising, which became empowerment and productivity, and I think it’s fair to say that those of us who were among that particular group of “lactivist” moms fundamentally and forever changed the dialogue on breastfeeding in America.

Some of us played a role as writers, while others of us were Web developers, doctors, nurses, academics, midwives, peer counselors, lactation consultants and activists. In the course of only about one decade, this group of women – early adopters and very effective users of what is now called social media – built on the pioneering work of La Leche League and others – and in doing so, we successfully reclaimed an important part of motherhood for ourselves, and for our daughters. We changed laws, we changed workplaces, and we sparked a process of significant and ongoing change in the way medical practitioners learn about breastfeeding. (Hells yeah, we did!)

Read the whole thing.

I wrote earlier this week over at my Home/Work blog about my ongoing struggle to leave work at work when I come home to my family, and now I am working on a somewhat related essay for Babble about former GE CEO Jack Welch’s recent comments on whether women who want to make it to the very top of their careers AND be really invested in their mothering can ever really succeed at both.

Welch basically says no, you have to choose one or the other, and he tells women they need to just accept that if we take time off to be home with our children at any point, or if we work a modified schedule or go part time during our careers, we can’t ever make it to the c-suite.

I’ll share my views on Welch’s comments, and what I think they say about men, women, the feminist movement, and national priorities in my essay, which should run in the next week or two at Babble, but I’d like to hear your thoughts on this.

Is Welch right? Are women who believe they can be really good moms and still reach the highest levels of their professions just deluding themselves? It is my anecdotal observation – and I am looking for research to either support or refute my hypothesis – that a higher-than-average percentage of women in America’s upper echelon of corporate career success have only one child, or no children at all.

Are Welch’s comments specific to only a few types of careers, like investment banking, law and corporate management? Or do they also apply to traditionally “female” careers, like teaching and social work?

If Welch is correct, should American women just accept this as the way of the world, and a price we pay for being female? Or is this a call to action for more women in legislative positions to help workers-who-are-also-mothers succeed in their careers, despite the “handicap” of being responsible for children? (Sort of the way minority legislators have traditionally looked out for their own affinity groups when crafting social policy, or the way Bob Dole helped get the Americans With Disabilities Act passed.)

Fire away on this one in the comments below. How has your own mothering impacted your career choices and opportunities, and vice versa?

I love this post from Meagan Francis about whether it’s ever acceptable to bring a baby into an “adult” venue or event. She lays out the issue exactly as I would, with a nod to both the rights and the responsibilities of parents.

The very first essay I ever sold to a paying publication was a piece I sold to the Chicago Tribune in 1995 in response to an op-ed they had run from some curmudgeonly guy who said that children should basically never be taken into public places, particularly places where he was paying for food. I can’t find a copy of it anywhere, but my primary point was that a culture that believes young children should be mostly segregated from the world of adult activity is a culture that is in effect, banishing women to a certain invisibility. Banning babies is a de facto policy that bans women with babies.

This is Jon and me, hittin’ the town with C when she was about 3 weeks old, I think. Yes, we went and had a drink at our favorite brewpub. With the baby in the sling. As you can see from the photo, she was a real rabble rouser that night.

Now, having said that, I do not believe people should allow their babies or young children to actively disrupt other diners at a restaurant or play or neighborhood meeting, etc. There is a balance, and I think that our society tends to have trouble finding it with this issue. We swing wildly from pronouncements that any woman who occasionally wants to bring a child along to an event or job site or activity (generally because she cannot afford or find acceptable childcare) must not want to be taken seriously, to finding ourselves in restaurants where one inconsiderate parent ruins everyone’s meal (including other, less noisy kids who are also trying to eat in peace) by allowing his two year old to scream for 30 minutes without realizing it’s time to get a to-go bag and leave.

But go read Meagan’s blog post. As with everything she writes, it’s just darn good.

I’ve decided today that Sarah Palin is sort of a genius.

Unless the real reason she’s stepping down is that the National Enquirer is about to publish a cover story revealing that she’s actually a man who became a woman to escape his history as a Sandinista guerilla fighter, her resignation is flat-out brilliant. It’s certainly possible that she’s leaving her post in advance of some big, ugly, serious scandal becoming public, but I suspect not. And if not, then she’s made the best political move I can imagine in her plan to run for president in 2012.

Whenever I make a big decision, or help someone else make a decision, I always ask this question first, “what’s the downside?” If we ask that question about Sarah Palin’s decision to resign, there really isn’t one of any consequence. Sure, some (not all) Alaskans will be irritated. And some Americans will consider her a quitter. But as Palin begins to build her national organization in earnest, the pissy Alaskans will be equivalent to a few political gnats, and the folks in the lower 48 who will express their disapproval of her resignation don’t like Palin anyway, no matter what she does.

So those are the negatives. If there is any other downside, I am not seeing it. And of course, we Americans have a short attention span, and the “quitter” label just won’t carry any weight within a year, particularly since Palin is now an iconic figure who transcends any single action she takes.. Given who she is, and the passions she stirs in people, the relatively dull, bureaucratic fact that she decided to leave office early really won’t factor in the grand scheme of the Palin narrative

So what are the benefits to Palin? They are huge. First of all, her resignation offers the very basic positive of immediately freeing her from the ethical and logistical constraints that come with her office; as givernor, she can’t leave Alaska too often. She can’t raise money as easily. She has to deal with day to day tasks of actually governing, and she has to face the press scrutiny that comes with being a high-profile, sitting public official.

So Palin resigns yesterday, pointing to the truly unprecedented way she continues to be trashed in the media. She frames it as “best for Alaskans,” saying that the press has essentially driven her from office, and noting that she’s doing the honorable thing by walking away so that Alaskan government can regain some sense of peace and normalcy. Plus, even as she claims that her family’s privacy continues to be violated, she explicitly reminds us that her toddler has Down Syndrome, and she gets Good Mother points by saying she needs to spend more time with him.

Both the suggestion that she’s basically been forced out of office by the liberal media, and her stated plan to be some version of the saintly stay-at-home mama galvanize her admittedly limited, but very enthusiastic and cohesive base: the rightest of right wing Republicans, plus Evangelical Christians. They love her already; now she becomes a crusading martyr with a story to tell, and a comeback to plan. While her base doesn’t actually have enough votes on their own to get her elected, she can spend the next 18 months wringing every last penny they have to give out of them, money she can then parlay into a more comprehensive and well-financed campaign organization that will do its job of turning that money into votes outside of her base. For the next year and a half, Palin will be on the road continuously, speaking, rallying and passing the hat at churches, pro-life meetings, and gun advocacy groups. And when she’s not out there rallying her activist footsoldiers, she reinforces her mainstream GOP street cred with occasional Fox News analysis gigs.

It’s brilliant, I tell you.

Don’t underestimate Sarah Palin. Any woman who can calmly stare down David Letterman, without blinking, forcing a humiliating public apology out of a man who routinely makes lesser mortals weep via his withering excoriation is a woman with a plan. A big plan.

You wait and see.

CLARIFICATION: Thanks for all the comments on this post (except the ones I had to delete – the ones threatening violence against other commenters. Sheesh people.) After writing the post yesterday, and seeing the dozens of “Right on, fellow Palin supporter!” comments since that time, I feel the need to clarify for those who are perhaps first time visitors to my blog that I am not a Sarah Palin supporter. (That would, in fact, be a radical understatement.) In saying that I believe Palin’s resignation was a brilliant move for her in terms of pure political strategy, I am not suggesting that I support her policy positions, or that I hope she succeeds in her quest to become president. But yes, I do think that she just checkmated her political enemies in a pretty clever way. And I also think she’s a seriously tough cookie with a Big Plan. But for those of you who read the post offering my recognition of these things, and then got the impression that my compliment for Palin’s political savvy equates to being a fan or supporter, sorry to disappoint. But I hope you’ll consider stopping by my blog again, now that you’ve discovered me. I may be one of “those people” you love to hate, but at least now you know I’m one who is willing to call ‘em like I see ‘em

I’ve heard the saying that everyone is against abortion or trial lawyers…until someone they love really needs one.

And that’s been my experience; lots of people are “against” gay folks…until someone in their family turns out to be gay, at which point a certain, very specific tolerance blossoms. Or they are opposed to single motherhood…until their own 18 year old daughter turns up pregnant, at which point that daughter is described as “a wonderful mother” (singularly different, I guess, from all the other single mothers in America, who have long been the subject of this grandparent’s scorn and derision).

And now we have Mel Gibson, poster child for this selective intolerance. Gibson famously adheres to the “traditional Catholic” movement, which preaches abstinence outside of marriage, the sin of divorce, etc, etc, etc. Gibson has donated tens of millions of dollars to ultra-conservative Catholic causes and activities, yet he now announces that he’s divorcing his wife of 28 years, even as his girlfriend is already in the second trimester with what will be his 8th child.

As a commenter on my Facebook page noted, at least he didn’t use that evil, evil birth control!

I plan to blog more about this amazing piece at Babble by Jennifer Block on the backlash against breastfeeding, but you should go read it now. It’s smart and wonderful and spot-on.

So the term “cougar” is everywhere these days, referring to women of a certain age (30s and older, it seems) who date or marry younger men. The media would have us believe that this “cougar” phenomenon is a trend. Maybe it is and maybe it isn’t, but the way the issue is being defined is definitely sexist.

I say this as a woman who is 12 years older than her husband. Yep, I am 41 and my husband is 29. I don’t think either one of us intended to end up married to someone of a very different age, but here we are. We are both adults. We love and are committed to each other. We have created a family together. It is what it is. And except for my occasional concerns that Jon will end up taking care of me if I become feeble in my old age long before he does, we really never even think about our age difference. Like I said, we’re both grownups, which is really all that matters.

But then this “cougar” garbage keeps popping up all over the place, and I find myself increasingly irritated by it. I understand that the label is a bit tongue in cheek – I get that – but even the humor sends a negative message to girls, I think. First of all, the word implies some sort of predator-prey paradigm, conjuring up visions of desperate middle aged women stalking their reluctant targets, a la Mrs. Robinson. It assumes that no man would willingly choose to be in a relationship with a woman older than he is because women are only attractive or valuable when they are young, based on their appearance or perceived sexuality. Media interest in this “trend” also ignores the fact that we all know many, many examples of happy couples in which the man is older – sometimes significantly older – than his girlfriend or wife. No one has ever bothered to give the guys in these relationships any sort of negative label. The sexism here is pretty obvious.

So please don’t call me that. Instead, I humbly propose that I be labeled a Bushbaby, Meerkat…or perhaps a Platypus

That’s what I’m blogging about over the the KNS today…

I’m issuing a challenge over at my Babble blog.