Forbes Footnote

The blogosphere is certainly alive this past week with discussions of the Forbes article. I was most intrigued, though, by an article in the business section of today's NYTimes. In short, Forbes.com charges its advertisers a great deal to appear there, but the website on a normal day doesn't actually get the number of hits it needs to back up its exorbitant rates. Solution: every so often it places an incendiary article on the website to get readers' collective goats. Readers read sexist male writer bashing career women, readers get mad, readers email their ten closest friends and tell them to click on Forbes.com and read. Result: Forbes.com's hits go up, its ad rates stay high. In short, we're played both ways. If no one responds, the awful words stand. If we do respond, we're encouraging their strategy and raising their profits. Talk about putting women between a rock and a hard place.

Advertisers are encouraged to play on the battle of the sexes and the mommy wars as a way to gain attention from women by touching on topics that hit us deep in the heart. I wrote about this in my book "The Truth Behind the Mommy Wars," and I leafed through my copy tonight to reread page 40 and after. What is the best way to stop this callous use of women's attention and energy? Who's phrase was "stop the madness"? How apropos.