There’s been a disappointing trend I’ve watched develop over my college years. A trend, I suspect, that has been present through decades and centuries, each time with a new twist relevant to the times. This trend, brought to my attention through numerous male acquaintances and a few male friends, is the scoffing of men at their female counterparts for discussing successful women and female accomplishments. “Girl power,” as they sarcastically and with an accompanying “girlie” tone say, is a mockery for them, a good chuckle as they shake their heads and roll their eyes. Now, I am certainly not saying my male friends are all sexist jerks, but I have certainly noticed the lack of seriousness and a “feminism is oh-so overdone” quality to all female success-related conversation. The sad thing is, is feminism has become equated for these men with hairy-legged, decades old, bra-burning antics. Perhaps the mention of “bra” in history class grabbed their attention and resulted in that description leading their feminist definition. While that may have been a harsh guess, the reality is that many early-twenty-something males seem to think feminism is both a cliché and a bore.

Feminism is simply the support of equal social and political rights for women, and, while I do not fall into the superficial category of a feminist brought to mind by most of my same-aged male peers, I do overwhelmingly support equal rights for women, gravitate toward articles on women’s rising accomplishments in the workforce and in social endeavors, and will gladly spend any conversation persuading my listener of the needs for flex schedules and accommodations for working mothers. In fact, even my term-long empirical project for econometrics investigates the impact of rising child-care costs on women’s participation rates in the labor force.

My interest in these topics lies in the ulterior motive—as I’ve mentioned before—that I, one day, would like to be a mom in the midst of a successful, thriving, and busy career. Far ahead of schedule, I am already looking into types of company adjustments and offerings for working mothers (for the corporations that are catching on) and have a few advice/support blogs for working moms in my feed reader. While some may think this is overkill, especially as I am only 21, this early research makes perfect sense for my goal of establishing a professional career—becoming a smart and efficient employee and mom. Perhaps my early concern is the result of seeing the somewhat recent new wave of working mothers spark blogs, articles and support groups for their kind. Realizing how difficult all these publishing make the process seem, I want to be prepared (as well as I can, anyway) for the transition of becoming a mother during a career, without compromising my talent in both the workplace and at home.

I was delighted then, to see my interest in successful women and my search for advice on working mothers coupled together in a new website founded by five ultra-successful and inspiring women: Joni Evans, former president of Simon and Schuster and an ex-publisher at Random House; Liz Smith, author and famous New York gossip columnist; Mary Wells, advertising executive whose work includes the “I Love New York” campaign; Peggy Noonan, political columnist and former presidential speech writer; and Lesley Stahl, television news reporter and a CBS 60 Minutes correspondent since 1991. The website, Wowowow (somewhat standing for Women on the Web), is aimed at women 40 and older, but is full of information that I believe women of every age can find useful.

With over 15 contributers including Candice Bergen and Marlo Thomas, Wowowow is an inspiring source of female talent and energy for more than fashion advice, with sections like Change the World and Conversations. The New York Times covered the launching of the website here, and explains the humorous process of choosing a domain name, learning about blogging and becoming part of the Web 2.0 culture. The site does cover what The New York Times says is, “in some ways no different than that of other women-focused community Web sites like iVillage: horoscopes and posts about love and marriage, health and fashion,” but Wowowow is also an inspiring culmination of talented minds with advice and political commentary for its readers. More than another site for women, Wowowow is a step toward social media being utilized by all generations and I couldn’t be prouder, nor more inspired by these successful women.

Now, if only they’d add an RSS Feed icon…