>The point is that Doug's friend claims Stewart is somehow a
>feminist icon, is somehow challenging gender stereotypes.
Well, no, that's not exactly what she said. She said she confounds our received notions of gender - doubly, as she turns the "girly" arts into a business, and runs The Home with businesslike efficiency:
>She invaded the traditionally male turf of big business, but her
>business is based on "skills that were supposed to be girly and
>stay-at-home." Yet while she "plays the über-homemaker, she isn't
>charming or warm. She's cold and efficient and a little awkward.
>She's not marketing the warmth and the comfort of the home, she's
>showing how it's like a business or a machine. That's not so easy to
>like, and it makes her scarier, to men especially."