Over at the Huffington Post Dispatch god-father Peter Daou offers his prediction that 2010 will be a horrible year for women.  He writes, "Another decade closes, another decade dawns, another thing you can bet on in the years to come: women across this planet will be disrespected, beaten, abused, violated, oppressed. Simply for being born female."

About an a hour ago, this ease with which our society casually disrespects women manifested itself in a pretty shocking way.  Take a look at this list of finalists for the Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year. (The numbers represent the number of votes they received.)   

Serena Williams 66

Zenyatta 18

Kim Clijsters 16

Lindsey Vonn 15

Diana Taurasi 14

Maya Moore 13

Rachel Alexandra 10

Bridget Sloan 3

Jiyai Shin 2

Erin Hamlin 1

First things first, congratulations to tennis great Serena Williams for winning top honors. But upon closer inspection you may notice that two of the athletes listed are not human beings.  Zenyatta and Rachel Alexandra, in fact, are horses.  That's right.  We live in a world in which animals are eligable to win "Female Athlete of the Year" from one of the most important global news agencies.  That's some shameful stuff.  And for the record, none of the male athletes of the year were anything but human.  That said, the winner was NASCAR driver Jimmie Johnson. Given the AP's criteria, maybe his automobile should have won instead? 

Image: Flickr