Two stories have emerged in the US as big talking points over the last couple of days.Both deal, at some level, with the position of women in society. One shows how much progress women are making at being treated as equals. The other shows how much further there is to go.First the good news. Augusta National, home of US golf’s most celebrated tournament, the Masters, has finally decided to drop its restriction on women members and has invited two women to join, including the former Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice.It would be easy to dismiss this as a small thing. Women being allowed to join a golf club, even Augusta, may not be that significant in the greater scheme of things. But the fact that the home of a golf tournament seen by tens of millions of people, and rewarded with hundreds of millions of dollars in corporate sponsorship, could reject a woman who had been entrusted with the foreign policy of the most powerful nation on earth as somehow not quite good enough to be a member of a place where grown men spend their time hitting little white balls with sticks, was an insult to women everywhere.So this is an important day for those who believe that equal access means equal access anywhere at any time.But that small victory pales against the fact that a serious candidate for the United States Senate can say, when asked if he opposed abortions that resulted from rape, that: “It seems to me, from what I understand from doctors, that’s really rare. If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. But let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work or something: I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be of the rapist, and not attacking the child.”Those were the words of Congressman Todd Akin, who is running for the Senate in Missouri. Having set off a firestorm, Rep Akin scrambled to put it out, apologising to all and sundry and saying that he “misspoke”.Perhaps he did, but it certainly read like he meant what he said. To be sure, the question of abortion is a difficult and emotionally charged one, and there are arguments both in favour of abortion and against it.And leaving aside Rep Akin’s strange beliefs about pregnancy being suppressed — there are 31,000 victims of rape who become pregnant in the US each year — there remains Rep Akin’s attempt to distinguish between “legitimate” rape and, presumably, “illegitimate” rape. This suggests that in many cases, Rep Akin believes that women pretended they were raped when they weren’t, or that they invited it.Neither of these views have a place in serious debate. Are there people who falsely accuse others of rape? Yes, but they are a tiny minority. They do not form a basis for discussion of the terrible physical and emotional damage incurred on victims of rape, and serve only to de-emphasise its effects and in doing so, cause a grave disservice to the victims.Does this matter in Bermuda? It does. There are plenty of people in Bermuda who blame the victim of rape, and there are magistrates who are prepared to make and listen to arguments about how under-age sex is socially acceptable and how young girls may invite unlawful carnal knowledge or worse.And it’s a world where sexism in its various forms remains strong.If you don’t believe that, consider how many women chief executive officers there are in Bermuda. Or ask Dame Jennifer Smith, who faced a rebellion over her leadership from 11 male MPs and not a single female in 2003. The basis of that rebellion may not have been gender-based, but the numbers spoke for themselves, just as they do at Augusta National where there are around 300 male members and, now, two females.So hooray for August National, but women still have a long way to go.