Recently in Popular Culture Category

This ad is apparently airing in California right now:

(There's no spoken commentary -- just images.)

On one level, I really like this approach because it uses the wedding-industrial complex against itself. It takes as a given the fact that many straight people (women in particular) desire and idealize this sort of mega white wedding, and uses that to tug their emotions. I can see how this would be a very compelling. In that, it feels subversive. Taking the ultimate heteronormative, capitalist celebration and turning it into an argument for equality. I like that.

On the other hand, you could argue that this ad is just propping up the same old ideals about extravagant weddings and proper marriages. That it's not subversive at all -- it's more of the same.

What do you all think?

For more food for thought on the subject, check out Miriam on why marriage isn't her golden ticket, Courtney on how gay marriage has her rethinking her personal views on getting hitched, and Samhita on how marriage laws erase transgendered people.

(Thanks to Crystal for the link.)

Apparently 8/8/08 (today's date) is a popular day to get married. People seem to love special wedding dates (or at least the media loves reporting about them).

Today has particular meaning for Chinese culture, which explains the start of the Olympics today at 8:08:08pm.

The lucky number eight means wealth and prosperity to Asians who observe Chinese numerology.

According to NPR, some couples getting married today will also have eight bridesmaids and eight course meals at their ceremonies.

So I was walking out of the New York Public Library this evening after a couple of hours of non-internet enabled writing (it saves me), when I noticed this long line of teenage and tween girls sitting on the sidewalk. Their line snaked all the way around the library, around Bryant Park, and to the subway station. Finally I leaned over and asked one what was going on. She replied:

We're here waiting for the Jonas Brothers. They're performing tomorrow on Good Morning America.
Me: Tomorrow? So you're going to sit here all night?
Her: Yep. We're all sitting here all night. We're obsessed with the Jonas Brothers.

There were at least 500 of them. And it was 6pm.

Let me admit, first off, that I had no idea who the Jonas Brothers were. Let me admit, secondly, that Vanessa got me on to So You Think You Can Dance? and so I'm about to find out (apparently these little guys are playing live in LA on the show and then flying overnight to NYC to play GMA in the a.m....insane.)

But then let me go on to say, this really freaks me out. What is it about those teen years that creates such a capacity for obsessive, religious-like worship of mediocre bands? I mean, even if they were the best musicians/dancers ever and total heartthrobs, would it really constitute sitting out on the NYC sidewalk for fifteen hours on the hottest night ever?

I know what everyone's thinking...the Beatles. But did anyone ever study that shit? What are the sort of psychological, political factors that bring that kind of hysteria on? It can't all be the floppy hair and androgyny. Or can it...

At Salon, Rebecca Traister has a love letter to her favorite sci-fi protagonist, Dana Scully:

In this summer of Dark Knights and Hellboys and Iron Men, it's refreshing to be reminded -- as we will be this weekend, with the opening of "The-X-Files: I Want to Believe" -- that not so long ago, there was a science fiction series with a woman at its core, a heroine whose major goals were more about disproving the existence of extraterrestrial life than marrying Big, a chick who spent more time chasing fluke worms down toilets than trying on shoes.

Awhile ago, Starziki6 posted some very similar sentiments on our community blog:

Mostly, my love for the show (and I loved this show for eight seasons) had to do with Scully and how unique her character was. She was introduced to the show as its rational, scientific, and spiritual voice. When Mulder got himself into trouble by following his gut, Scully would reel him into reality by using her head. (It also happened that Scully got into trouble from using her head and Mulder could save her by following his gut, but the roles remained largely consistent.)

I cannot love the show more for the way it depicted a strong, smart, beautiful, and ultimately feminist woman.

Deeky at Shakesville has a post on a humor website hawking a faux video game modeled on Guitar Hero... called Vagina Hero.

Let me say that before I followed the link, I had some hopes here. I thought, "Maybe it's a teaching tool for women and their partners, informing them of little-known facts about the female anatomy." Jessica commented, "Vagina Hero could be an amazing feminist superhero." Alas, we were way too optimistic.

No surprise! It's really just some sexist bullshit dressed up as humor. Deeky writes,

Here's the premise of the joke: What if the makers of Guitar Hero introduced a new game called Vagina Hero wherein the player had to tap all the right buttons in the right sequence at the right time, just like in the original game, but on a vagina shaped controller to "win"? (If you're not holding your sides now from laughing so hard, well, you won't ever be. The joke doesn't get any better than that. A stupid premise has nowhere to go but downhill, my friends.) Oh, and "winning" here is defined as bringing an on-screen woman to orgasm. In case you hadn't guessed.

Now, I'm all for establishing the idea that a woman's pleasure should be a priority for her sexual partner. But this "game" is less about women's sexual pleasure than it is about establishing the idea that ladyparts are icky and confusing and "other." (Below the jump, because it could be NSFW, have a gander at the "controller.")

Classy 70's-style bow-chika-wow-wow starts playing, and you find your screen assaulted with colored button-press indicators called "E-Zones". The E-Zones (or "EZ's") correspond to the same colored buttons on your Vagina Hero controller, dubbed "HodgePodge". Why HodgePodge? "Just look at it. What the fuck is that? We designed it and we don't even really know. We tried to stay true to real thing, but that's the best we could do."

Translation: Aren't ladyparts weird, icky, and incomprehensible?

As the EZ's approach the middle of the screen, you need to tap the corresponding EZ button on your controller. Sounds easy enough, but this bitch has 6 buttons! Apparently, if you want to be a serious player, you need to get creative.

"Most people just use their thumb and pointer finger on their off-hand, but we've had a few people use other body parts. Personally, if you want to really see what you're doing, the two hand approach is best. You could also just mash all the buttons at the same time with your fist and hope to get lucky."

You could also just mash all the buttons at the same time with your fist and hope to get lucky?!?! I'm sorry, this is hardly "teaching boys something useful." To the contrary. In comments at Shakesville, Astraea points out,

It's not only not original misogyny, it's not even an original video game concept since the Japanese have had cheap versions of that kind of game for ages, and all nicely drawn to make those weird girlyparts nicely hair-free and less complicated for the poor menz who just want to get off.

Even as a Humorless Feminist (TM), I think it certainly would be possible to craft a parody that mocks the fact that some men think of the vagina as icky and foreign. This "game" ain't that. It's not funny because it's got a wink-nudge tone -- the creators are essentially agreeing with every dude who's ever expressed disgust or disdain for the vadge -- and who has wanted a gold star for even attempting to please his female sexual partner. (Plus? It's not even that clever. They should have called this shit Clitar Hero.) Sorry. I'm not laughing.

I frigging love this Sarah Haskins gal

So this video is NSFW (not safe for work) and it is very disturbing. Trigger warning! But it is one of the trailers to the new Grand Theft Auto coming out today, and it is reprehensible. All around the country posters for the new GTA have been removed due to their offensive nature. Most of the complaints have been about the violence in the video game. Not one article has been about the blatant violence and misogyny displayed towards women.

If you get through the trailer you will notice that not only are the sex scenes very real looking, most of the women are killed shortly after forcibly performing sex acts. So, many young men are going to have their first (or already have, as this is not new content for GTA) sexual experiences via GTA and then they are going to kill the women they are sleeping with. The implications of that are mind-blowing. It is no question that GTA is merely reflective of the bigger misogyny embedded in capitalist patriarchy, but the question is why is a game that depicts such violence towards women so popular? How is that acceptable?

I think this has two consequences in the land of no child left behind where standardized educational systems have led to a cutback in the teaching of metacognition in elementary schools. What does that mean? Youth don't get taught to think about why they make the choices they do, they are instead force fed information that they must memorize. So it can be argued that they are being force fed heavily marketed violent images (that often reflect the violence in the media, movies, government policy and in their own communities) that become normalized. And not only normalized, but given the popular nature of GTA, it is cool to be violent and kill prostitutes.

The second implication is where does this put young women gamers? How do they feel when playing video games with such violent representations of women?

I can tell you that watching that video was humiliating and I don't play video games, so I never have to see it again if I don't want to.

A lot of issues here. Other thoughts?

Apparently there's a show on WE (the network that brought you Bridezillas) called Bulging Brides, in which women buy wedding dresses two sizes too small, and rely on a drill-sergeant-like trainer to get them to lose the weight by their wedding day. It's size-shaming meets the bridal-industrial complex. Or, as Big Fat Blog asks, "There aren't enough reality shows that combine unrealistic feminine body ideals with unrealistic and heavily-marketed ideals towards heterosexual weddings?"

Here's a sample of what it's like:

Ah, a tasteful montage of close-ups of everything the bride-to-be eats during her bachelorette party, followed by an early-morning pole-dancing lesson to shed the pounds she supposedly gained the night before from all those quesadillas and mojitos. My feminist head is exploding.

Yes, there's a lot of sexist, sizist, crappy "reality" TV out there. But something about this show seems to have it all. Which is why it's worth mentioning and decrying here.

Thanks to Tomi for the tip.

Yahoo just launched a new web portal called Shine, “for women between ages 25 and 54, calling it a key demographic underserved by current Yahoo properties.� Topics of the site include “fashion + beauty, healthy living, entertainment, parenting, love +sex, work + money, food, at home, and astrology.� And the site's signature color is, of course, pink.

Would it be possible, maybe, please, for a website “for women� to not be pink? I mean, honestly, I couldn’t even get past that to see what the content is. It’s not breast cancer pink (light pink), so I think that means it must be Sex and the City pink. Hot pink, some sparkes. Yup.

Sigh.

Props of the Day go to Sweden's Trade Ethical Council against Sexism in Advertising for reporting a Jagermeister advertisement for its...well, just check out the ad:

I received this as a forward yesterday with the message, "This is how a real man uses post-its." It reminds me of oldie-but-goody Lakshmi Chaudry's "Men Growing Up To Be Boys," where she talks about consumer culture literally consuming more traditional concepts of manhood and spitting out a man-child.

So move over, beer commercials and manly meat ads; we've now entered the realm of sexist stationary. Sigh.

NOTE: We have found out that this is, in fact, a joke and not an actual post-it ad. At the same time, the fact that this is being disseminated very widely still perpetuates the same confused notions of American masculinity/man-boyhood we find in our everyday commercials and magazine ads. But we are glad to find that that Post-It has not taken part in it.

As a fifth anniversary gift to her husband, Freddie Prince, Jr., Sarah Michelle Gellar has changed her name to Sarah Michelle Prinze.

"On their anniversary, she showed [Freddie] her new driver's license," the source tells Us. "It was so sweet."

Despite the fact that Gellar Prinze has said she isn't a feminist, I was still pretty surprised by this. Does the concept of giving away your own name as a birthday gift seem a little fucked up to anyone else? It doesn't strike me as weird to change your name of your own accord, even several years into the marriage. But framing it as a "gift" makes it seem like a sacrifice rather than something she wanted to do for herself. Kind of like the difference between "I got a boob job because I wanted one" and "I got a boob job for my husband's birthday." Like taking your husband's name, I'm not into the idea of boob jobs generally, but I suppose it seems better to do it to please yourself rather than to please your partner.

Also, I'm always shocked when a famous woman changes her name to that of her less-famous husband. I mean, isn't name recognition incredibly important? If I saw "Sarah Michelle Prinze" on a movie poster, I would just assume it was a newbie actress I'd never heard of.

Or, as my friend Phoebe exclaimed, "Did she learn nothing from Rebecca Romijn-Stamos?!"

For those who think that only rap videos contain sexist content.

While this is more or less a rock video version of Vogue Italia's spread, we can use this as a reminder of how sickly obsessed (no pun intended) pop culture has become with glorifying (and in this case, sexualizing) mental illness, addiction and general life failure among the young women of Hollywood.

Thanks to reader Michele.

Left, Judy Nails in a previous version of the game. Right, in the latest version.

When I picture guitar heroines, they're usually sporting jeans and a tank top. Or menswear. Not the case in the Guitar Hero video game, apparently, where all of the ladies wear midriffs or bikini tops. Cara laments the sexing-up of her favorite Guitar Hero character, Judy Nails, in the latest version of the game:

Basically, I’m not sure why they bothered to put a shirt on her. There are copious amounts of cleavage, her entire stomach, and at least half of her bra hanging out. The shirt is really more of an accessory than an actual article of clothing. Even on stage with all of those bright lights, she still might get a little cold. And every outfit change I could give her doesn’t make it any better.

Even worse, I don’t have any other female options. There’s Cassie, who has always worn a bikini top in lieu of a shirt (which I was originally fine with, because there were other options and there is a male character with no shirt). And there’s a new Asian female character who, though she is covered, is dressed like she works for Gwen Stefani. And since I see it as pretty racist, I can’t go with her, either.

So. Apparently Guitar Hero now thinks that it either A. does not have any female fans or B. their female fans will, for some reason, not mind being objectified and forced to play with a character who is half naked, if they want to play with a woman.

Add to that Axe sponsorship (including the eau de asshole promotional jingle actually placed within the game), a guitar shaped like a woman's disembodied leg in a fishnet stocking, and a guitar called "Lady Shapes" with an airbrushed blonde in a bikini on it. More from Cara:

Do you think Joel Stein stands outside throwing Halloween candy at women screaming, "Whores, all of you, whores!!!" while secretly cursing them for not sleeping with him?

On a more productive note, who has a great costume idea? (C'mon, I know someone's going as sexy mustard.) I'm considering going as Joan Collins, but am on the lookout for a better idea...

This is one of those things that I almost didn't blog about, because it's clearly a publicity stunt and me writing this only adds to the "buzz." The awful Radar cover is photoshopped spoof of a Vanity Fair cover from March 2006 -- which Rebecca Traister ably took to task at the time. (Using naked women as accessories to powerful dudes is a real VF cover theme.)

I know this stupid Radar cover is designed to make me go, "ugh." And it succeeded. Of course the white man is the only one who's fully clothed. As Rachel Sklar points out, "Rudy's head just looks so natural on Tom Ford's skin-crawlingly skeevy body."

Thoughts?

A Reuters article titled, "Sexy rap videos suspected to be damaging to young girls" says:

Watching rap music videos that are overly sexy and violent can lead to alcohol abuse and promiscuity among young black girls, according to a study into sexual stereotypes in rap music footage.

Firstly, putting "sexy" and "violent" within the same category is a bit disconcerting. (Not to mention "promiscuity" and "alcohol abuse.") The actual study was even more so:

The research was based on a survey of 522 African-American girls aged 14 to 18 who were asked how often they watched rap videos, questioned about their sex lives and asked to provide a urine sample for a marijuana screening.

While obviously the media and pop culture (which does include the misogyny that exists in many rap videos) has a huge impact on girls' lives, why not focus more on their self esteem and confidence rather than their sexual activity and pot smoking? (The research method itself is pretty problematic to me as well, but that's a whole other discussion.)

Thoughts?

I fell for Ms. July even harder when I read her interview in the latest issue of Bust, especially this part:

Do you consider yourself a feminist?
Yes.
That's so nice to hear. There are a lot of women who don't want to associate with the word anymore. Why do you think that is?
Whenever I see people have a long answer to that question, I'm just like, "What's confusing about that?" It's just being pro your ability to do what you need to do [laughs]. I doesn't mean you don't love your boyfriend or whatever." And I wouldn't go out with any guy who wasn't a feminist. But I guess for people, especially once you kind of get more well-known, labels get really scary because it's a reduction of who you are. When I say "feminist," I mean that in the most complex, interesting, exciting way!

Word.

Today, the New York Times takes on a trend for new (and rich) mothers: postpartum plastic surgery. (With a really horrendous title, I might add: "Is the 'Mom Job' Really Necessary?")

"Mommy makeovers" are being marketed by plastic surgeons across the country in an attempt to reach out to women post-childbirth, so that they can get their, you know, "normal" bodies back:

In 1970, “Our Bodies, Ourselves,� the seminal guide to women’s health, described the cosmetic changes that can happen during and after pregnancy simply as phenomena. But now narrowing beauty norms are recasting the transformations of motherhood as stigma.

These unforgiving standards are the offspring of pop culture and technology, a union that treats biological changes as if they were as optional as hair color. Gossip magazines excoriate celebrity moms who don’t immediately lose their “baby weight.� Even Cookie, a luxury parenting magazine, recently ran an article that described postpregnancy breasts as “the ultimate indignity� and promoted implant surgery; a photo of droopy water-filled balloons accompanied the article.

Many women struggle with the impact of aging and pregnancy on their bodies. But the marketing of the “mommy makeover� seeks to pathologize the postpartum body, characterizing pregnancy and childbirth as maladies with disfiguring aftereffects that can be repaired with the help of scalpels and cannulae.

The Mommy Makeover website is nothing less than atrocious, with a slideshow introduction of "beautiful" mothers and their children with the text: "Embrace the feeling of being a woman." Which apparently means going under the knife.

So these surgeons are not only pitching this idea that women's bodies are "used up" after they give birth, but even physically deformed. In other words, while it's more than natural for a woman to bear a child, her post-baby body isn't natural and needs to be "fixed." (For a minimum of $10,000, I might add.)

There are way too many double standards and oxymorons to list here; all I know is that it never ceases to amaze me how obvious the war over our bodies is.

P.S. I second Feministe's request that the NY Times start to "focus more often on issues affecting more than the top 1% of the income distribution." Amen.

The Fashionista Diaries couldn't be more vapid. That's part of the fun of the show. I mean, I spent 30 minutes playing Facebook TV trivia this morning, who am I to judge?

However, this one little clip from Jezebel really got my brain going.

In it, the "naïve" white girl, Tina (who's apparently hanging out with the first black person she's ever met) discovers two earth-shattering things about black people. In case you're reading this while standing, please sit down so you don't pass out from the shock of what I'm about to share.

Exhibit A. Actual tan line on black skin.

Fact #1. Black people get darker in the sun. It's tanning, just like anyone else does. Black skin may, if dark enough, resemble teflon, but it is not. This realization came up when Janjay, the black girl in question, said she didn't want to lay out so she wouldn't get darker. Not that laying out in the sun is such an important pursuit, but it's a shame she feels that way. I'm darker-skinned than anyone in my immediate family, and it's something that sadly comes up a lot. In fact, my grandmother apparently decided to marry my grandfather partially because he was a lot lighter than her, and she wanted light-skinned children.

Fact #2. Black people don't automatically want to date all other black people.
Again, poor Janjay. Tina saw a cute black guy and ran over to fetch him for her friend. Janjay, not interested, notes that Tina tries to set her up with every black guy they see. What a great friend.

I have to say, I feel Janjay's pain here. I grew up as one of two or three black kids in my grade at school, and it can be exhausting. Having to "teach" your friends about race is so isolating. For the longest time I actually felt like a freak, because how could someone you like be so ignorant about such simple things. I thought there must really have been something weird about me for it to be so confusing. It was a lot worse in feminist circles. Not that the comments were worse, but the feeling like an outsider. I became to loathe going to certain group meetings in college. Being expected to speak for all black women, or sometimes, all non-white women. Can't. Won't. The sad thing is, it still happens. And it still sucks. It sucks to have to steel yourself against the seemingly inevitable ignorance, disrespect and bigotry of your allies. And that's why it sucks extra hard when you hear that it's not a big deal. Because this shit is usually the latest in a long list of painful moments.

See, reality TV is fucking deep.

Update: To go back to the tanning thing, the reason it bugs me so much is I don't understand how anyone could think that. I mean, skin gets darker in the sun. Even if you never thought about black people tanning before, when you do, doesn't it just make sense?

Never thought I'd say this... but I'm starting to love Barry Manilow. That's right. He declined to appear on The View when producers denied his request that the interview be conducted by anyone but the anti-choice Elizabeth Hasselbeck. (You remember her, right? She was the one screeching that emergency contraception is abortion.)

As Manilow writes on his website,

Hey guys,

I wanted to let you know that I will no longer be on The View tomorrow as scheduled. I had made a request that I be interviewed by Joy, Barbara or Whoopi, but not Elisabeth Hasselback. Unfortunately, the show was not willing to accommodate this simple request so I bowed out.

It’s really too bad because I've always been a big supporter of the show, but I cannot compromise my beliefs. The good news is that I will be on a whole slew of other shows promoting the new album so I hope you can catch me on those.

Love,
Barry

Love you, too, buddy.

It is interesting all the speculation around the increase access in technology and new media to people in rural places and how it is or is not emancipating them. Specifically, this article in Slate delves into the commonly discussed question of TV series (Indian equivalent of soaps) and their effects on women in India. According to Slate, these women are being "helped" or rather, brought into the modern times (if you will) by the cable television.

A new study by Robert Jensen of Brown University and Emily Oster of the University of Chicago shows that television is having a distinctly helpful effect on women, at least in rural India, which admittedly doesn't have America's half-century of experience with the medium, or 300 channels to surf through.

So I checked out the abstract from the study and it said this:

This paper explores the effect of the introduction of cable television on gender attitudes in rural India. Using a three-year individual-level panel dataset, we find that the introduction of cable television is associated with improvements in women's status. We find significant increases in reported autonomy, decreases in the reported acceptability of beating and decreases in reported son preference. We also find increases in female school enrollment and decreases in fertility (primarily via increased birth spacing). The effects are large, equivalent in some cases to about five years of education in the cross section, and move gender attitudes of individuals in rural areas much closer to those in urban areas. We argue that the results are not driven by pre-existing differential trends. These results have important policy implications, as India and other countries attempt to decrease bias against women.

I think it can be argued that there is some truth to this. I don't really prefer Waldfogel's presumptive nature of the way that things are for women in rural India, as backwards and traditional and the television is helping them come into the light. However, I think some of the trends that are happening, as a result of a change in economy and the women's movement in India, are probably reflected in television and they mutually reinforce each other.

I am weary of studies that say new technologies emancipate people in "old, narrow and backward" places. There has been similar work done on internet access and rural women in India. Women in rural India have roles and responsibilities, extensive kinship networks, methods of healing, irrigation techniques that "modernization" sometimes wipes out. I am not saying one is better than the other, it is just important to see things for what they are. Series television is very much like soap operas, they are not based in reality, the women reflect idealized and unattainable standards of beauty, and the plot lines are unrealistic and fantastical. So although they women in series may represent a more modern woman, she is also a production of capitalist desire, latching on to upper-middle class notions of success.

It is hard to judge one culture while sitting in another, wondering what exactly emancipation is for rural women in India, having some intense desire for them to be free. While ignoring how many of us are enslaved by the images we watch on television and I would hardly call that freedom.

Ultimately the study found that it was a change in attitude that is most notable, as opposed to a change in actual behavior. I think it is safe to say that TV has the potential to change attitudes everywhere, but it is a matter of the direction that we want it to change in. Mainstream media and its reach has had truly dangerous consequences for the American imagination, so, I maybe a little skeptical of calling the TV in India an "Empowerment box."

It is amazing to me how advertisers in the male body care products industry, beer industry and most recently found example, the fast food industry, continue to rely on sexist and racist stereotypes to sell their products. This ad, sent in by a reader, is another example of the consumption of women's bodies or buns to the consumption of hamburgers and their respective buns. And as this narrative illustrates, men have preferences for how they like women's buns, so naturally, they have preferences for their hamburger buns. This is so tired, I fell asleep.

Carl's Jr strikes out bad, not only for supplying a bad product that is a public health threat (IMHO) but for producing such corny and trashy commercials that a 2 year old could deconstruct as highly problematic.

Hot for teacher anyone?

Seriously, what the hell? And I don't appreciate the race implications of casting a bunch of white boys dressed up like "rappers" rapping about how the like flat buns, to sarcastically mimic black rappers in how they like round ones. It is just tacky.

The Los Angeles Times had a piece yesterday about the television and movie trend of the BBF--the Black Best Friend:

Julia Louis-Dreyfus has one. Sandra Bullock had one. So did Jennifer Garner and Katie Holmes. Jennifer Love Hewitt has had two. Calista Flockhart took hers dancing. Kate Walsh had one, lost her, and got another one with a different face but the same name. And Scarlett Johansson got her first one last weekend.

They're stars who have all played lead characters who experience adventure with the help of their BFF (Best Friend Forever). But in many cases, these BFFs might more accurately be characterized as BBFs -- Black Best Friend -- played by an African American actress whose character's principal function is to support the heroine, often with sass, attitude and a keen insight into relationships and life.

Rose Catherine Pinkney, executive vice president of programming and production for TV One and a former Paramount Studios executive, says "...[I]t's a shame that studios also don't have the courage to put these actresses in leads...Historically, people of color have had to play nurturing, rational caretakers of the white lead characters. And studios are just not willing to reverse that role."

Sounds like the "magical black man" syndrome. Charming.

But the article is quick to point out that unlike movies or shows where black and white men are shown to be buddies, the relationship between women on screen follows a rather predictable formula:

BBFs vary in personality and looks, but many share the same qualities: They are gorgeous, independent, loyal and successful. They live or work with their friend but are not really around all that much except for well-timed moments when the heroine needs an eating companion or is in crisis. BBFs basically have very little going on, so they are largely available for such moments. And even though they are single or lack consistent solid relationships, BBFs are experts in the ways of the world, using that knowledge to comfort, warn or scold their BFF.

Oh yeah, and they're usually the only person of color around. Way to go, Hollywood.

Tatiana

Tatiana Suarez Pico, Tara Lopez and Aurin Squire together make a bilingual comic strip titled, "Bodega Ave." Tatiana translates and writes, Aurin writes and Tara draws.

Their website describes "Bodega Ave." as a pop fantasy and ridiculous satire based on a bunch of pre-teens in Brooklyn."

Here's Tatiana, Tara and Aurin...

The New York Times reports today that the New York City Council is considering a proposal to ban the word bitch. This proposal follows a similar ruling which banned the use of the n-word last February.

The term is hateful and deeply sexist, said Councilwoman Darlene Mealy of Brooklyn, who has introduced a measure against the word, saying it creates “a paradigm of shame and indignity� for all women.

While the article mentions no details about how a ban like this would be enforced (NYPD giving tickets for profanity?) they do talk to quite a few random people on the street to gauge their reactions to such a proposal. Most people interviewed are against the idea, arguing that is a too crucial part of their daily speech--they use it to refer to their friends, spouses, in their stand-up comedy or in their every day.

While I agree with the Councilwoman's sentiment above, that in many of its uses, the word bitch is derogatory toward women--eradicating its usage isn't going to solve the larger problem of the word's sentiment, or the fact that women who are assertive or opinionated are considered bitches. The idea of fighting sexism by regulating our language seems to me like putting a politically correct band-aid over the larger problem we face--mistreatment and disrespect of women.

What do you all think?

I noticed an item on Glossed Over last week about an article in Marie Claire called "Fembots: The New Breed of Women." The whole thing is posted on MSN now, and it's a doozy. Writes Theresa O'Rourke,

I came of age in the gut-spilling '90s, a time of Ally McBeal, "female bonding," Lilith Fair, and the explosion of the self-help section at Barnes & Noble. A decade has passed, but women still seem bent on suffocating themselves with an endless supply of self-indulgent hot air. We're due for a backlash, and I think it has arrived in the form of what I like to call the fembot: the cool, together, emotionally unavailable girl one cube over.

Um, didn't that stereotype "arrive" nearly a decade ago, in the form of Samantha, when Sex and the City first aired on HBO in 1998? She continues,

In 2007, fembotism is the next frontier in the great big gender divide. We can narrow the pay gap, outpace men earning degrees, helm a company, run the House of Representatives, choose to raise a child on our own, and match a man’s sexual appetite thrust for thrust. But there’s an unspoken disclaimer: We’d better not forsake our nurturing instinct while doing all of the above. Yeah, well, some of us are saying screw you to the fine print.

Hmmm... what sort woman might want to narrow the pay gap, advance women's educational opportunities, break through the glass ceiling, succeed in politics, raise her own children, and have lots of satisfying sex? I don't think "fembot" is the word we're looking for, here. Theresa, honey, it's "feminist." Say it with me now: "FEMINIST."

Problem is, she has to lump all the stupid "manhating bitch" stereotypes along with it, extending that "cold, disconnected" caricature of the young, modern woman well into strawman territory. I'm surprised she doesn't already have a book deal, because this sort of material makes people like Bill O'Reilly feel vindicated, and allows people like Laura Sessions Stepp to do more hand-wringing.

I know it doesn't make for clear-cut, black-and-white article, but most young women I know who possess a lot of these so-called "fembot" characteristics are in fact not afraid of intimacy, not disgusted by men, not self-absorbed. They fall in love and like to cuddle and sometimes cry at the movies. They just don't like flowers, Norah Jones, or traditional gender roles. And they don't feel a pressing need to get married.

The Observer had a piece yesterday on the media's obsession with the "Bad Girls of Hollywood," and questions why everyone seems to get off on watching these irritating rich, white women get in trouble.

While an obvious answer to this is that it's entertaining to see these overly privileged bad gals like Britney Spears, Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan who think they can get away with anything not only be treated as criminals just as any one of us would, but also have overwhelming flaws and personal problems. (In other words, rich life ain't all that grand.)

But is there more to it? And what is so appealing about famous women's demise rather than the lads? 'We have had years of young male stars running amok. It is now so much more fun for the public to see beautiful young women being hauled off to jail,' said Robert Thompson, professor of popular culture at Syracuse University, New York state.

Is this saying something bigger about our culture? Why is it so much fun to watch "beautiful women" be imprisoned--or drug-addicted or clearly sick with eating disorders? And the comparison of these women's behavior with "Girls Gone Wild" is irksome as well; it's almost being posed as some kind of fetish. And who are we blaming?

To put it simply: is this a feminist issue?

Singer and songwriter Nicole Nelson recently returned to New York City after a long run in Boston, MA where I first saw her perform. Her voice and music are often compared to the artistry of Eva Cassidy, Donny Hathaway, Gladys Knight and Erykah Badu; and her style and poise are often compared to those of female greats well beyond her years.

I thankfully caught up with Nicole over email amidst her hectic schedule. Here's Nicole...

I read last week about Mattel marketing a new Barbie website and other types of "virtual play" for girls. Even though it's still in beta, in its first 60 days, the Barbie Girls site signed up three million members, and is adding another 50,000 every day. (I tried to log in and poke around the site, but it's been so jammed with visitors that I couldn't get it to load.)

One of the reasons Barbie has historically had such a hold on young girls (and what I loved about Barbie as a kid) is that she's a grown-up. I know this is one of the critiques of Barbie -- that she presents a very screwed up image of what an adult woman is supposed to physically look like. As a kid, I loved Barbie because she wasn't a baby doll -- I had no interest in playing mommy. I used Barbie to act out how I wanted to be as an adult. My Barbie was a journalist. She wore men's sweaters sometimes. She always drove the red convertible. In her spare time, she was the frontwoman of a rock band.

What didn't she do? Go shopping. Sure, she had lots of fun outfits, but having her "purchase" more was never part of my play routine. When I searched for descriptions of what Barbie is actually set up to do in her popular new virtual world, every article I found only mentioned her ability to shop for stuff like "miniskirts, tiaras or home accessories." In other words, training girls to grow up to be women who are first and foremost consumers.

A Barbie virtual world seems so much more pernicious than Barbie the 10-inch doll. It's still got all the body- and beauty-standard issues that the old-school version has. But at least girls can more easily impose their own personalities and interests onto a doll. It requires imaginative play. I'm sure that Barbie Girls has been focus-grouped like crazy, and that TONS of young girls want their Barbies to do nothing but go shopping and get makeovers. But it's really terrible (not to mention a wasted opportunity) to not include other activities. Why couldn't they join a virtual rock band, or run for virtual office, or play virtual sports? (I can think of several great organizations that would have made perfect partners for a website like this.)

As the site stands now, though, where would a kid like I was fit into the Barbie Girls world? From what I've read, the site features no fast cars, no rock band, no newsdesk. Just credit cards and cosmetics.

Hillary Duff recently had an interview with the Guardian titled, "What I know about men..." in which she talks about not being a "tramp" or "whore," her desire to have a family and bake pies, and comes out with this gem:

I'm not, like, a crazy feminist. I think women definitely need men. Like, I couldn't imagine having a girlfriend!

Icky lesbian feminists! Check out the rest of the interview, it's pretty, um, interesting.

Via DollyMix.

Originally posted at Racewire.

These pictures are too much for me.

Talk about the wedding industrial complex has been all over the place and I like it. But the conversation of race and culture has been left out of the larger discussion. How does capitalism intersect with wedding rituals in cultures other than mainstream white culture? Looking through the wedding section of Nirali has me perplexed (and cracking up) thinking about South Asian weddings in the US and how they typify this notion of the "wedding industrial complex". I have been to many and at this point I have just stopped going. I am 29 and don't plan on getting married. In fact I vehemently oppose getting married, and really can't afford to fly all over the country for a ritual I have deep problems with.

The weddings that I have seen and many of the weddings characterized in Nirali, don't really seem like weddings that are about love and romance. They seem more like business mergers and marketing ploys. Some weddings even get straight to the point and ask that you don't bring boxed gifts, just a check. Nothing says love like having all your friends give you a few thousand dollars. And clearly love can only *really* happen if you spend 70K and have 500 of your closest friends present.

Weddings in India are huge as well, but in the US they are huge, elaborate, cheesy and cost a small fortune. It has become the norm in the middle class South Asian community to have a huge wedding and spend a ton of money whether you have it or not. It is a new way to become American in an Indian way. For example, "something old, something new, " is not a South Asian tradition! That is the placement of US romantic fetish marketing within South Asian chic. Romantic heterosexuality, having money and raising a normal family have become encoded in the "becoming" process for second generation South Asian Indians. And since being American seems to be all about capitalist consumption they may almost succeed, except for that post 9/11 'you look like a terrorist snag.' (Which may be the fear that exaggerates it in the first place, but let me not get ahead of myself.).

It is so lame. Neela at Hyphen delves deeper.

Thoughts?

In a bikini. On YouTube. The breathless coverage of presidential campaign "hot chick" videos continues. I really really tried to ignore the whole Obama Girl craziness, hoping it would just go away. But no, now videos of scantily clad women have somehow become emblematic of new media in this presidential election cycle. Letting anyone submit debate questions via YouTube? Oh, interesting. But damn, hot girls dancing and singing? This is groundbreaking political discourse. Oh, wait. They're just supposed to be "funny." Oh, I get it. Just had to take my humorless feminist hat off.

The latest in this string of videos really takes it to the next level. That's right, folks. What you've all been waiting for, a cat fight. Obama Girl and Giuliani girl get it on. And what a surprise, there's a pillow fight.

The woman from the Obama video says this isn't all frivolous, though:

But the song, says Kauffman, "is less a love song than a debate song. We go into some serious issues, like the war in Iraq and Giuliani comparing himself to Ronald Reagan."

Yup. Thought-provoking. I assume next month we'll get a 5-woman mud wrestling match. CNN will provide live coverage of the video shoot. Showtime will play the unrated version. You'll probably be able to buy it bundled with a Girls gone Wild DVD.

So let's get a (clothed) debate going. What do people think about these ads?

Photo by Niesha Studio, copyright 2006.

Audacia Ray is an executive editor of $pread, a magazine by and for sex workers, and is a contributor to the porn blog Fleshbot. She is also the director/producer of a bisexual feature adult film, The Bi Apple and head of her blog, WakingVixen.com. Audacia describes herself as "a sex nerd in both bookish and salacious ways."

Here's Audacia...

Ann linked to this story yesterday in WFR, but I just had to delve a little deeper and point out just how depressing this is.

Partnerships of Mattel and the cosmetics industry is no new thing; their “Barbie Loves MAC� collection this past Spring was MAC’s largest and most successful collection they’d ever had. (After all, who could resist looking like the "Barbie Loves MAC" scary doll-woman to the left.)

Now they’re collaborating with Bonne Bell to market a new line of makeup aimed at 6 to 9-year old girls. Mattel included in their announcement of the partnership:

"The Barbie and Bonne Bell partnership will bring girls a fun, feminine and unique beauty experience, leveraging the unparalleled popularity of two globally loved brands."

Because what’s the most unique and useful growing experience a girl could have? Placing beauty standards on her at an early age, of course! What's more rewarding than learning about the wonders of femininity?!?

We all know this is much more important than, say, the “I Can� campaign that came out of Mattel’s partnership with Girls Inc. This project was aimed to tell girls to believe in themselves, in their strengths and that they could make a difference in the world. But of course, that relationship wasn’t so “successful� because of the sexist, anti-choice and homophobic American Family Association’s disapproval of the organization; Mattel cut ties from Girls Inc. shortly after the AFA launched their attack.

So we've gone from “I can be myself, follow my dreams and always do my best,� to “I can apply make-up.� When will young girls be given the positive messages they need which tells them they can be more than...well, a doll?

Given my undying love for Freaks and Geeks (and, by extension,