Gender Trouble

The Anachronism of Anything Anne of Green Gables.

originalotaku — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:37:41 -0500

A cover for a particular Anne of Green Gables trilogy has been receiving a sorrowful buzz if only for its malapropistic inception, unwittingly shaming the red-headed character of its inner pages.

Supposed book geeks are railing against the image of a blonde representing non-other than Anne Shirley, yelling at publishers for not reading the book before choosing a cover. I argue publishers know exactly what they’re doing, and that Anne of Green Gables is well known enough to warrant knowing the character is a fiery redhead (a sexual trope all its own). I like to assume this is a crude attempt to trick readers into purchasing a book solely based on the cover, which is what a lot of books do. People are less apt to read the back of the sleeve, anyway. If they were, we’d have no need for the cover.

Someone expressed a pang that the problem with the cover is the sexualization of the young blonde, tussling her hair, arching her back in a popular pin up pose, and thereby encouraging young women to act the same way. This argument falls flat on its face if anyone reads the actual book and realizes, by today’s conventions, that Anne Shirley is exactly what a young woman doesn’t want to be like if she wants popular attention and success. Yes, times have changed since the intellectual woman could depend solely on her intellect alone- but let’s face it, branding the self is as important as shelling out whatever adventures Anne Shirley could drum up in her old age.

Really though, the performativity of the photograph, not the colour of the hair, is the problem; because there is no doubt that young readers associate a successful young women with a vivacious sexuality. More importantly, if rhetorical icons like these continually represent female protagonists we do risk the danger of normalizing what young girls- popular girls- successful girls- look like from a space of hetero-normativity. Does it pressure women in the real world? I suppose it can, but there’re a myriad of representations we see in print, film, wherever. Go to the mall. This book cover just seems a moot point, and if there is any dilemma its in regards to getting a character image wrong in looks and even history- I’m pretty sure Anne Shirley didn’t ride horses, nor did she wear plaid shirts, or have highlights. Heck, I know she didn’t. That said, whatever cynically pulls on the normative heart strings of girls who want to be attractive young protagonists. In hindsight, this may be a perfect example of sex actually selling to young girls, the iconic image being so perfect in its representation of, again, an attractive, successful young girl doing girling, and no doubt affecting young consumers with a performative response of girling themselves.

-l

For more on ‘girling’ and ‘affect’, read:

Feeling Girl, Girling Feeling: An Examination of “Girl” as Affect by Monica Swindle

Right ways to eat.

originalotaku — Sat, 02 Feb 2013 15:13:05 -0500

I just saw Le Vian Chocolate’s Diamonds Commercial on television a couple seconds ago and couldn’t help but think of Nina Powers on the power of chocolate,

“Chocolate represents that acceptable everyday extravagance that all-too-neatly encapsulates just the right kind of perky passivity that feminized capitalism just loves to reward with a bubble bath and some crumbly cocoa solids. It sticks in the mouth a bit. … I think there’s a very real sense in which women are supposed to say ‘chocolate’ whenever someone asks them what they want. It irresistibly symbolizes any or all of the following: ontological girlishness, a naughty virginity that gets its kicks only from a widely-available mucky cloying substitute, a kind of pecuniary decadence.”

This particular passage is hauled up by a lot of writers, especially in the realm of women and food and bodies. A particular read, by
Autumn Whitefield-Madrano in her essay entitled “The Sweet Smell of Sexcess” about foodie products being pushed as an alternative for eating also came to mind- conveniently, she also draws on Powers. I think the foodie scope of the argument is a little lost, and the term misused, but the point still hits home thanks to Powers.

What’s so intriguing about this commercial, whether women see it or not, is its ability to police the body through growing up and eating. Of course, I’ll explain.

The commercial opens with a young girl gazing at chocolate and a voice over explains, ‘the craving for chocolate… is all grown up’. During this allotted time we see the young girl transform into the prime woman, and we see the chocolate transform into- what else?- jewelry, the candy of the grown woman. From a perspective of consumerism this entire situation greases capitalism’s wheels perfectly.

The success of the object as food supplement works exceptionally well with women and bodies, especially when women are unfortunately burdened with the task of wrong ways to eat their entire lives, especially if they are subject to believing the particular bodies they see in Western culture as right, wrong, normal, not normal. Food is a tempting and dangerous thing, especially in a world policed by perfect bodies and calorie counting. Because while women want to eat, they are stigmatized by the danger of becoming unattractive, which is why objects that manifest the characteristics of food work so well to become conduits for actual food, absolving the guilt and shame of decadent, fat rendering eating, ignored in youth for a short time, until girls start practicing being girls, make up and all. Now, of course most women may say they aren’t concerned with perfect calorie counting, but there is no doubt they are saddled with a voice that occasionally nags them for eating a little too much.

For the past two years I’ve been serendipitously privileged with jobs in the wellness industry, selling and making creams and lotions that have a lot of food scents- vanilla, chocolate, mint, whatever fruit. And though it’s nice to smell like these things, they also activate a desire to eat- unfortunately you can’t eat a decadent coconut body lotion that contains borax. Even I have to admit, I’ve come across some that have made me salivate. I argue that while some men wear scented body lotions- which smell like food-it is very very rare, and women are the prime targets for this marketing strategy.

Because women police their eating much more than men, who can always eat more and get ‘big’ and be more accepted, products that masquerade as food become ways for women to absolve themselves of the guilt of eating. You don’t eat a lotion, and it’s good for staying young and looking young- and even being thin. In the instance of beauty products, scented creams, especially if all natural and non-toxic, become ways to have your cake and eat it too. The body can ingest without calorie intake and be satisfied- or at least, women train themselves to be satisfied. It takes time, but it’s better than a future of fat. More importantly, women are praised for taking care of themselves.

In the case of diamonds and Le Vian’s commercial, which operates just as complexly, the diamond becomes a food object a woman can always use to satiate her desire for decadent things. Not only that, it becomes a fetishized food substitute she is praised and revered for having. Jewelry represents success in wealth and relationships. She can have her chocolate and not feel bad because it is viewed in this case as a good thing, not consuming action that represents poor discipline. Indeed, it is the best kind of discipline- a loved woman gets diamonds, a rich woman gets diamonds. All axioms of the successful consumer in capitalism.

By the commercial’s end, the women is held by her significant other, satisfied, and happy with the nourishing, fetishized, consumer good.

I noticed multiple viewings of jewelry commercials, of all places, on the SPIKE NETWORK, which delivers another level of analysis to this body policing through jewelry. What would a man think when constantly seeing these chocolate diamond commercials? Me aside, I can assume that men can nourish women with these products that become as life giving as food, while objectifying the women in their lives to statuses of normative- being supplied for and remaining thin, remaining beautiful. The pressure for the male viewer certainly is palpable. I counted three commercials in the span of a half hour. Even if they don’t feel the pressure, there is some particular hypnotic rhetoric going on, especially if we view the television screen as a window for objective reality- for what is true in the world and culture. You may say I’m foolish, that people know better. But when marketing becomes more sophisticated and when consumers engage in the activity of purchasing products they see on commercials, I believe what I say hits home. Indeed, the fantasy displayed may not be real, but the idea of making it reality- of seeing a utopian life on television and working towards it- is something viewers more often than not want to do, especially if it can make their lives more validated.

-l

(The fantasy window is an interesting subject. For more information, feel free to pic up anything by Anne Friedberg.)

"Trampire:" Why the Public Slut Shaming of Kristen Stewart Matters for Young Women

originalotaku — Thu, 06 Sep 2012 21:25:28 -0400

"Trampire:" Why the Public Slut Shaming of Kristen Stewart Matters for Young Women :

for young women, the culture of slut shaming that the Kristen Stewart scandal represents won’t go away. I might not be concerned for K-Stew, but I am concerned for all the young women today who are tuned into this scandal, ones who are learning that it’s not okay to screw up, ever.”

It doesn’t matter if you don’t like her as an actor, I know I sure don’t. It’s gross that this is big news. It’s double gross that people who have only the word of the media to go on make all sorts of judgments about her character. You don’t fucking know her.

By tearing into her, and any other woman in the public spotlight who fails to be perfect 100% of the time, we’re really just making things worse for ourselves.

I’ve been seeing this posted everywhere lately, and it’s getting a lot of support- I think, for the wrong, misdirected reasons. Therefore, I can’t help but call shenanigans. But before I get into it, let me cover my ass by saying slut shaming is obviously wrong, both parties were at fault, yaddy yaddy yadda. The media focuses on the woman at fault and not the man- both parties are at fault, and both parties should be blamed. There may also be reasons for the focus, however. Stewart’s lover isn’t important in the public eye of fans who would identify with the romance between Pattison and Stewart. These are who obsessive fans watch; these people are what sell an audience to advertisers and which get the television show, magazine, whatever, its profit. So we should state that outright. The dollar is the bottom line. If we were all good people, we wouldn’t bother to gossip, but lets remember why we have a story- because we have to live, albeit a little cynically. I claim that’s why the man in the affair wasn’t focused on and why he ‘got off’ without any contempt in the media. Obviously, there is contempt from audiences, but that’s beside the point. My problem here is with the act of eliminating slut-shaming. Slut-shaming should be eliminated, it is obvious. The notion of Stewart being young and forgiven for her mistake is where I lose truck. It’s dubious, because what she did isn’t alright- at any age. Conventionally, this is something that isn’t alright. Cheating isn’t alright. Young women know this. The problem is that it’s always ‘okay’ to make mistakes like these. In reality, it happens too often to be alright. Young women aren’t this stupid, but this kind of dialogue enables them to disavow what they already know- don’t cheat in a relationship. But as long as dialogues like this continue in the fantasy scape of the media- which we all indirectly take as true and durable- it gives leeway for a young woman to become a victim.

So which point stands, someone asks me: that this society should be slut-shaming women because they ought to know better? Or that there should be an equal distribution of blame?

Again, both parties should be blamed, obviously. And in the real, civil, responsible world without a capitalist dollar agenda we would slap both wrists. but no, my point isn’t that society should be slut-shaming women because they ought to know better. Slut-shaming shouldn’t happen at all. My problem is that the article paradoxically reinforces slut-shaming in trying to speak against slut-shaming.

It fails because it draws attention away from the fact that everyone knows cheating is wrong and that it’s okay for Stewart to make a mistake because she’s a young woman. Not that she shouldn’t cheat. It may be said, but it’s buffered by her young foolishness. As a result, I argue that readers can interpret this behaviour of fooling around as alright, as long as when caught, they admit their mistake but not without riding on the notion that they are young, so they’re not totally at fault. Again, specifically because they’re young. We hear the cheating message too much to engage in it without knowing that cheating is wrong. No one is that foolish. Especially the women who read this. Again, society obviously shouldn’t slut shame. It shouldn’t shame at all. Sadly, I fear young women will read this, engage in a hook-up culture, and always use the excuse of youth to absolve their guilt, and we owe thanks to the Huffington Post, something seen as a legitimate source, right and true, because it says it’s alright to make the mistake of cheating when you’re young.

-l

Haus of Eve: B00bies!

originalotaku — Sat, 04 Aug 2012 15:25:35 -0400

Haus of Eve: B00bies!:

Normativity alert! We lost another one, Judith.

evecates:

It’s true! I’m getting new boobies! It’s something I have been thinking about on and off for years and I think I’m finally ready. I put off telling people because I know anytime a girl decides to change something about her own body (GOD FORBID) all her fans get up in arms over it but you know…

evecates: thugxwife: Photographer:...

originalotaku — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 18:19:08 -0400

evecates:

thugxwife:

Photographer: tomiknoxyouout.tumblr.com

Reminds me of the movie Jawbreaker <3

Jawbreaker was a dope flick, but this is not glamorous, it’s dangerous, the rhetoric of the photograph needs no explanation, but here it is: a tied up girl speaks to the hypersexual desire of men in control and woman as submissive in a fantasy of hetero-normative pornography. Now, there’s nothing intrinsically wrong with pornography if you’re smart enough to know when the fantasy ends- but I’m rather myopic with my faith in humanity.

Disney Princesses: New Drawings, New Problems

originalotaku — Sat, 16 Jun 2012 21:53:16 -0400

Disney Princesses: New Drawings, New Problems:

Except… why does being bad ass mean a woman has to lose her clothes? They’ve become tough, dangerous, mean fighters - and this involves fish-net stockings (Snow White), a loin cloth (Cinderella, Belle, Rapunzel), and a bared navel (pretty much all of them). And Sleeping Beauty (ye gods). We’ve seen this time and again, when a woman goes to fight she leaves her clothes behind. Can a woman’s clothes and a weapon not exist in the same picture?

I’ll tell you why. Because women are regarded as powerful by way of their hypersexuality. Of course, you could argue their stripdowns are to exhibit their muscles- and their is some naive truth to that- but, like action heroes show their muscles to show their strength with definition shown through clothes, women must strip because the hetero normative form for a female, isn’t necessarily defined- so it becomes confused by way of a stripdown; ‘nudity’ to codify strength, but unfortunately, bolstering the hetero normative idea that a woman’s power lay in her objectifiable, broken into sexual parts body.

-l

Fat Girls Belong on The Pole Too

originalotaku — Wed, 06 Jun 2012 13:09:55 -0400

Fat Girls Belong on The Pole Too:

true speak. I do find one argument problematic. That the judges disqualified her outright. They did no such thing- I found their choice based on ability and talent. If a ‘fat girl’ came and danced with skill, what’s to say the judges wouldn’t have congratulated her. As for Nick’s dance, yes, it’s satirical and a spectacle, but I viewed it as a way of buffering a touchy subject. People know ‘fat girls’ should be able to dance, and yet, there’s a paradoxical disavowel of the act. Alas. Still, Nick’s dance wasn’t spur of the moment. I viewed it as Canon attempting to share interest. It is inevitable that any man dancing on a pole, unless a beef cake will be seen as a stag spectacle. My point here is that Nick inspired her- Nick didn’t come out and say, let me have a try, let me show you up. What about when Nick pole danced in the past? Who did he dance after? Or before? A misdirected polemic I think. But those are my only qualms.

-l

Full article below:

I am sure the shock came from the fact that fat women are told to cover our bodies at all times. With the summer approaching we are told that we don’t belong in bathing suits, let alone a bikini. Fat women are also constructed as repulsive and therefore not sexual. When LuLu walked on stage she challenged all of those assumptions. She dared to be sexual, she dared to reveal her body and showed absolutely no shame.

Sharon Osborne was the first to hit her buzzer followed very quickly by Howard Stern. Howie Mandel said there were times he didn’t think that she would make it up the pole. What is unfortunate is what really got the audience going was Nick getting on the pole which to me read like a mockery of everything that LuLu had done. Howard was inspired to put a dollar down Nick’s pants and he handed LuLu a dollar as well.

I think that what she did took incredible guts considering the pervasive nature of fat shaming. She dared to sexual, and revealing on a very large stage. Her confidence is inspiring and though she wasn’t selected to move further, she absolutely made my day. Fat women not only have the right to take up space, we have the right to be sexual, I only wish that didn’t turn what she did into a cheap joke.

Snow White and the Huntsman: From Queer Failure to Heteronormative Supremacy

originalotaku — Sun, 03 Jun 2012 01:06:00 -0400

I’m snowballing before bed…

I’ll be brief- because this movie alone warrants its own critical analysis, one which I myself find daunting and unrewarding- because I don’t get paid to do this stuff, and being a White dude writing Feminist/Queer theory is so problematic for other people. But I invite everyone to enter into a discussion with me- this movie is a Queer goldmine, from abilist Dwarves as comic relief characters to young female empowerment that falls flat on its face. That said, I’ll talk about that. As a hyper feminist Hollywood text, Snow White & the Huntsman succeeds, but I use the term hyper feminist here scornfully, because the empowered female archetype I see Hollywood use to empower young women- heck all women- only serves to solidify an ideal of heteronormative capitalist supremacy.

I said I’d be brief, so in brief, on a superficial level, the film operates to make itself a superficial feminist homage, but manages, much to my delight, to be a practise in the queer art of failure, until that itself becomes betrayed, ironically, by the female protagonist attempting to empower female kind. Why is this?

The story of Snow White begins with a King losing his wife, mourning, falling for another beautiful woman and then being killed by her, whom, she tells the listeners, is someone who’s made it her life’s mission to punish men for using women as objects- loving them for their beauty- and then throwing them away. She thus states that beauty is the only thing that has power, or something of the sort. So, beautiful woman becomes evil queen, audience recognizes vanity metaphor, thinks beauty is on inside, paradoxically still worships beauty in real life (thank you, H&M). But that’s another line of flight I’ll stay away from.

What seems important is that Snow White, who escapes to advance the plot, isn’t really an empowered female as much as she is a female empowered by queer characters. In that respect, the film fails in female empowerment but succeeds in a heteronormative perspective because it maintains heteronormative control, especially from a male space of power, while hypnotizing audiences into making women think they’re empowered.

To explain further. The Huntsman searches out Snow White for the resurrection of his dead wife (that’s the reward). He’s a degenerate drunk, liminal in society as far as I’m concerned (on the edge of two plains of existence; hypermasculine archetype, drunk, useless, non-capitalist loser). He at first searches out the poor fawn Snow White, finds her and almost returns her until the Evil Queen’s bro shirks on the deal, thus saving her. What’s important though is that through the journey, the liminal failure that is the Huntsman- great war hero turned drunk loser- is queer in the story, because though a handsome cowboy, he still ain’t perfect by heteronormative capitalist standards. I’ll diverge here to explain that heteronormative supremacy in this story has huge roots in capitalism because of the space of heteronormative balance that the film comes to by the end.

So, it turns out that the Huntsman indirectly, and directly, teaches Snow White skills that allow her to survive ‘outside’ the Kingdom- she becomes queer, paradoxically in a quest to become ‘not queer.’ That is, to restore the Kingdom to a place of peace, which the Evil Queen took away. It’s at this junction that I argue that the queen, again paradoxically is actually herself queer, and fulfills a capitalist heteronormative agenda to return peace and order and submissiveness on a female heroine who will rule a Kingdom that has roots in Patriarchy.

Ironically, Snow White becomes a Hetero Wolf in Queer Sheeps’ clothing. But we don’t know that until the end.

What else proves Snow White’s (SW from now on) queerness transformation? Howabout her death? Jesus metaphor aside, she becomes ‘poisoned’ by the queer queen and put under a spell (no doubt another analogy for the ‘black magic’ ‘not naturalness’ of queerness that heteronormativity uses to disqualify it). Instead of the heteronormative Duke’s son, Prince Charming, fighting the good fight doing everything right, kissing her and having her wake up, it is, in fact the Huntsman, in drunken fit and hysteria who unknowingly does so. This would otherwise be problematic if you view him as straight male kissing straight female, but- again, he is a queer metaphor- AND! the movie cleverly doesn’t allow him to know he’s the one that wakes her up- AND! they never get together by the end- thank queer God. Thus, SW is reborn, a true liminal queer heroine, having mastered the art of queer failure. BUT! she rallies the troupes of expelled villagers in order to overcome the Evil Queen and restore order, as if a cell sent by some Heteronormative government, and she manages to destroy herself by giving up her queerness for ‘Queenly’ responsibility and order. The kicker? She kills the queen with a move the Huntsman taught her- queer against queer, presenting the viewer with the hetero truth that queerness is problematic because it collapses in on itself. it destroys its own Other. The only thing that can work, and is the natural Order is King/Queen/Patriarchal rule. Everyone has a space, job, role in the Kingdom and that equals happiness.

The saving grace of the film? The Huntsman is at Snow White’s coronation, eyes her among the crowd, but is not decked out in anything fancy but still his old garbs and demeaner, unchanged in the least. He remains liminal, he remains queer, he gives viewers a little hope.

-l

hollywood fetishes youth BECAUSE celebrity women fetishize you-...

originalotaku — Tue, 29 May 2012 20:26:47 -0400

hollywood fetishes youth BECAUSE celebrity women fetishize you- that is, their beauty values come from the convention that youth is valued in beauty. See what’s happening there? Call it Actor Network Theory, call it whatever you want. But that’s how it operates- you can’t just say because actresses are old they’re not valued because they’re not young. That’s pure absurdity.

thenewinquiry:

When I was in college, the hot new face belonged to an actress named Jennifer Aniston, who, at age 25, had found herself with the coveted Rachel haircut and a hit TV show. Thirteen years after my graduation, who do I see on magazine covers? A 43-year-old Jennifer Aniston. And a 39-year-old Gwyneth Paltrow, 36-year-old Kate Winslet, 42-year-old Jennifer Lopez, 42-year-old Tina Fey, and 36-year-old Reese Witherspoon—all of whom were big or rapidly on their way there when they, and I, were in our 20s. Add to that the 38-year-old Elizabeth Banks, 33-year-old Rachel McAdams, 32-year-old Zooey Deschanel, 33-year-old Kate Hudson, 38-year-old Heidi Klum, 37-year-old Christina Hendricks, and 36-year-old Angelina Jolie, and it gets harder and harder to believe that Hollywood truly does fetishize youth as much as we say it does. Yes, there will always be the 18-year-old Dakotas and 22-year-old Kristens, but we’re in an unprecedented age of mature women being construed as alluring in the mainstream press. Julianne Moore is 51. Want to know who else was 51? Rue McClanahan, when The Golden Girls first aired.

The Beheld on what 36 looks like

Vogue vows to ban ultra-skinny models

originalotaku — Mon, 07 May 2012 15:02:31 -0400

Vogue vows to ban ultra-skinny models:

Oh, Vogue, here you go again, humouring the normative masses. I feel this struggle is a moot point, because while you exclude ‘skinny’ models, are you not splitting a dichotomy even more? Into more, paradoxically, separate parts. And what about the skinny girl who can’t gain weight? This trivializes the struggle of one who WANTS to put on weight. I know a lot of skinny- down on themself- girls. Perhaps your models should be all colours, and sizes of the big, grey rainbow. Trying to fit people into a big ol’ normative box is gun’ work against ya. Eventually, everyone’s gonna have to fit a particular body type with these good intentions. And then what? Ableism wins, that’s what.

ARTICLE:

NEW YORK — Lip service or sea change? Skeptics wonder whether Vogue magazine’s vow to ban models under 16 or those of any age with visible signs of eating disorders is more hype than health.

The 19 editors of Vogue around the world made the promise Thursday, beginning with June issues and including editions in America, France, Britain and China. They also encouraged fashion designers to reconsider “unrealistically” small sample sizes that make ultra-thin models necessary in the first place.

Vogue didn’t address the widespread industry practice of digitally altering photos that critics believe promotes an impossible standard of beauty.

While the new initiatives are certainly good news for models, Susan Linn of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood said Vogue didn’t go far enough.

“If Vogue was really concerned about the well being of girls in terms of their health, then they would have done what Spain and Italy did and use only girls who have what has been deemed a healthy Body Mass Index.”

The health of models, especially their weight, has been in the spotlight over the past few years, especially after the death of two models from apparent complications from eating disorders in 2006 and 2007, but the focus, until now, has been on runway fashion shows.

The primary fashion organizations in Italy and Spain banned catwalk models who fall below a certain BMI level. Israel’s government passed an anti-skinny-model law earlier this year.

The Council of Fashion Designers of America adopted a voluntary initiative in 2007 emphasizing age minimums and healthy working environments during New York Fashion Week. London Fashion Week designers signed a contract with the British Fashion Council to use models who are at least 16.

Anna Wintour, Vogue’s U.S. editor-in-chief, was instrumental in crafting the CFDA’s guidelines.

Still, there is persistent criticism that the fashion world creates a largely unattainable and unhealthy standard that particularly affects impressionable young girls.

Audrey Brashich, a former teen model and ex-editor of a teen magazine, called the Vogue announcement a “tiny baby step of progress,” at best.

“The cynic in me feels like they are simply grandstanding while really just throwing a bone to an audience that is getting ever more savvy and tired of the tricks of the trade,” she said.

Linn agreed, adding: “It’s not going to help the millions of young girls who turn to these magazines to decide what they should aspire to look like.”

Conde Nast publishes other magazines, including Glamour and Allure, but a spokeswoman said there are no current plans for these guidelines to be adopted across the company. Glamour said the magazine’s policy already was not to book models under 16 or those who appear to have an eating disorder.

The Hearst Corp., home to Elle, Harper’s Bizarre and Marie Claire, said that it supports the CFDA guidelines.

i feel like the rebuddtle to this should be, as women, we're repulsed by body hair on men- especially the back. So really, who's in the right? Who's empowered?

originalotaku — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 16:48:21 -0400

thegirlwhokissedtheshadow:

markaragnos:We’re manly men. We fight in wars, we play sport, we drive noisy cars. We’re tough.

We’re terrified of body hair on women though.

Great blog

originalotaku — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:06:15 -0400

Great blog

Booted out for being born a boy: Transgender beauty queen kicked out of Miss Universe

originalotaku — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 22:58:00 -0400

Booted out for being born a boy: Transgender beauty queen kicked out of Miss Universe:

A beauty pageant has booted a contestant out the competition after discovering the buxom blonde was born a boy.

The Miss Universe Canada organizers threw out Jenna Talackova when they found out she had undergone surgery to become a woman.

The transgendered contestant had already successfully reached the finals in the Miss Vancouver pageant before she was banned from continuing in the competition.

Although the pageant organizers described Talackova as a ‘real girl’ they disqualified her arguing that the rules state that each contestant must be a ‘naturally born female.’

According to Denis Davila, the national director of Miss Universe Canada, Talackova claimed on her registration form she was born a female.

But becoming suspicious Davila confronted the 23-year-old about her sex change and the contestant admitted she was actually born a male.

Despite her pleas to stay in the pageant her confession meant that she was pulled from the contest that same day.

‘She feels like a real girl and she is a real girl. She didn’t expect people to question it,’ Davila told thestar.com.

‘She was hoping we could put her back in the competition, but the rules are very clear and there’s no way we can go back on it.’

The decision from the Miss Universe Canada pageant, which is owned by Donald Trump, has sparked outrage with people calling for Jenna to be reinstated into the contest.

Scroll down for video

Suspicious: The transgendered beauty queen was kicked out after pageant organizers became suspicious that the contestant was not a ‘naturally born female’ as she stated in her registration form

Beauty queen: Jenna Talackova, fourth from right, has competed in a Miss Universe contest before

People have taken to social media pages to express their disgust with one Facebook user writing on the pageant’s page: ‘Tell us what “requirements” did she not make? This reeks of discrimination…’

In a YouTube interview Talackova says she knew she was a female at the age of four and began hormone therapy ten years later.

And the 23-year-old beauty queen, who has competed in Miss Universe pageants and transgendered pageants before, says that she surgically changed her gender aged 19.

"Femme is defiance. Femme ignores the male gaze & tells patriarchy to fuck off. Femme is a..."

originalotaku — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 13:02:00 -0400

“Femme is defiance. Femme ignores the male gaze & tells patriarchy to fuck off. Femme is a refusal of the pressure to be thinner, whiter, pimple-free, wrinkle-free, smaller, quieter. Femme says that we’ll take the short skirts but you can keep the catcalls to yourself.”

- BOSSY FEMME (via albinwonderland)

Why is this wrong? you can’t ignore the male gaze- you cannot rearticulate it. More importantly, this site is total jerkoff propaganda for victimized women who don’t truly understand feminism, skirting the issue of truly dealing feminism with a girl who posts pics of herself looking pretty and fashion- which is female empowerment? Ha. Please. Fashion is total male gaze.

a peeler is a peeler is a peeler is a peeler.

originalotaku — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 13:51:35 -0500

a peeler is a peeler is a peeler is a peeler.

A Thought I think I’ve come to a conclusion about...

originalotaku — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 16:57:25 -0500

A Thought

I think I’ve come to a conclusion about something. I’ve always tried to make sense of girls’ re-posts of women, more or less viewed in popular culture sexually. There’s been a disconnect in my mind as to why girls .tumblr images in admiration when they are- indeed, we all are- constantly fighting a fight against the unattainable. From a stand point of business and marketing, the fantasy sells and can never be obtained. That’s why it works. But I now look at it another way, and I’ll be as to the point as I possibly can. These images of beauty harken, obviously, on girls’ value on the ideological idea of the ‘proper woman’, conversely the ‘wanted’ ‘right’ ‘subordinate’ woman. But again, there is a paradox, because women constantly try to renegotiate an impossible female image. Then there’s the issue of women being empowered with their hypersexuality- I need only think of girls on the internet taking sexualized photos of themselves today and tumbling them which gets views and ‘likes’ from males and females. The irony of this action is that it makes static what women are, how they are loved, and how they are wanted. Certainly, they can feel empowered, but are they? They are posing for an inescapable male gaze- yes fine, whatever. We all know that. And they only solidify themselves in a space of objectivity so long as their own gender and the opposite praise it without saying, ‘hey, wait a minute.’ The most intriguing thing about these images is that these animated .gifs, pictures of models, whatever, not only stabilize a fantasy female but show us where women assume their power from- their bodies, but in a sexual way, since, I argue, historically, they cannot physically fight for a number of reasons: biological, cultural, anthropological, social, being unlady-like, and therefore undesirable, blah blah blah. What’s the opposite end of this gender spectrum? Perhaps the hypermasculated male. I think, what images to males see and think is a man? Why, the muscular fighting male, of course. The aggressive action hero/ business man. I think Arnold, I think Sylvestor, I think Bruce. Those are examples of physical power that manifest as symbolic and come out realistically (I use that loosely) as powerful. Again, the woman model sexy .gif thing, as I see it, is the manifestation of the action hero, hypermasculine male. It is how women view themselves as powerful (and men too). These things have become, strangely enough, mirrors for us that reflexively stabilize the very stereotypes we try so hard to escape but only disavow when we get involved with each other- when those urges to attract and have relationships rear their primordial, ugly heads. Hetero-normatively speaking.

How subversive are you trying to be Iggy...

originalotaku — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 15:23:00 -0500

How subversive are you trying to be Iggy Pop?

uppersdownersscreamerslaughers:

Iggy Pop is in a dress.

Nothing like material objects to solidify our own gender...

originalotaku — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 20:12:42 -0500

Nothing like material objects to solidify our own gender perspectives. Because if you don’t have a shitty looking room with archaic tools, you’re not a man. Am I right? or am I right?

mostexerent:

MAN CAVE

Gender inequality still has a starring role in Hollywood, USC study finds

originalotaku — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 00:34:05 -0500

Gender inequality still has a starring role in Hollywood, USC study finds:

By Rebecca Keegan, Los Angeles Times

November 22, 2011

Cinema trends ebb and flow, but one facet of Hollywood moviemaking proving remarkably consistent is gender inequality, according to a study being released Monday by USC’s Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism.

In a survey of the top 100-grossing movies of 2009 — including “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” and “The Twilight Saga: New Moon” — researchers found that 32.8% of the 4,342 speaking characters were female and 67.2% were male, a percentage identical to that of the top-grossing movies of 2008.

“We see remarkably stable trends,” said USC Annenberg associate professor Stacy L. Smith. “This reveals an industry formula for gender that may be outside of people’s conscious awareness.”

TIMELINE: Female cinema

It’s not just the ratio of female to male characters that continues to be imbalanced but the manner in which they’re depicted, according to Smith.

The USC study determined that women were still far more likely than men to wear sexy clothing in movies, such as swimwear and unbuttoned shirts (25.8% versus 4.7%), to expose skin (23% versus 7.4%) and to be described by another character as attractive (10.9% versus 2.5%).

Revealing clothing and partial nudity was just as prevalent among 13- to 20-year-old female characters as it was among those 21 to 29, suggesting that females are sexualized on-screen at young ages, Smith said.

Behind the camera, the gender inequality is just as dramatic: only 3.6% of the directors and 13.5% of the writers on the top-grossing films of 2009 were female, according to the study.

Researchers found that the sex of the storytellers had a significant effect on what appeared on-screen. In movies directed by women, 47.7% of the characters were female; in movies directed by men, fewer than a third of the characters were female. When one or more of the screenwriters was female, 40% of characters were female; when all the screenwriters were male, 29.8% of the characters were female.

“Some of this is a function of the fact that we see more males working behind the scenes than females, and they’re telling the stories that they know,” Smith said. “If the numbers behind the scenes move, we’re likely to see numbers on-screen move.”

There is one area where women surpassed men in films in 2009 — they bought more than 50% of the movie tickets sold in the U.S., according to the Motion Picture Assn. of America.

“Females represent half of the population and half of moviegoing audiences, but they don’t hit a third of the characters,” Smith said. “Male consumers aren’t the only ones going to the movies, but our cultural storytellers today are male. The problem is really thinking about the perpetuation of the status quo.”

Ok, that makes a lot more sense. Sorry if I came off as rude, I just needed it to be broken down a bit more. I agree.

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 18:48:16 -0500

not at all, young master. i welcome it. i don’t not expect dissent on the internet, i’m not a sucky baby.