Tag: feminism

Feminism Doesn’t Stand A Chance

equality1Like it or not, folks, despite our best efforts, here in 2017, feminism doesn’t stand a chance.  Gender equality might be a wonderful ideal, but it’s not going to happen anytime soon because men and women don’t get killed, dismembered or injured the same way — in the movies.  The fact is, as long as we maintain our Neo-Victorian attitude toward violent entertainment, gender equality will remain a distant dream.  Let me explain.

Shooting — When minor male characters get shot in films, their guts are splattered across three walls, half their chest is missing and their arteries are pumping enough ketchup to sicken Dracula’s sister.  If the action’s close enough, they fly backwards through a plate glass window, bounce off the windshield of a car and end up in the gutter with their head caved in.  When minor female characters get shot — actually, minor female characters seldom get shot on camera — but if they do, it’s usually because they’ve caught a stray bullet that causes nothing more than a vague look of surprise and a spreading red stain.  (FYI, the recovery rate for female characters from lethal gunshot wounds is astronomical.)

Fire — When men get set on fire in film, they run around, flaying their arms and screaming like a berserk barbeque briquette.  Women are instantly incinerated — no fuss, no muss and very little clean-up.

Torture — When men are tortured in the movies, they’re hanging by their thumbs.  The bad guys are punching the hell out of them while simultaneously zapping them with 500 volts, hacking away with a machete and blowing cigar smoke in their face.  There’s tons of slobbering and swearing and crying and hollering, and this goes on for at least three scenes — while the good guys are racing to the rescue.  Women, however, seldom get past the sinister music and the initial scream of anticipation before the camera cuts to the next scene — where they’re found half-naked in an isolated wooded area (shallow grave optional.)

Dying — When men die, there’s no coming back.  This guy’s been shot 4 times, stabbed, hit by a truck, blown up by 2 mortars and a grenade and dropped off a 12-storey building.  His face looks as if it’s done 12 rounds with a K-Tel meat tenderizer, and both legs are either missing or bent around like a Bavarian pretzel.  He’s coughing and spewing and spitting up god-only-knows-what while he vainly struggles to choke out his last words.  When women die, they are normally on their back, their head comfortably resting or cradled in the arms of … you get the idea.  There’s a tiny smear of blood from the corner of their mouth and they say something like “I’m so cold.” before their head slumps sideways and their eyes close — makeup completely intact.  Honestly, I’ve fallen asleep with more fanfare than that.

Let’s face it, people! The only time women get any screaming-ass agony in the movies is during childbirth.  And if that isn’t the final sexist kick in the head, I don’t know what is.

It’s sad, but until men and women get their heads blown off with some kind of equality in movies, feminism will remain merely a hope and a promise.

Germaine Greer vs Caitlyn Jenner

female eunuchPaleo-feminist Germaine Greer certainly has a lot to say these days, including, “Just because you lop off your dick and then wear a dress, doesn’t make you a fucking woman.”  Nice try. Ms. Greer!  You are clearly disagreeing with the transgender community — that’s called transphobia.  Have you ever had your dick lopped off?  I think not.

It’s pretty safe to say that Germaine Greer doesn’t have a clue what contemporary feminism is all about.  Her book The Female Eunuch was written 45 years ago, and here — in the 21st century — feminist priorities are different.  For example, when asked what the hardest thing about being a woman in 2015 was, Caitlyn Jenner, Glamour Magazine‘s Woman of the Year replied, “Figuring out what to wear.”  It’s obvious that the world has moved on since the days when economic and political inequality dominated the feminist narrative.  Shaved legs and push-up bras are back in style, Ms. Greer.  Have you ever been named Glamour Magazine‘s Woman of the Year?  I think not.

The Female Eunuch may have been a manifesto of gender equality back in the day, but most contemporary feminists have probably never read it.  Today’s feminism is more about inclusion that strives to shape all women (including transgender women) into one single, unified voice.  That’s why more than 3,000 people at Cardiff University signed a petition which demanded Ms. Greer not be allowed to speak at that institute of higher learning.  Sadly, Greer refused to bend under the pressure and spoke anyway.  But what do you expect from a woman who once willingly battled arch-conservative William F. Buckley in a debate at Oxford University, when clearly, contemporary feminists would never have allowed Buckley and his knuckle-dragging views on campus in the first place?  Today, many feminists stand together to silence unacceptable views and opinions, Ms Greer.  Do you support these women?  I think not.

This is 2015.  Germaine Greer is a 76-year-old privileged white academic.  Throughout history, the opinions of old ladies have usually been overlooked or ignored.  On the other hand, Caitlyn Jenner is, by definition, a female eunuch.  And it seems, for the foreseeable future anyway, the Kardashian women will be setting the feminist agenda.  Oh, God!  I hope not!

International Women’s Day — 2013

snooki3I wasn’t the least bit shocked to discover that Nicole Polizzi has lost 42 pounds; actually I hadn’t given it much thought.  I was a bit surprised, though, to find that it’s headline news.  Granted, she wasn’t “above the fold” as they say (that was reserved for Hugo and Stompin’ Tom) but she was still there, dressed in a bikini bottom smile to generate magazine sales and promote the 2nd season of her television show.  I’m not opposed to people using their bodies to make a living; after all, professional athletes do it every day.  Nor am I against self promotion, although I am wary of some of the stuff people get up to, to put their names in the public eye.  (Witness Dennis Rodman’s recent adventure.)  Weight loss, however, is nothing serious; Oprah Winfrey was using it as a marketing ploy (tool?) back when Ms. Polizzi was still in diapers.  (That’s a disturbing image, BTW)  No, Nicole can put herself out there all she wants.  Even her ensuing interview didn’t bother me that much.  I’m not sure my life is any fuller knowing that she’s not quite as horny as she used to be, but I suppose, in an abstract way, I’m glad she still makes time for sex when she can.  What I did wonder, however, was what would history’s serious women think about the antics of contemporary females like Ms Polizzi who have taken to whoring their privacy for so little gain and such limited fame.  What, for example, would Lillian Hellman have to say, or Tina Modotti or the tongue that launched a thousand quips, Dorothy Parker?

For those of you who don’t live on this planet, Nicole Polizzi is Snooki the sex gerbil from Jersey Shore, and Lillian, Tina and Dorothy are some of the great-grandmothers from the 1920s and 30s who cut a path for her to get there.

The last thing the world needs right now is a lesson in feminism.  However, I think that we should stop for a moment, take three deep ones and get some perspective.  Snooki and her cohorts are smart business people.  They know what sells, and they’ve packaged themselves as the product.  This is not a sin.  Their transgression is not what they do; it’s the way they do it.

Way back in the day, the women who first strolled through the Men Only door in the media arts were considered anomalies, at best.  They were there for the female perspective.   Men did the heavy intellectual lifting, and the girls softened the edges, normally on a separate page.  This all changed in the 1930s.  Unwilling to be segregated, women like Dorothy Parker and Lillian Hellman took centre stage, as accepted (if not equal) parts of the New York literary scene.  They did their share of crap (both wrote for Hollywood) but they also confronted some serious social and political issues.  Hellman’s The Children’s Hour (1934) dealt with lesbianism before most of America knew it even existed.  Meanwhile, the outspoken Parker was eventually blacklisted for her sharp and uncompromising political views.  At the same time, women like Martha Gellhorn and Msnookiargaret Bourke-White were making their bones as legitimate foreign correspondents.  Gelllhorn covered the Spanish Civil War for Collier’s and Bourke-White went to the Soviet Union for Fortune Magazine.  (She was the first Western journalist allowed in, by the way.)  Other photojournalists, like Dorothea Lange were picturing the Great Depression with a feminine eye, and Tina Modotti was putting a female face on the Mexican Revolution.

The one recurring theme throughout this entire period was that women were just as smart as their male counterparts, just as serious — but they were still women.  They didn’t just echo men.  Amelia Earhart might fly with the boys (and frequently did) but it was the typewriters and cameras of the age that gave the world a uniquely female intellectual voice.  People stopped, looked and listened.

Today, a lot of people are going to stop and look at Snooki in her faux leopard bathing costume.  They’re going to watch her TV program and listen to what she says.  At twenty-five, her claims to fame are being frequently drunk, getting punched in the face and losing 42 pounds after the birth of her first child.  As a businesswoman she’s obviously smart and clever enough to turn these minimal assets (?) into a million dollar industry.  However, I wonder what the girls* from the 30s would make of what their female voice has become.

Happy International Women’s Day

*Make no mistake: Hellman, Parker, Gellhorn and the rest were just girls at the time.  They drank and partied to excess.  They smoked Virginia tobacco and Mexican marijuana.  They listened to cool jazz and Cab Calloway’s hot jive.  They had sex with who they wanted to; when they wanted to.  They married, divorced and frequently took lovers.  They danced in the streets.  They were young and acted like it.