Apple's iPad Commercials are Sexist

Are Apple's iPad commercials sexist? Yes.
Not really sure why the title had to be posed as a question. And I would strongly disagree that "it may seem kind of a small thing to freak out over." This is just another of hundreds of thousands of ways in which gender stereotypes are reinforced to the point that they seem to be just the natural order of things.

The Continued Ghettoization of Women's Labor

This list of the worst paying college degrees from the Huffington Post is making its way around the web. I enjoyed reading the list of highest paying college degrees a few weeks ago as well.

I suppose nothing is terribly surprising on those lists but it is sad to see that the value of work generally done by women has not changed at all. We can intellectualize about how raising future generations of engineers is just as important as engineering itself but we passively accept that teachers and social workers make significantly less money than almost any other profession (for which they were formally educated). Seriously, look at both of those lists and it will be clear that men's work is more valued than women's work. And it is clear that the Huffington Post realizes that low paying jobs are women's work and high paying jobs are men's work based on the images they chose to accompany the text. In the article about the highest paying degrees only one out of fourteen of the people pictured appeared to be women. In the article about the lowest paying degrees six out of the eleven people pictured appeared to be women. This is no accident.


What I wonder about these articles is whether they will deter the next generation of college students from choosing social service related majors. If we are to discourage young people from going into social service professions, who is going to do that work (will it even matter with all of the social service cuts)? Moreover, who can afford to do that work? Who can afford to take out over $80,000 in student loans (seriously I know this person) to get an MSW only to find the best paying jobs in that field are in the $40,000s and that is if you can find work at all.

I don't have to be an accountant to know that that investment will never pay off.
And that is depressing because I am in that same situation only my major wasn't directly on that list.

Lollapalooza

The Lollapalooza lineup was recently released and I have to say, pursuant to one of my recent posts, that it isn't nearly as much of a sausage-fest this year. Wonderful!

The lineup is far from balanced in terms of gender but considering last year's pretty much all male show, I am happy to see some women taking the stage.

First of all, we got Lady Gaga!!! I couldn't be more excited. I tried to see her when she was in Chicago this winter but the show was sold out so soon I didn't even have a chance. Hopefully it will work out this time.

I am really excited about The XX, it used to be two women and two men but it seems that they lost their female guitarist. I hope that if they replace her it is with another kick ass female guitarist!

I think I mentioned Metric in the last post, I am excited to see them. Arcade Fire should be good. It isn't necessarily my favorite music but I can dig it especially since they tout two female members, including one of the band's founders.


Finally, Erykah Badu. Enough said. : D
I didn't look up any of the bands I don't know so I am sure I am missing a few gems. Please let me know in the comments. I am very excited, hope I can actually afford to go!

I will leave you with a video of my favorite XX song. Enjoy!

On "Booty"

A few weeks ago I read this post on Shakesville. With all of my education in sexuality and gender studies, I can honestly say I had no idea that “punk” had such a long and complex history. When I was teaching high school I would hear my students referring to each other (or their step father, in one case) as punks and I thought it was amusing because I pictured this:

which is especially amusing when you consider that both high schools I have worked at were predominantly African American. Now I realize that that is not what they were saying at all and I am sorry I missed the opportunity to talk with them about it and use it as a teaching moment especially as we spent several weeks talking about sex and gender.

This week on the bus I have been re-reading Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. As I was reading, I noticed that Anzaldúa refers to colonized women as “booty” for the victorious nation during times of war and imperialism. Of course, I know what booty means and have heard it many times before, but since reading that Shakesville post I started to think about the ways in which “booty” has been used in our current vernacular. I wonder how “booty” came to mean buttocks: specifically female buttocks. When one considers its original meaning, the correlation starts to seem too insidious to be a coincidence. “Booty,” a term for the possessions gained through violently overtaking a group of people and co-opting their culture, is used today as a description of the female buttocks, suggesting that women themselves are possessions to be won through whatever means necessary. This implies that women are owned by the men of their own culture and can be stolen by men of another culture. It is especially disconcerting if we consider that "booty" is generally used to describe the backsides of black women whose bodies have a long history of being literally objectified and owned by white culture. If we look at the popular culture use of the term this does not seem like a far fetched or radical hypothesis.

There is, evidently, such a thing as booty hip hop.

Booty is sometimes what we call sex.

It is a movie.

It is a song.

Or two.

Beyond that, Rachael and Ross sang Sir Mix-a-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” to their newborn on Friends and I once heard my baby cousin referred to his mother’s bottom as ‘booty’ when he was under one year old! The term "booty" is deeply entrenched in our language to the point that it is completely normal for anyone to say, much like "punk."

Women in Alternative Music

As you could probably guess from perusing this blog, I am a great lover of music. I wrote my master’s thesis about Kurt Cobain which really forced me to dig deep into what music I love and why. The first music I can remember loving was Dolly Parton and that was when I was a very small child. In middle school I developed a fondness for Stevie Nicks (I even managed to convince my aunt to take me to one of her concerts in Chicago when I was barely a tween). Later in middle school I started to break free from what my parents listened to and I loved the Spice Girls. It was around that time that I started a little CD collection of my own. I can vividly remember a day when my father sat down in my bedroom and looked through my CDs. I should note that music led to some of the greatest wars between my parents and myself starting in middle school and ignited battles well into my adult years. At any rate, that day my father said to me “all you have are female musicians here. Don’t you like any men?” I don’t think he meant it in an accusatory way but the vast majority of his large music collection is comprised of male artists. It wasn’t long after that that I began high school. In high school I learned through observation what music was cool and how music and style went hand in hand.

One of the first things that happened when I transitioned from grade school to high school was I grew very rebellious and did not want to be associated with the popular kids. I became friends with a large group of boys who liked alternative music and I made it my music. It was around that time that I started to dress like Kurt Cobain and listened to Nirvana on my discman and in my car all the time.

My CD collection made a dramatic shift from entirely female artists to mostly male artists within the course of just two years. I loved grunge and I can recall listening to Hole in middle school but then when I got to high school and saw the reaction I got when I said I liked Courtney Love, I started to believe that she was a villain murderer and stopped listening to Hole altogether.

In my thesis last summer I examined the cultural reactions to Courtney Love and the narratives around her life with Kurt Cobain. One of the most compelling findings of my thesis was that women are either completely invisible in alternative music or they are demonized as vixens who bring down talented men (think Yoko Ono).

The first thing I noticed in the narrative about Cobain’s life was that Bikini Kill is often completely erased as an influence. Kurt dated Tobi Vail and was good friends with Kathleen Hanna for years. They even moved him to feminist activism. How that part of the story gets erased is nothing short of remarkable. It takes intentional and deliberate storytelling on the part of biographers and music critics. The sheer insidiousness of that erasure stuns me. And it is not only Bikini Kill it is the whole Riot Grrrl movement that is not part of the story.

Of course there are many layers and ways in which fame was deployed as a tool by Cobain who claimed to eschew all of the trappings of his celebrity while at the same time being the biggest advocate for his own success. Part of the “coolness” of grunge was that the artists did not wish to be cool… supposedly. Considering that, it is especially interesting that Cobain used his celebrity as a platform to put forth ideas about queerness, gender, sexuality and feminism. That was part of who he was and that part is completely erased in the biographies, reviews and stories told about him in mainstream culture.

At any rate, all of these things are swirling through my head lately and I get passionately angry when I listen to alternative radio these days. You could go days and I mean DAYS without hearing a single female voice on the alternative radio stations here in Chicago. What I want to know is what the hell is alternative about alternative music? They seem to propound the same old patriarchal stories or worse, the ‘poor me’ stories so popular amongst young white men. They sing about women and heartache all the while real women are invisible. What really set me off what when I realized last summer that Lollapalooza was almost entirely comprised of white male artists. (Kings of Leon, Depeche Mode, Tool, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Decemberists, Jane’s Addiction, The Killers, Lou Reed, Silversun Pickups, and Snoop Dogg.) I cannot think of one excuse good enough for not including any female headliners. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs were added last minute or there wouldn’t have been a female presence at all (save for a female band member in the Decemberists and Silversun Pickups). How do we justify that in 2009? It isn’t like these women don’t exist. And what makes it even more insideous is that many of the male artists slated to preform are deeply misogynistic and that ideology has no female voice to balance it out.

Then just yesterday my partner told me that he wants to go to Q101’s Jamboree and he asked if I’d be interested in going. I said if even one of the headliners was a band comprised of at least half women I’d go. Guess who’s not going? This blogger! Three Days Grace, Seether, Hollywood Undead, Papa Roach, Puddle of Mudd, Saliva, Janus, Story of the Year, Flobots, Crash Kings and AM Taxi. I think I might have seen one female face WAY in the back of one of their band pictures but that was all. I am not surprised but I am deeply saddened by it the more I think about it.

Let me assure you that there are many women in alternative music. I like The Gossip and Metric lately. Why are they invisible on these radio stations, at these events and in these publications? The only answer I have is outright and unapologetic misogyny. Alternative music is deeply afraid of women as anything other than muse, groupie or sexual conquest.

Please feel free to suggest any awesome female alternative artists in the comments!

I Guess This is What it Takes for me to Come Out of Hibernation

Via Gizmodo, another image of a woman's body being used as an object. They don't even offer her the courtesy of giving her a head in this disembodied image. Of course, this tee shirt implies that the cord from the controller is connected to her head which further implies that the controller/breasts can be used to control the woman wearing it. I suppose, given the misogynist nature of gaming culture, this would be a logical conclusion.

Because I adore her and I am sure her concern is one shared by other readers I am going to share a comment from one of my friends and my response to that comment:

"Ok, ok, maybe that's true, but lets see the humor in this, To me it looks like she's allowing this to happen. Her arms are back, prepared for what she knows is taking place. She doesn't want her head shown because she wouldn't want anyone to identify her."

I have no doubt that this particular model consented to this particular action. But we must always remember that images do not exist in a vacuum, taken within the context of gaming culture and the larger patriarchal culture in which it has been given room to flourish, images like this have tremendous meaning. It means that women, like game controllers, are objects, in this case, for male consumption and pleasure. Objectifying a person is the first step in the process of dehumanization and ALL of the abuses that we feel justified in inflicting upon objects. Game controllers can be thrown away, replaced with better, upgraded controllers, they can be smashed if they don't work properly and overall, they are objects. They are interchangeable, they don't have feelings. What this image conveys is that women are objects like game controllers and, like objects, it is okay to use them, hurt them, and toss them aside. Again, it has little to do with the actual people in the image and more to do with the greater cultural context in which it was born.

Unattended Children are Subject to Violence and Dehumanization

There are a few sites I peruse when I am bored or just in need of mindless entertainment. My favorite is FoodGawker. If you like food blogs you will love this site because it is basically a best of collection from a vast array of food blogs. I waste hours on that blog thinking up great recipe ideas. I also enjoy FailBlog and occasionally PassiveAggressiveNotes.

This particular post at PassiveAgressiveNotes really got me thinking. Now I am not one who wants to have children and when I am around other people's children I am uncomfortable and seldom know how to interact with them. In fact, I have occasionally been heard to utter "I hate children." I suppose it would be better to say, "I don't understand children, I don't particularly like their presence and the less time I spend with them in my day to day life the happier I usually am." The exception, of course, being my amazing 3 year old nephew (funny how that works).

Anyway, that post made me think about our patriarchal culture of domination and the ways in which creatures deemed other, weaker or less than in any way are subject to all sorts of violations, abuses and violence. (Be warned, the comments on that post are pretty atrocious). My usual interest is the way in which women have been historically othered and dehumanized because of it. I have discussed here the connection between domination of land and animals and the domination of women and people of color. The connection seems so obvious once one really examines the evidence.
What I saw when looking at the images I linked to was a similar wanton dehumanization of children at the hands of adults. In this world, adults have total control and power over children. Children have few legal rights of their own and are wholly dependent upon the (however unqualified) adults to whom they were born. Childhood is not the same as race or gender as a unit of analysis but there are certain similarities that it would be irresponsible to overlook. The sheer violence of these signs was horrific. Imagine if it said "unattended women will be sold as slaves" or "unattended black men will be placed on hooks and tortured" or "unattended women will be served as sausage" or "placed in dumpsters."
Stand back and think about that. It is pretty horrific. Why is it even remotely acceptable or funny for that matter, to say these sorts of things even as jokes. (Yes, I get that they are intended to be jokes, please do not comment on how humorless I am.) When you imagine a class of people that are legally dependent and unable to defend themselves because of age and ability, being symbolically violated in this way, it really is not remotely funny. The sign below reminded me of the Hustler Magazine cover that I wrote about for one of my undergrad media studies courses. The image of the obvious female form being pulverized in a meat grinder is perhaps one of the more horrific examples of mass media's symbolic annihilation of women.
In case I have not made my point well enough, I will provide this quote from I Blame the Patriarchy. I think she says it quite well:

"I have stated on numerous occasions (following the materialization in my personal sphere of a pair of nieces), children are an oppressed class. Their universal and legitimately reviled unruliness is not natural. It is a product of neurosis generated by patriarchy’s two main replicatory units: the nuclear family, which directly supports male dominance, and the single mother household, which indirectly supports male dominance a) by acting as an underclass dependent for its survival on paternalism and b) by incubating a ready supply of disadvantaged candidates for membership in the all-important working and military classes."

I Hope They Serve Karma in Hell

I have been meaning to blog about Tucker Max and I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell for quite awhile but every time I try to put pen to paper I am too overwhelmed and horrified to continue. What can I say about someone whose hatred of women and disabled people is so acute and obvious? All I can do is shake my head and mutter about how this proves the need for feminist activism.

After contemplating some quasi-legal anti-IHTSBIH actions, I decided to start a Facebook page with lots of links and information for people who are unfamiliar with the film. I hope we can educate without having to ever pay money to see this film or encouraging anyone else to do so. This film should come with a serious trigger warning. Since it does not, I offer my own for all of the links and videos on my Facebook page and here.

The Facebook page is currently by invite only so feel free to request an invitation if you would like to be a part of this small feminist action.

Here is a link to the trailer from Shakesville.
Here is the Gawker movie review.
There has been some controversy about the I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell ads on CTA buses with slogans like "Deaf girls can't hear you coming" and "Blind girls can't see you coming."
And here is a little culture jamming because we are not without agency here.


So you don't have to subject yourself to the book, blog or movie, here are some of the most telling quotes from Max
On women:
- “She may be a vacuous slut with no taste, but at least she’s not a stripper.”
- “I’d rather mainline Drano than listen to another minute of your whore prattle.”
- “Your gender is hardwired for whoredom.”
- “I don’t like her because she’s a negative fucking bitch, not because she has tits.”
- “Fat girls aren’t real people.”
- “Cum dumpsters.”

On fun:
- “Ready to get shit-faced and grab some titty!?”
- “We can’t all go after the girl with low self-esteem.”

On what women are good for, beyond fucking:
- “I will gut you and grind you into pig fodder.”
- “Get away from me or I’m going to carve a fuck hole in your torso.”
- “I want to shoot every one of these bitches.”
- “The only way I can cut you deep is with a battle axe and a running start.”
- “Rape’s not funny, but murder can be.”

According to Jim His Wife is His Property

Insomnia is a rotten thing but it did grant me the opportunity to watch a ridiculous show that I otherwise would never have seen. According to Jim is an ABC sitcom that has evidently been on the air for over 8 years. As sitcoms go, it seems pretty typical and unremarkable but the episode that I caught from the first season entitled "Blow Up" seemed a little too familiar for comfort. I realized about halfway through the episode that it was an almost exact copy of the storyline from an episode of Roseanne that aired almost ten years earlier. There were a few little changes to the storyline that made a huge difference in the representation of gender roles.

I think that this summary from Wikipedia really explains the feel of the show pretty well:
"Jim and Cheryl are the perfect middle class American couple. Happily married, living in a suburban house with two adorable (but loud) little girls and a baby boy, they really can't complain much about life – except for those couple fights that neither one can ever let go."



"Blow Up" was about the way that Jim and Cheryl chose to celebrate Valentine's Day. Jim got Cheryl a car safety kit (ever the practical thinker) and Cheryl, at the pushing of her sister, decided to get a sexy photo taken. The fight in this episode (I am going to assume there is one in every episode, as I said, this is not a remarkable sitcom) happened when Jim decided to show his friends, coworkers, and the Kinkos employees the intimate picture, thus humiliating his wife. She tried to explain her humiliation and he just didn't understand. The episode ended hilariously with Jim begging Cheryl to take down the giant portrait of herself that was in the shop window where she had the picture taken. Now that she wanted to show off her body on her own terms he get extremely possessive, even getting down on one knee to beg her to take it down. The show ends with Jim presenting Cheryl with a hilarious sexy portrait of his own.
fin

Before I go into an analysis of why this show was sexist and awful, I'd like to share the synopsis for an episode of Roseanne entitled "It Was 20 Years Ago Today" from season 5. In this episode, Roseanne, at the pushing of her sister, decided to take a sexy photo for Dan for their anniversary. He decides to alter her wedding ring to include all of their childrens' birthstones without telling her. Hilarity ensues as she goes on a mad search for her ring and tries to keep the picture a secret. In the photo shoot, she is shy and embarrassed but realizes that Dan loves her and loves looking at her so she gains the confidence to take the pictures. In the end Dan loves the picture and respectfully keeps it between the two of them. The show ends with a montage of images of Dan's own sexy pictures.
fin

I don't think I need to tell you why I was reminded of this episode of Roseanne after watching According to Jim. What I do want to share is the remarkable difference that a few subtle changes can make in a storyline like this one. The According to Jim episode was about betrayal and objectification. Jim decided that since his wife is his property, there is really no harm in sharing her sexualized body with everyone he knows. He really didn't think that there was one thing wrong with that. When Cheryl expressed her betrayal and feelings of violation, it was all set up for laughs. Because it is hilarious when a woman is stripped of her autonomy and is exposed in a provocative way AGAINST HER WILL. She makes Jim promise not to show the image to anyone else and all is well. Until her brother spots the picture of her blown up and hanging in a window display at the photographer's studio. Cheryl's body is presented in these scenes as being the property first of her brother who hangs his coat over the picture for the entire scene and then of her husband who throws a temper tantrum on the street begging Cheryl to take the picture down. In this scene, Cheryl decides that she kind of likes the picture being out and gains a certain confidence from knowing that other women were inspired by her (that could be another post in and of its self). The only indication of Cheryl owning her own body is undermined by Jim's demand that the picture be removed. Cheryl "teaches him a lesson" by telling him that this is exactly how she felt when he was showing the picture off to their friends. Of course, it is not the same thing because the picture is still one of her.

In the Roseanne episode, the sexy photo is an opportunity for Roseanne to explore her sexuality and to be intimate with her husband. The image is not the focus of the episode, the relationships between Dan and Roseanne and Roseanne and her body are the focus of the episode. There is not one second in this episode in which Roseanne is not in control of her own body or her own sexuality and as pathetic as it might be, that is a pretty remarkable thing to see on broadcast television. Dan and Roseanne, like Jim and Cheryl, have three children, have been married for awhile, and their trials and tribulations are the focus of the episodes. Dan and Roseanne had a fight in "It Was 20 Years Ago Today" and the arc of the stories were really almost identical. Yet those subtle differences go a long way to make a show either a piece of misogynist tripe or a story informed by feminist ideals. (It might also be notable that the Roseanne episode was written by a woman while the According to Jim episode was written and directed by two men.)

Writer's Block

I have been trying to decide what to write about here for days. I have this amazing space to write about all of the things that amuse, frustrate and interest me and I am sad that I use it so little. Perhaps I have a case of writer's block.

To get back into the swing of it I will write about what has been going on with me. I finished my thesis and defended it on August 18. My defense went very well and I graduated with distinction. I am considering looking for a publisher. A book about Kurt Cobain would be popular what with the new film in the works. It ended up being 84 pages only because I cut out about half of the analysis I had hoped to include. Only trouble is that I have no idea how to find a publisher or self publish or acquire permission to use images or copyrights. Any advice would be welcomed!

Now I am all graduated and looking for full time work. Couldn't be a worse time to be looking for work. I guess I'll be a barista for awhile longer... a very well educated barista.

Here is a list of things I have been thinking about and will probably blog about soon:
-Tucker Max
-Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons
-Confessions of a Shopaholic (book and film)

"The Terrible Bargain"

A few days ago I read Melissa McEwan's piece "The Terrible Bargain We Have Regretfully Struck" over at Shakesville. Like many other readers, this piece struck a chord with me. As I read, I thought about all of the relationships I have had with the men in my life and the ways in which I let things slide or bite my tongue to keep the peace. Those who know me will probably find it unbelievable that I ever bite my tongue, but believe me, if I said it all, I doubt I'd have ever kept a job for more than a week.

At any rate, I recalled an incident about nine months ago with a former co-worker. Lets call co-worker "Tom." Tom seemed nice enough when we first met and we immediately had a flirty little banter going. After a few shifts together, Tom and I got to talking about ourselves and I shared with him that I am a Women's Studies graduate student and an active feminist advocate. This was when our friendly banter turned sour. Tom constantly made terrible, offensive sexist jokes, thinking that I'd find them adorable. He turned everything into some sort of sexist comment just to see what I'd do. When I confronted him, saying it wasn't funny and that it was really offensive, he did the old "you have no sense of humor" schtick.

Alas, working with him became a tiresome chore for me and some of his jokes made me angry for days. I eventually transferred to another location in part to get away from him. After that he texted me a several times to tell me another of his hilarious jokes. I am hoping that my non-responsiveness will give him a hint, since being blunt did not.

As I think about that exchange I think about the endless instances of sexism that we all swallow every day because we want to keep the peace and we want a reprieve. Of course, this is not peace, this is a silent and subtle war to remind women of our place as second class citizens.

Then I get to thinking of my male relatives, including my father, who say some of the most ignorant things I have ever heard and, again, I bite my tongue because when I don't the consequences are devastating.

Men are allowed the easy comfort of their unexamined privilege, but my regard will always be shot through with a steely, anxious bolt of caution.

Then I think about whenever a man at work is really friendly and I thoroughly enjoy our conversation and then he ends it by calling me "little girl." Every time a situation like this arises, I am reminded, like Melissa, of the male privilege that we are all constantly swimming in.

In one of my undergraduate Africology courses, I had developed a wonderful relationship with my professor who was one of the smartest and most compassionate men I had ever met. I shared my undergrad thesis with this man and graciously accepted his comments and criticisms of my writing. And then one day in class he said that in 1865 following the passage of the 15th amendment, "African Americans were granted the right to vote." It felt like I had been slapped in the face, so stunned was I to hear this man whom I had trusted and respected erase the history of black women in America in one sentence.

I hope those men will hear me when I say, again, I do not hate you. I mistrust you. You can tell yourselves that's a problem with me, some inherent flaw, some evidence that I am fucked up and broken and weird; you can choose to believe that the women in your lives are nothing like me.
Or you can be vigilant, can make yourselves trustworthy. Every day.

Like Melissa, it pains me when men call me a feminazi or say that I clearly hate men. I don't hate men. I just don't trust them. Or rather, it takes a lot longer for me to trust them and even then, instances like these put me on the defensive. When I was younger I would say that I hate men after reading Andrea Dworkin's texts or listening to groups of friends tell of their sexual assaults or watching Law and Order SVU. It took me a long time to realize that it wasn't all men and that men swim in the same water of patriarchy and male privilege as the rest of us.

But I hope that they will heed our call to make themselves trustworthy, to examine their privilege and to listen when we say "that is offensive" or "that is painful" or "that is sexist!"

Update!

To all of my readers, and I know there are still some out there even though it seems I have fallen off the face of the blogsphere. I assure you, I am here reading Shakesville everyday!

I am very nearly done with graduate school! I finished all of my coursework and even walked in the graduation ceremony. Now I just have to finish that pesky thesis.

So for anyone interested, I am going to post some of my research questions. I'd LOVE to know what people think. My defense is going to be August 12 or 13. After that, you can expect a lot more posts! I promise.

In my research, I pose the question of whether Cobain can be considered a queer subject. In what ways did he perform masculinity and whiteness and why did he portray that particular celebrity image? Did critics and fans understand him to be challenging hegemonic gender norms? How did Cobain’s bodily subjectivity inform his art? Was Cobain’s celebrity a form of resistance and if so how?

Much of the critical work on Cobain’s oeuvre is framed in terms of his authenticity. What is meant by ‘authenticity’ in this context and why are music critics so concerned with this concept? Is Cobain’s music ‘authentic?’ Is this a useful way of understanding his life and work? What is the primary narrative surrounding Kurt Cobain’s life and work and why is that the dominant discourse? Who authors this narrative and what stakes do they have in maintaining a particular image of Cobain?

Finally, I think that it is important to consider Cobain’s feminist attitudes, his interrogation of hegemonic gender, whether he ought even to be considered a feminist under certain theoretical traditions. This question has not been asked in much of the academic and critical work on Kurt Cobain’s celebrity.

So that is what I have been doing.

A Few Problematic Products

I am in the market for a new digital camera (not that I can afford it since soon I will be + an MA and - a job, but nonetheless, I've never had one and I've always wanted one). Anyway, I have my eye on a nice purple Nikon so when I came across this on Gizmodo, it caught my attention. Who knew that a camera (much less one whose company is headquartered in Japan) could be so "racially insensitive" or as I'd prefer to say, racist. The varied nature of eye shape seems like the kind of thing you would take into consideration when developing technology to eliminate photos of people blinking.

In other product news, I came across this new "candy bar for women." Another subtle way that women are reminded that their personal value and worth comes from how little space they take up. If the candy bar is for women and it is marketed as being low calorie then it speaks volumes about the ways in which women are taught to think about themselves and other people are taught to think about women. And that is not even to mention the 'creepy' sexual inuendo in the advertising.

Whats Wrong With Twitter?

I came across this New York Times op-ed piece by Maureen Dowd and I just had to say a few things about it.



First, I just hate how techno-phobic some people are. New social networking/blogging sites are an excellent way to empower people who otherwise wouldn't have the chance to make their voices heard. We don't all get our 'annoying' musings published by The New York Times, Ms. Dowd. I am sure that, mostly, that is for the best. Still, I love how equalizing the Internet can be if only because it is so easy to access.

Second, even if Twitter is "a toy for bored celebrities and high-school girls," can you please tell me what is wrong with that? I think that giving high-school girls the opportunity to speak to each other and to speak back to media is fabulous. The everyday minutia of girls' lives is forever being trivialized and if Twitter provides another space for girls (and everyone else) to communicate and to articulate their interests and desires then please, please tell me what is so awful about that.

Third, why on earth do you care that people use Twitter to grieve?
"I heard about a woman who tweeted her father’s funeral. Whatever happened to private pain?" Whatever happened to letting people grieve in the way that is most productive for them?

Pee-wee's Playhouse as a Queer Text

I used to watch Pee-wee's Playhouse all the time as a child but I was recently re-introduced to it as an adult and I am totally loving it. Why aren't there more queer, or at least ambiguous, children's television shows available? As a child I never read Pee-wee as anything other than a childlike man in an imaginary world with kooky characters. As an adult I see the queer subtext all over. Whether it be the overdone caricature of femininity that Miss Yvonne performed or the almost maternal male femininity performed by Pee-wee, both provided a critique of hegemonic gender by presenting a parody of it. I know a lot of readers of this blog are children of the 1980s and wonder what you all think?

Also, has anyone heard that Pee-wee's Playhouse is going to be made into a movie to come out in 2011?