YAY social media, women’s orgs, and John Stewart!
Caving to pressure, today House Republicans announced that they are dropping the word “forcible” from the section of the bill about abortion that addresses rape.
It is kind of sad this is such a victory, but a victory it is. It’s pretty scary how close America just came to redefining rape.
See John Stewart’s hilarious skit here.
The United States has an opportunity to take a different road than it usually does.
Barbara Victor, an author and journalist with extensive experience in the Middle East, just posted on this, read it here: Barbara Victor’s blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
Predictably, the majority of Egyptians believe that once Mubarak leaves the country, freedom will reign and chaos will end. The reality, if history is any lesson, is that Islamic Fundamentalists will take over, promise people a better life, and tragically make good on those promises. What is even more tragic of course is the price people will and have paid for that so-called, on-the-surface better life.
In exchange for the youth having the opportunity to be educated and technologically trained, they will find themselves indoctrinated into a philosophical army that deplores America, intends to obliterate Israel, and ultimately will be willing to die for their cause.
In exchange for improved social services where children will not starve and the elderly will be cared for, women will lose any gains they had made when it comes to 21st century equality.
The truth is that the United States would rather see despots ruling Arab countries than risk Islamic Fundamentalists taking over, gathering strength, and attacking American installations at home or throughout the world. France, Germany, and England, to name a few European countries which have burgeoning Arab populations that are not afforded the same rights as their citizens, consider an Arab world ruled by Fundamentalists to be dangerous to peace within their own borders. These fears are not unfounded, which only makes the solution to this dilemma—the lesser of two evils—almost impossible to achieve.
Dear Representative Chris Smith (R-NJ),
Thank you for introducing bill HR 3 to make sure federal funding will only go towards abortions if the pregnancies resulted from ‘forcible’ rape and not just any old kind of rape.
Silly me! Before I saw your bill, I actually thought all rape was forcible. I even thought that’s what ‘rape’ meant.
But now, I understand what rape is! It’s like when a stranger comes out of the bushes and rapes you, right? It doesn’t apply to some slutty fourteen year old who seduces a forty year old guy. And it sure doesn’t include a loose woman who drank too much or let herself get drugged. She was probably flirting with the guy who had sex with her passed out body anyway.
I just thought you might want to know, there’s a petition out there against you and all of your good work. Here’s the link.
Don’t worry, I’ve started my own petition against Webster’s to at least get ‘statutory’ out of their definition and clarify this word once and for all.
Very truly yours,
Margot Magowan, Blogger, ReelGirl
Read this and find out. I wrote it for Salon in 2001.
“What a pussy!” shouted my friend Joe. He was complaining to me about a business partner who backed out of a deal at the last minute. Joe wanted sympathy, but I was snagged on the word “pussy.”
The night before Joe’s outburst, I’d been channel surfing and caught Barbara Walters interviewing Jane Fonda about her performance in Eve Ensler’s wildly successful play, “The Vagina Monologues.”
“You can’t talk about vaginas,” Fonda said to Walters, “and not talk about this remarkable ability they have to give birth. It’s awesome. If penises could do what vaginas could do, they’d be on postage stamps. I mean, vaginas are absolutely extraordinary.”
Listening to Fonda, I thought, “We have come a long way, baby.” Just a few years ago, producers forbade actress Cybill Shepherd to utter the V-word on her own TV show. It was, they said, obscene.
I noted the further progress of female genitalia in mainstream media when I spotted fresh-faced actress Claire Danes sporting a “V-Day” T-shirt on the cover of March’s issue of Marie Claire, in which women like Brooke Shields, Marisa Tomei and Calista Flockhart were asked, among other things: If your vagina could talk, what would it say, and if it could wear clothes, what would it wear?
So pussy power was in the air when Joe launched his diatribe. Suddenly it struck me as wrong that the word “pussy” is used to imply cowardice or ineffectiveness. Why must we equate weakness with the female sex organ? Why have we for so long?
I began to wonder how one — how we — might take the wussy out of pussy.
Is it possible to change the meaning of the word, to restore to “pussy” its deserved glory? Could we use pussy as a compliment? Could pussy denote someone or something as cool or heroic or impressive? “Rosa Parks — what a pussy!” or “John McCain is way pussy!” or “New York is a big ol’ pussy!”
At the moment, “pussy” isn’t even used to slight women directly. It is reserved for men, used among them to make fun of one another. It’s “sissy” for male heteros. It’s the politically correct big boy’s way of calling somebody a fag. And, please, don’t get me started on “pussy-whipped.”
People say “dick,” they say “asshole,” they say “prick,” but they do it with respect. Those words have power and punch, the way the word “cunt” has power. But “cunt” makes people shudder; they judge, perhaps wrongly, the user of the word. Meanwhile, poor “pussy” lies there limp, pathetic and, until this moment, defenseless.
Ensler does a fabulous soliloquy to “cunt” in “The Vagina Monologues.” Perched on a stool in her black cocktail dress, barefoot, throwing back her head, shaking her Louise Brooks haircut, she says the word “cunt” for about 10 minutes, obviously relishing each repetition. But what does she say about pussy? If she said anything, I couldn’t remember. Is pussy so forgettable?
To find answers — and to solicit allies in rehabilitating the word — I went to novelist and essayist Erica Jong, a pioneer in reclaiming language in her own writing, and a recent star of “The Vagina Monologues.”
Jong told me that there are, in fact, a couple of references to pussy in the “Monologues,” though they’re mostly humorous, such as “Don’t let him tell you it smells like roses when it’s supposed to smell like pussy!”
She thinks changing the popular meaning of the word is possible. “If we use it with positive intent, it will become positive,” she said. “I really don’t know how long it will take. Language changes, but changes slowly. It depends on the usage — whether the new connotation catches on.”
Jong warned it wouldn’t be easy. “My feeling is that we’re on the verge of reclaiming ‘cunt,’ a fine old Middle English word, but we’re not there yet with ‘pussy,'” said Jong. “Pussy remains humorous, if not insulting. At the moment pussy is a laugh word. It always gets them rolling on the floors in ‘Vagina.'”
Jong suggested I go to the vagina mama herself, Ensler, to ask her advice.
“I like the sound of ‘pussy,'” Ensler told me, smiling. “I think it’s a good word.”
She agreed that it’s different from cunt. “A cunt is someone who dreams the big dream. You are ambitious. You want to go the distance.” Hillary Rodham Clinton, she told me, is a cunt.
Pussy, she said, is more personal. “Pussy is wet, juicy and inviting. It could be used as a word of empowerment or honor. It’s a feisty word. There’s a little fear, a little danger there — you better be nice if you want my pussy.”
Pussy has so much potential, it’s a shame to limit it to the immature and derisive mocking of weak boys. Let’s give it a shot in the arm! I envision hit songs featuring “pussy” — “Who Let the Pussies Out?” or “The Real Slim Pussy” or “The Real Shady Pussy.” Hallmark-type cards that read “Thanks for being such a pussy!” Colloquial expressions: “You da pussy!” “Stand up and fight like a pussy!”
And when, and if, Joe consummates his next business deal, I’ll be there to toast him, saying, “You’re so pussy.”
Flattered, he’ll smile.
After posting that I was unsure what to teach my kids regarding God and prayer, I was reminded how, at San Francisco’s amazing Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival last Fall, Patti Smith, in the middle of rocking out (I think to “Gloria”) pulled a crumpled paper from her coat and recited the prayer of St. Francis. “San Francisco!” she said to us, all watching her, wide-eyed and smiling, standing there in the fog and sun under all those Eucalyptus trees. “Be happy!” Patti said. “Work hard! Love one another!”
Here’s Patti’s prayer. I may try reading it to my kids tonight; they are San Franciscans, after all.
What do you tell your kids about God? And praying? Anything?
I didn’t learn how to pray until I was 26 and someone taught me this simple skill (and I do look at it as a skill) that changed my life forever. I’d love to teach my kids so they know about it much earlier than I figured it out. Praying can be so incredibly cool and calming. But the prayer I was taught, the only one I do really, seems way too grown up for them.
I was told to get on my knees every single morning and say:
“God,
I am totally powerless over people, places and things and my life is unmanageable. I’ve come to believe a power greater than myself is restoring me to sanity and I’m turning my will and my life over to that power.”
I did not believe a single word of this prayer. Most of the time, I still don’t.
But I was told then: what you believe doesn’t matter. If you want to get better, try getting on your knees and saying this. You’ve tried everything else, and nothing has worked. So, why not this? Is it any stupider than sticking your finger down your throat and making yourself throw up several times a day?
I had to admit, it was not.
I don’t know how praying works or why it works. I don’t even care anymore. All I know is that if something is bothering me or obsessing me, and I get on my knees and ‘turn it over,’ instantly, I feel calmer and happier. Remarkably and paradoxically, I also get the energy and focus to move forward and ‘do the next right thing.’ After praying about how powerless I am, I act. Happens every time.
So I’d like to teach my kids about this because it’s so damn useful.
Also, my seven year old daughter has started to ask me about God. What she’s picked up, somehow, somewhere, just as I did when I was a kid, is that praying is all about asking for stuff. And then if you’re ‘good,’ you get what you asked for.
But the kind of praying I do isn’t like that at all. More like the opposite. Still, those things I say– which as I wrote, I often don’t believe– seem way too heavy to put on a little kid. As is the whole powerless/powerful paradox. I don’t even get it!
I could tell my daughter: just tell God what you’re grateful or thankful for, but that seems sanctimonious, and it’s not what I do either.
Please let me know if your kids have asked you about praying or God, and if you’ve had any luck in teaching them anything. Especially if you don’t know if you believe in God.
Kim wins again! The Australian Open! Her first time!
How cool is that?
Kim Clijsters celebrates win with her daughter
After beating Li Na (3-6, 6-3, 6-3) Clijsters wiped tears from her eyes. So this week, we saw her laugh and cry. Just a few days ago, after winning an earlier match, Clijsters was unable to stop smiling when she publicly confronted courtside reporter Todd Woodbridge for sending a nasty text message about her which implied that she was fat. Clijsters is an awesome player and a very, cool woman who skillfully knows how to come out a winner in all kinds of situations.
Read more about why Clijsters is ReelGirl’s Star of the Week.
Women’s Media Center just posted a great, short video on YouTube called “WMC at Sundance Film festival 2011” that gets across how invisible women and women’s stories are in the media. See the video here
As a potential mirror of our dreams and our realities, the media is seriously warped. Women are 53% of our population. How different would the world be if the media reflected women’s imaginations and points of view with the same attention it does men’s? Can you even picture it? Sometimes I think men have no idea what it’s like to exist in a world created by male fantasy. The problem isn’t that men are bad or that men are sexist; it’s that women need to be able to be the ones to tell their own stories.
Stats from the video:
72% of G-rated film characters are male. I just blogged about this yesterday
4 women have received best director nods, 1 woman has won
77% of film critics are male
86% of films had no female writers
5x more skin shown by women than men from G to R rated films
7% of top films in 2009 were directed by women (same stat as back in 1987)
24% of people interviewed in news are women
13% of guests on Sunday news shows are women
16% of news stories focus on women
67% of guests on major cable networks are men
26% of sources on NPR are women.
Driving to school today, my three daughters and I passed a poster for Disney’s new movie “Gnomeo and Juliet” coming to theaters February 11. My kids wanted to know, where’s Juliet?
Can you find her?
If you spot Juliet around town, preferably with eight or so of her girlfriends frolicking behind her, Romeo nowhere in sight, please let me know. Extra points if she’s doing something acrobatic and looking grumpy, instead of standing around beaming at Romeo which, of course, she won’t be because, remember, he’s not in the poster.
Last year, at the same billboard location, around Townsend and Brannan, there was an ad for Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland.” It featured only the flame-haired Madhatter.
I’m sure Alice found her way out of Disney’s marketing machine rabbit hole onto some poster, somewhere in San Francisco, but my daughters and I never discovered her. Maybe we should’ve checked the backs of milk cartons.
Girls in kids’ movies have gone missing.
Just last month, Disney’s male executives announced they were going to stop making princess movies, practically the only animation vehicle where girls were allowed to be stars. It may be a lame genre, but at least it acknowledged that girls do, in fact, exist.
Movies that feature girls in title roles, star girls, or feature female characters of any kind continue to decline. See statistics here.
Research is also showing that the limited role models for girls in the media along with the increasingly gendered toys sold to them is affecting children’s brain development.
Apparently, imaginary land never got the memo that we’ve all achieved gender equality and are living happily ever after in a post-feminist world.
I wrote this for The San Jose Mercury news in 2007 when “Ratatouille” opened. The movie’s hypocritical reference to sexism helped to inspire my blog, ReelGirl. Please read and let me know what you think.
Phooey on `Ratatouille’: Female leads lacking in kid films
STUDIOS ACKNOWLEDGE, ACCEPT SEXISM
By Margot Magowan
Article Launched: 07/06/2007 01:32:35 AM PDT
“Ratatouille” made $47 million opening weekend, but as I watched the
film with my 4-year-old daughter, I felt depressed. There was nary a
female rat in sight. I’d forked over $9 so my daughter could get yet
another lesson in sexism direct from Pixar or Disney: No matter if
you’re a rodent, car, or fish – boys are the ones with the starring
roles while girls are relegated to sidekicks.
“Cars,” “Toy Story,” “Finding Nemo,” “The Lion King,” “Monsters Inc.”
each features a male hero and multiple male characters; often a token
female is around to help propel one of the guys to greatness.
“Ratatouille” faithfully follows suit. Colette, a female human sous
chef, even justifies her secondary role in the film with a brief
monologue on misogyny: “Do you know how hard I had to work to get
ahead in this male-dominated kitchen?” she yells at our hero.
The speech is there to throw girls a bone, and you can find this
gesture in most modern day motion picture cartoons. It’s that nod to
the audience: unlike all those cartoons of yesteryear, we know this is
sexist, but there’s nothing we can do about it.
When I complained to my mom and sister: “Why couldn’t Ratatouille have
been female? Why no girls – again?” They said, “Didn’t you hear
Colette’s talk? That’s how it is in the real world.” OK, let me get
this straight: It’s just fine to stretch our imaginations to believe
in a talking rat who can cook, but when it comes to gender
roles, we admire realism and authenticity?
When my daughter goes to the movies, she sees animals talk, fairies or
unicorns prance around, witches cast evil spells, but she’s never
shown a magical land where boys and girls are treated equally, where
gender doesn’t matter. Why can’t Pixar or Disney allow her the fantasy
of equality?
After I saw “The Lion King,” I wanted to know: Why couldn’t the
lionesses have attacked weak, old Scar? Why did they have to wait
around for Simba to come back to Pride Rock to help them? I was told:
that’s how it is in nature – lionesses need a male to lead the pride.
So a lion can be best friends with a warthog and a meerkat without
gobbling them up, but a lioness heading a pride? That could never
happen in the animal kingdom!
Pixar has yet to allow girls any starring roles, but Disney permits it
if she’s a princess. Audiences can count on the contemporary princess
movie to throw girls their bone: Unlike princesses of the past who
happily went off with the first guy who kissed them out of
unconsciousness, these modern girls get to choose whom they marry.
Ariel, Belle, and Jasmine put up a huge stink, stubbornly refusing
betrothal to the obvious choice. But these elaborate shows of
independence are bases for entire plot lines, keeping the princesses
stories almost entirely focused on marriage: rebellion within the
safest possible framework.
When my daughter was watching “Mulan” – probably the most feminist of
all the motion picture cartoons – dress up as a boy to fight in a war,
she asked me, “Why can’t girls fight?” Before she can even understand
how Mulan is empowering, first she has to understand sexism. But does
she need to know, at age 4, about sexism? Does she need to know people
still believe girls can’t do so many things, like cook in a top-tier
French kitchen? Why can’t she just see a girl chef making great food,
receiving acclaim for her talent, being helped along by a girl rat or
sous chef boy?
The hyper-concern for gender accuracy in the fantasy world extends to
things like plush toys – when I refer to my kid’s animals as “she,”
adults invariably do a double take, checking for manes or tusks: even
female toys must stay in their place. And of course, toys are a big
part of the problem. With today’s mass marketing, all these movie
characters live on as action figures, dolls, games, on T-shirts and
cereal boxes. On my daughter’s kite, her beach ball, her pull-ups, the
trifecta of Jasmine, Belle and Ariel smile shyly. My daughter wasn’t
born with this fairy tale-princess fantasy embedded in her brain, but
like any kid, she’s self-centered. She likes the movies that are all
about her. Females are half of the population. We pay our $10 just
like everyone else. When can we get more representation in our movies?
How long do we have to wait?
Pixar is made up of a bunch of guy geeks. Disney’s top brass is
practically all male. Maybe when we get more female studio heads, more
female directors and producers and writers, we’ll see groups of girls
having adventures; girl heroes doing cool, brave things in starring
roles where marriage may never be mentioned at all. Maybe then people
will wake up, finally recognize the radical lack of imagination going
on in our make believe worlds; Princess Charming finally rescues
Sleeping Hunk.