Misogyny and Sexism in the News

[Soon]

Bret Easton Ellis on American Psycho, Christian Bale, and His Problem with Women Directors


What are your thoughts on women directors? After you saw Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank, you tweeted that you might have to reevaluate your preconceived notions about them.
I did. And after I saw [Floria Sigismondi’s] The Runaways, too.

Really?
I loved it.

I wish I’d loved it.
Well, I wasn’t looking forward to it. I avoided it, and then I was with some people and they said, “It starts soon at the Arclight. Let’s go.” So yeah, I do have to reevaluate that, but for the most part I’m not totally convinced, [except for] Andrea Arnold, Kathryn Bigelow, Sofia Coppola…

Not Mary Harron?
Mary Harron to a degree. There’s something about the medium of film itself that I think requires the male gaze.

What would that be?
We’re watching, and we’re aroused by looking, whereas I don’t think women respond that way to films, just because of how they’re built.

"Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg?"

You don’t think they have an overt level of arousal?

[They have one] that’s not so stimulated by the visual. I think, to a degree, all the women I named aren’t particularly visual directors. You could argue that Lost in Translation is beautiful, but is that [cinematographer Lance Acord]? I don’t know. Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg? I don’t know. I think it’s a medium that really is built for the male gaze and for a male sensibility. I mean, the best art is made under not an indifference to, but a neutrality [toward] the kind of emotionalism that I think can be a trap for women directors. But I have to get over it, you’re right, because so far this year, two of my favorite movies were made by women, Fish Tank and The Runaways. I’ve got to start rethinking that, although I have to say that a lot of the big studio movies I saw last year that were directed by women were far worse than the sh***y big-budget studio movies that were directed by men.

Which are we talking about?
"I mean, do I want to say this on the record? Did you see The Proposal? Anyway, whatever."

[Soon]

Elena Kagan, cross your legs!
Robin Givhan goes after the Supreme Court nominee's "unusual" posture (and perhaps her sexuality)


This weekend, the Washington Post raised a new concern about Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan and her posture. No, not her political stance, but how she carries her body. Naturally, this commentary comes from the Post's fashion writer Robin Givhan, who is disturbed by how "she sat hunched over" and "with her legs ajar" while courting senators on Capitol Hill.

Givhan writes, "In the photographs ... she doesn't appear to ever cross her legs." (Oddly enough, the first image I came across of these meetings shows Kagan crossing her legs -- but, hyperbole aside, let's move on.) Givhan continues:

People tend to mimic each other's body language during a conversation, especially if they're trying to connect with one another. But even when Kagan sits across from Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who has her legs crossed at the knees, Kagan keeps both feet planted firmly on the ground. Her body language will not be bullied into conformity.

She does not cross her legs at the ankles either, the way so many older women do. Instead, Kagan sits, in her sensible skirts, with her legs slightly apart, hands draped in her lap.

Certainly this sort of critique can't be taken too seriously, given the context. Givhan is on the fashion beat, after all, and she indiscriminately targets political figures, male and female alike. But what silliness, subjecting a 50-year-old woman to that classic grandmotherly scolding of "cross your legs, young lady!" The truth is, Kagan still sits rather demurely, despite her legs being uncrossed.

Beyond that basic ridiculousness, I find Givhan's emphasis on Kagan's otherness, her refusal to conform and be normal, somewhat discomfiting. It feels like Kagan is, however indirectly, being indicted over her sexuality -- once again. An accompanying photo caption reads: "UNUSUAL: Most women, including Sen. Amy Klobuchar, cross their legs when sitting, but not Kagan." Maybe because she's an "unusual" lesbian.

Givhan also lays into Kagan for her "frumpiness," noting that "Kagan's version of middle-age seems stuck in a time warp, back when 50-something did not mean Kim Cattrall or Sharon Stone, 'Cougar Town' or 'Sex and the City.'" I'm going to give Givhan -- and my own sanity -- the benefit of the doubt and assume she doesn't actually mean that the gold standard of sartorial appropriateness for a 50-year-old Supreme Court nominee is "Cougar Town."

[Martina]

That is so interesting and so lame. i loved it. Thank you!!!

How does he explain other women visual artists -- photographers, graphic artists, etc?

And Spielberg and Hitchcock???? Of course there are not women Spielberg's and Hitchcock's. None of us has been an adolescent male. Plus when Hitchcock was directing, how many women could dream of getting to make major motion pictures.

The reason why there are fewer major women directors is simple. It's a very expensive medium. You have to be able to work within and get the support of corporations to do your work. i do not know the nature of the business. But there do not seem to be a lot of women producers either. And that is business acumen. No one has ever said women lack that. So there must be some old boy stuff going on.

And he's also not looking at foreign films. i am not a huge fan, but what about Lina Wertmuller?

And he's totally conflated eighties film theory about the gaze -- which is about how films use point of view to reinforce gender hierarchies -- and psychological theories about men being more visual.

LOL. Oh well, he wrote American Psycho. Nuff said.

Originally Posted by HowSoonIsNow

Bret Easton Ellis on American Psycho, Christian Bale, and His Problem with Women Directors


What are your thoughts on women directors? After you saw Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank, you tweeted that you might have to reevaluate your preconceived notions about them.
I did. And after I saw [Floria Sigismondi’s] The Runaways, too.

Really?
I loved it.

I wish I’d loved it.
Well, I wasn’t looking forward to it. I avoided it, and then I was with some people and they said, “It starts soon at the Arclight. Let’s go.” So yeah, I do have to reevaluate that, but for the most part I’m not totally convinced, [except for] Andrea Arnold, Kathryn Bigelow, Sofia Coppola…

Not Mary Harron?
Mary Harron to a degree. There’s something about the medium of film itself that I think requires the male gaze.

What would that be?
We’re watching, and we’re aroused by looking, whereas I don’t think women respond that way to films, just because of how they’re built.

"Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg?"

You don’t think they have an overt level of arousal?

[They have one] that’s not so stimulated by the visual. I think, to a degree, all the women I named aren’t particularly visual directors. You could argue that Lost in Translation is beautiful, but is that [cinematographer Lance Acord]? I don’t know. Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg? I don’t know. I think it’s a medium that really is built for the male gaze and for a male sensibility. I mean, the best art is made under not an indifference to, but a neutrality [toward] the kind of emotionalism that I think can be a trap for women directors. But I have to get over it, you’re right, because so far this year, two of my favorite movies were made by women, Fish Tank and The Runaways. I’ve got to start rethinking that, although I have to say that a lot of the big studio movies I saw last year that were directed by women were far worse than the sh***y big-budget studio movies that were directed by men.

Which are we talking about?
"I mean, do I want to say this on the record? Did you see The Proposal? Anyway, whatever."

[Heart]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/31/wo...1flogging.html

[Nat]

Jesus this thread is upsetting.

[AtLast]

Feminism's Fourth Wave
Women are doing nearly everything men do, but...
November 4, 2003
by Katie Allison Granju


Last year, during the U.S. assault on the Taliban in Afghanistan, my seven-year old daughter, Jane seemed truly puzzled by the photos of Afghani women that dominated the news. Why, she wanted to know, did those women want to wear clothing that covered them from head to toe? Weren't they hot? How could they run or even smile at other people? Why weren't there ever interviews on television with any Afghani women? What was meant when it was said that now, women and girls in that country could read and write again?

I explained to Jane about the cultural and religious restrictions faced by these particular mothers and daughters, and she listened, mouth hanging open in vivid disbelief. She peppered me with questions about every aspect of the lives of Afghanistan's female population, and seemed utterly astounded when I told her that there are actually many places and cultures around the world in which girls cannot go to school; choose what they will wear or whom they will marry; own property; or vote.

As sad as it made me to explain the state of so many of the world's women to the most important girl in my life, I realized that the fact that Jane found this information so incomprehensible represented something very positive. The environment in which my daughter is growing into adulthood is one in which she sees few, if any restrictions on what is possible for her. Her American girlhood is very different from the one in which I came of age only a few decades ago.

When I was Jane's age, my working, feminist mother was an anomaly among the women I knew, and my parents had to make a conscious effort to be sure I understood that, although most doctors, police officers, and engineers were men, this didn't mean that "only" men could hold these jobs. My parents had to be ever-vigilant to protect both their daughters from being held back by unfair and sexist limitations, and they worked to be sure that we were exposed to art, music, and great ideas by women. They ensured that we had "Free to Be You and Me" books and records around the house, and a lifetime subscription to Ms. Magazine in our mailbox.

Today, however, the world has changed enough that parents don't have to make these kinds of special efforts to promote a sense of equality and possibility in our young daughters. Basic feminist consciousness has become an organic part of our culture, and we are all the better for it.

My third grade girl gets her news and information from terrific female journalists, and she is personally acquainted with women lawyers, priests, doctors, firefighters, farmers, athletes, social workers, and artists. Jane is an aggressive and successful competitor in her own chosen sport, and she enjoys listening to music by everyone from 'tween queen Hilary Duff to riot-grrls Sleater-Kinney.

Unlike my own parents, I do not feel compelled to pontificate on the wrong-headedness of rigid gender roles every time I see Jane playing with her dolls. I'm confident that she understands clearly that motherhood is not incompatible with professional achievement or civic engagement.

Also different from my own childhood as the daughter of '70s "women's libbers," Jane and her friends don't seem to feel any conflict between their femininity and their power. When I was a little girl, equality often meant trying to act or look like the little boys. Jane, however, is growing up in a pop culture infused with grrl-power -- from the Powerpuff Girls to Jessica Lynch. I observe her and her little friends playing superheroes, but their superheroes proudly wear sparkly pink capes as they save the world.

While all of this progress is terrific, I also recognize that my daughter is growing up in a society where women still earn less money than men for performing the same work; where women continue to live in realistic, ever-present fear of sexual assault; and where girls are still too often discouraged from studying math or science. There is still work ahead for her generation of rising young feministas. But as I watch her playing things like "President Barbie solves the Mideast peace crisis" with her friends, I feel hopeful.


Katie Allison Granju lives in Knoxville and is the mother of three children. She is the author of Attachment Parenting (Simon and Schuster, 1999) and her website is www.locoparentis.blogspot.com. This article first appeared in Metro Pulse Online.
From Feminist.net
http://www.ifeminists.net/introducti...104granju.html

[Soon]

Banker Deemed Too Sexy For Her Job

[Soon]

Worth a Read: (I think the title is inflammatory and am still reading it as I post, but would love to hear what others think):


The End of Men

[Soon]

Yale fraternity pledges chant about rape

A viral video shows young men marching through campus while barking, "No means yes!"

Sometimes, the post just writes itself: On Wednesday night, Delta Kappa Epsilon pledges marched through Yale's Old Campus -- where most first-year female students are housed -- chanting, "No means yes, yes means anal!" The fraternity pledges were marched blindfolded while barking like soldiers ... with marching orders of anal rape. They also threw in, "My name is Jack, I'm a necrophiliac, I fuck dead women." A video of the initiation was immediately posted on YouTube and, what do you know, it's gone viral.

Now, DKE President Jordan Forney has been forced to apologize for this blatant sexual intimidation by calling it "a serious lapse in judgment by the fraternity and in very poor taste." But this sort of hateful crap isn't a "lapse in judgment." It doesn't innocently happen that you're guiding male pledges by young women's dorms in the dark of night chanting about anal rape. It isn't a forehead-slapping slip-up, it's a sign that you need major reprogramming as a human being. Student feminist magazine Broad Recognition has it right: It's calling for Yale to take disciplinary action against DKE -- where George W. Bush got his presidential training -- "on behalf of its female students."

[Greyson]

latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-1016-gender-politics-20101016,0,1971721.story
latimes.com

It's a strange year for gender in politics
Polite sensitivities are being shelved during this election cycle, a trend led by the conservative female candidates who call themselves 'mama grizzlies.'By Kathleen Hennessey, Tribune Washington Bureau

October 16, 2010


In one of the stranger moments in the Nevada Senate debate Thursday, Sharron Angle, the ever-grinning, grandmotherly GOP Senate candidate, fired off the retort of the night.

"Man up, Harry Reid," the 61-year-old said, dropping the smile as she pushed the Senate majority leader to discuss Social Security's solvency.

Angle's zinger stood out for its unexpected near-hipness. But in the current political climate, the fact that it was loaded with sexual stereotypes seemed hardly to register as controversial.

The 2010 election cycle may be remembered for a jarring shift in the political dialogue between the sexes, a moment when polite sensitivities were shelved and bold gender-based power plays became the norm.

The trend is clearest among a new class of conservative women — the "mama grizzlies" who pride themselves on a strong and irreverent post-feminist posture and frank rhetoric. Their leader, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, set the tone when she told Fox News Channel in August that President Obama didn't have the "cojones" to get tough on illegal immigration.

About a month later, Delaware Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell told a radio interviewer that her primary opponent should "put his man pants on." Angle's "man up" seemed another link in that chain.

"The references to manliness have gotten more explicit," said Deborah Tannen, an author and linguist who has studied communication between the sexes at Georgetown University. At the same time, Palin "has built a sort of brand on" such brash statements, while the culture at large is welcoming less formal conversation.

"The lines between public and private keep blurring, so ways of talking you used to do only in private you more and more do in public," Tannen said.

The trend isn't exclusive to conservative women. Missouri Democrat Robin Carnahan also told Republican Rep. Roy Blunt to "man up" in their Senate debate Thursday.

Male candidates also have used the phrase with increasing frequency — usually in an attempt to insinuate an opponent's lack of political courage.

"At least man up and say I'm fat," the rotund Republican Chris Christie said last year in answer to ads from then- New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine accusing him of "throwing his weight around."

But experts in political discourse see another subtext, particularly when coming from a female candidate.

"Male candidates have traditionally been assumed by would-be voters to be tough and competent. Women have traditionally been assumed to be caring and have to establish their competence," said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, a professor of communication at the Annenberg Public Policy Center. " 'Man up' frames the attacker as tougher than the person attacked and suggests the male candidate is not taking responsibility or being accountable for his failures."

Others see the origins as more closely tied to the identities of the two parties and the way they connect with voters.George Lakoff, a professor of cognitive science and linguistics at UC Berkeley, describes the Republican Party as emphasizing masculinity and strength in its world view and rhetoric, while Democrats underscore the more feminine quality of empathy. Conservative women, in order to trigger cues in some voters, must project strength, he said."If you're a woman candidate who's a conservative, then you have to say you're more masculine than the other guy," Lakoff said.

The boldly direct approach seems to suggest a double standard. It is hard to imagine a male candidate telling a female opponent to be more ladylike without facing repercussions. In fact, the candidates who have recently been accused of sexism were men.

In Colorado, Republican Senate candidate Ken Buck was widely criticized for telling voters to support him because, unlike primary opponent Jane Norton, "I do not wear high heels." In California, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown apologized to Republican Meg Whitman after an aide was recorded calling Whitman a "whore."

But in the Colorado Senate race, Buck was not the first to strike on gender terms. In a July ad, Norton assailed attack ads against her. "They're paid for by a shady interest group doing the bidding of Ken Buck. You'd think Ken would be man enough to do it himself," she said.

None of this is to suggest female candidates do not face sexism, said Jamieson. Women continue to be criticized based on gender stereotypes, she said — often for being too weak, incompetent or, in some cases, not feminine enough."The attack is made, but not in explicitly gendered terms," she said.

Implicit remarks are no less effective. It was Margaret Thatcher, a hero of Palin's, who, when sensing that President George H.W. Bush was wavering on the Gulf War, reportedly warned, "Don't go wobbly on us, George."

kathleen.hennessey@latimes.com

Copyright © 2010, Los Angeles Times

[The_Lady_Snow]

GQ's Gross 'Glee' Photos: The Objections Are Right For The Wrong Reasons



http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...27&sc=fb&cc=fp