Journalist's Journal

"Cross Dressing" at a Wisconsin Elementary School

2008-04-14T22:37:42Z

I can't decide if I'm offended or delighted by this news item.

Kids at an elementary school in Wisconsin dressed in drag for "wacky week", which their principal explained as just being silly. I'm delighted by the school's embrace of a little queer activity, but I'm not sure how I feel about the "wacky" bit. Yes, drag is supposed to be funny and it uses humor to exploit gendered stereotypes. So in that sense, the school was right on the mark. But since they're denying the activities relation to anything in the gender family, is the activity the costume equivalent of a double negative?
Meaning - if they're making fun of a form of subversive comedy, does it come back around to just making fun of the idea of dressing outside of one's assigned gender?

Heidi Montag is a Feminist Icon

2008-04-07T16:12:37Z

I just threw up in my mouth a little.

Some idiot at the New York Times had declared a pseudo-reality star with a manipulative boyfriend and a bad music video to be a "feminist hero". Gross.

Her evidence that makes this case centers around the fact that Heidi Montag only allows herself to be pushed around sometimes. She stands up for herself, the columnist says, and Montag's shining moment of feminist glory “This isn’t, like, Spencer’s relationship and you decide what we do." Since when are our standards for feminism so low?

I thought that power-equal relationships were in (see democratic presidential candidates with smart, savvy spouses), and dating men that don't respect you and talk you in to plastic surgery (see Heidi Montag) was out. I guess not. Apparently, while I was in class or taking a nap, the New York Times writer decided to hijack feminism a-la Tyra Banks and use to to describe women who knowingly objectify and demean themselves. Yey!

I'm also moderately appalled that the writer brought Gloria Allred in to this mess. Rude. Refusing to elope does not qualify as fighting back against injustice or discrimination.

A Perfectly Good Noun

2008-04-07T15:59:22Z

It's been a wonderful weekend for feminist news-makers.

To start things off, NPR's Peter Sagal made a wonderful point about Hollywood distortion of a perfectly good Dr. Suess book.

Librarians at John's Hopkins pointed out that "abortion" is a "perfectly good noun" and ought not to be excluded from search terms, especially not on a web site that claims to be a database on reproductive health.

And last but not least, Jezebel, a blog that I normally despise wrote a mostly good commentary, explaining, yet again, what a horrible sexist Rush Limbaugh is (in case there were still doubts out there) .

I Have a Very Serious Love/Hate Relationship with Tina Fey

2008-02-25T05:38:01Z

Tina Fey says so many horrible about women (see Kirstie Alley line) in this clip, and then she comes back with an amazing/hilarious rant about Hillary Clinton.

I have so many mixed feelings about Tina Fey, but at the end of the day, I'm really happy to see her pointing out to a large audience the ridiculous way that Hillary Clinton is treated by the media.

But still, is Tina Fey's feminist-lite just taking what I can get? And if so, is that wrong? I'm not sure I'll ever reconcile.

Reframings teaches us to reframe

2008-02-18T21:17:04Z

Each chapter in Reframings examines another element of feminist photography and the art of the “other�?. Looking through different lenses, the book seeks to allow all women of all backgrounds a place in the art world, and the essays examine what it means to be a woman in art. Diane Neumaier’s discussion in the introduction of photography and art as a means of power and of the archetypal/stereotypical and limiting ways that women are photographed is an apt commentary on the state of women in mass media. “Women are objectified in a way distinct from the ways in which other groups are objectified. The determination of a woman’s sexual desirability by the age and shape of her body is perhaps the most vulgar and common mechanism of the objectification of women facilitated by photography�? (2). So if we can see artistic expression and freedom as a type of power and look critically at the ways in with the patriarchy has constructed the gaze within photography, Reframings is a response to the many ways in which women are objectified and rendered powerless/without agency in mass medias. The objectification of women in mass medias has an obviously detrimental effect on women and on our social, political and cultural lives, and I think that Neumaier’s book encourages women (and men) to reframe themselves and their view of self and value, and to consider the ways in which we assign value.

Each section articulates another form that oppression takes. In chapter two, domesticity and feminity are examined, looking at those values as a way of understanding the identity politics of feminism. In the discussion of Saartje Baartman (the Venus Hottentot), we can see the damage of objectification in it’s extreme form and observe it’s persistence through the continued display of Baartman’s genitalia. The ways in which this attitude of value through women’s bodies and the hyper objectification of women of color is perpetuated and can be found in popular magazines and websites at this moment.

Chapter three looks at creating identity through consumer culture, and the photos featured in that chapter explicate this issue and its problems. The photos of teen girls’ bodies fragmented and imitating an exercise video and the portrayal of a search for identity in the pages of a teen magazine serve as manifestations of pressure to be a certain way and identify in a specific way.

Postcolonial legacies in chapter four examine the gaze in a culturally and racially charged sense. Examining portrayals of nonwhite people in photography and responding to them, the photos and essay in this chapter exploit stereotyped “western�? anxieties about the other. The photos and the essay challenge the prescribed identity from women and people of color in the United States.

Women’s attitude towards our own bodies and the societal value of alienation from one’s own body are challenged in chapter five. The presenters for that chapter asked how American women’s attitudes towards their own bodies have changed and what the effects are of physical self-realization.

“Reimagining and Reimaging�? in chapter six discusses queer gender identities and representations of sexuality /sexual orientation with people of color and what sex and anxiety have to do with both the public and the private sphere. Heteronormativity and assimilation are both themes within the chapter.

In “Turning the tables: Three Asian American Artists�? the essay and the art reflects on portrayals of Asians and Asian Americans in the mass media and popular art. Archetypal caricatures of Asians are revisited in this chapter, starting with stereotypes about male and female sexuality and moving on to stereotypes that are excused for their “complimentary�? nature (TIME magazine cover). The presenters examined ways in which Asian American artists subvert the colonial gaze and represent themselves in a more real way.

We read this book collectively so that we could reflect more closely on individual passages and share insights with the class. We also read it collectively so as to facilitate a discussion of what these works mean to us and how these reframed representations of self can be used in our own creation of feminist art.

I think that the conclusion of chapter eight sums this up perfectly “ ... one can, justifiably, identify an impulse – widely manifest in the art production of subaltern producers – toward a recuperation, a redemption, even, of the notion of self-representation that makes it something all together different from the dominant modes of self-representations that have traditionally figured so prominently in art history�? (310).

Sex and Violence are Ever-Present in Hip Hop

2008-02-14T05:46:00Z

I do my best not to see the misogyny in hip hip that I like, especially with an artist like Kanye West, who is truly an artist and very progressive in other ways. But, I've again been denied the ability to turn a blind eye, with the new "Flashing Lights" video that combines sex, violence, and "too much ass" for me to ignore.

The video manages to sexualize murder and to villify the woman not only lyrically, but visually. The narrative is of a vindictive and selfish woman who takes her relationship revenge to an extreme degree, murdering a perfect, caring, romantic, obedient man. She is the ultimate castrator within the power dynamic of the relationship. And she has no face, only a materialistic values and massive breasts and ass.

It is a combination of all things negative in popular rap and hip hop, and I feel really let down by someone who (in my ideal world) could be setting a progressive example for the hip hop and rap community.

Lyrics after the jump.

]]> She don't believe in shootin stars
But she believe in shoes and cars
Wood floors in the new apartment
Couture from the store's departments
You more like love to start shit
I'm more of the trips to Florida
Ordered the hors d'oeuvres views of the water
Straight from the page of your favorite author
And the weather so breezy, man why can't life always be this easy?
She in the mirror dancin so sleazy
I get a call like where are you Yeezy?
And try to hit you with the ol' whopty
Till I got flashed by the paparazzi
Damn, these niggas got me
I hate these niggas more than the Nazis

[Chorus - Dwele] (Sample)
As I recall I know you love to show off (Off)
But I never thought that you would take it this far (Far)
What do I know? (Flashing... lights)
What do I know? (Flashing... lights)
Knoowwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!!!!!!!

[Verse 2 - Kanye West]
I know it's been a while sweetheart
We hardly talk I was doing my thang
I know it was foul baby
A bay, lately, you been all on my brain
And if somebody woulda told me a month ago
Frontin though, yo I wouldn't wanna know
If somebody woulda told me a year ago
It'll go get this difficult
Feelin like Katrina with no F.E.M.A.
Like Martin with no Gina
Like a flight with no visa
First class with the seat back I still see ya
In my past, you on the other side of the glass
Of my memory's museum
I'm just sayin, hey Mona Lisa come home
You know you can't +Rome+ without +Caesar+

As I recall I know you love to show off (Off)
But I never thought that you would take it this far (Far)
What do I know? (Flashing... lights)
What do I know? (Flashing... lights)

Are We Really Still Doing This?

2008-02-05T05:44:48Z

Carla Bruni: Presidential Arm Candy

Thanks, TIME magazine.

Never Take The First Ammendment for Granted

2008-02-05T03:36:33Z

Just when reading the domestic news has made me feel hopeless for my feminist journalist agenda, I found the story of an Afghani man being imprisoned and possibly killed for trying to have a debate about feminism.
"He was accused of blasphemy after he downloaded a report from a Farsi website which stated that Muslim fundamentalists who claimed the Koran justified the oppression of women had misrepresented the views of the prophet Mohamed."

]]> I am about to embark upon my journalism career in which I hope to make the news media a more feminist place. Reading about this Afghani man's struggle reminds me that being a feminist member of the media is more than just offering fair coverage to women's issues and being constantly offended by advertisements. Being a feminist media maker is about the having the freedom to express myself and trying to reach as many people as possible. The concept alone that women can be (and are) successful leaders in anything is enough to put one's life on the line in Afghanistan (a country that is supposedly democratic by the U.S.'s increasingly ironic hand), and that's what I'm working against. The whole idea is to empower people to look outside of their socially constructed expectations for themselves, and this story is a perfect example.

This man is stepping so far outside of gender norms for his community that he's being persecuted, while on United States territory, little is being done to stop it. For all of the political and military power the U.S. exercises over Afghanistan, I thought that I could expect a little compassion as well. But this story isn't even on the New York Times web site yet, while coverage on the front page discusses the Super Bowl and Fashion Week.

Seriously? This is why I'm going in to journalism.

Miss America is a plague

2008-01-29T04:57:19Z

CNN.com reports " that "Kristen Haglund, of Farmington Hills, Michigan, sang "Over the Rainbow" and walked a crowd-pleasing strut in a black and gold bikini to clinch the title."

For this, she has been awarded $50,000 and a year of travel.

]]> I don't want to disparage the "aspiring Broadway star" or her talent or her ambition, but I would like to take this time to attack the fact that her singing skills and black and gold bikini garnered such praise and rewards. The last time I was out in public in a bikini, all I could think was "this is indecent exposure... I think these 5 other people can see my reproductive parts...."

The Miss America pageant is, in my mind, the jumping off point for standardizing women in to a "perfect" version of femininity. She's poised, she's "smart", she's hot in spandex underwear. It puts out in contest form what so many other popular culture facets hint at, but might not say (except for Extreme Makeover or The Swan). Around every corner messages are being sent to women about how they can achieve the ultimate femininity and therefore happiness, but no other cultural establishment standardizes and rewards it in quite the same way.

I would like to leave you, dear reader, with ads from NIvea skin care, in 3 languages, two of which I don't understand, but still send me a very clear message about my skin/life/chances at love: