So Long, Farewell.

Ok, single follower, instead of continuing this blog or revamping or doing Actual Work on something for once in my life, I've just decided to start my own personal diary-type blog about myself elsewhere. The quality will be extra-low, so look forward to that. Not even sure why I'm posting this here, since I could just email you personally, but I like to feel like I'm concluding this weird chapter and starting fresh.

Neat.

Bye bye, blog.

p.s. You are definitely NOT required to read my other blog. You may, but I assure you it's dumb and a waste of time, but just seems more official (and with more timestamps for me to monitor myself with) than a bunch of random word documents.

Because I'm Finally Free

To say something cryptic and unexpected, my blog is finally free to roam on its own. Since there's no wordcount here anymore, I'll just share this link that I really enjoyed.

See, I was originally embarrassed to be intrigued by Lady Gaga's odd outfits and shocking antics, but then I read this article from the LA Times. I especially liked this part, and I very much enjoy the way in which Gaga explains herself.

Gaga does view her music as a liberating force. "When I say to you, there is nobody like me, and there never was, that is a statement I want every woman to feel and make about themselves," she continued. "I don't make it as a defense. I make it as, OK, guys, it's been two years, and I've made a lot of music, and I know my greatness is individual. And I want every woman to be able to say that."

So I'll be hitting up more Lady Gaga interviews later, just to see what's up with the most Andy Warhol person since David Bowie.

Also please congratulate me on making it through this post without making the inevitable "gaga for Gaga" pun.

This Post Whomps

This weekend I've come down with a flu (most likely not of the swine variety, but nonetheless annoying) and have spent a lot of time on youtube as a result. When I'm sick I like to curl up with a bowl of soup, a box of tissues, and some of my favorite old Saturday morning cartoons. I've also recently finished a paper in which I examined the gender portrayals in some of my old favorites, like Recess, Pepper Ann, Doug, and Pokemon. This weekend I've just been watching as many Recess episodes as I can stay awake for, and just honestly wanted to share how much of a great show I think this is for children to be influenced by. I'm horribly biased, so probably if you aren't already a fan or at least aren't against Recess for some reason or other, you'll find very little of interest in this post. But if you've never heard of Recess (gasp!) do some youtubing and join fifth-grade me in giddy, if fever-induced, joy.

So first things first, I love T.J. Detweiler. Not in the weird, college-girl-in-love-with-an-animated-10-year-old way that it sounds. Which is how it sounds. No, I just love a character that I don't have to hate. See, most shows that I watch are made for people who don't consider coloring to be a worldly skill and so are full of characters that have moral issues they must overcome, who sometimes don't do the right thing even if they know what the right thing is, and who make bad decisions on a regular basis. Most of the characters I like, I like despite something, and that's usually the realism that I praise in shows. But it's so nice to watch a character who always knows what's right and fights for it no matter the odds. I want to give speeches that can convince anyone to do the right thing. I want to convince all kids of the playground to work together against the tyranny of rules and adulthood. I want to be T.J. Detweiler when I grow up.

The other (one other among many) reason that I love Recess is that it lets the girls play too. On Recess there are a lot of weird stereotypes of people (the snitch, the kindergartners, the bullies, the pale kids) but there are very few gender biases. Spinelli and Gretchen get to play sports and solve mysteries just as much as the other four boys in their gang do.

So, if you've stuck with my feverish rantings to this point, the main argument I'm making is to make a little time in your adult schedule for a 90's classic that gives me a little hope that Disney has made some headway over the years. Cheers, wishing Recess and cough syrup to all.

List-or-Treat: Five Good Reasons to Watch TV

Maybe it's the chilly breeze in L.A. these past couple of days, but lately I've been feeling very holiday spirited (ghost pun intended). I've wanted to get out of my routine and do something lighthearted. The downside to running a feminist blog is that you sometimes feel like a big critical, negative jerk (or at least I do, on occasion). It's not that what I usually point out isn't in the wrong, it's just you need a cheerful break full of positivity to give a little contrast. So, in celebration of Halloween, I'm giving you a list of my five favorite female characters on television. These ladies aren't just sex symbols, aren't just splendid mothers, and aren't just a 2-d version of women. They're not in any specific order because I don't have that kind of dedication, but enjoy this Halloween treat from yours truly.

1. Nancy Botwin from Weeds (photo from yahooTV)

Ever since the first season with this pot-dealing suburban widow, I've not been able to get Nancy Botwin's twisted path through middle-life and the world of illegal substances out of my mind. Nancy is a mother figure who could be debated to be good or bad for her children as the seasons progress, and a morally-gray-area kind of gal in all of her weed-dealing shenanigans. Nancy isn't cookie cutter in any sense of the word, and I think it's Nancy's complexity which makes her so compelling. I think Nancy defies any stereotype that's placed on her. Nancy may not be the best role model for young girls to look up to, but Nancy is an example of how a character can just be a wonderful, complex character (and protagonist!) without having to be a token woman on a show about men.

2. Clair Huxtable from The Cosby Show (photo from imdb)

So maybe it's been a couple year since I've seen an episode of The Cosby Show, but I still remember the soothing presence of Mrs. Huxtable in a house that sometimes seemed it had gone mad. I also remember that, unlike so many TV moms, Mrs. Huxtable had a job of just as much prestige as her husband, and spent just as much time worried about/working at her job as did her husband. Mrs. Huxtable was a figure equal to her husband in every way. Both would care for their children in sometimes sweet ways, sometimes in a more tough-love fashion, but always as a team. Mrs. Huxtable, and The Cosby Show in general, gave me hope for all sitcoms to be as hilarious and endearing as The Cosby Show was.

3. Agent Dana Scully from The X-Files (photo from yahooTV)

I just love Agent Scully. I do. She was the brains of the Mulder/Scully team, and the logical voice that the audience always had in their head, saying "Really, Mulder? Aliens? Again?" Scully wasn't just a pretty girl hanging out on Mulder's side. She showed strength when Mulder couldn't, and showed compassion for those who she and Mulder could help. She wasn't a boring, character-less love interest, but was a multidimensional character, with belief in both science and religion, but rarely in extraterrestrials.

4. Elaine Benes from Seinfeld (photo from Netster's blog)

In a show that may be ripe with misogyny at times, Elaine is a balance to all that testosterone. Elaine is always willing to speak her mind, and doesn't back down when confronted. Elaine is Jerry's equivalent on the show, and probably dates just as many people as Jerry does throughout the series' run. Even though I'm new to the show, Elaine is one of the funniest characters I've seen on television, if just for the way she occasionally flubs a word and refuses to admit it when questioned. She's startlingly real and always makes me laugh.

5. Buffy Summers from Buffy the Vampire Slayer (photo from skyrock)

Ok, I won't do that babbling on about Buffy thing I'm so wont to do. You know why she's here. She kicked vampire butt in high school. She was the antidote to scaredy-blondes in every horror film ever made. You can't make this list without Buffy. Sorry, but you must have seen this one coming.

So there it is! A list of wonderful characters you can enjoy on these brisk fall nights, even though all but one of them are off the air now. Happy Halloween everyone!

I'm With Stephen King on This One

I'll start by warning that I'm not going to say anything you couldn't find on Yahoo answers here, so don't be waiting around for anything terribly brilliant or unique, I just want everyone to be absolutely clear here. I want there to be not even the whisper of a chance that I feel a certain way when I so strongly prescribe to another opinion.

The Twilight series is terrible.

Ok, ok. I know, not a revelation. But it's not just because I think Stephanie Meyer couldn't write well if someone dictated to her. It isn't that it's secretly some kind of veiled Mormon message. That I can live with. It's Bella and Edward. And even Jacob.

So first of all, Bella is Stephanie Meyer. She's the self-inserted author character. She's the useless, personality-less character who is just there for us to have somebody "normal" to identify with. She bumbles around. She's socially awkward. She doesn't get the best grades. She has no life outside of Edward.

It's the fact that Bella is a complete non-entity that drives me crazy. The lack of anything resembling personality, and her constant dependence on Edward and Jacob at every turn, her need to be coddled, protected, and saved, are just disgusting.

Now, my roommate and I have been debating whether or not, in the end, when she gets the power to protect her loved ones she's (finally!) a powerful character, or at least has something to contribute to the supermen around her. Personally, I hate the story and am hesitant to give it any room to argue, but my roommate makes a valid point that in the end (the very very end!) Bella does gain some power and possibly becomes more powerful than Edward or Jacob. It's a solid point, but I counter with the fact that up until that point Bella has been saved so many times (so so so many times) that it's a case of too little too late, as cliche and elementary as my argument style may be.

I don't even want to talk about the movies in this post, because honestly they're some of the funniest things I've ever seen. Edward literally says the words "You'd better hold on tight, spider monkey!" which make me want to die with both disgust and utter delight, because I have this picture in my mind of some old man in a black suit at a desk hearing this line and saying "Oh yeah, that's what the kids these days want to hear!"

But to the point, Twilight is not the next big thing. It's not a Harry Potter equivalent. And please, please don't start comparing it to Buffy. It's sexist. And not just that, it's badly written sexism that's targeted toward young girls around the world. I know I'm contributing nothing new, I just want to make sure we all understand each other.

Waiting on John Mayer to Change

As you can probably tell from that super-duper high-larious title, I never liked the guy that much. (See what I did there? it's his song title! but with his name in it!) But I didn't know he was this bad.

Ok so ever since he put out that terrible song about daughters (the title, creatively, is "Daughters") I've just disliked John Mayer. And then, recalling how much I hated that song, I stupidly looked it up on songmeanings.net (one of the biggest ways I waste my time online, though not the worst) and found, to me eternal dismay, some of the most disturbing comments I've ever seen on the internet.

Apparently most of the commenters are in complete denial about the sexism inherent in the song. I'll spare you having to read the whole thing and just summarize the different kinds of comments you'll find there. Firstly there are the ones that give me hope for America, wherein people explain exactly how sexist Mayer is not just in his lyrics, but in his personal life. There are a series in which girls discuss how caring Mayer is for writing about taking care of women, and that he must be a really sweet guy. Then there are of course the ones that, in various stages of rage, exclaim "Stop calling this song sexist! You only see misogyny if you look for it! Stop listening to what he's saying! You're ruining the song!"

Um, yeah. So lemme just quote my favorite bit of the song for you here and then we'll delve into a little more about the man, the myth, the Mayer (as pictured above in all his glory).

On behalf of every man,
Who's looking out for every girl,
You are the god and you are the weight of her world.

Yes. This is not made up. This is a song that people still fervently call beautiful and moving and other delightful, blind things like that. The argument is made several times on songmeanings.net that Mayer's intentions are good, honest, and true.

Shocking as it may seem, I'm not impressed with little ol' John Mayer. I find sanity alongside fellow Mayer-Naysayers. When asked by The Rolling Stone what song would be playing in hell, Brandon Flowers of "The Killers" replied "I think "Daughters," by John Mayer, would be a good candidate. I don't know why he bugs me so bad."

I also agree with Amy Keyishian over at nerve.com, who wrote quite colorfully,

"The song itself is the very epitome of fake-feminist, ersatz-sensitive-man, phony-baloney-pretending-to-care-about-the-plight-of-women, wanna-get-laid-the-nice-guy-way bullhockey. That's right, I called it bullhockey. I don't buy this crap for a minute: "Fathers, be good to your daughters. Daughters will love like you do. Girls become lovers, who turn into mothers, so mothers, be good to your daughters, too." In other words, everyone, everywhere, should strive to be better parents, so it'll be easier for John Mayer to get laid twenty-three years in the future. "

I couldn't put it better if had a month to think and a personal writing coach at my constant call.

So now you're thinking "But that's just one song. Maybe it's just a one-time incident of bad word choice. Cut him some slack." And I'm thinking, well, that's valid. We've all written a bad song or two, so maybe Mayer just knows not what he croons.

But then I stumbled upon the thing that really set off this post and started this whole terror-process of delving back into archived comments praising John Mayer.

That's right. If you've followed the link above (or stopped by bitch magazine or feministe, as everyone should) you know it's an interview Mayer gave about two weeks ago with a reporter from New York Entertainment. In the interview Mayer is in great form when asked by a female reporter about Obama's Nobel prize, answering with the good, honest, and true "If you don't know who else should have gotten it instead of Obama, I love you, you're beautiful, but shut your fucking mouth."

He loves you. You're beautiful. He sang about how much of a wonderland your body is. He thinks your father should be good to you. Now "shut your fucking mouth."

The interview only gets worse from there, and devolves down to the point where, after calling the editor of the magazine a "moron," he says "I'm going to forcefully sodomize your editor."

Yep. That one's not a typo.

If you watch the instant replay you can see the little slip up he made there. I do believe, if I'm not mistaken, that it was somewhere around "forcefully sodomize" that he fumbled this one. Had he substituted almost any other English words (e.g. "complement," "send a fruit basket to," "congratulate with a hefty handshake") for "forcefully sodomize" Mayer would have been in the clear. But no. No, he's just not that kind of guy.

Oh, John Mayer. I emphatically shake my head at you and your general worldview. Also that photo above.

(image from theinsider.com)

The Skinny on Ralph Lauren

If you don't already know that the fashion industry is built on nearly-laughable contradiction and impossibility, after Filippa Hamilton, a Ralph Lauren model, being photoshopped then fired this week, you're surely aware of this particular breed of insanity. Apparently not even a woman who weighs 120lbs. at 5'10'' is skinny enough to be considered beautiful by the brilliant staff at Ralph Lauren.

The above horrorshow (photo courtesy of boingboing's blog, where the original post was made) is the infamous photoshopped shot, if you couldn't tell that thang ain't quite human. You can also check out the post made on Appetite for Equal Rights, which gives a great side-by-side of the alien-creature in plaid and the real model with space for lungs inside that ribcage. The original post made on boingboing says it best, "Dude, her head's bigger than her pelvis."

It's not just the fact that the model was photoshopped to the point of near-decimation, but it's that later this size four model was fired because she supposedly couldn't fit into the clothes. Ralph Lauren apologized for the photoshoptastrophy, but also fired the girl who obviously wasn't skinny enough for Ralph Lauren.

For over 42 years, we have built a brand based on quality and integrity. After further investigation, we have learned that we are responsible for the poor imaging and retouching that resulted in a very distorted image of a woman's body. We have addressed the problem and going forward will take every precaution to ensure that the calibre of our artwork represents our brand appropriately.

That's all nice and fine, but wasn't firing the model a bad sign to send about your brand to the millions of people following this story? I mean, the apology sounds a little weak to me. It's sounds more like "We're sorry that picture was bad looking. We'll make sure not to get caught next time so that our brand doesn't suffer any bad publicity."

Sorry, Ralph Lauren. This one's just a little too much. If this girl looks too fat for your clothes, than who in the world are they supposed to fit? So maybe I don't own any of their clothes anyway, but suddenly not buying Ralph Lauren never felt so good.

There's an app for THAT?

Let's play a game.

First, watch this video:



Now sit for a while. Contemplate humanity. Try not to cry, hard as it is, and we'll dive in together to see what exactly just happened to you.

No, it wasn't the apocalypse, though it was pretty close. Nope, it was just Pepsi Co.'s newest attempt to corner the you-youngins-and-your-interwebs market using the latest technology in an NC-17 app for your iPhone, called "AMP Up Before You Score". And what does the AMP Energy drink app do? It helps you do some shallow research about a certain type of girl that leads directly to you hooking up with said girl, then bragging about it to all your friends, all on your handy-dandy iPhone. To make identifying the perfect pick-up lines and hangouts best for that not-too-special somebody easy, the app breaks girls down into twenty-four neato little categories. They're fun things like Cougar, Sorority Girl, Goth Girl, Nerd, Married, Princess, Treehugger, and my personal favorite, Women's Studies Major.

It's almost worth getting the app just to find out exactly what killer lines it suggests you read awkwardly off of your iPhone to start these promising conversations, and what it suggests you do once the lucky lady learns you've categorized her based on an iPhone app's illustration and plan on tweeting all about her after you've done the deed.

So what's the problem here? There's the complete awkward mental-visual I now have of some unlucky boy coming up to me, red cup in hand, to read lines out of his iPhone and then suggest we take this conversation to my favorite organic food store or local black box theatre or whatever it is they recommend for whatever he's deemed my type to be. And of course, everybody knows what you're drinking at those killer parties on fraternity row...Pepsi products. Hells yeah.

But besides the obvious lack of practicality, what's the main issue? The categorizing of women into stereotypical categories? The way the app views sleeping with a woman as conquest? The need to brag about sexual conquest to friends via tweet or status update? The inane move of a company to target its product at only the male portion of the population? That Pepsi Co. also creates a bro-stereotype of men as seeking only to sleep with as many women as possible, which excludes even more consumers from feeling like they're part of the target audience?

Honestly, I don't know what the worst part of this app is. I couldn't tell you. I can just tell you that I find it disturbing, laughably disturbing. It's almost a farce. Hilarious if looked at in a certain light. So much so that...is it? Is it a joke?

Well, that's the main discussion going on about this app, besides initial understandable outrage. But it makes me wonder if it matters. So what if it is a joke? It's a joke in bad taste. Who would find this so funny that it would make them buy Pepsi products? Apparently there's been a lot of chatter about how this is just a joke and how people should lighten up and stop being offended. While I find it funny that people would think that making an app like this would get them anything but bad publicity, apparently people elsewhere (in the scariest of comment conversations) find it funny in a non-heartbreaking way. To me, that's the most disturbing part. Not that such a thing was even made, but that people are defending its creation and cannot see the offensive nature of the product. I mean, you see it, right?

Luckily the good folks over at Jezebel have also noticed this and their comment section is actually brimming with brilliancy instead of mourn-inducing shouting matches. One commenter provided this link to the Mountain Dew website where you can complain about the AMP Energy drink app, and which I would highly encourage. One of my favorite comments was "You'd never see RC Cola pulling this shit."

Well, after a hard day's blogging I'm just dying for a cold drink. Coke, anyone?