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Quote reblogged from à la garconnière with 29 notes
Do you think that a woman would have been able to get forty million dollars to make a puppet movie the way that Wes Anderson has been able to make, bringing to bear all the publicity and advertising budget of Fox? After two movies that didn’t make a lot of money? I think this is true for a lot of black filmmakers too – they’re held to a higher standard. And an unfair standard. You can be a male filmmaker and if you’re perceived as a genius – a boy genius or a fully-formed adult genius – that you are allowed to fail in a way that a woman is not allowed to fail.
Manohla Dargis on male and female directors being held to different standards in “Fuck Them”: Times Critic On Hollywood, Women, & Why Romantic Comedies Suck at Jezebel
For fucking serious, read this.
So, so, so good. But so depressing because it is so true.
(via bibliotheque)
(via garconniere)
Text reblogged from bookselves with 135 notes
thoughts on lady gaga
“The great thing about Gaga is she always want to push for the most extreme option,” Card said. “She’s brave enough to let herself be a canvas for a designer to go and really express themselves. Nothing is off limits! With Rihanna and Beyoncé there is an end result of desirability and unattainable sexiness, whereas Gaga is a really interesting bridge between the desirable and the grotesque. She’s not at all worried about looking ridiculous or hideous; actually, I think she thrives off it.”so this is what i think that feministing commenter was getting it, and which i also have a problem taking seriously, because it’s like… i feel like there are limits, maybe, to how “hideous” an extremely skinny blonde white girl can be considered. and this isn’t a critique of gaga herself because it’s true that she for the most part can’t help these things and shouldn’t (though: she did recently say in an interview that she doesn’t eat, make of that what you will). but i see this argument thrown around a lot and i don’t buy it, because she’s still in that safety zone.
or to put it another way: picture a fat woman, or a black woman, or a Latina woman, or a fat black Latina woman, doing ANYTHING that lady gaga has ever done, and tell me people would still be talking about her as some kind of subversive artiste. tell me she would have gotten a recording contract. tell me 95% of the commentary about her outside maybe the feminist blogosphere wouldn’t be ridicule or disgust. for the exact same actions. and: please do note that in this quote, it’s two women of color set up opposite gaga; i find it very questionable that the person didn’t mention katy perry, or britney spears, or any other white female pop artists in setting up this dichotomy, especially considering that musically gaga is arguably closer to both of them than she is to rihanna or especially beyonce (IMO).
or to put it another way: white skinny bodies are allowed to be art. you see this all the fucking time in the twee/hipster zones of the world/internet, soft-focus photos in sepia tones with size 2 AT MOST people standing in for melancholy, or wistfulness, or love, or whatever. you don’t see fat girls lying in a field of daisies wearing fishnets and reading haruki murakami next to a picnic spread under a parasol. because then the viewer, it’s assumed, would get distracted by their fatness. skinny bodies (& white bodies) are allowed to turn themselves into things because they are presumed to be blank slates. they’re neutral. fatness already symbolizes things in our culture - laziness, sloth, greed - so it’s not allowed to symbolize other things.
or another way: lady gaga is allowed to play at being grotesque because it’s understood that she is making a choice to be grotesque; fat, non-white, or otherwise atypical bodies already belong to the realm of the grotesque. the choice is made for them. whether it’s as unfuckable (fat women, women with visible disabilities) or inherently sexualized (black and Latina women) or some weird combination of fuckable but not sexual (asian women) or just grotesque and unworthy (trans women).
or another way: kelly clarkson also doesn’t give a fuck if people think of her as unsexy, grotesque, ridiculous, hideous, all of which people call her all the time because of her weight. but that isn’t seen as transgressive - just a fat woman (please no arguments over whether or not kelly qualifies as fat; i think she’s beautiful, i don’t mean fat as a value judgment, and i do think by the standards of a lot of people, especially in the entertainment business, she does qualify as fat) being comfortable isn’t considered noteworthy, even though that’s also implicitly challenging cultural standards of beauty.
again, none of this is anything against gaga herself, really, and there’s a lot of stuff in the interview i liked about her. it’s just that i’m tired of hearing people talk about how subversive she is without acknowledging the rules she does play by - through admittedly no particular effort of her own - that make it possible for her to be subversive. and yeah, i guess i am saying that there’s a limit to how actually subversive a blonde skinny white pop star can be. that isn’t a reflection on gaga (or any other blonde skinny white pop star) herself at all - it’s a reflection on a culture that marks some bodies as acceptable and some bodies as inescapably transgressive. for gaga, the grotesque is a costume, an act. a fun act, one that’s interesting (…sorta) and entertaining to watch play out. but it still remains true that she’s allowed to act this way because we all know that she’s doing it on purpose, much like actresses are allowed to be “ugly” for a role but not in real life because we know that at the end of the day they go back to their acceptably pretty selves. for women who don’t have that stamp of approval, there is no backstage, there is no going home after the show, there isn’t even a fucking intermission, and they don’t get a say in whether they’re performing or not. and i really wish more people would acknowledge that in these conversations.
FUCK YEAH. so, so, well put. i’ve been putting off purging my thoughts about lady gaga for a while but i suppose there is no better time than now…
i bolded my favourite parts if you are a skimmer. the only thing i really have to add to this is in regards to sexuality and age and ability. people have been quick to point out that women of colour (namely grace jones) have been doing what gaga is doing years ago, and better might i add, and so have queer women, and queer women of colour. just look at
motherfatherfucking peaches for godsake! her album cover was of her with her pubes hanging out of her hot pink short shorts. her lyrics are literally her screaming “i don’t give a fuuuuuuuck!” and “i like girls and i like boys, i don’t have to make a choice.” now that was music i wanted to listen to. this is a proud hairy queer woman in her late forties! who gets iggy pop to fucking guest on her album and sing about her crotch! amazing!i paid no attention to lady gaga at all, until recently because of these discussions that have sprung up. i found her first single absolutely insufferable; the lyrics might as well have been “i’m the drunk obnoxious rich girl at the club spilling her drink all over you while bellowing out requests to the annoyed dj and trying to dance like elaine from seinfeld.” the only song of hers i can honestly agree to finding catchy and that i slightly enjoy listening to is “bad romance.” like lavenderlines points out, this isn’t necessarily about hating on lady gaga, but pointing out that there is so much more revolutionary shit that needs to happen in the mainstream music industry and lady gaga is not necessarily the messiah.
i have been intrigued by all of the attention a lot of feminists i admire have been giving her lately, and looked up her interview with barbara walters when she blushed after being asked if she’d ever slept with a woman. and yeah, gaga is all for gay rights and that is amazing, but she is still catering to this heteronormative mainstream gaze, which is why she has number one singles and truly subversive artists don’t. as much as we don’t want to acknowledge it, she still fits into the mould in so many ways; dyed her hair blonde before releasing her first album, and has an enormous team of people behind her making sure she picks the right single, dances the right way, poses at the right places, gets interviewed by the right people. even if we want her to be this saviour of pop music and read her and queer her as subversive, she is still a product being sold to us and i think that’s what i have trouble getting past.
she makes out with a hot chick dressed as a cop in a phonebooth or some shit but the song is still talking about “riding a disco stick” and love being between a boy and a girl. i feel like maybe there is something i am just missing, on the music/lyrical side of things? yeah, i think her costumes are awesome, the fact the she calls herself a performance artist and acknowledges that the whole music industry is a circus that she participates in, that she is talking frankly about sexuality, but at the end of the day… i still cannot stand her music! and it isn’t particularly different, or political, or revolutionary.
it’s the same problem i have with other mainstream artists who claim to be political and do activism and philanthropy and shit, but don’t ever sing about it.
call me when beth ditto and lady gaga do a duet about fucking up patriarchy.
And that’s why J-Bomb and I are bffs. But maybe we should just assume that “disco stick” is code for the most fabulous strap-on in existence? (Alright, I know none of the rest of the lyrics to that song. Carry on!)
Great posts mean instant reblog.
Video reblogged from nickdrake with 18 notes
Electric Six - “Gay Bar” (Hi Res)
I can’t have enough of their videos!
Text
It’s officially the 16th here so this means today’s the 235 anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth. She’s one of my favourite English writers and, coincidentally, I have to write an essay on Pride and Prejudice. I have no idea what to talk about. The only thing that has been in my mind is making a comparison between Elizabeth and Georgiana, connecting them to women’s education and the role of female accomplishments. Probably no one will answer this, but I lose nothing. I need advice (I know I should ask my professor but I’d like to have some clear ideas on what I want to tackle first)
Thanks a lot.
Photo reblogged from The Triumph Of Magic Over The Brute. with 28 notes
Dorothy Counts. September 4, 1956, United States.
Dorothy Counts was one of the first black students admitted to the Harry Harding High School in the United States. After four days of harassment that threatened her safety, her parents forced her to withdraw from the school. In 1957, forty black students applied for transfers at a white school. At 15-years of age, on September 1957, Counts was one of the four black students enrolled at various all-white schools in the district; Counts was at Harry Harding High School, Charlotte, North Carolina. Three students were enrolled at other schools, including Central High School. The harassment started when the wife of John Z. Warlickthe, the leader of the White Citizens Council, urged the boys to “keep her out” and at the same time, implored the girls to spit on her, saying, “spit on her, girls, spit on her.” Counts walked by without reacting, but told the press that many people threw rocks at her—most of which landed in front of her feet—and that many spat on her back. More abuse followed that day. She had trash thrown at her while eating her dinner and the teachers ignored her. The following day, she befriended two white girls, but they soon drew back because of harassment from other classmates. Her family received threatening phone calls and after four days of extensive harassment—which included a smashed car and having her locker ransacked, her father decided to take his daughter out of the school. At a press conference, he said: It is with compassion for our native land and love for our daughter Dorothy that we withdraw her as a student at Harding High School. As long as we felt she could be protected from bodily injury and insults within the school’s walls and upon the school premises, we were willing to grant her desire to study at Harding. The family moved to Pennsylvania, where Counts attended an integrated school in Philadelphia.
Photo reblogged from with 407 notes
![katoleary:
clingtomymouth:
wingsandfins:
trixietreats:
preciousjezebel:
suicideblonde:
Female hysteria was a once-common medical diagnosis, made exclusively in women, which is today no longer recognized by modern medical authorities as a medical disorder. Its diagnosis and treatment were routine for many hundreds of years in Western Europe. Hysteria was widely discussed in the medical literature of the Victorian era. Women considered to be suffering from it exhibited a wide array of symptoms including faintness, nervousness, insomnia, fluid retention, heaviness in abdomen, muscle spasm, shortness of breath, irritability, loss of appetite for food or sex, and “a tendency to cause trouble”.[1]
Since ancient times women considered to be suffering from hysteria would sometimes undergo “pelvic massage” — manual stimulation of the genitals by the doctor until the patient experienced “hysterical paroxysm” (orgasm).
OMG this is such a weird coincidence. I was just reading this Wiki page earlier because I wanted to make sure I was using the phrase “the vapors” correctly. It was in regard to Kings of Leon, and once I was reminded that there was a loss of sexual appetite involved, I realized that this was precisely the opposite of what I meant re: Caleb Followill’s voice.](http://12.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kuldybQ1by1qz9qooo1_r1_500.gif)
Female hysteria was a once-common medical diagnosis, made exclusively in women, which is today no longer recognized by modern medical authorities as a medical disorder. Its diagnosis and treatment were routine for many hundreds of years in Western Europe. Hysteria was widely discussed in the medical literature of the Victorian era. Women considered to be suffering from it exhibited a wide array of symptoms including faintness, nervousness, insomnia, fluid retention, heaviness in abdomen, muscle spasm, shortness of breath, irritability, loss of appetite for food or sex, and “a tendency to cause trouble”.[1]
Since ancient times women considered to be suffering from hysteria would sometimes undergo “pelvic massage” — manual stimulation of the genitals by the doctor until the patient experienced “hysterical paroxysm” (orgasm).
OMG this is such a weird coincidence. I was just reading this Wiki page earlier because I wanted to make sure I was using the phrase “the vapors” correctly. It was in regard to Kings of Leon, and once I was reminded that there was a loss of sexual appetite involved, I realized that this was precisely the opposite of what I meant re: Caleb Followill’s voice.
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