It's She Who Holds Her Tongue Who Gets Her Man

As a kid, my parents were very selective about what they let me watch on television. My brother and I grew up in a cable-less household with only public television stations like PBS to keep us entertained. Movies in particular were especially filtered by my mother, who knew that sex and violence in the media had a huge impact on its audience, especially children. But for our hefty collection of animated Disney movies, an exception was made. It wasn't until recently that I started paying attention to some of the other messages being sent by these films: more specifically, messages related to gender issues.

In The Little Mermaid, for example, the villainess Ursula persuades Ariel to give up her voice (consider that for a moment) in exchange for a life out of water. And of course her love interest Eric won't mind her silent disposition, because in Ursula's words, "On land, it's much preferred for ladies not to say a word."

In Mulan, the soldiers off in battle describe their ideal woman.
"How 'bout a girl who's got a brain, who always speaks her mind?"

"Nah!"

In The Hunchback of Notre Dame, we're treated to a little pole dance.

And what was with none of the Disney princesses having mothers, only fathers? Has anyone else noticed this? I plan to find out more before this semester is over.

Disney also included a lot of racist undertones. While poking around on YouTube, I stumbled upon this little mashup that covers a handful of racial nightmares from Disney's past.

Yikes!

Until next time.

Debasing Cindy

Trashy reality shows are like train wrecks. You're not supposed to enjoy watching them, but once you start, it's impossible to look away. There's something so horrifying and yet so satisfying about watching other people destroy their lives on national television, especially if the people in question are B-list celebrities.

Anyway, while camping out at home during The Great Snowpocolypse of 2010, I found myself submitting to the guiltiest of all guilty pleasures: Fox Reality Channel. As if that weren't sinful enough, I became enraptured, if you will, with the newest "celebreality" sensation, Seducing Cindy.

This little gem of a show follows human Barbie doll Cindy Margolis on her quest to find "love" following her divorce in 2008.

Cindy, 44 years old, is given the choice between two-dozen men, ranging from 18 to 71 years of age. While shows like The Bachelor present the subject with a number of potential suitors based on compatibility, Cindy'scornucopia of men seem to have little or nothing in common with her. She's a good sport, though, and politely accepts any and all affectionate gestures from her contestants, despite the fact that most of them are complete zeros. From the antisocial comic collector to the chronic celebrity dater, to the speed-strung musician with a beard down to his belt, all I could do was ask myself what on earth a Playboy centerfold model was doing with such losers. The most amazing part to me was the way Fox Reality presented Cindy as a desperate older mom in need of a date, rather than as an extremely attractive woman who should rightfully have her pick of any man she wanted. And even with a room of men falling over themselves to be with her, Cindy still expressed insecurity, lack of self-esteem, and a need to use her appearance to win their approval. Aside from prancing around in a wide array of desperate-looking outfits, the elimination ceremony consisted of the contestants individually reaching into a very high slit in Cindy's dress to remove a garter, one for each man moving onto the next round. Very classy, Fox Reality. Very classy indeed.

You'll be happy to know that the sexism present in this show isn't just a one-way street. I can't have been the only viewer with my jaw on the floor when I saw Cindy's first elimination challenge. While most reality dating shows start off with something tame, such as bowling, Cindy Margolis brought in the big guns on only her second episode. The summons? To participate in a fertility test.

That's right, before she bothered to learn all of their names, she wanted them to masturbate into a cup.

The challenge would determine two winners: the man with the most fertile specimen, (tested by a lab technician) and the man who produced it the fastest. The two biggest jerk-offs were rewarded with a date. I don't even know what to say about this, except that they must have needed at least one challenge that the goateed musician could win (and win it he did, in a stunning one-and-a-half minutes).

When you hear from me next, I'll be criticizing your favorite childhood films!

Hi there.

My name is Holly and this is my blog. One of them, at least. I've had a few. This blog, however, is the bloggiest blog of all. I guess it's a pretty typical thing, for a blog to be centered around a topic, a project, some sort of new experience that deserves to be documented. For me though, this is my first time writing a blog quite like that. I think it'll be interesting.

This blog specifically is for one of my classes, Gender & Mass Media in the U.S.

I'm taking it as an elective, not a requirement, because I studied some gender issues last semester and found it all really fascinating. It was mostly through my Music, Power, & Gender class, but we covered quite a few gender issues in my Philosophy class as well. I ended up writing both of my final papers on gender linguistics, but from different perspectives. Just the little bit of research I've done on the topic has already opened my eyes to a power struggle that I didn't even know still existed. Obviously men and women aren't fully equal yet, but I had no idea how deeply rooted sexism was in our culture until I did some reading for myself. These issues are alive and kicking! We have quite the struggle ahead of us.

For that reason, I'm looking forward to seeing what this class can teach me about discrimination in the media, not only based on sex, but also race, class, and disability.

As for the moment, I'm going to bed. I need to be awake for class tomorrow!