Where are all the educated rom-com heroines? [Thought Catalog]
While we’re on the topic of locating certain female characters, what about all the superheroines? [ThinkProgress]
And, the problem with female sitcom characters. [Women & Hollywood]
Who was the real Jessica Rabbit? [Messy Nessy Chic]
On zoos. [Meajin]
Attempting to use the female condom. [TheVine]
Still with contraception, the pull-out method is an increasing form of it. [Daily Life]
Image via Southwestern.
PETA get more anti-women with each ad campaign. [Daily Life]
On favouring the internet over books. I’m a rapacious reader; if I don’t get at least an hour’s reading time in each day, I will slowly start to go insane. Some of my friends tease me ’cause it can take me up to a month or six weeks to finish a book (the most recent was Stephen King’s Under the Dome, and what a waste of two months that was!), but that’s not taking into account the copious amounts of other reading I do. On a good day, I’ll devour every article on TheVine, Daily Life, MamaMia and Jezebel, and fit in some before-bed book reading. On the weekends I can get through The Age‘s lifestyle sections, long-form articles I can’t commit to throughout the week and magazines that have been languishing on my bedside table for weeks, on top of all the rest. I read probably millions of words a week. I don’t think there’s any harm in some of those words being from the internet. These days, reading is about so much more than books. Just so long as I can get a chapter or two in every night or on the bus, I’ll take my reading where I can get it. [Daily Life]
Reading letters to Ms. magazine’s editors from the 1980s. [The New Yorker]
The rise of the Trojan Horse TV show. [Film School Rejects]
I review Monash Uni Student Theatre’s production of Columbine. [TheatrePress]
Anna Gunn, the actress who plays Skyler White on Breaking Bad, weighs in on the vitriol directed at her character. [NYTimes]
Can you perform a gay anthem if you’re straight? [Jezebel]
The privileged male sexuality of “Blurred Lines”. [Collapse Board]
In defence of the make-up-free selfie. I like MamaMia‘s Body Positive campaign, but I think it’s just the concept of the selfie I’m a bit iffy about. I’m all for taking a photo of myself after exercise or of a body part that I’m self-conscious about, but I just can’t get behind selfies (so to speak). Maybe it’s also an insecurity about my face without makeup. Apart from my legs, my bare face is the body part I most struggle with. I love the structure of my face, and I think my eyes are my best feature, but I’m still sporting the scars from years of late-adolescence/early-adulthood acne which means I’m not ready to upload a make-up-free pic of myself for all the interwebs to see. Plus, I think selfies are kind of narcissistic—there’s a difference between a light-hearted holiday or dancefloor snap with friends and a duckface bathroom pic which just screams “validate me!” What do you think of the whole selfie phenomenon in general?
Some slighted feminists sick of receiving dick pics have decided to make them into an art exhibition. And that’s where the issue of consent comes in. [Daily Life]
The slave narrative of Orange is the New Black. [The Nation]
Still with Orange is the New Black, literature on the show. [Bitch Magazine]
SlutWalk Melbourne is next weekend, and last year’s speaker, Emily Maguire, talks about why she supports the movement. [SlutWalk Melbourne]
I reviewed Patricia Cornelius’ Savages for TheatrePress. Head on over and check it out, and then get to fortyfive downstairs quick smart!
50 not-so-obvious feminist pop cultural items. [Flavorwire]
Why do we treat the male contraceptive pill differently to the female pill? [Aeon Magazine]
Tony Abbott’s sexism is more than just a “gaffe”. [AusVotes2013]
Mark Ruffalo is pro-choice. [Stop Patriarchy]
What the Harriet Tubman “sex tape” means for black feminism. [Ms. Magazine]
Are politicians the new Ryan Gosling? [Daily Life]
And in the wake of last week’s “sex appeal”-gate, Cleo rates Canberra’s sexiest and unsexiest men. A step towards equality or should everyone just shut the eff up about it? [MamaMia]
Fuck “strong female characters”. [New Statesman]
Short and sweet this week.
Rape as a plot device. I’m reading Stephen King’s Under the Dome at the moment, in preparation to delve into the series which Clementine Ford cites in her article, and let me tell you, it is rife with unnecessary and gratuitous rape and violence against women. Even the characters’ inner monologues reek of misogyny. It should be interesting to see if the TV show is as heavily drenched in it as the print version. Judging by Ford’s article, it is. [Daily Life]
The racial politics of Beyonce’s hair. [Daily Beast]
Lady Gaga and cultural appropriation. [Jezebel]
Why do we care so much about other people’s sex lives, or lack thereof? [Jezebel]
Melissa Fabello makes some good points in her video about not wasting time on in-fighting about who’s a good feminist and who’s not, but you know me; I really think more people should proud to call themselves feminists and that not all supposedly feminist acts are created equal.
Speaking of, it’s no secret I’m Taylor Swift’s number one hater but over at One Week One Band the dissection of all things Swift is truly eye-opening if a bit fawning. I still think she’s a dolt with some seriously detrimental views about gender and sex, but it’s nice to look at her music from a different point of view for a change.
Anthony Weiner’s mistress, Sydney Leathers (what a name!) gives her top sexting advice. And it’s mind-numbingly mundane. [xoJane]
A call to arms for Twitter to do something about their complacency for rape threats and gender-based hatred from a woman who’s been there; the woman who was faced with a torrent of vitriolic abuse from Tyler, the Creator and his fans. [Daily Life]
Rachel Hills on Hugo Scwhyzer’s retirement from the online femisphere. [Musings of an Inappropriate Woman]
Bisexuality on The O.C. [Bitch]
Why are all TV serial killers’ victims women? [The Guardian]
Well, the 12th Doctor Who wasn’t a woman or a person of colour, as has recently been speculated, but is Peter Capaldi’s age progressive in itself? [TheVine]
Then again, maybe not. [Jezebel]
The sexual politics of Grindr. [The Guardian]
A really thought-provoking piece about the evolution of cooking. Meal preparation is the bane of my existence; I’d rather clean than cook. I find it so boring and time-consuming that if I was to come into a large chunk of money, I would seriously consider hiring a personal chef. Recently, I even privately mused about just ordering takeaway every night, but that isn’t necessarily in line with my ethical philosophies, not to mention health. [Daily Life]
Hugo Schwyzer has quit feminism. While a lot of feminists will be rejoicing at this fact, I actually like Hugo and will be sad to see his brand of male feminism disappear from the feminist interwebs. At least for now… [The Cut]
Twitter misogynists are finally getting their comeuppance. [Daily Life]
Camilla Peffer writes about the inherent sexism of Australia’s Next Top Model. [TheVine]
An interesting response to “I want to date you because you’re awesome”: “I want you to date me because I’m awesome”. [Pandagon]
“The Rape Joke”: a poem about being raped. *trigger warning* [The Awl]
The difference between the Melbourne murders of Jill Meagher and Tracy Connelly? Meagher was “the perfect victim” worthy of mourning while Connelly was just a prostitute. [The King’s Tribune]
But Wendy Squires posits that Meagher and Connelly were more similar than we think: they were both victims of predators who want to hurt women, regardless of their occupation. [The Age]
And it turns out the anonymous sex worker in Squires’ piece, above, was Tracy Connelly. [MamaMia]
Sex & the City‘s Samantha vs. Cougartown. [New York Magazine]
Is there such a thing as a bad Olsen twin movie? [Rookie]
Chris Brown, R. Kelly, Surfer Blood… What are we willing to overlook in order to enjoy pop culture? [Grantland]
How many times will you see your parents before they die? [See Your Folks]
“Bindi Irwin: Feminist Warrior?” [MamaMia]
In defence of Sex & the City. [The New Yorker]
And, furthermore, in defence of Miranda Hobbes. [Women & Hollywood]
Why women in sport matter. [Lip Mag]
How to ask about someone’s ethnicity the right way. [Jezebel]
Image via Ask Your Feet.
Where does Glee go next after the tragic death of Cory Monteith over the weekend? [Vulture]
Furthermore, Monteith as Finn Hudson embodied the fear of failure and being stuck in a small town with little to no prospects. Drawing on his real-life experiences, perhaps? [The Atlantic]
Got daddy issues? The ultimate TV father/lovers. [Daily Life]
I went to a Lady Gaga variety fundraising night and wrote about it for TheatrePress.
Is news bad for us? It is if it comes from The Daily Mail. [Daily Life]
Homosexuality in hip hop. [The Guardian]
Pacific Rim—the latest in a depressingly long line of films—fails the Bechdel test, hard. [Vulture]
The Pixar Theory: why Brave, Toy Story, Monsters Inc. et al are all linked together as part of the same story as opposed to different ones. The mind boggles. [Jon Negroni]
The underlying religious messages in Man of Steel. [EW Pop Watch]
Oh, goody! I’ve always wanted a system to chart how slutty I am. Gives a whole new meaning to the “slut barometre” Alyx Gorman discussed on TheVine a few weeks ago. [Slut Formula]
Why paedophiles Peter Truong and Mark Newton give same-sex parents a bad name. [ABC The Drum]
The Scarlett Woman 