On the (Rest of the) Net.

If you didn’t get a chance to catch Go Back to Where You Came From on SBS last night, Wednesday or Tuesday night’s, check it out on the website. Do yourself a favour: it really is eye-opening stuff, whichever side of the asylum-seeking fence you sit on (and you’d better be on the right one, dammit!). And here’s MamaMia’s Rick Morton’s take on the show.

Also at MamaMia, “The Weiner Photos”.

Who is Coco?

“The ‘Scary Dad’ Phenomenon.”

It’s a year today since Julia Gillard took over as Prime Minister of Australia.

According to Dilbert creator Scott Adams, men are square pegs in round, vagina-shaped holes. Consent or no.

The Angelina–Louis Vuitton–Cambodia debacle.

Gala Darling on body image and beauty in style blogging:

“… Whoever these girls are that we choose to compare ourselves to, they’re just living their lives—and honestly, if that makes us feel bad about OURselves, it is OUR issue.”

Well said, girlfriend!

Forget Women in Refrigerators. “Dead Men Defrosting.”

“Likes Girls”? Dianna Agron on equality.

Born this way, or pray the gay away? Jezebel, via Autostraddle.

“Liberals tend… to believe that the more socially liberal actions (deciding to make less money and help others) were when people were being true to themselves, and conservatives tend… to believe that socially conservative actions (renouncing homosexuality) were more authentic. So! That solves the case, no? Everyone thinks they’re right, in philosophy as everywhere else in the world.

“Maybe that’s true; maybe what matters are our opinions more than our choices or our biology.”

Freeman-Sheldon sufferer Jes Sachse and photographer Holly Norris challenge the hipster-sexy American Apparel ads with their own “American Able” series of images.

–Phobia and –Isms in Glee.

Now this is how you write an anti-SlutWalk article.

“Why I Walked the SlutWalk.”

Still with the SlutWalk, this time from a man’s perspective.

Girl with a Satchel on Bridesmaids, feminism, taste and “public v private appropriateness”.

Images via West Coast Show, Fell Down the Rabbit Hole, MamaMia.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

The disturbing, tragic life of Hustler’s Larry Flynt.

Dubai isn’t the pink-buildinged, “Middle-Eastern Shangri-La” of materialistic Sex & the City movies it’s made out to be.

“All Work, (Almost) No Pay” for the Washington Redskins Cheerleaders. Fascinating stuff.

The cult of Oprah.

The case for women to serve in combat roles in the armed forces.

Hypocrisy and “male narcissism” in “political sex scandals”.

Got a problem with SlutWalk? Finally, some solutions to make it better.

Also, for all you anti-SlutWalkers out there, This is What Slut-Shaming Looks Like”:

“1. Was I suppose to just take it in stride that random pervs found out where my little sister went to high school and speculated about whether she, too, would become a ‘whore’? An anonymous asshole emailed her last fall asking her that. Don’t tell me that’s normal criticism.

“2. What about the manufactured ‘scandal’ that Internet vigilantes began in hopes of getting my boyfriend kicked out of his Ph.D program? They decided to email the entire sociology faculty list. I was a junior at the time in the same department. Do you have any idea how incredibly difficult it is to force yourself to graduate when your professors have all read about how you’re supposedly being ‘raped’ on a regular basis? That is not criticism.

“3. Is trying to get me fired also normal? In 2009, when I was working for an education non-profit during my time off from Harvard, someone wrote a fake article about how my employer was so embarrassed to have hired a ‘porn blogger’. There were made-up quotes from ‘company reps’. They disseminated it online, not realizing that I actually told my boss about my blog during my initial interview. (He emailed me the article and totally had my back. It was one of the most touching things I’ve ever experienced from an employer, no joke.)”

I originally blew off Roseanne Barr’s New York Magazine take on sexism in Hollywood. But I read it this week and couldn’t recommend it enough. Great writing.

The Smurfette principle:

“Little girls learn to split their consciousness, filtering their dreams and ambitions through boy characters while admiring the clothes of the princess. The more privileged and daring can dream of becoming exceptional women in a man’s world—Smurfettes. The others are being taught to accept the more usual fate, which is to be a passenger car drawn through life by a masculine train engine. Boys, who are rarely confronted with stories in which males play only minor roles, learn a simpler lesson: girls just don’t matter much.”

This article on the sexual misconduct of AFL players from 2008 is just as pertinent today.

“In Defence of Prudes.”

“Women are pieces of art, men aren’t”?

What is the average Australian’s yearly income?

Sarah Ayoub-Christie writes her final post for Wordsmith Lane.

Why Psychology Today hates women.

How the celeb sex tape ruined America (NSFW).

On the (Rest of the) Net.

(No images this week as I’ve maxed out my broadband limit watching Grey’s Anatomy online!)

Style blog as “unapologetic narcissism”?

“Here is a beautiful slender girl who is constantly posting photos of herself wearing somewhat predicable outfits… Does she really have amazing style or is it just simply the case of a pretty girl wearing denim shorts and a knitted jumper?… How long can this low-on-substance form of blogging survive?’

“I am not your sex-crazy nympho dreamgirl!” at The Good Men Project, via Jezebel:

“… Surely he’d prefer the sexy, fake, plastic dreamgirl shell?

“[This]… image includes a lot of behavioural stuff: the way you squirm, the way you moan, being Super Excited about everything the guy wants to do, and Always Being Up for It—whatever ‘It’ is. When people think about ‘good in bed’, for a woman, that’s often what they think.

“This image also includes being young and thin and cisgendered of course, and that can be problematic.”

“Rihanna Shoots Her Rapist in Her New Video”, “Man Down”.

And here’s Fox News’ take on the video:

“ ‘Man Down’ is an inexcusable, shock-only, shoot-and-kill theme song. In my thirty years of viewing BET [Black Entertainment Television], I have never witnessed such a cold, calculated execution of murder in primetime.

“… She sings that she killed a man when she ‘lost her cool’ because ‘he was playing her for a fool’. This garbage from the same woman who publicly bragged to Rolling Stone recently that she likes to be spanked and tied up… Rihanna gets to have it both ways—accuse Chris Brown of domestic violence and be violent herself—because she’s a woman.”

What does Lady Gaga really have left to say?

The racism and “ugly women” involved in the Arnold Schwarzenegger scandal.

Beyonce: running the world or copying the cat?

The “endangered” and “reclusive” “North American Obeast”.

The World According to Paris [Hilton]: Same Shit, Different Show.”

Special needs kids as prom king and queen. Yay!

How many handbags do you need?

Rebecca Sparrow on Carbon Cate’s fallout:

“So who are these celebs to be loaning their support to such causes? Who are they not to be? Fame’s sidekick is a bloody big, unrelenting spotlight. With the trappings of fame comes a responsibility, I believe, to shine that light on causes you believe in. And while anonymous donations and clandestine charity work are noble—public giving, supporting and encouraging can—literally—save lives. Make a difference. Raise awareness.

“And frankly, I’d rather see [George] Clooney pimping his fame for Darfur than, say, Nespresso.”

On the (Rest of the) Net.

 

On the censorship of Andrej Pejic’s Dossier cover:

“… why is Pejic’s cover getting the same treatment as a porno mag? What message are the big bookstore chains sending—that the male torso is only appropriate [for] all-ages viewing when the man in question is ripped?”

Mia Freedman on when life begins.

SlutWalker Leslie Cannold on “the right to be equally mediocre”.

Speaking of SlutWalk, the Melbourne event’s coordinator, Clem Bastow, writes on the event for the Sydney Morning Herald.

The ostentatious disgustingness of “Push Presents”.

Glee: give fat girls a chance.

 The militant atheist doesn’t exist.

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s infidelity and Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s sexual assault allegations are one in the same, according to “The Media’s Groping Problem”.

In the same vein: why powerful men sexually assault women.

From Texas’ hottest sex offenders to Strauss-Kahn’s “hot-or-not” accuser.

What would “a word where Aspergers was the norm” look like? “Girls who spend hours a day straightening their hair are recommended for counselling,” amongst other things.

Rebecca Sparrow on “Hollywood’s Fake Teenagers”.

As if we didn’t need another reason to love Mick Foley: the Huffington Post names him their “Greatest Person of the Day”.

Meghan McCain rips the sexist and sizist Glenn Beck a new one.

Much to my mother’s—and her fellow kindy mums’—dismay, my big-for-her-age, four-year-old sister refused to walk to preschool, so Mum was forced to push her in a stroller. Check out Too Big For Stroller for more on this hideous phenomenon.

Are child murderers born evil or created?

In the case of toddler James Bulger’s murderers (one of whom re-offended after being released and is now back in jail), and Dontez Tillman and Thomas McCloud, who beat and tortured “two homeless men over the course of two days”, I tend to lean towards them being “born that way”. If Law & Order and Criminal Minds have taught us anything, it’s that children who demonstrate these kinds of behaviours usually turn out to be sociopathic serial killers.

Image via Queer Me Up, Psychology Today, Even Without Popcorn.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

 

“The Class Boundaries of Veronica Mars.”

Why the Body Image Advisory Group’s voluntary code of conduct didn’t work.

Rachel Hills on the internet, artifice and being fake.

“The New Middleton Class”.

Speaking of the Middleton’s, Melinda Tankard Reist takes issue with the admiration of Pippa’s ass online:

“The FB site provides an opportunity for men everywhere to share their sexual fantasies for the young maid of honour. Knock her up, bash her in, cause her injury such that she would not be able to walk. Wrecking and shredding a woman’s anus is a popular porn script.

“And all this is supposed to be accepted as a compliment. Of course there are no ‘Pippa the Wonderfully Supportive Sister Appreciation Societies’ or other pages lauding her gifts and character and other non-body related attributes.”

Bret Easton Ellis on the spectacle that is Charlie Sheen.

“Filling the Gaps” in the online feminist community’s “call-out culture”.

In what was Elizabeth Taylor’s last interview, with Kim Kardashian for US Harper’s Bazaar, she divulges her thoughts on living like a queen, the Krupp diamond and Twitter. I was never a fan of Taylor, but this interview made me one.

What does it mean to be a feminist today?

Is the male body “Repulsive or Beautiful?”

Ever been hollered at in the street as you walk past a construction site? “Why Men Cat Call” sounds interesting, but is disappointingly dismal.

Amélie sex (noun): intercourse undertaken in the classic missionary position which, by itself, is not objectionable—during which the male is impervious to the female’s lack of enjoyment.”

The bromance VS. Bridesmaids“Homance”.

Don’t give up your day job: “Freelancing on the Side.”

Images via I Just Have So Many Feelings, Sydney Morning Herald.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

Embrace your inner slut:

“If someone calls you a slut, there’s nothing you can say to refute the claim because it never had any cognitive content anyway.

“If you try to argue that you’re not a slut, you’re implicitly buying into the idea that there are sluts out there. If there’s some criterion that will set you free, that standard will indict someone else—someone with a higher ‘number,’ or shorter skirt, or a later curfew. So we get bogged down in slut/non-slut border skirmishes over a line nobody should have tried to draw in the first place, and we all lose.

“Even virginity is not a defense against alleged sluttiness. Virgins can be sluts if they dress the wrong way, walk the wrong way, or even instill the wrong thoughts in other people. Some people will convict you of sluttitude because your body is the wrong shape, or the right shape.”

Sluts just can’t win. That’s why you should (as above) embrace your inner slut and join the SlutWalk next weekend in Melbourne, at the State Library from 1pm. I’ll be blogging more about this throughout next week.

Glee’s Mercedes just can’t get a date!

Video vixen VS. female bodybuilders:

“It is not ‘respectable’ to be black, female, voluptuous, and sexy on a stage for profit, but it is perfectly acceptable to be black, female, muscular, and ‘unsexy’. Is this double standard acceptable? Is one profession truly more sexualized than the other?”

I don’t entirely agree with this hypothesis. I think it’s far more acceptable to be conventionally and femininely sexy, as opposed to muscular and unconventionally masculine. Sure, the video vixen job title isn’t exactly perceived as a classy, “respectable” occupation, but neither is female bodybuilding. Society as a whole would much rather see women shaking what they were born with (or, you know, what the plastic surgeon gave them) than manipulating their bodies via hormones and free weights.

The surrogacy debate rages on at MamaMia

“$150,000 Doesn’t Make You Rich. Discuss.” Okay, I will: I come from a family where my mother stayed home with my sister and I, and my dad worked three jobs at some stages. I was very young then, so I have no idea how much money he brought in. But I can tell you, it sure as hell wasn’t $150,000, and we struggled to keep our heads above water week-to-week. We never had savings, we could never go on family holidays that required much travel because we couldn’t afford flights or accommodation. I missed out on all but one of my seven cousins’ weddings because we couldn’t make it interstate. My parents have only bought two houses in their lifetime: the other nine we resided in throughout my lifetime were rentals. I also don’t know how much my dad makes now, but it is a lot less than $100,000, and my mum’s on a pension. In my opinion, $150,000 a year is rich.

“Opposition leader Tony Abbott says the Government is punishing ‘aspiration and hard work’,” with the new middle class welfare breaks. Is working three jobs and hardly being able to see your family not hard work, Mr. Abbott?

How to deal with your boyfriend’s porn-watching habit.

The argument for Pixar movie heroines who aren’t princesses, “from all the girls with band-aids on their knees”.

The perils of being smiled at by a cute guy in a café when you’re not wearing makeup.

Texas’ “10 Hottest Female Sex Offenders”. “No doubt that 4-year-old boy, that 2-year-old boy and that 13-year-old girl are taking solace even as we speak that at least they were abused, molested and assaulted by a hot person.”

Hillary Clinton, brownies and Vanity Fair’s cover line.

The aftermath of the royal wedding and the state of Britain’s monarchy for the next 30 years.

Gay/straight chicken: when straight men insult homosexuality and “gay men insult women”.

“Is Kate Hudson Coasting on Cuteness?” My money is on “yes”. When was the last time she starred in a box-office smash, or was nominated for an award other than a Razzie?

Images via Jezebel, Fashion Fame.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

 

These iconic images, taken by photographer Lennart Nilsson for Life magazine in 1965, and later used for pro-life propaganda materials, have actually been taken of aborted embryos, not living fetuses in the womb:

“Although claiming to show the living fetus, Nilsson actually photographed abortus material obtained from women who terminated their pregnancies under the liberal Swedish law. Working with dead embryos allowed Nilsson to experiment with lighting, background and positions, such as placing the thumb into the fetus’ mouth.”

“Does Carrying Condoms Make You Easy?” Will.I.Am seems to think so.

Erica Bartle on maintaining the balance between “frothy and bubbly and frivolous” and her passion for writing about her faith and God on Girl with a Satchel, which she understands can sometimes be “like receiving a knock on the door from a Jehovah’s Witness  (or a pamphlet in the postbox)” for some. (Okay, I’ll admit it: I’m one of them.) Food for “critical thought”.

Should the government be pouring money into funding to fight domestic violence against women and children, when there are also men who are victims of domestic violence out there?

Girl crush porn in Mia Freedman’s new weekly post, “A Week in the Life” on MamaMia.

The importance of “good, old-fashioned” sub-editing.

How to be a Playboy Club Bunny, circa 1968.

Love, domestic violence and Gossip Girl.

On Hillary Clinton being photoshopped out of the situation room photo in Hasidic newspaper Der Tzitung:

“The religious paper never publishes pictures of women, as they could be considered ‘sexually suggestive.’ Apparently the presence of a woman, any woman, being all womanly and sexy all over the United States’ counterterrorism efforts was too much for the editors of Der Tzitung to handle…

Der Tzitung edited Hillary Clinton out of the photo, thereby changing history. To my mind, this act of censorship is actually a violation of the Jewish legal principle of g’neivat da’at (deceit).”

Would you rather be blind or obese? According to an Arizona State University study, 1 in 6 women would choose the former…

Images via The Hairpin, Sociological Images.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

 

Porn star Stoya Tweets, “If you think pubic hair on a woman is unnatural or weird, you aren’t mature enough to be touching vaginas.” You go, girl!

Beware hot baths in winter: they can cause heart attacks!

Celebrities and mental illness.

I was absolutely disgusted by Bob Ellis’ take on the ADFA sex scandal on ABC’s The Drum Unleashed, comparing the unconsented filming of a young female cadet during sex to the girls discussing last night’s date on Sex & the City. Here are some choice excerpts:

“Let us imagine the girl agreed to be filmed, and then, afterwards, being mocked for it, and flabbergasted by the number of leering hoons who saw the film, made the complaint. Would that then occasion the sacking of her commanding officer, the court-martial of fifteen or twenty of her fellow recruits, and the bastardising of her lover?

“… She would have been mortified. She would have cursed for months the prurient observers of her bed games. She would have railed at them in the canteen. She would have sobbed on the phone to her mother. She would have attracted some sympathy. She would almost certainly have got over it… And she might… have married the boy.”

“… They, and we, should be careful when we attend too closely to what occurs in a bedroom consensually, and how we punish either participant.

“… Is the young woman, moreover, to be named, and acclaimed, and promoted, and hereafter entrusted with frontline command on some field of battle? Who would trust her in any high army position? Who would be sure she was truthful? Or sound of judgment? Or loyal? Or reliable under fire?”

To end, he makes sure we know that group sex didn’t occur, “as it sometimes does in traveling footballers’ motel rooms”, as if that somehow makes it okay.

Kim Powell writes in response at News with Nipples about Ellis’ assertion that (male) society owns female bodies, as he began the above piece by reminiscing about an old M.A.S.H. episode in which the shower Hot Lips Houlihan is using is lifted by a crane and the menfolk gaze at her naked body.

Girl with a Satchel posts a smashing review of Tina Fey’s Bossypants.

Vintage Gala Darling, circa 2005. Glad to see she hasn’t changed :).

“7 Reasons to Get Excited About the Royal Wedding”… one week later!

In relation, is Princess Catherine doomed to repeat the same fate as Diana? A royal comparison.

Also, “Jessica Rudd shines some perspective on the wedding and the Republic.”

Much to my chagrin, tanning beds are safe… for some things!

Sarah Wilson on private schooling:

“I know parents want to provide the best for their own kids… I don’t know that fancy pools and excursions to Tuscany make for a better education.”

“Things Fat People Are Told”:

“If a fat person defied any of these pronouncements in any way, they spoke of having their lives and experiences denied. They couldn’t really have low blood pressure. They couldn’t really be getting married.

“The hostility fat people experience is extreme. One woman spoke about being on an operating table for a C-section and having a surgeon mock her fat, suggesting they get rid of it while they’ve got her open. Another spoke of sitting in an ambulance while a police officer refused to believe she was raped. Others were told they should be happy to have been sexually assaulted. We heard about how transgender persons were belittled for being too fat to pass. We heard about fat people who were sick and were denied treatment until they lost weight. Fat mothers were told they were selfish for being fat because they would orphan their children. Or that their children would never love them. Or that they’d just ruin their children’s lives so maybe the baby should just die in the womb.”

Lisa Simpson would “totally be a Jezebel reader if she were human.”

Images via Jezebel.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

 

“The Evolution of April O’Neil.”

Both MamaMia & Melinda Tankard-Reist have run stories on footballers behaving badly, after the  New Zealand Warriors rugby team drafted Shaun Metcalf, who spent 18 months in jail for rallying a couple of his teammates to help him kick his pregnant teen girlfriend to cause her to miscarriage. Tankard-Reist writes:

“One of Metcalf’s key defenders and outspoken advocates is Celia Lashlie… [says]:

‘We can all get caught up in the emotional image of young men booting a young woman in the stomach to cause her to abort her baby, but these were two young people … she got pregnant, he was way out of his depth, and he did a really cruel and dumb thing.

‘He was caught in the moment, and what he did was the equivalent of a young man putting a noose around his neck because his girlfriend tossed him out. He has to be allowed to move forward and put his life together, and I think the ability of the NRL and the Warriors to take this young man in and help him do that is role modelling and something they should get credit for’…

“Oh no, we wouldn’t want to get caught up in an image of young footballers playing football with the pregnant womb of a 15-year old girl now would we?

“‘The equivalent of putting the noose around his neck’? No, it was the equivalent of putting a noose around her neck—and the neck of her child. Laslie paints the act as some kind of self-punishment. But he wasn’t assaulted. He wasn’t trying to protect the child he was carrying. It wasn’t he who might lose his life.”

“Glorified pimp” Kris Jenner VS. the “strong of character” Khloe Kardashian on her new reality show, Khloe & Lamar.

Katy Perry and Britney Spears celebrate a pop apocalypse in their new singles on Girl with a Satchel.

Also at GWAS, Erica Bartle writes in response to Mia Freedman’s take on the relevance and influence of magazines, and what that means for women.

This makes me even more upset that my body corporate won’t allow Foxtel installation: MamaMia has their own TV show on SkyNews, Tuesday nights at 8pm. Congrats to the MamaMia team; they really are showing that the blogosphere is the new media frontier.

How to make the real-life Barbie doll.

Is this what 43 looks like?

Rebecca Black’s “Friday” is more popular on—wait for it…—Fridays! Who knew?!

Hugo Schwyzer on perfection, “good guys” and respect in relationships:

“… Many young women conclude that happiness is something that you only get when you get to your goal weight. And even more troublingly, when it comes to relationships, lots of straight girls think that if their own bodies aren’t perfect, they have no right to expect too much from guys.”

Apparently, leading a sedentary, office-bound life can lead to heart disease and other health problems. Not good news for bloggers…!

Do Spanx make the world a better place?:

“… My world is a better place when I can fucking breathe. My world is a better place when someone is not trying to convince me that making myself into a human sausage will make the world a better place.”

Vintage STD-warning posters. Oh, the misogyny!

“The Public Health Problem No One Wants to Talk About”: Stillbirth.

“Stop Being ‘Shocked’ by ‘Isms’” of the rac- and sex- persuasions. And trans- and homophobia while we’re at it.

Sexualised violence is the new black.

The real-life The Wrestler: the tragic life-story of Chris Kanyon.

The perils of the unfinished book.

How to raise boys well.

Images via Jezebel, MamaMia.

On the (Rest of the) Net Comes a Day Early.

As tomorrow is Good Friday (Friday, gotta get down on Good Friday), the international day of mourning sleeping in, On the (Rest of the) Net is arriving a day early. Enjoy, and happy Easter!

If you read only one thing this Easter weekend, make it Hadley Freeman’s “Rape is Not a Compliment” on The Guardian.

Rick Morton with “6 Arguments Against Women Serving in Combat Roles (And Why They’re Dodgy)”.

The pros and cons of trash reality TV and its treatment of women.

MamaMia has picked up Airiel Clark’s “Slut-Shaming on the Playground”, as well.

The view from the other side of the burqa is not one I agree with, but it’s a valid one nonetheless:

“Before you scream your disagreement, which many of you may do as a knee-jerk reaction to being told you’re also oppressed, stop and think. Look around you; contemplate society today, and its values, its aspirations, its goals, its direction, its past-times, its hobbies….

“What good has it done for images of uncovered made-up women to be plastered on every billboard and magazine, on the TV, in the movies, and on the net?

“The women in the images may aptly feel good about themselves for a while, but what does it mean for every other women?

“Women who look upon these images usually become anxious, jealous, unsure and critical of themselves, or all of these things. Many men who view them will become aroused, or even unhappy, less satisfied with the partners they already have. What can, and does this lead to?

“Cheating, dumping, chastisement, and even harassment of other women, and even children, by men who cannot find a legitimate outlet for their constant arousal.

“And yes, I can hear some of you; ‘then the men must control themselves!’ Frankly speaking that argument is well spent, not to mention futile, as most men are, inherently, only able to react to that, the same way a hungry lion would react if thrown a juicy piece of steak, and told not to eat it…”

Shades of Sheik El-Hilaly’s “uncovered meat” statement, don’t you think?

Gemma Ward makes her return to the newsstand.

“What to Wear for SlutWalk”:

“Wear anything you like, the organisers told me when I emailed them…

“SlutWalk will feature people in all sorts of garments and gear, dressed for the office, clubbing, yoga, walking the dog, whatever it is that people wear as they go about their lives not asking to be raped.”

A behind-the-scenes look at how Mia Freedman’s Sunday Life profile pictures go down.

Also at MamaMia, Freedman writes on Paper Giants (more on that to come next week; oh, the perils of not yet being digital TV-ready!), Park St, and the relevance and demise of magazines in 2011.

Nina Funnell on the “appalling” and “exploitative” nature of child beauty pageants.

“Gym. Tan. Laundry. Discuss.” The social politics of Jersey Shore.

She-Ra gets a fashionable makeover for a good cause.