Brynne Edelsten’s “No Barbie”, But Should She Aspire to Be?

In this week’s Who magazine, Dancing with the Stars contestant Brynne Edelsten (formerly Gordon) divulges her “normal” childhood in “a modest four-bedroom home” in Oklahoma, and says that while she played with Barbies, don’t mistake her for one.

I’ve blogged numerous times about the virtues of Barbie; I jut don’t think she’s a damaging toy—or role model—for girls.

Edelsten, on the other hand, may be sweet and “shy”, but she’s got a long way to go if she wants to be viewed as someone other than Geoffrey Edelsten’s young, surgically enhanced trophy wife and un-co DWTS contestant.

Whereas Barbie is smart, confident, does dare to bare on the red carpet like Edelsten, but never looks trashy and, judging from her numerous careers in the physical field, is bodily synchronised. Then again, it’s hard not to be when you’re plastic.

Edelsten seems harmless enough, and the Who article reveals that she wants to be taken more seriously as not just Geoffrey Edelsten’s “shallow, pretty” wife.

She unbelievably survived the first elimination on DWTS; overcoming the odds. Now that’s something Barbie could relate to.

Related: Toy Story 3’s Barbie: Not as Dumb as She Looks.

Don’t Just Blame Barbie.

Is There Really a Beauty Myth?

Prime Minister Barbie.

In Defence of Barbie.

Toy Story 3’s Barbie—Not as Dumb as She Looks.

 

I recently re-watched Toy Story 3 after seeing it originally in cinemas last year. Barbie never ceases to amaze me, and I, like, really relate to her bubbly air-head exterior and smart and assertive interior. Here, her exact words on Lot-So’s dictatorship, which could totes be applied to Muammar Gaddafi and the situation in Libya:

“Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Elsewhere: [Free Frank Warner] Barbie’s Words on “The Consent of the Governed”.

Image via Free Frank Warner.

Don’t Just Blame Barbie.

 

From “Barbie Doll With Life-Sized Proportions is Ridiculous, Scary” by Whitney Jefferson on Jezebel:

“As a pop-cultural icon, Barbie is often used as art to express one’s own personal opinions and views. Girls see female body images everywhere today and it’s critical that parents and caregivers provide perspective on what they are seeing. It’s important to remember that Barbie is a doll who stands 11.5 inches tall and weights 7.25 ounces—she was never modeled on the proportions of a real person.”

Elsewhere: [Jezebel] Barbie Doll With Life-Sized Proportions is Ridiculous, Scary.

Images via Guardian, Fashion Doll Guide, Angelic Accents.

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.

 

Megan Fox’s body politics:

“… You have a picture of said body—made even thinner through creative posing—that’s used to sell underwear. In other words, she is paid to be thin. Period. All the talk about her abs and her weight-training regimen don’t have anything to do with the reality: Her body is her business. Literally. It’s her business, not ours, whether she’s healthy—that’s between Ms. Fox and her doctor. And it’s her business—an integral part of her financial strategy—to be thin.”

This is a superb, graphic and thought-provoking piece of writing on waxing, vaginoplasty and the ubiquity of female lady-parts. Semi-NSFW, but I recommend reading it at any cost:

“… while we can look over with horror at a tribe of women who claim that if their five-year-old happened to bleed excessively after having her clitoris cut off, that she must have been a witch, here in our own backyard, we give it some fancy name like vaginoplasty and somehow it’s less archaic? Goodness, we’re so civilized.”

Bern Morley on song lyrics and what we let our children listen to. Good stuff.

The double standards of cheating. FYI, I don’t agree with them.

Sachar Mathias divulges her favourite black dolls. Does this make-shift Michael Jackson Ken count? It is circa late ’90s/early ’00s—his face mask, baby-dangling period—so maybe not…

Anti-Semitism in the fashion house of Christian Dior goes further back than just John Galliano’s comments.

James Franco was a jerk to Kristina Wong. I think he’s a jerk in general.

CNN recently published an article asking if “whites are racially oppressed?” That’s like saying there needs to be an international men’s day if there’s a women’s one. Seriously, someone tried to argue that to me last week!

Charlie Sheen and “The Disposable Woman”.

Thanks for the shoutout, Beauty Redefined.

Celebrities behaving badly: who’s responsible?:

“But is it the responsibility of the media to be the moral gatekeepers of what we should and shouldn’t know about? Is it their responsibility to diagnose supposed ‘mental illness’ and on that basis, stop reporting on certain stories?

“… If drug addled celebrities on the front pages didn’t sell, they wouldn’t be there. So is the problem us? Just who is egging on who[m] here?”

Alissa Warren is a bit unsure if Waity Kaity is the royal for her.

Rick Morton on Pauline Hanson’s political return.

Images via Jezebel, Carlen Altman.

Lisa Simpson—Girl Wonder.

 

From Fuck Yeah Lisa Simpson, by Shoshana Funk:

“I would like to take a moment to thank the first person to show me what feminism is and how amazing it can really be… I am talking about none other than Lisa Simpson! As merely a second grader, Lisa is probably the youngest and most fearless feminist TV icon of our time. ‘Animated and liberated,’ Lisa is a little girl-power gem tucked inside a satirical cartoon world devoid of real values that is tucked inside our actual culture of decaying ideals. (It’s the Turducken of social commentary, if you will.) Can you imagine a girl character like that even being invented today? Sure, Meg Griffin has some Lisa-esque qualities, but she mainly serves as a placeholder for the butt of jokes about how pathetic teen girls can be. Lisa, on the other hand, reminded me I was a feminist before I even knew what the word meant.

“Remember when she launched that crusade against the Malibu Stacy doll (i.e. Barbie) because it said something like, ‘Don’t ask me, I’m just a girl ha ha’?… Remember how she played saxophone, loved Simone de Beauvoir, was staunchly vegetarian, and aspired to be a Supreme Court Justice? So thank you, Matt Groening, for giving us a tiny, yellow, subversive, and intelligent feminist child to look up to over the past 20 years.”

Elsewhere: [Fuck Yeah Lisa Simpson] Shoshana Funk.

Image via Fuck Yeah Lisa Simpson.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

 

The perils of pants-less ladies.

Does Gossip Girl care about women in politics?

Bryce Corbett in defence of Nicole Kidman:

“… it seems to me that Nicole Kidman is engaged in what must be a most dissatisfying unrequited love affair with her homeland. She flies to Australia to pimp her country on Oprah. She makes a film with Baz Luhrmann which (whatever you may have thought of the final product) was a massive shot in the arm for the local film industry and a two-hour love-song to her country of birth. She fronts up to G’Day USA every year to flog the myriad wonders of Down Under. And following the Victorian bushfires, she donated half-a-million dollars of her own money to the Red Cross relief fund. What a cow.”

“Sexual Assault & the Super Bowl.”

Anna Chong, a designer from the London College of Fashion, has re-imagined Lady Gaga’s most popular get-ups into Barbie-sized outfits. But she’s not the first to do it

“Why is Captain America Ruling Our Screens & Not Wonder Woman?”

Seinfeld’s Elaine Benes as modern-day hipster fashion icon.

The New York Times profiles “nice-guy blogger” Jared Eng on his “cheery, quotidian, Britney-goes-to-Starbucks” blog, JustJared.com.

Also at The New York Times, The Catcher in the Rye’s Holden Caulfield is un-relatable.

Jacob Lambert on “The Paper-Reader’s Dilemma”:

“No longer are books being pitted against pixels; pointing out that paper isn’t reflective either seems very 2007.  The war is now between tablets, as if the book never existed at all.”

Yet more dispelling of the Nicole Kidman vitriol, this time in a vintage (2008) article on Girl with a Satchel.

In the same vein of “17 Arguments Against Gay Marriage & Why They’re Bollocks” and “10 Things You Need to Understand About Asylum Seekers”, comes John Birmingham’s defence of Sandra Reynolds, via MamaMia.

I’d been searching for this article for awhile to reference in a few Lady Gaga musings, and finally came across it again last week and re-read it in the bath. Bliss. A fine example of quality journalism.

Reblogged from Fuck Yeah, Gender Studies, Rachel Hills runs a post on the question of “Who Sexualises Children?”:

“God, it doesn’t even make sense—HOW can a child be sex vixen? When I look at a child, I see a child. Regardless of costume. Dressed like Mary Poppins or dressed like Britney Spears, a kid is a kid! If you see something sexual, the problem is with you.”

I haven’t been shy about my hatred of Charlie Sheen (I know hate is a strong word, but honestly, he is a despicable human being), especially when he gets a free pass because he happens to be the star of TV’s most successful show, while Lindsay Lohan’s career is in ruins. Jezebel reiterates this:

“In recent years no stars (with the possible exception of the oddly lovable Celebrity Rehab cast members) have had their problems with addiction more publicized than Charlie and Lindsay. However, the way these stars are treated by the media and the public is vastly different, mainly due to the double standard for female celebrities.

“The scorn for Lindsay is particularly strange because compared to Charlie, she’s only hurting herself. Let’s review some of Lindsay’s biggest tabloid scandals: Two DUI arrests, four stays in rehab, missing numerous court hearings, going to jail for failing a drug test, battling bulimia, battling her father, and breaking up with her girlfriend. As for Charlie, he’s been in and out of rehab for years, he “accidentally” shot fiancee Kelly Preston in the arm, he was named as a frequent visitor to brothels owned by Heidi Fleiss, he’s dated numerous porn stars, he ODed on cocaine, allegedly shoved Denise Richards and verbally abused her during their marriage, and was arrested for domestic violence against Brooke Mueller, but avoided jail time due to a plea deal. Lindsay has never been married and has no children. Charlie has been married three times and has five kids, four of whom are under the age of 10.”

Forget Computer Engineer Barbie—Barbie as Sociopath.

 

“Behind the vacuous perpetual lipsticked-smile lurks the black heart of the true sociopath, just like in real life,” says artist Mariel Clayton of her “Bad Barbie” series, which sees the blonde beauty as sociopath. Very American Psycho

Related: American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis Review.

Elsewhere: [Jezebel] “Bad Barbie” Stars in Bloody Photoshoot.

Valley of the Dolls.

 

From “The Tyranny of Self-Perfection” by Anne Summers on The Australian website:

“… voicing her concerns that, overall, women were slipping backwards from the promise of equality that she, the daughter of a feminist, had grown up with. Another guest demurred: ‘Young women now have good role models, they are forging ahead,’ Anne McElvoy, deputy editor of the London Evening Standard told her ‘Why do you think things are bad for them?’

“It is entirely possible that McElvoy had never seen a Bratz doll or watched a Lady Gaga video. Unless she has young daughters or other close relatives she might not be aware of the ubiquity of pink or the Playboy logos that are now de rigueur adornments on the pencil cases of the pre-teen set.

“This reviewer has to confess a comparable ignorance. Sure, I’ve seen little girls dressed inappropriately for travel in pink tutus at airports. I’ve checked myself from disapproving of the skimpy outfits sported by 10-year-old daughters of friends. Gee, I still thought Barbie was bad.

“It’s partly that she now has daughters and has discovered that the ‘slutty and sultry’ Bratz with its wardrobe for clubbing and shopping has displaced innocent blonde Barbie as the top-selling doll for girls. It’s partly the growing use of the language of liberationmost often the word ‘empowering’to describe the new sexual thraldom. And it’s also the realisation that ‘the rhetoric of choice may have burgeoned in this generation, but in many ways the range of female characters and role models available for young girls has narrowed’.

“Girls want to be WAGS, ‘glamour models’ (pose naked without displaying genitals) or even prostitutes because they have been led to believe that these vocations will deliver them the celebrity lifestyle so relentlessly documented in magazines and on television…”

… and in the aisles of toy stores, too, if the Bratz pack has anything to do with it.

Elsewhere: [The Australian] The Tyranny of Self-Perfection.

On the (Rest of the) Net.

 

“A Guide to Eating Food Off the Floor.”

Feminist Themes’ regular “Wait… What?” column features The View co-host, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, and her take on the pro-choice versus pro-life debate.

In The Atlantic’s thought provoking piece on “The End of White America?”, Hua Hsu “discuss[es] Obama, football, hip-hop, and the elusive notion of a ‘post-racial’ society.”

Pandagon responds to Susan Faludi’s piece on third-wave feminism (which I haven’t read yet, but expect it to be included in an upcoming On the [Rest of the] Net), in which “she puts out evidence that younger feminists are sometimes unfair and ungrateful to older feminists, and that older feminists are sometimes so afraid of younger women that they go out of their way to exclude them… complaining that younger women don’t care.” Furthermore:

“… she reinforces a jumble of often conflicting stereotypes on younger feminists to discredit us: that we’re obsessed with navel-gazing over activism, that our obsession with technology comes at the expense of actual work, that we don’t know our history and don’t care about systemic issues, that we’re materialist[ic] and unwilling to challenge sexual exploitation for fear of pissing off men, that we’re so busy cultivating our graduate degrees writing about Lady Gaga… that we can’t be bothered to worry about real world issues.”

I do agree with some of this summary of Faludi’s piece, but Lady Gaga’s meat dress drew attention to vegetarianism, animal welfare and gay rights. They’re, like, real world issues, aren’t they?

Liz Greene delivers some particularly poignant points on parental relationships and “the family triangle” in “The Eternal Triangle”.

Buffy is “The Third Wave’s Final Girl”.

Jezebel reasons “Why Glee Still Needs to Work on Diversity”, while Brittany and Santana are “Queer Idols”:

“It wasn’t even until halfway through Glee’s first season that the first hint of queerness was even mentioned… Maybe you’d call it bisexual, maybe you’d call it heteroflexible, maybe you’d call it bicurious: whatever they are, it’s definitely a bit queer… Brittany is, if you will, an equal opportunity slut: one who’s willing to make out with whatever hotness crosses her path, regardless of gender… And among fellow fans of the show, my designation of Brittany and Santana as queer icons has met with some derision: their relationship is played for laughs, I’ve been told. They’re just straight girls making out for male attention… [But]… with the exception of their joint date with Finn, Brittany and Santana have hardly been shown using their relationship to win over boys… For me, Brittany and Santana represent a new mode of queer figure… : fluidly sexual, comfortable with same sex contacts, and more interested in finding happiness than finding the right label. They may not fit into the rigid structures of traditional sexual identities, but they’re comfortable enough with themselves not to care.”

More Jezebel: They’ve really been getting on the “slut-shaming bandwagon”, especially with their endorsement of Easy A. Now, they give their take on the “Ancient Slut-Shaming” of Cleopatra, as well as the “sexual double standards” on Jersey Shore. About the latter, they say:

“… The slut-shaming of Angelina… revealed their thoughts on sexual double standards. (The ‘thoughts’ being that sexual double standards exist, and that’s just the way it is.)… Pauly said about Angelina: ‘She brought all these random people home. She’s a girl. You don’t do that. That’s a guy thing. Guy’s do that, no girls.’… Shouldn’t Pauly and The Situation be grateful for sluts? If there were no sluts then they would never be able to have sex. Do they think for one minute that they would even want to live in a world in which all girls acted the way they’re ‘supposed’ to?”

“Who Stole Feminism?”, asks The Nation. Sarah Palin, Christine O’Donnell and all those right-wing extremists, that’s who!

“Sarah Palin opposes abortion and comprehensive sex education. While mayor of Wasilla she made sexual assault victims pay for their own rape kits. She also calls herself a feminist. Delaware GOP Senate nominee Christine O’Donnell has said that allowing women to attend military academies ‘cripples the readiness of our defence’ and that wives should ‘graciously submit’ to their husbandsbut her website touts her ‘commitment to the women’s movement. Pundits who once mocked women’s rights activists as ugly bra burners are abuzz over the ‘new conservative feminism’, and the Tea Party is lauding itself as a women’s movement.

The right once disparaged feminism as man-hating and baby-killing, but now ‘feminist’ is the must-have label for women on the right.”

“Geeks Versus Hipsters” is the equivalent of the passionate versus the apathetic, respectively, according to Gizmodo. And from the hipsters I’ve come into contact with, I’m inclined to agree.

Can Newsanchor Barbie be both hot and a feminist?

Jessica Rudd (yes, Kevin’s daughter) discusses the differences between chick-lit and (the nonexistent) dick-lit in a guest post on MamaMia.

Beneath the “campy sensationalism” of True Blood lies “the weird, seemingly reactionary politics” of “the right’s worst nightmare about post-gay-liberation America come to life.”