Misogyny and Sexism in the News

[Soon]

At 76, Steinem laments elusive equality for women

[Soon]

Men with sexist views 'earn more'

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You're not guilty of rape: Those skinny jeans were too tight to remove by yourself, jury rules

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Why the media gets rape so wrong

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[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bp6EVKr7sLs&feature=player_embedded"]YouTube- Eudy Simelane -- A Story of Corrective Rape[/nomedia]

[Soon]

Bret Easton Ellis on American Psycho, Christian Bale, and His Problem with Women Directors


What are your thoughts on women directors? After you saw Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank, you tweeted that you might have to reevaluate your preconceived notions about them.
I did. And after I saw [Floria Sigismondi’s] The Runaways, too.

Really?
I loved it.

I wish I’d loved it.
Well, I wasn’t looking forward to it. I avoided it, and then I was with some people and they said, “It starts soon at the Arclight. Let’s go.” So yeah, I do have to reevaluate that, but for the most part I’m not totally convinced, [except for] Andrea Arnold, Kathryn Bigelow, Sofia Coppola…

Not Mary Harron?
Mary Harron to a degree. There’s something about the medium of film itself that I think requires the male gaze.

What would that be?
We’re watching, and we’re aroused by looking, whereas I don’t think women respond that way to films, just because of how they’re built.

"Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg?"

You don’t think they have an overt level of arousal?

[They have one] that’s not so stimulated by the visual. I think, to a degree, all the women I named aren’t particularly visual directors. You could argue that Lost in Translation is beautiful, but is that [cinematographer Lance Acord]? I don’t know. Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg? I don’t know. I think it’s a medium that really is built for the male gaze and for a male sensibility. I mean, the best art is made under not an indifference to, but a neutrality [toward] the kind of emotionalism that I think can be a trap for women directors. But I have to get over it, you’re right, because so far this year, two of my favorite movies were made by women, Fish Tank and The Runaways. I’ve got to start rethinking that, although I have to say that a lot of the big studio movies I saw last year that were directed by women were far worse than the sh***y big-budget studio movies that were directed by men.

Which are we talking about?
"I mean, do I want to say this on the record? Did you see The Proposal? Anyway, whatever."

[Soon]

Elena Kagan, cross your legs!
Robin Givhan goes after the Supreme Court nominee's "unusual" posture (and perhaps her sexuality)


This weekend, the Washington Post raised a new concern about Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan and her posture. No, not her political stance, but how she carries her body. Naturally, this commentary comes from the Post's fashion writer Robin Givhan, who is disturbed by how "she sat hunched over" and "with her legs ajar" while courting senators on Capitol Hill.

Givhan writes, "In the photographs ... she doesn't appear to ever cross her legs." (Oddly enough, the first image I came across of these meetings shows Kagan crossing her legs -- but, hyperbole aside, let's move on.) Givhan continues:

People tend to mimic each other's body language during a conversation, especially if they're trying to connect with one another. But even when Kagan sits across from Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who has her legs crossed at the knees, Kagan keeps both feet planted firmly on the ground. Her body language will not be bullied into conformity.

She does not cross her legs at the ankles either, the way so many older women do. Instead, Kagan sits, in her sensible skirts, with her legs slightly apart, hands draped in her lap.

Certainly this sort of critique can't be taken too seriously, given the context. Givhan is on the fashion beat, after all, and she indiscriminately targets political figures, male and female alike. But what silliness, subjecting a 50-year-old woman to that classic grandmotherly scolding of "cross your legs, young lady!" The truth is, Kagan still sits rather demurely, despite her legs being uncrossed.

Beyond that basic ridiculousness, I find Givhan's emphasis on Kagan's otherness, her refusal to conform and be normal, somewhat discomfiting. It feels like Kagan is, however indirectly, being indicted over her sexuality -- once again. An accompanying photo caption reads: "UNUSUAL: Most women, including Sen. Amy Klobuchar, cross their legs when sitting, but not Kagan." Maybe because she's an "unusual" lesbian.

Givhan also lays into Kagan for her "frumpiness," noting that "Kagan's version of middle-age seems stuck in a time warp, back when 50-something did not mean Kim Cattrall or Sharon Stone, 'Cougar Town' or 'Sex and the City.'" I'm going to give Givhan -- and my own sanity -- the benefit of the doubt and assume she doesn't actually mean that the gold standard of sartorial appropriateness for a 50-year-old Supreme Court nominee is "Cougar Town."

[Martina]

That is so interesting and so lame. i loved it. Thank you!!!

How does he explain other women visual artists -- photographers, graphic artists, etc?

And Spielberg and Hitchcock???? Of course there are not women Spielberg's and Hitchcock's. None of us has been an adolescent male. Plus when Hitchcock was directing, how many women could dream of getting to make major motion pictures.

The reason why there are fewer major women directors is simple. It's a very expensive medium. You have to be able to work within and get the support of corporations to do your work. i do not know the nature of the business. But there do not seem to be a lot of women producers either. And that is business acumen. No one has ever said women lack that. So there must be some old boy stuff going on.

And he's also not looking at foreign films. i am not a huge fan, but what about Lina Wertmuller?

And he's totally conflated eighties film theory about the gaze -- which is about how films use point of view to reinforce gender hierarchies -- and psychological theories about men being more visual.

LOL. Oh well, he wrote American Psycho. Nuff said.

Originally Posted by HowSoonIsNow

Bret Easton Ellis on American Psycho, Christian Bale, and His Problem with Women Directors


What are your thoughts on women directors? After you saw Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank, you tweeted that you might have to reevaluate your preconceived notions about them.
I did. And after I saw [Floria Sigismondi’s] The Runaways, too.

Really?
I loved it.

I wish I’d loved it.
Well, I wasn’t looking forward to it. I avoided it, and then I was with some people and they said, “It starts soon at the Arclight. Let’s go.” So yeah, I do have to reevaluate that, but for the most part I’m not totally convinced, [except for] Andrea Arnold, Kathryn Bigelow, Sofia Coppola…

Not Mary Harron?
Mary Harron to a degree. There’s something about the medium of film itself that I think requires the male gaze.

What would that be?
We’re watching, and we’re aroused by looking, whereas I don’t think women respond that way to films, just because of how they’re built.

"Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg?"

You don’t think they have an overt level of arousal?

[They have one] that’s not so stimulated by the visual. I think, to a degree, all the women I named aren’t particularly visual directors. You could argue that Lost in Translation is beautiful, but is that [cinematographer Lance Acord]? I don’t know. Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg? I don’t know. I think it’s a medium that really is built for the male gaze and for a male sensibility. I mean, the best art is made under not an indifference to, but a neutrality [toward] the kind of emotionalism that I think can be a trap for women directors. But I have to get over it, you’re right, because so far this year, two of my favorite movies were made by women, Fish Tank and The Runaways. I’ve got to start rethinking that, although I have to say that a lot of the big studio movies I saw last year that were directed by women were far worse than the sh***y big-budget studio movies that were directed by men.

Which are we talking about?
"I mean, do I want to say this on the record? Did you see The Proposal? Anyway, whatever."