Mad Men Finale: Take Note, Ladies!

This season of Mad Men has been filled with moments of heart-wrenching emotion.

Tonight’s finale, though, it was the engagement. Left in the lurch by Betty’s precipitous firing of the nanny Carla, Don enlists his secretary (and sometime-bedmate) Megan to accompany him and his children to California. During that trip, Don and Megan spend a couple more nights together. Don believes he is in love, and he asks her to marry him. When they return to Sterling Cooper Draper Price, they announce their impending nuptials to the office staff.

What’s sad about Don falling in love? Nothing... if it seemed based on actual love. There’s also the issue of his girlfriend, the smart and compassionate Faye Miller, who is waiting for him back in New York. There is the disappointment plain in Peggy’s face, when she says of Megan, “She’s very... beautiful”--the implication being that beauty is pretty much the extent of Megan’s contribution. Don counters by telling Peggy how much she (Megan) reminds him of Peggy. “She’s got that same spark,” he says. The difference is, of course, that Megan is merely beautiful, though it was Peggy who had just landed a new account in the wake of the Lucky Strike departure. (I find it amusing that I keep typing Don’t instead of Don’s. Yes, Don Draper is clearly a don’t!)

Megan is also young and in awe of Don. He watches her interact with his children, and it becomes apparent he is softening toward her, a definite contrast to Faye’s awkward interactions with them earlier in the season. She shows interest in whatever Don is working on around the office. She unfailingly supports his work, even when others are against him. Unfortunately, that’s about the extent of her character development.

Happily, Joan (recipient of the title-only promotion to “Director of Agency Relations”) and Peggy manage to bond over their mutual disappointments, which is a welcome change from the divisiveness of their dispute over the handling of the sexual harassment a few episodes ago.

Why is Don marrying his secretary so discouraging? Primarily, because no matter how much his character appears to have evolved, nothing really changed. Although Don has the pick of any number of women, he chooses the one who most closely resembles a schoolgirl with a crush, a benevolent babysitter. She is less assertive and more traditionally seductive. She uncritically supports Don. She’s already stepping into the mommy role with his kids. She is certainly not shown to be his intellectual equal, nor is she on equal footing with him at work, being his secretary and all. And that is precisely how he wants it. Because regardless of what Don might say (or think) he wants, regardless of who he sleeps with or dates or promotes at work, only a beautiful and pliable girl who's good with kiddies gets a ring.

All you ladies who think Don is the cat’s, take note. Or more precisely, take dictation, if you want to marry him.



Bitch magazine offers a thoughtful analysis of the finale in the context of the whole season here: http://bitchmagazine.org/post/tube-tied-notes-on-mad-mens-fourth-season. While I don't agree with their entire assessment, I do concur on many points, particularly their disappointment in how Betty is written.

Put This Wedding on Ice

Recently, I took my daughter to see a Disney ice show. Aside from not being able to get Harvey Fierstein's voice out of my head (that was an allusion to Death to Smoochy, yes), I have some very mixed feelings about the whole thing. One, despite my feminist bent, I am not completely anti-Disney. I plan to visit the 'World with my kid. As an amusement park nerd, I love the rides. I love many of the Disney villains. I sing the songs, I watch the movies, and I buy the merch. Although I am critical of many portrayals of women in Disney's animated films, I also appreciate that they have improved. And finally, I attended the ice show.

Were I merely playing reviewer, then I would compliment the performances and the production values, and how the actors interacted with the audience members. I would mention the costumes, which were beautiful. From that perspective, we got our money's worth. My daughter got to see Disney characters she loved, hear songs she knows by heart, and see scenes from movies acted out virtually right in front of her. All cool. Even the kid in me was excited about that.

But then there was the show's finale, which consisted of all the princesses in the show--Jasmine, Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Belle, Mulan, and Ariel as well as Minnie Mouse--coming out in full bridal regalia and waltzing around with the prince/Mouse of her choice. Although it wasn't ever called a wedding, clearly, given the profusion of ivory dresses and the pap about "dreams coming true," it was a mass wedding.

At this point in the show, the kid in me took a backseat to the feminist-mom-writer in me. Holy shit! A wedding as "all your dreams come true"? Being a bride as the pinnacle of one's woman-ness? Even for Disney, it seemed excessive.

Earlier in the show, I had even remarked that seeing so many little girls in proto-wedding gowns made me uncomfortable. Because, well, there are child brides in this world, even in parts of this country. It strikes me as profoundly disturbing to see little girls in bridal attire, even if they are "princess" wedding gowns. The fact that my daughter was one of the only kids NOT wearing a princess outfit made me pretty proud, and she didn't seem to care that we had left her dress-up clothes at home.

But here's the rub with all the weddingness. Clearly, the feminist-mom-writer in me was--and still is--pissed at the blatant sexism. But another part of me, the part brought up on Disney movies and who believes in the magic of weddings and the transformative power of love and all that other bullshit, found it so romantic. Yes, a tiny part of me still swoons at wedding dresses and cascading floral arrangements and candlelight. While I know that being married isn't about moonlight and roses, that doesn't mean moonlight and roses become any less appealing.

Over ten years ago, I had a church wedding wearing my mother's dress. If, for whatever reason, I were to have another wedding, I would not do it the same way. But that doesn't mean my buttons don't get pushed by the schmaltzy sentiment, by the sight of all these princesses in their sparkly ivory gowns, by the songs about love and devotion. Someday, my prince will come. A dream is a wish your heart makes once upon a dream. It's a whole new world, Beauty and the Beast.

It may be a whole new world but it's the same old crap: the same stereotypes, the same lack of ambitions beyond changing one's marital status, and for me, the same old conflict. I hate that what I know and what I feel end up fighting so doggedly with one another. I don't want to be hard and cold, denying the power of emotions and the importance of love. However, we have to stop indoctrinating kids (i.e. little girls) by privileging the white-dress-as-happy-ending concept of love.





For what it's worth, my daughter's favorite parts of the show, she reported the following day, were Gaston (the villain from Beauty & the Beast) and Maleficent (the villain from Sleeping Beauty). She admires villainy, and has not yet been infected by the virus that is wedding-as-pinnacle. I hope to keep it that way!

Man Bites Dog: Or, VB learns a hard lesson about principles in porn

Violet Blue tweeted on Saturday: "Bad night. Discovered that companies that were friends, who I've done promo for, are selling porn 'starring' me. It's NOT me. It's not okay."

But V, I thought you were a friend to the porn industry and its stars. So why does that tweet smack of a condescending "not that there's anything wrong with that" attitude toward pornstariness? (Or is that residual anger from the case of the porn star who "stole"and besmirched your good name?) And I thought that certain hip and cool porn companies were your friends, your buddies, your pals. I thought that those "good" porn producers--your so-called friends--were sexual freedom fighters, breaking down the oppressive hegemonic depictions of sexuality and...

Oh, wait, some porn producers--even some of the cool ones-- might just want to make money? They betrayed a "friend" to help their cause? Porn might NOT be an awesomely liberatory force, as some pro-porn feminists might suggest? Porn companies might, in fact, place greed ahead of good?

Isn't that basically what I've been saying all along?

Even the "coolest" and most outspoken pro-porn feminist on the Web can get bitten in the ass by the business of porn.

Who's the Douche, Really?

Everyone cool on the interwebs has in the past couple days commented on the ridiculous Summer's Eve ad that lists cleaning one's genitals with their products as the first step in feeling confident enough to ask for a raise.

What no one has mentioned, however, is that this ad ran in the October issue of Woman's Day as the left-hand page in a two-page ad. The right-hand page features the memorable tagline "No one has ever told you to 'Grow a Pair.'"

(No, Summer's Eve, you're right. No one has told me that. And even though I’m down one ovary, I still feel I have “a pair.”) The implication that women don't need cajones (because we already have something better?) is a new-old riff on the idea of the moral superiority of women.

More "woman power" key words are used throughout the rest of the text: “Courage. You were born with it.” But then the text devolves into helping women stay courageous “with a little extra care down there.” Ugh. Given that most doctors now recommend AGAINST douching and using scented feminine products because they can irritate the tissue and throw off the natural balance, using these crap products is the opposite of “caring” for your goodies.

What is fascinating about this pair of ads is not so much that douchey companies are still preying on women's fear of "down there" to sell more crotch deodorant. That has been happening for ages. I still distinctly remember the embarrassed agony of being subjected to commercials featuring mother-and-daughter heart-to-heart chats about feeling "not so fresh" while watching soap operas with my mom and grandma.

The interesting thing to me about these ads is less the insidious appeal to fear but the laughable attempt to deceive readers visually. These facing pages are intended to look like a career-related article (the now-infamous list) on the left and the opposite page, a layout that clearly telegraphs that it is an advertisement featuring a supposedly empowered woman. The "empowered woman" ad has become a staple of women's magazines in recent years. Appropriating the language of feminism to help prey on women's fears has become an effective marketing ploy.

What makes this, on the right-hand page, at least, an "empowered woman ad"?

• Language filled with bravado, a "strong enough for a man" tone. Check.
• A well-dressed (usually in evening garb or a party dress) young and conventionally attractive woman who stares, smilingly and not at all coy, straight at the camera. Check.
• An appeal that on one hand appears to reaffirm readers as intelligent and independent, capable women, while on the other hand appealing to the same fears and insecurities that the culture uses to cripple women's self-esteem. Checkity, check check on that.
  

Because if women weren't afraid that their vaginas smell bad, they might want to use them more freely. They might talk about them. They might stop being ashamed of their sexuality. They might explore them. They might let other people explore them. Women with vaginas that are okay as is, that are pleasant even, might become unmanageable. (And why does Blogger's spell-check keep flagging vaginas as misspelled? Vagina can't be plural?)

Do advertisers really believe that this visual article/ad gimmick works? Are readers fooled into seeing the list as an article and the "empowered woman" ad as unrelated? And does pseudo-feminist rhetoric help sell douches, sprays, and wipes?

Let's stick it to Summer's Eve. Stop worrying about how you smell "down there." If "down there" remains a bit of a mystery to you, spend a little time getting to know yourself: your anatomy, your texture, and yes, even your smell. As long as you are clean and in good health, your natural smell is fine. Knowing what's normal for you can help you determine when you might have a problem, as yeast infections, BV, and some STIs can cause distinctive changes in smell. If you're always masking your smell, how can you tell if it changes?

And maybe start calling "down there" something less ominously euphemistic. Tackling terminology is beyond the purview of this post, but seriously, even my daughter uses more sensible terminology, "privates," and she's only five.

When will advertisers stop treating us like we're smelly and stupid?

Remembering the Struggle for Suffrage

Right now, lots of media outlets are helping to commemorate this, the 90th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment, which granted women the right to vote. You can find good accounts of the process of gaining suffrage elsewhere.

What I want to remind readers is that it was, indeed, a fight for women to earn the right to vote. Women, often at great peril fought. Sometimes, the fight was physical, as many women were jailed for their protests and force-fed while imprisoned. And the suffragists made mistakes, too, like jettisoning the needs of people of color to sway Southern politicians.

In American history, we are taught about as children and commemorate as adults battles waged for independence from England, against slavery (among other reasons), and in favor of civil rights. We often fail to remember how recent, difficult, and yes, violent the struggle for women’s suffrage was.

I’ve only touched on parts of the story because unfortunately, I don’t know nearly enough about this battle. The little I know, I learned very recently. The documentary One Woman, One Vote provides an overview of this struggle. Watching this film, I was profoundly moved at points. It was the first time I had seen American history that was truly my history, a history of women in America, rather than how various women (like Martha Washington, Betsy Ross, and Harriet Tubman) had played supporting roles in the grander history of men. I am not a tearful person generally, but I was moved to tears. Although I’ve not seen it, I have also heard recommended Not for Ourselves Alone: The Story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton & Susan B. Anthony.

However you learn about the fight for full citizenship for women in the United States, do learn about it. It’s a fascinating chapter in our not-so-distant history.

Mad Men's Bad Ads

Although Mad Men has many merits, the blatant sexism of the show makes me wince. Because the show is not simply a wistful ode to the "good old days," I continue to watch despite that discomfort.

For example... Do I enjoy watching everyone refer to his secretary as his "girl"? Does it thrill me when Joan is raped by her soon-to-be husband? Do I long to return to a time of the most blatant sexual double-standards that force Peggy to agonize over whether to sleep with her boyfriend? No. No. No.

However, as Greta Christina points out in her piece on Carnal Nation*, Don Draper tends to connect with women who are very different from his now-ex Betty, who adheres tenaciously to her gender role. Around the office, Peggy gets promoted from secretary to copywriter. Joan is, well, Joan: smart, cool, and always in control. The characters are faceted and the writing nuanced. In addition to evincing good writing, the complexity prevents the show from being merely parody, elegy, or a sanitized-for-our-protection version of the 60s.

To cash in on Mad Men chic, some companies have created commercials specifically to dovetail with the show.

In this unfortunate Suave ad, a Don Draper wannabe discusses his visit to the ladies' beauty salon. The banter between wannabe and the copywriter quickly devolves into an innuendo-laden discussion of the attractive hairdressers he encountered at the salon:

"Sisters?"

"Twins."

And then, "I believe in throwing myself into my research. My research is quite extensive." Wink wink, nudge nudge.

In 40-seconds, they manage to work in a couple of gag-worthy appeals to stereotypical male fantasies:





Yes, I realize the commercial is intended to be tongue-in-cheek, referring to Mad Men while also parodying it. However, the characteristics making the show palatable--sexism balanced by strong female characters, and controlled, nuanced writing--are tough to establish in a 60-second ad. They are absent from this one.

This Suave commercial becomes what the show self-consciously is not: parody that blatantly objectifies women while devoid of strong (or any) female characters. I wonder if the ad men (yep, I'm going to assume) who came up with this concept have ever watched the show. Do they think so little of their audience that they surmise fast-paced banter between Brylcreemed execs will fool us into associating their product with the subtle maturity of Mad Men?

Don Draper would never have let that Suave commercial hit the air.

* Greta Christina makes a thoughtful argument about why even feminists swoon over good old Don Draper. For the record, I am not one of those women. If I had to pick one of the guys, it would probably be Harry Crane. But more likely, I'd be attracted to the construction crew working outside the building or the janitors or someone else not clad in a gray flannel suit.

VB Accuses Gail Dines of Profiteering, or Pot Calls Kettle...

Internet barker for all things pro-porn Violet Blue just attacked the "profiteering" of anti-porn activist and academic Gail Dines for her work. Reading Blue's piece, my only thought was, Are you kidding?

In the same piece, to her credit, Blue also questions the recent anti-porn hysteria regarding female porn addicts and the many faith-based, often quite costly, programs that have sprung up in the wake of said "epidemic." These programs, while supplanting secular therapies, also purport to cure women of dreadful afflictions such as masturbation and sexual arousal. I am NOT arguing with Blue on the questionable nature of these groups' claims or the sleaziness of profiting from fearmongering.

But Gail Dines is, as previously pointed out, a sociologist, not a Web celebrity. She is an academic who studies pornography. Yes, she has adopted an anti-porn stance because she claims pornography has various deleterious effects on our culture.

And does Dines profit from that anti-porn work? Sure. Why shouldn't she? As a respected academic, she is also a paid speaker and author. Many other academics do the same thing. And although Dines's work is more widely disseminated than many other academics', I doubt she's making as much money as Blue intimates. Most academics would kill to publish titles that would make the kind of bank Blue speculates Dines is making with her latest book, Pornland. If Dines gets rich from academic work, props to her, as she will be joining a very elite club.

But regarding Blue, who herself profiteers by further contributing to, defending, and aggrandizing the zillion-dollar porn industry, I cannot believe she has the nerve to condemn. As I have said in previous posts, being pro-porn is popular and cool--and profitable, because pro-porn voices (like Blue) can always benefit from the scraps being tossed from the porn table.

Being an anti-porn academic is one profession. Being a Webutante is another. And yes, BOTH should profit from their work in their respective areas. But don't criticize the opposition just for making money when you still represent the more mainstream, popular, cool, and far, far more economically enviable position in the debate.

Battleground: Breasts

Hooray for Kathryn Blundell, the much-maligned editor of the UK's Mother and Baby Magazine, who defended her decision NOT to breastfeed. Here's the BBC article summarizing her comments. She calls breastfeeding "creepy," even.

To be clear, I do not agree with her perspective. But isn't she expressing what many women (and I daresay most men) in our culture think about breastfeeding? Because breasts are so sexualized for us, it's hard to uncouple those sexual connotations. That's a cultural disconnect to address.

For me, breastfeeding is a very charged issue. When pregnant, I had every intention of nursing. But then my daughter spent her first several days hooked to monitors in the NICU, and I couldn't nurse her. I had to pump. If you've never been hooked up to a breast pump, the sensation is distinctly bovine. I hated to pump. A sense of foreboding and dread descend on me every time I started to pump (thanks, hormones!). It was tough psyching myself up to do that every few hours. Meanwhile, my daughter became accustomed to the bottles used in NICU. When I finally could attempt to get her to latch on, she screamed in terror at my approaching breasts. My milk came... and then went.

Currently, there's a pervasive bias toward breastfeeding in the medical community and among upper-middle class moms, the type who might also worry about buying organic this and weigh carefully all the diapering options and mull baby signing classes. When I was a baby in the 70s, nursing was seen as an inferior choice made only by women who couldn't afford formula or weird hippie types. Now, the reverse is true. Women who want to do the right thing by their infants are expected to breastfeed because of a plethora of health benefits conferred by breastmilk.

So birth classes and hospitals hype breastfeeding--while also contradictorily providing plenty of formula samples and coupons in welcome packs. But when it came to nursing under my daughter's and my particular circumstances, I didn't get much help or support from nursing staff. I had no women among my family and friends who could help because they either didn't have kids or felt profound discomfort about nursing. The lactation "help" offered in the hospital was perfunctory and distinctly unhelpful. When the consultant squeezed my painfully engorged breast without warning, I can't say it inspired me to seek further "assistance."

When I couldn't nurse successfully, I felt like a failure as a woman and a mom. The prevailing wisdom indicates that I just wasn't trying hard enough, that I was taking the "lazy" route by formula feeding. In the blur of the first post-partum weeks, the last thing I needed was some other pressure telling me I was doing a bad job. Unfortunately, pro-nursing sentiment is pretty strident and uncompromising. I had internalized their party line. Anytime the subject of breastfeeding came up for a few years after, I would become emotional and tear up, still haunted by the feeling that I'd done my daughter a horrible disservice by feeding her formula.

Unfortunately, even for those women who do the "right" thing and nurse, the approbation they receive extends only to the hospital doors. In the wider world outside, women are routinely ogled or reviled for nursing, even discreetly, in public. No one would object to bottle feeding a baby in public, but nursing women are routinely banished to the bathroom. People often express outright revulsion at nursing. I find that inability to accept breasts' multiple purposes offensive. But I also understand how women can internalize those competing pressures. In some women, as Blundell articulates, the sexual function of breasts will prevail.

I hate that we view these functions as dichotomous, that we can't see breasts as sexual and decorative under certain circumstances and baby-nourishing under others. Why must they be mutually exclusive? Why isn't nursing considered sexy, or sex seen as an integral part of being a mom? Why is breastfeeding a litmus test for good mothering?

Breasts are a battleground, an emblem of the many conflicting roles and duties our culture inflicts on us. But they're also a very personal space. I don't agree with Blundell's assessment of breastfeeding, nor do I agree with rabid nursing advocates who can't or won't understand the many reasons women may not breastfeed. Do I wish my experience with nursing had been more successful? Of course. But am I a terrible mother because I didn't? Not at all. Neither is Blundell for saying publicly what so many people already think and feel.

Penis Fly Trap

A South African doctor has invented a condom with teeth to help deter and/or punish rapists. Here's the CNN.com article for more details. Apparently, this device is being tested during the World Cup.

Honestly, I don't know where to begin. First, I feel compelled to rail--just briefly--against the fact that we live in such a shitty world that rape remains essentially commonplace. Some days, it's hard to remain optimistic in the face of such... ick.

Okay, so in response someone has invented a toothed female condom. How will we measure the efficacy of such a device? Will the vague threat of a toothy-trap snapping shut on their goodies be enough to deter rapists? Might rapists start preying on others who might be less willing or able to "arm" themselves?

This device further ignores that sexual assaults are not committed only by a penis entering a vagina. There are other acts of rape that do not fit that narrow definition.

And what about the rapist's response to the device when it deploys? Even if the device works as it should, clamping down on the rapist's member upon penetration, might it enrage him enough to further hurt or even kill the woman whose vagina it came from?

Significantly, we must remember that if the device has deployed, then A RAPE HAS STILL OCCURRED. True, it will have been unpleasant for the perpetrator and the duration of the assault may be truncated. But will the woman have incurred any less emotional or physical trauma? A man still penetrated a woman without her consent, regardless of what happens to his penis AFTER.

Finally, must we employ tactics that amount to creating a minefield in our privates? What if a woman is planning to have (gasp!) consensual sex? "Hang on, honey, while I dig out this Bear-Trap Condom. Can you grab a Trojan instead?"

In situations when a woman feels she has no other options to combat would-be (or actual) rapists, then perhaps the toothy condom is the stopgap answer.

But this product's mere existence reminds us that rape remains an epidemic requiring changes in cultural attitudes toward women and rape, and better laws and enforcement regarding sexual assault. Arming our vaginas does not solve the problem.

A Little Pink Pill for the Ladies?

Apparently, the FDA is unimpressed by the test results for flibanserin, "a pill anticipated to become the first 'female Viagra,'" according to a CNN.com report.

The drug's manufacturer remains unsurprisingly optimistic. "We have conducted a robust program showing that flibanserin shows improvement increasing satisfying sexual events, in improving sexual desire and lowering distress," says Peter Piliero. Satisfying events? Lowering distress? Over-medicalization of sexuality, while understandable given our culture's tendency to turn every ailment into a disease, still troubles me.

Should female sexual dysfunction be treated medically? If low sex drive is troubling to the woman, of course! That we even consider low sex drive an issue worthy of resolution is, overall, a positive change from the old "it's all in her head" approach to "frigidity," or even worse, the expectation that women naturally don't (or shouldn't) enjoy sex.

However, the danger comes when we believe a pill (will this one be pink? please?) is the best or only solution. I worry that doctors and patients will be less likely to consider a range of treatment options--such as hormone monitoring and balancing, therapy, stress reduction, dietary changes, communicating effectively with one's sexual partner(s), to name a few. Availability of even a marginally effective "female Viagra" could pathologize normal variations in sex drive and permit doctors to resort to pill pushing rather than searching for root causes and offering varied, and possibly non-pharmaceutical, solutions.

But for frustrated women who feel they've already tried everything, I sincerely hope flibanserin, if it's safe, becomes available.

Violet Blue Versus Stop Porn Culture: Part 3, Critici$m and the Victim Mentality

Why are pro-porn people so opposed to any questioning of their perspective? Furthermore, why do they adopt a victim mentality about it, as though they're oppressed sex radicals whose scandalous enjoyment of porn marks them for scorn and derision? Their attitude toward porn might have been a serious point of contention in the late 70s and early 80s, when the feminist sex wars raged over issues like dildo use, bondage, and porn. Then, pro-sex activists were ostracized by their fellow feminists.

However, here in 2010, with pornography as plentiful and readily available as it is, with so many people watching porn with such frequency, how are those viewers in any way victims of anti-porn scorn? How are pro-porn supporters members of a marginalized minority?

They're not. But Violet Blue doesn't let that stop her from portraying herself and her fellow porn lovers as downtrodden sexual freedom fighters. She tweeted about their negative treatment in this column in the Boston Herald, for example.

Of course, anyone who follows online snits knows that Violet Blue doesn't take criticism well. Beyond a touchy ego, though, what's with the victim mentality and inability to accept even valid, constructive criticism?

Well, pro-porn activists start with an acceptable premise, rightly asserting that sexuality is still repressed in our culture. Sure, we can access idealized, airbrushed, fetishized image of sex presented in porn. But women's sexuality, particularly a liberated and honest sexuality, is curiously absent from scene. Honestly, I don't know exactly what that would look like. I don't think anyone does.

The sexuality we do see expressed throughout our culture and particularly in porn is still predominantly phallocentric. It's the "Samantha syndrome," where being a sexually liberated woman means acting like a man. Because only men are free to express themselves sexually--and a narrow, masculine sexuality, at that--that's the only model we have for what a sexually liberated woman might look like. I guess pro-porn folks believe that protecting this fictional "sexual freedom" is more important than trying to imagine new sexual options.

For example, they could support sexual freedom by pressuring the porn industry to feature more diverse performers. They could try to get porn producers to treat performers more humanely by offering better pay, benefits, and working conditions. They could try to discourage the production of Max Hardcore-type gross-out porn. But instead, they aim their vitriol at academic organizations like Stop Porn Culture. Because pro-porn folks so value "sexual freedom," they interpret anti-porn activists, not the huge porn industry that now largely defines what is sexually attractive in our culture, as oppressive.

Why don't they consider the many other ways sexual freedom is being threatened, like

• abstinence-only sex ed. policies
• rampant photoshopping that creates unrealistic images of the (usually) female body wherever we look
• how sexual difference, like sexual orientation or polyamory or consensual BDSM, is still constructed as deviance?

These are all oppressions, all ways that sexuality suffers. But if porn looks enough like "sexual freedom," if the porn industry keeps repeating that porn is sexual freedom, then opposition will continue to be interpreted as an attack on sexual freedom. It's as if pro-porn forces can't distinguish between sexual behaviors and identities, many of which remain marginalized and stigmatized, and sexual media, which have little to do with sex and more to do with money. Yet pro-porn folks conflate these two, as if porn itself were a marginalized sexual identity.

Or maybe it is all about money. Perhaps "oppressed" pro-porn advocates protest so loudly because rising anti-porn sentiment would eat into their profits. In a clear example of pro-porn's symbiosis with the porn industry, one of the winners of Blue's "Our Porn, Ourselves" video contest is herself a porn star. Blue, too, has an economic incentive to generate interest in porn and inspire people to defend it. Writing a book on porn and having porn sites advertising on one's homepage likely encourage a more zealous defense. I'm not sure anti-porn academics have any such financial incentive, as anti-porn forces (especially feminist ones) do not have a wealthy and powerful political lobby or millions of willing consumers, unlike the porn industry.

If you're riding the coat tales of a $10 billion business, I suppose you might want to cultivate the appearance of oppression. It certainly makes for better press. After all, who would listen to the pro-porn argument if they prefaced it by acknowledging the prevalence of porn and the strength of the industry? And Violet Blue craves coverage. I guess shouting oppression garners attention while obscuring that unconditional, uncritical support for porn, rather than being sexually liberated, is merely anti-intellectual and money-grubbing.

Perhaps pro-porn folks have even more in common with Tea Partiers and Sarah Palin than I'd thought.

(Thanks, Kristie, for the dialogue that evolved into this post!)

Violet Blue Versus Stop Porn Culture: Part 2, Anti-Social Networking

Blue's campaign against Stop Porn Culture has made effective use of social media to gather support for her pro-porn cause. Sure, everyone knows one can do marvelous things with Twitter these days. But who, exactly, is she reaching?

One of Blue's recent tweets was, "lesson: how NOT to be a rank f*cking amateur #1: make sure your anti-porn con has its Twitter account before event." Great advice IF your anti-porn con wants to reach people via Twitter. However, none of the professional, academic conferences I attend have Twitter accounts, nor are they "rank f*cking amateur" events, either. Such conferences do appeal to people who don't live and die by Twitter, though. Disinterest in communicating in 140-character blurbs doesn't make the anti-porn side less credible.

Consider the conference context. Stop Porn Culture conference presenters are academics from disciplines including philosophy, medicine, and sociology who have been brought together by their concern over pornography. Sure, one might surmise that there's a touch of ivory-tower-ness, that these folks who breath the rarefied air of academia daily are "out of touch" with the real world. That might be the case. However, it's important to note that their work on pornography has different parameters than what Blue is doing. It makes sense that they use more traditional channels of communication.

So, they're not as concerned with how pretty their Web site is, how many followers or fans they have, whether they're on Twitter, or how much user-produced content they can inspire. Instead, these anti-porn feminists study the actual subject of pornography, not how many people love porn. That's basically what Blue's video contest proves: people love porn. Well, file that under "water also wet" news. The numbers regarding how much porn is out there and how frequently it is viewed have already told that story. People like porn? No shit. Porn producers are exquisitely attuned to supply and demand, and the demand is high. Further, as Sarah Palin's book sales and Tea Party gatherings and Fox News ratings have shown, a bunch of people liking something doesn't mean that thing is unassailably good and right, or that smart people shouldn't question it. Porn is no exception.

I question whether the tools Blue uses: her blog, Twitter, and anti-conference Web pages are any less out of touch than the other side. She's preaching to her wired chorus, essentially, and in the process ignores academics who ply their trade primarily in the great big world offline: in classrooms, laboratories, universities, academic journals, and academic conferences. Their preferred media are NOT the same in terms of publication standards, either: journals and conferences involve peer review, whereas blogs require no such moderation (lucky for me!). That's fine, though, because they're speaking to different audiences with differing agendas.

But Blue implies that savvy use of social media somehow lends her argument credence, and that is not true. As I tell my students, "Any idiot can have a Web site, and many do." A quick glance through YouTube comments demonstrates that saying something online doesn't imbue the message with merit. It's up to the audience to evaluate the credibility of any argument, regardless of the medium used to deliver it. I'm finding Blue's argument to be prettily and widely disseminated but ultimately unconvincing as it perpetuates stupid stereotypes and "reasons" via logical fallacy.

Next time... the victim mentality

Violet Blue Versus Stop Porn Culture: Part 1

We need more dialogue between pro-porn and anti-porn feminists. As someone who has enjoyed porn, respects sex workers, and embraces gender and sexual difference, I identify more with "pro-sex" or "sex-positive" feminists than I do anti-porn activists. Although I respect the contributions of both, I prefer Pat Califia to Andrea Dworkin.

However, I cannot accept that porn is unquestionably a good thing. Porn is a business, and as with any business, I think we need to be critical consumers. Any business that uses women's bodies as its raw material should be particularly suspect for feminists. It's hard to see the sort of women who would never stoop to shopping at Wal-Mart uncritically defending the porn industry in the name of sexual freedom. Would the same argument work if I tried to defend shopping at Wal-Mart in the name of price-rollback freedom?

Anti-porn feminists aren't as prolific as they used to be, either. Among third-wavers, it's way cooler to identify as a "pro-sex" or "sex-positive" feminist. However, among anti-porn forces, Stop Porn Culture is one of the better known organizations, and their conference is coming up this month.

Well, sex-blogger Violet Blue is pissed. Sure, I understand her pro-sex orientation, and the title of her book The Smart Girl's Guide to Porn indicates her attitude toward pornography. In a perfect world, I share that attitude. But we don't live in such a sexually liberated utopia. And as feminists, we are not wrong to question pornography's impact, good and bad, on our culture.

Upon learning of the upcoming conference, Blue decided to wage a pro-porn campaign in response, encouraging pro-porn folks to make short vids about their love of porn to win prizes. Because of her Web presence, she's managed to garner quite a response in the short time she's known about the conference.

Initially, I was taken aback by her sudden outrage. Anyone even cursorily familiar with anti-porn feminism would know about Stop Porn Culture. I wondered how a feminist who makes her living writing about sex, who has written a book on porn, wouldn't have her finger on the pulse of the opposition. Violet's "discovery" of the conference was old news to anyone familiar with the debate.

Unfortunately, the aim of Blue's pro-porn campaign has not been to create dialogue or even to present an opposing perspective. Instead, it has been yet another attempt to construct anti-porn feminists as hopelessly naive, culturally and technologically backward, and generally oppressive to the clearly smarter and more liberated sex-positive feminists. Here's her film introducing the pro-porn video contest:



Her tone of derision is evident throughout, but one highlight is her calling anti-porn activists "douchebags." That certainly elevates the conversation, doesn't it?

I wonder, though...

• How does misrepresenting the anti-porn side's argument and mocking their perspectives contribute to the discussion?
• How is condescension a "sex-positive" attitude?
• Isn't it hypocritical of pro-porn activists to parrot the dominant culture's attitudes about porn while portraying themselves as oppressed sex radicals?
  

Being anti-porn is not a popular stance to take, particularly among a certain brand of tech-saavy, pop culture feminist. Questioning a phenomenon as ubiquitous as pornography takes more than a slick Web site and a slew of user-produced videos as support. It takes guts and conviction.

Does Blue seriously believe anti-porn activists can even make a dent in the veritable tidal wave of pornography currently available? Seriously, anti-porn forces can't force your porn-loving ass "back in the closet" (a questionable appropriation of LGBT terminology). They can't make pornography disappear from the Web. Porn is a fact of modern American life.

But then condescension toward feminists concerned about the impact of porn on our culture is easier than actually listening to them and responding thoughtfully and respectfully. Saying "hooray for porn" uncritically is more popular than questioning it.

I am a feminist who is sex-positive and pro-porn, under certain circumstances. But I resent Violet Blue and others with condescending, hypocritical attitudes toward the opposition being my compatriots.

More on this campaign next time...

Partner-ing for Equality

Recently, I've noticed a slew of people--straight, white women, to be specific--referring to their significant others as their "partners." Doesn't use of this term constitute an appropriation of what has essentially become a stand-in term for "husband" or "wife" among gays and lesbians? Women who are legally married to men are afforded significant legal and cultural protections that gay, lesbian, and alternative lifestyle types (poly people, for instance) CANNOT access. Using the term "partner" seems akin to saying, regarding racism, "I'm colorblind. Color doesn't matter to me." But differences, and our attention to them, do matter; they highlight significant inequalities and differing levels of privilege.

I understand wanting to posit that one's marriage is indeed a partnership between equals. However, your marital partnership (and my own, to be fair) is NOT, in legal terms, the same as the relationship between two gay men or two lesbians in this state. It's not the same as cohabiting. It's not the same as a boyfriend or girlfriend or lover. It cannot be. I can file taxes jointly, use my husband's health insurance, visit him in the hospital, collect benefits in the event of his untimely demise and much more without doing a damn thing other than simply be married.

Further, I am in a culturally acceptable hetero marriage. Many people in this culture wouldn't view me, or the validity of my relationships, the same way if I had a wife, or two husbands. To refer to a husband as a "partner," while it may sound more mature and egalitarian of me, would imply that I'm somehow in the same boat as all the GLBT couples and alt people who can't be married.

But I am not in the same boat. My (hetero) marital status gives me privilege that they do not have access to.

Why don't we name our relationships accurately while we work to allow adults--any adults--who want to get legally married to do so?

Just when you thought you weren't merely a breeder...

I have bad skin. Since my 20s--when endometriosis began wreaking hormonal havoc--I’ve been fighting a losing battle. In a huge concession to vanity, last year I started seeing a dermatologist to help my acne. Recently, I visited her again because my current retinoid treatment was no longer helping.

The doc suggested we step up the treatment, and that I consider taking Accutane. Accutane? I kept thinking. The name rang a bell, but I didn't know why.

Then, she gave me THE BOOK on Accutane, a glossy publication with attention-grabbing yellow and red pages and lots of graphics. The Web site replicates the color scheme: https://www.ipledgeprogram.com/AboutIsotretinoin.aspx

This book, however, is not really about isotretinoin, the drug that used to be marketed as Accutane. Instead, most of the text describes how to avoid pregnancy while taking Accutane. You see, this drug causes severe birth defects--very, very severe ones.

Okay, you’re saying. I don’t plan on getting pregnant. Or I’m not having sex. Or I don’t have sex with men. Or I already use birth control.

That’s what you think.

Women who can get pregnant and decide to take isotretinoin must engage in an elaborate system of FDA-approved checks and balances to insure that they do not get pregnant, termed iPledge: https://www.ipledgeprogram.com/AboutiPLEDGE.aspx

Like what, you ask? Using two forms of birth control. But I have my tubes tied, you say. Ha! Tubal ligation is not considered 100% effective birth control. (Probably news to many post-tubal women. Ditto for vasectomies, by the way.) You must use a secondary form from an approved list. Further, your doctor must certify you are using the two approved methods.

In fact, you’re exempt from the two-method policy only if you have had your uterus and/or both ovaries removed (and, of course, a doctor must attest to this fact as well, because women can’t be trusted to know their own bodies and/or tell the truth!)

Oh, and did I mention the mandatory pregnancy testing every month? Because women certainly can’t be trusted to monitor our own fertility.

Reading through the tome that detailed the iPledge program, my blood boiled. My intelligence--about whether to take the drug or not, about how to prevent pregnancy in the first place, about how to select and use birth control--was insulted.

But then... the final insult came on page 14 of the book. After having spent the first part of the book telling women about the supreme importance of avoiding pregnancy (and how to PROVE to the FDA that one is responsibly avoiding conception) because of danger to a potential fetus, the book finally gets around to mentioning the following dangerous side effects:

Serious mental health problems. Isotretinoin may cause:

• Depression
• Psychosis (seeing or hearing things that are not real)
• Suicide

Some patients taking isotretinoin have had thoughts about hurting themselves or putting an end to their own lives (suicidal thoughts). Some people tried to end their own lives. And some people have ended their own lives.

And that's when I realized why the Accutane trade name rang a bell for me: suicides caused by the drug, and lawsuits alleging that patients were not informed.

The patient’s mental health clearly remains a distant second priority for the drug companies (and the FDA, with their i-Pledge system). What about an i-Pledge system that monitored women taking the drug for adverse mental health reactions, in addition to pregnancy? What about making potential mental health danger as obvious and important a point to recipients of the drug?

It’s clear that the drug makers and the FDA still consider breeding capacity--and the specter of abortion that accompanies conceiving a fetus with severe birth defects--far more important than mental health. We’re still just walking wombs

• unable to think for ourselves about whether to take the drug
  
• unable to evaluate the risks we’re willing to take
• unsure how to prevent an unwanted and, in this case, unwise pregnancy. (Perhaps, if we had comprehensive sexual education instead of abstinence-only “education,” the FDA wouldn’t need an i-Pledge program to teach the basics of human reproduction.)
• unimportant enough to be informed immediately, upfront about ALL potential side effects.
  

I decided not to take Accutane. I did not even consider it seriously because I value my mental health. And even if I didn’t have an adverse mental reaction, there were many additional dangerous (some irreversible) possible side effects. Further, I don’t like to be told what birth control methods I must use--or to be obligated to report those methods to a government agency.

At the end of the day, I can deal with a bad complexion, if isotretinoin is my alternative.

The fact that a drug with so many contraindications is still being prescribed at all--and for a “malady” as insignificant as acne--seems unethical, while the complicated and value-laden system used to administer it is downright insulting.

https://www.ipledgeprogram.com/AboutiPLEDGE.aspx

A Valentine to My Friends (and everyone else, too)

I’ve never had many friends. Yes, I’m okay with that. In this regard, I prefer quality to quantity. The following are my own highly subjective guidelines for friendship:

• I only become and remain friends with people I like, whose company I enjoy.

• Even in this era of social networking, I refuse to meet people online. I want to know real people, not online personae. My Facebook and Myspace friends basically fall into two categories: famous people whose work I admire and people whom I know in real life. Most of those f2f friends are not casual acquaintances, either. I do not friend my mail carrier, that down-the-street neighbor I wave to three times a year, or the girl who sat next to me in first grade. I friend actual friends.

• I won't maintain friendships on the basis of time served. Even having shared intensely personal or traumatic experiences doesn’t obligate us to remain friends. Like all relationships, friendships (and the friends involved) grow and change. Sometimes, we find ourselves in different and incompatible places. Sometimes, we simply grow apart. Sometimes, a friendship that started out positive becomes a destructive force in our lives. The end of a friendship--again, like any relationship--can be painful, certainly. I ended one of those a couple years ago. Did it hurt? Yes. Am I better for it? Yes.
  

• I won’t have “frenemies.” This phenomenon of having friends whom we don’t like, or are secretly competing with, or are jealous of, baffles me. I know people who play frenemy-like games--like the coworker who comments regularly on my weight and appearance in such a way that she's never outright insulting, but she's clearly not being complimentary. I refuse to play. Finding time to spend with the people I do love is hard enough. My time is too valuable to waste on people I don’t like.

• As a culture, we lack good examples of close female friendships. Because contrary to many media models, we’re not all scratching each other's eyes out over a man. Sex and the City, for all its other faults (there were many faults, but that’s another post), featured women who were true friends to one another, not catty and backstabbing. Refreshingly, the friendships weren’t perfect--they argued and disagreed--but they also clearly loved one another. Unfortunately, no other shows, at least none that have become cultural phenoms like SaTC, have since emerged to fill that void. (No, not all my friends are women, but I recognize and value the particular closeness and support that female friendships can offer.)
  

So, as we approach Valentine’s Day this year, I want to say to all my friends--you know who you are; it’s an exclusive club!--I love you. Thank you.

Joan Jett rocks & Kristen Stewart (maybe) redeems herself

This piece appeared in a slightly different form on my myspace blog over the summer.

When I was a kid, Joan Jett was the coolest chick on MTV. (And if MTV still showed videos, and Joan Jett’s were in the rotation, she would still be the coolest chick on there.) In fact, pre-Madonna, she was just about the only woman on MTV who wasn’t dancing in a cage or serving as arm (fender?) candy in a ZZ Top video. And she wasn’t a pop star, or an R & B crooner. She was a fucking rock star. She was the only woman on MTV who looked like she could kick ass. Her look in the “I Love Rock and Roll” video influenced me so much that I wore it pretty much all through high school and into college: thick eyeliner, leather jacket, black Converse All-Stars.













And attitude? She wasn’t some rock star girlfriend—she was the rock star. Gritty, a little angry, with awesome tough-girl sex appeal. In “I Love Rock and Roll,” she growls, “I could tell it wouldn’t be long ‘til he was with me, YEAH ME.” Damn right, if he knows what’s good for him! Her directness was a welcome antidote to the innuendo and coyness of most pop. And by the end of the song, she takes him home “so we can be alone.” She moves fast and, more importantly, unapologetically.

That same take-charge sexuality is evident in “Do You Wanna Touch?” I’m not as fond of the video, as 80s clichés abound.













However, when she says, “Begging on my knees/Baby won’t you please/Run your fingers through my hair,” it is clear she is not making a polite request. Instead, it’s a directive: “Get those fingers moving. Now. And don’t stop until I say so.” At the end of the song, when she says, “Touch me there. You know where,” we suspect where. And we wouldn’t dare say no.

Even “I Hate Myself for Loving You,” her most self-deprecating popular tune still doesn’t come off as a typical “s/he done me wrong” tune. Sure, there’s a cheating lover, but there’s that undercurrent of sex, which seems at least as important as the love. “Can’t break free from the things that you do. I wanna walk, but I run back to you.” The lyrics clearly indicate: you missed getting laid last night. Too bad for you. I just wish I didn’t care quite so much.

More recently, I fell in love with “ACDC.” The playful ode to a bisexual lover ticked me, again, with the sex appeal and the attitude: “She can’t make up her mind/Just how to fill her time… She’s got some other lover as well as me.” And that’s just the way “she” is, apparently. Polyamory goes mainstream, reinforced in the lighthearted video with Carmen Electra.













In fact, many of the songs on her recent CD Naked deal with gender and sexual identity. Catchy songs about heavy issues can help people engage more readily with such “radical” ideas. Here's the video for "Androgynous," with some famous help.













Although I don’t think Joan Jett is officially out, rumors about her sexuality have been rampant for years. Kudos to her for not hiding her identity while also not feeling compelled to comment on it to the public. But her sexuality, which at the very least is lesbian-identified, makes my admiration (and life-long half-assed emulation) of her make even more sense. It’s been a theme throughout my life. I gravitate toward women who are not typically beautiful or feminine. Many of them happen to be lesbians or bisexual women.



So what did I learn from Joan Jett? Well, it’s 20 years too late for me to form my answer to the Runaways. I can’t sing or play guitar, so my odds of attaining rock stardom are slim. So… I merely steal from her. Still like black leather, Converses, and too much eyeliner. The sexy short blonde hairdo she had a few years ago helped inspire me to cut off my hair. (See the hair in this live version of "I Love Rock and Roll.")













I suspect my long-standing goal to have a cute enough ass to warrant buying a pair of leather pants might have something to do with her. Sadly, I have had to come to terms with the fact that I have never looked, and will never look, as good in leather pants and a bikini top as she looks now, in her early 50s. But it's all good. Really, really good!

More importantly for me, growing up it was great to see one woman on MTV who looked like she was having fun on her own terms. She wasn’t someone’s girlfriend. She wasn’t just eye candy. She wasn’t an overblown pop diva. She was a bona fide rock star. A woman who was in control of (and reveled in) her own sexuality. She didn’t look or sound like the other female singers who cluttered the airwaves back in the day, but she was gorgeous and sexy, regardless. She didn’t have to put on a bullet bra and garter belt to garner attention. Her on-stage persona didn’t play to the virgin/whore dichotomy. Hell, she sang, "And I don't give a damn about my bad reputation."












And, as a girl (and now a woman) who has often failed to look, act, and feel typically feminine, it was nice to have such a rock n’role model.

Here's hoping that Kristen Stewart's portrayal of Jett in the upcoming Runaways biopic does Joan justice. Rumor has it that Joan is pleased. Judging by this trailer, Stewart looks the part. Hopefully Stewart's presence in the film will attract those girls who worship at the alter of Cullen, and a new generation can be introduced to an anti-Bella in Joan Jett.

Twilight Zone

Although it’s a bit dated now, I began this anti-Twilight piece a few months ago after slogging through the book. I’d become interested in the franchise because smart women seemed to lose their minds over these stories, and I read the novel to understand the appeal. Well, the experience was even more disheartening than I’d anticipated. This rant resulted.

Admittedly, I was pre-biased against Twilight based upon some feminist critiques I’d read. After finally plodding through that ponderous tome, I found myself angry. Very, very angry. My displeasure was two-fold: the writing and the implied message.

First, the writing SUCKS.

Until about ¾ of the way through the book, the plot consists of “my boyfriend’s a vampire." The “bad” vampire tracker/antagonist has no motivation except that he hunts. To paraphrase, that’s just what he does. He likes killing. Uh, okay. He’s a vampire. Doesn’t he get more motivation than “I like killin’”?

Then there were the random, weird settings, like the dance studio. Major portions of latter part of the book take place in a dance studio we’ve never heard of or seen before, a place that doesn’t seem to have any particular relevance to the characters. Oh, and to, I guess, emphasize the Cullen family’s all-Americanness, they play baseball. The peculiar settings and seemingly random activities sound like the stories I wrote in middle school. I wrote what I knew. Apparently, Meyer knows dance studios and family baseball games.

And then there’s the character development. Or lack thereof. The dialogue has as much flavor as oatmeal. Without tags, I had difficulty telling who was speaking. Didja notice how Bella’s friends were played in the film by actors with very distinct physical appearances? How else would the audience have distinguished among them?

The characters suffer from an overall lack of description. Except for the color of his eyes, I don’t really know what Edward looks like. I know Bella finds him angelic, godlike, and otherwise freakin’ hot. So am I supposed to fill in the blanks w/whomever I think is hot?

As everyone now knows, the one detail Meyer did provide, is that the vampires fucking sparkle. Did someone attack the vamps with a Bedazzler? So, these creatures of the night, these undead… they sparkle? Well, my ideal hottie vampire would not sparkle, I can tell you that… (Spike doesn’t sparkle. And he’d kick the ass of any vamp who did.)

But far, far worse than the writing—and that’s a challenge, given how poorly this book is written—are the implicit messages in the book. Although I don’t believe that writers are necessarily responsible for creating heroes and heroines who are “good role models,” with YA writing, I do believe they should take that perspective into account. And here’s where I have my biggest issues with the book.

First, there’s Bella. She’s wimpy. She’s smart, or at least ahead of her classmates, but it’s never clear whether she’s a bookworm or an artist or if she might belong to some other non-popular clique. She’s a clutz, and that’s about all we know of her “talents.” She has no interests beyond feeding Charlie and making sure her mom is not worried about her. Sure, it might be a failing of the writing to have undeveloped characters, but it’s also a bad message for young female readers. Your boyfriend: the only hobby you’ll ever need!

Bella lacks what other geeky characters have—Ron, Hermoine, and Harry, for example—who are endearing when they manage to find within themselves the strength and wisdom to do more than they imagined themselves capable.

Toward the end of the book, Bella hatches a half-baked plot to sacrifice herself to the bad vampire and then ends up rescued by Edward. She doesn’t even remember the confrontation or being saved. And throughout the book, she basically exists to be saved by Edward’s superhuman awesomeness.

Further, there’s no indication of why Edward likes her, except that she smells good. Believe me, I understand the importance of someone’s smell. But usually, there’s also more to attraction than that.

The criticism I’ve seen of Twilight tended to focus mostly on the creepiness of Edward’s approach to Bella: how stalker-y he behaves toward her. And yes, his watching her while she sleeps and eavesdropping on her conversations does smack of stalker behavior. I find more distressing the possessiveness he exhibits toward the end of the novel when Jacob tries to warn her about him.

Most unsettling, however, is the basic premise upon which their relationship is founded: that his attraction to her involves wanting to drink her blood and probably kill her in the process. And she acquiesces to possibly dying at her boyfriend’s hand because she loves him. This idea of “I love you so much I might kill you” sounds eerily like what abusers tell their partners to keep them in line. It’s right up there with “look what you made me do” and “this hurts me more than it hurts you.”

The stalking, the possessiveness, and the violence-as-love are incredibly damaging. I might feel differently if Edward weren’t considered the hero, the love interest. But Edward is in control. Always. Of his own bloodlust. Of the sexual course of their relationship. Of Bella’s initiation into vampirehood.

I’ve heard many otherwise intelligent women gush, “he’s my Edward!” If that’s true, RUN! RUN FAR! RUN NOW! If he’s an “Edward,” then his attraction to you is predicated on wanting to kill you, and you are displaying the strength and intelligence of a dishtowel.

Think I’m attributing unfounded motives to Edward? Go read the first chapter of Midnight Sun, Meyer’s rewrite of Twilight from Stalker-Boy Edward’s perspective. It reveals Edward Cullen as the abusive, soulless, murderous prick he really is: http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/midnightsun.html.

Geez Spot

Lately, the media has given the g-spot the Bigfoot treatment, with crackpots coming out of the woodwork to discuss the likelihood of its existence. If you’ve looked at the British “study” that sparked this latest round of media attention, you’d notice that the “research” involved no physiological study at all. The research was merely a survey--and not a particularly well-crafted one at that. The questions, the lead researcher admits, might be problematic.

In that case, shouldn’t the researchers--and members of the media--frame the conclusions as, well, inconclusive?

As if women’s sexuality weren't schizophrenic enough in our culture, we have another pseudo-scientific study to muddy those waters. Regardless of how one interprets the results, the study seems designed to make women feel bad about their sexuality. Women who do have g-spots are now told that, like the Tooth Fairy, this source of pleasure may not actually exist. Women who don’t experience pleasure from their g-spots now have no reason, in theory, to explore themselves in that way or to encourage their partners to do so. Guys who have fumbled for but never found it are off the hook now.

One discouraging response I’ve seen in the media to this study was on The View, when Barbara Walters said that women should be relieved by this research because now the g-spot is “one less thing to worry about”:

Wouldn't it be more of a relief to be fulfilled sexually, whether that involved g-spot stimulation, or being bound in leather restraints, or dressing in a chipmunk outfit? Wouldn't it be more of a relief to speak honestly and intelligently about sex, rather than tittering like embarrassed schoolboys when the subject comes up (pun intended)? Wouldn't it be more of a relief to have a media that focused on facts, rather than faux science? Or perhaps those are simply the things that would be a relief to me. Except for the chipmunk suit thing... no offense to the furries.

In our culture that simultaneously demands the sexualization of women while tacitly condemning most healthy and informed expressions of their sexuality, it’s not surprising that women feel pressure to conform to a certain (unachievable) sexual ideal. However, I’m not sure that having a g-spot—or finding it, or enjoying it, or even believing in it—is an integral part of that ideal.

Misleading "research" and the misguided media attention it engenders should not be part of the ongoing conversation/shouting match about sexuality.