Ms. Magazine: Yes, The Playboy Club IS That Bad
The actual story of Hefner’s success is less sanguine, since Playboy’s initial popularity was based on its embrace of 1940s and ’50s sexist ideas. One of the bestselling books of this era was Philip Wylie’s Generation of Vipers, which accused women of rampant materialism and selfishness. Calling women dumb, greedy, rapacious and “an idle class,” Wylie developed the concept of “momism,” which held that American wives and mothers had gained too much power over their husbands and it was about time men fought back.
Picking up on these themes, the main article in the first issue of Playboy was called “Miss Gold-Digger of 1953.” Bemoaning the good old days when alimony was reserved for “little floozies,” the Playboy editors wrote, “When a modern day marriage ends, it doesn’t matter who’s to blame–it’s always the guy who pays and pays and pays.” This was a theme that was expressed again and again in the early years of Playboy by writers such as Burt Zollo and, of course, Philip Wylie.
As the women’s movement began to gain traction, Playboy editors realized that they needed to reinvent themselves as supporters of women’s rights, or risk being seen as a relic of a bygone era. They got off to a bumpy start when a memo by Hefner was leaked by a female secretary in 1970 that read, “What I’m interested in is the highly irrational, emotional, kookie [sic] trend that feminism has taken…these chicks are our natural enemy. It is time to do battle with them.” But over the years, Hefner has, with the help of the mainstream media, carefully crafted an image of himself as a champion of women’s sexual and economic freedom.
Woman Who Made Fun Of American Apparel Contest Wins, American Apparel Act Like A Bunch Of Babies
All things about this are beautiful. Except American Apparel, but damn, that’s some fierce and fiesty snark going on there.
THIS IS FUCKING AMAZING.
American Apparel mentioned that they ‘are not trying to offend and insult women’ but just because you’re ‘not trying to’ doesn’t mean that you didn’t. The goes along the same lines of “I’m not trying to be offensive but,” no shut up, you’re about to be offensive. But of course, I was never really expecting that a corporation would offer a heartwarming response to a human being or admit that they were, in anyway, wrong.
Love,
Taylor
The entire letter is up at her tumblr. I just… wow.
Wow, the full letter even goes on to talk about how journalists are basically out to attack American Apparel and Dov Charney to make them look bad out of spite. It’s…just go read it. What the fuck.
(Source: rawwomen)
Damn! Looks how standards changed!
Can we please go back to this?
what is wrong with our society!?
NO, SHE WASN’T. (in case that isn’t clear)
Just had enough with sloppy, sensationalistic “journalism” this morning, and chewed out a “media outlet” (cough) on Twitter. The phenomena I’m angry about isn’t specifically their doing, but it’s an excellent example of 1) a problem endemic in blog reporting and growing in more traditional media outlets, grabbing tweets, sound bites and quotes and instantly running them out of context as the basis for a story; 2) good old fashioned sensationalism.
In this case, their victim is Rihanna.
Gigwise claims Rihanna has been SLAMMED by her fans after STARVING HERSELF to prepare for a PHOTO SHOOT. They claim she COURTED CONTROVERSY after making COMMENTS, and that MANY of her fans IMMEDIATELY CONDEMNED her SAYING she set a BAD EXAMPLE.
My emphasis.
What actually happened is Rihanna made ONE tweet about the photoshoot, where she did reference starving, but no other context to say she actually starved herself or even dieted.
Rihanna “#RihannaNavy I shot my first cover for Esquire yesterday with Russell James #rockstarshit Not much preparation for that besides wax+starve!!”
While over 100+ people retweeted her announcement, the only replies or comments she got from fans, and there were only a handful, were mostly complimentary. In fact, the “many” fans who criticized her amounted to 2 (one who posted and another who retweeted the same tweet below), and another 2 who just didn’t think dieting sounded fun.
MD_Lost2009 “@rihanna starve?? why?? thats a bad message to your fans ri-ri im dissapointed”
Gidwise also didn’t bother to mention that four tweets (3 days) before her terrible starvation diet…
Rihanna “Had my very first Philly cheese steak yesterday! Thx @johnnybananza @Tamara_RS @JaniseeAileen #Yummy”
(Turn off annotations, there’s no other full version of this I could find, but whoever posted this put in an annotation at around 3:07 that says “derp” because of people arguing about 5/6 letters thing)
“Pretty” – Katie Makkai
When I was just a little girl, I asked my mother, “What will I be? Will I be pretty? Will I be pretty? Will I be pretty? What comes next? Oh right, will I be rich?” Which is almost pretty depending on where you shop. And the pretty question infects from conception, passing blood and breath into cells. The word hangs from our mothers’ hearts in a shrill fluorescent floodlight of worry.
“Will I be wanted? Worthy? Pretty?” But puberty left me this funhouse mirror dryad: teeth set at science fiction angles, crooked nose, face donkey-long and pox-marked where the hormones went finger-painting. My poor mother.
“How could this happen? You’ll have porcelain skin as soon as we can see a dermatologist. You sucked your thumb. That’s why your teeth look like that! You were hit in the face with a Frisbee when you were 6. Otherwise your nose would have been just fine!
“Don’t worry. We’ll get it fixed!” She would say, grasping my face, twisting it this way and that, as if it were a cabbage she might buy.
But this is not about her. Not her fault. She, too, was raised to believe the greatest asset she could bestow upon her awkward little girl was a marketable facade. By 16, I was pickled with ointments, medications, peroxides. Teeth corralled into steel prongs. Laying in a hospital bed, face packed with gauze, cushioning the brand new nose the surgeon had carved.
Belly gorged on 2 pints of my blood I had swallowed under anesthesia, and every convulsive twist of my gut like my body screaming at me from the inside out, “What did you let them do to you!”
All the while this never-ending chorus droning on and on, like the IV needle dripping liquid beauty into my blood. “Will I be pretty? Will I be pretty? Like my mother, unwrapping the gift wrap to reveal the bouquet of daughter her $10,000 bought her? Pretty? Pretty.”
And now, I have not seen my own face for 10 years. I have not seen my own face in 10 years, but this is not about me.
This is about the self-mutilating circus we have painted ourselves clowns in. About women who will prowl 30 stores in 6 malls to find the right cocktail dress, but haven’t a clue where to find fulfillment or how wear joy, wandering through life shackled to a shopping bag, beneath those 2 pretty syllables.
About men wallowing on bar stools, drearily practicing attraction and everyone who will drift home tonight, crest-fallen because not enough strangers found you suitably fuckable.
This, this is about my own some-day daughter. When you approach me, already stung-stayed with insecurity, begging, “Mom, will I be pretty? Will I be pretty?” I will wipe that question from your mouth like cheap lipstick and answer, “No! The word pretty is unworthy of everything you will be, and no child of mine will be contained in five letters.
“You will be pretty intelligent, pretty creative, pretty amazing. But you, will never be merely ‘pretty’.”(Transcript from Diana’s Many Lifetimes)
One of the most powerful videos I’ve seen in a while. Really captures the twisted ideals that are being forced on young girls and women today.
It’s not fat shaming just because we’re judging fat people
yo i have gotten like five people telling me about this girl at AnimeNext last weekend
JESUS CHRIST I AM SO HAPPY SOMEONE GOT A PICTURE
She legitimately did not change her appearance eall three days. Looked exactly the same.
Every.
Single.
Day.omg
Anonymous asked: That person seriously thought that you were making fun of her because she was fat? Um, did they look at what she was wearing?
lol like
5 people over the past few days told me stories about how they kept seeing that girl all over AN and how she NEVER CHANGED HER CLOTHES
never called her fat
hambeasts are overweight people who dont shower, wear illfitting clothes, and other characteristics described in the stories that i post on my blog
Anonymous asked: If all these questions/rage about fat hate are in response to that picture that was posted…believe me, that really was a hambeast. I was at AnimeNext all three days and happened to see that individual all three days.
She looked the same - every detail of everything she wore - every day. Which wouldn’t be a problem if you cleaned the clothing each day but it certainly did not seem like it at all. There was some kind of odor around her, and I don’t mean to be offensive.
Generally hambeast =/= fat; hambeast = someone that has tends to have a complete lack of hygeine or is extremely obnoxious to those around them
And if anyone says “blogs like these only post bad cosplays of fat people!!!1!” all I have to say to you is this: peacock-feather.PEACOCKFEATHER INDEED
o….
Yeah, because making judgements via the internet about someone’s assumed “complete lack of hygeine” [sic] because some people saw her wearing the same costume on multiple days of a convention (and may or may not have had some kind of odor that one person claims they noticed, that may or may not have been body odor or related to her level of personal hygiene) has nothing to do with fat shaming because people would of course have noticed, stalked and photo’d a girl to label her a “Hambeast” and make fun of her on the Internet if she’d been thin. Oh wait, no, because only fat people can be hambeasts… but that’s not at all singling people out for judgement based on their weight.
“hambeasts are overweight people who dont shower, wear illfitting clothes”
What do you call thin people who don’t shower and wear ill-fitting clothes? How do you know whether people shower or not? And how does anyone’s clothing being ill-fitting constitute a character defect?
Anonymous asked: I am a black girl living in the US, and my white friends were talking about going to an upcoming anime con (I like anime, but it doesn’t engulf my whole life). Then one of my best friends turned to me and said, straight up, “I don’t think you should come. It’s not like you can cosplay anybody, your skin is too dark.” The rest of my “friends” agreed. I felt very hurt and ashamed of my race/skintone, but I thought they were right. Now, I’m looking at their pictures on Facebook of their shitty cosplays looking like they were having the time of their lives. I’m heartbroken.
Friendship fucking revoked. Drop these ‘friends’. All through school I have put up with racist comments like this from people I thought were my friends. It’s not worth all the hurt and shame they subtly cast on you from day to day.
I am so, so sorry anon.
Next time, never let anyone tell you that you cannot do something because ‘you’re too dark’.
Ugh, it’s this stupid thinking that causes thousands of minorities to hold back from embracing their hobbies and interests, and it makes me feel disgusted and upset.
Anonymous asks: I am a heavy girl living in the US, and my thin friends were talking about going to an upcoming anime con (I like anime, but it doesn’t engulf my whole life). Then one of my best friends turned to me and said, straight up, “I don’t think you should come. It’s not like you can cosplay anybody, you’re too fat.” The rest of my “friends” agreed. I felt very hurt and ashamed of my weight, but I thought they were right. Now, I’m looking at their pictures on Facebook of their shitty cosplays looking like they were having the time of their lives. I’m heartbroken.
Edit: This blog also has a lovely disclaimer that, “If you are fat/hambeast and you are mad at me and think I am fatphobic and big meanie please read Resinfiend’s post on Cosplayers of a Substantial Size. It is a very great post and I think everyone should read it.”
The “guide” referenced advises heavy women to do things like use corsets or body shapers to help “smooth out any lumpiness,” choose who to cosplay based on their figure, and not cosplay characters that aren’t within 2 years of their real age…while at the same time saying they should tell people they have no business judging their appearance. Righhht.
DEAR EVERYONE
Let’s play a game!
- Name men who do not fit “traditional” or socially-acceptable male beauty standards but still feature in TV shows, movies, and the like where their roles revolve around something other than their weight. Men like, say, Seth Rogan. Or Chris Farley. Or Jack Black. Or Danny DeVito. Or John Beluschi. I could go on.
- Do these guys get a “hot” girl despite their appearance or flaws in their personality? Because man, I can’t tell you how many times something like Knocked Up has happened to me in real life. You know, where my gorgeous, successful friends have sex with some asshole with no job and no motivation and decide to stay with him despite the fact that he’s a child in a man’s body.
- What does that hot girl look like? Seriously. Think about it.
- Now, name women who do not fit “traditional” or socially-acceptable female beauty standards but still feature in TV shows, movies, and the like where their roles revolve around something other than their weight. Queen Latifah. And she’s had roles that revolve around her weight, but at least she’s also had roles that don’t. Anyone got someone else? Anyone?
- Do these women get a “hot” guy despite their appearance or the flaws in their personality? And more importantly, is he genuinely into her? And I’m not talking about the farce that was Shallow Hal, where they strapped Gwyneth Paltrow into a fat suit and had Jack Black’s character fall in love with her inner beauty … while he couldn’t see her outer self (which, in my opinion, was still beautiful). The message there is that men need to be convinced of a fat woman’s worth, like it’s this huge shocker that she’s beautiful AND fat.
Beyond that, there is a much wider variety of socially accepted male beauty than there is for women. Women, to be considered worthwhile and “hot,” have to be a certain weight. It’s not even about breast size or hair color anymore — it’s entirely about weight. Women like Emma Stone and Christina Hendricks are considered equally beautiful by mainstream culture (as they should be!) while women like Nikki Blonsky and Gabourey Sidibe are commended on their bravery or their boldness if they wear a sleeveless dress.
Men do not experience the same kind of body policing that women do. They just don’t. A woman’s weight is seen by American culture as an outward manifestation of her personal worth. If she is overweight, she has failed as a woman. If a guy is overweight… he’s dorky and cute. I’ve never seen any pictures of Seth Rogan in a bathing suit on the front page of a tabloid with giant letters deploring his “beach body.”
(Source: khaleesi)
I am done with people saying stripper or prostitute when discussing Wonder Woman’s costume
Last week Entertainment Weekly called it “a stripper outfit”. Yesterday on the Beat someone said it made her look like a “prostitute.” I’ve also heard hooker, slut, streetwalker and plenty of other descriptors.
So much fail.
What Wonder Woman wears has nothing to do with her sex life or anyone’s sex life or work.
To keep using these words is playing into the moralistic, misogynistic idea that when a woman shows “too much” skin or wears a certain kind of outfit, it enables you to make assumptions and judgements about her sex life. And it also also passes judgement on someone who chooses sex work as a profession.
What a crock of shit.
Look, here’s Wonder Woman in her traditional costume by Nicola Scott.
Now here are some female athletes.
Not much of a difference is there? Tell me what those outfits have to do with their sex life?
Can the Wonder Woman costume look tacky? Sure when certain artists draw her in it:
And that first costume for the TV show? That was just ugly.
So do me a favor. When you talk about Wonder Woman’s apparel, say you don’t like the costume because it is silly looking or because you don’t think it is appropriate to the task at hand or that you like pants better because you are a pants person.
But stop trying to make Wonder Woman’s costume about her sex life or any other woman’s.
And remember no matter how silly Wonder Woman’s costume is, it’s still not this:
Redbook’ Shatters Our ‘Faith’ In Well, Not Publishing, But Maybe God
(from back in 2007, Redbook felt Faith Hill just wasn’t young/pretty/thin enough and this was the resulting Photoshop makeover, and here’s how the Internet reacted.)
DOOM! Magazine - The more things change, the more they stay the same…
MiseryXchord - It’s been 13 years since The Body Shop introduced us to Ruby, and I wonder if we’ve really progressed in that time. The fashion industry still pushes impossibly thin models as the ideal and clothing manufacturers still can’t manage to make a pair of jeans to accommodate any of us that actually have hips. READ MORE»>
