Love / Shove

Ugh, here we go: On McCain's VP pick

Andi Zeisler — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:43:40 -0400

So by now we all know the basics about Sarah Palin, first-term governor of Alaska and John McCain's utterly transparent pick for running mate: She's a self-described "hockey mom," an avid proponent of drilling in Alaska and an equally avid opponent of abortion and gay-marriage rights. (She's also so unknown as a politician that Fox News has repeatedly been referring to her as "Susan" Palin—though admittedly, getting facts right has never been the forte of that particular outlet, has it?)

Shooting cunts?

Debbie Rasmussen — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:11:13 -0400

Um, have you seen this one? It's a video game called Cunt.

The object? Kill bosses while avoiding things that might hurt you.

Sounds harmless enough (well, in the world of video games at least)

The tips?

"Shaking the mouse will get bugs off your balls"

"Taking drugs will make you appear cool to others"

Douchebag lawyer and his douchebag lawsuit: “Feminism violates men's rights!”

Andi Zeisler — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 19:13:55 -0400

So New York lawyer Roy Den Hollander once married a young woman he met while working as a private investigator in Russia. Once Den Hollander moved himself and his foreign bride back to New York City, though, she took a job as a stripper and proceeded to dump him within months.

It's a sad little story, and probably not nearly the first of its kind. But to say Den Hollander seems to have had a wee bit of trouble letting it go would be a massive understatement. Since his marriage ended, the spurned groom has turned into a men's-rights crusader so convinced that feminism is the reason for all his personal woes that he's literally made a career out of litigating against it.

Podcast Debate Club: Can Britney do justice to Varla?

Andi Zeisler — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 16:19:32 -0400

Say what you will about the shock-schlock, soft-core oeuvre of filmmaker Russ Meyer, the man was definitely ahead of his time when it came to showcasing the hips-lips-tits-power! aesthetic that would eventually become inextricably linked to third-wave feminism. His best-known work, 1966's sinsister thrillride Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, has come to be regarded over the years as something of a prefeminist classic, but even those who cock a skeptical eyebrow at the equation of big-breasted go-go dancers + homicidal karate chops = empowerment can probably appreciate the film's gonzo exuberance, as well as its arresting black-and-white cinematography.

A moment of silence, please...

Andi Zeisler — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:53:52 -0400

Panda-ing to the Masses

Miriam Wolf — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 17:59:39 -0400

We avoided the 100-degree heat in Portland this weekend with a trip to blessed air conditioning to see Kung Fu Panda. And while you can't escape its exploitive racial sterotyping and fat-phobia, it did provide a good takeaway lesson for my 8-year-old daughter.

There are no words

Andi Zeisler — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 13:16:29 -0400

I don't know whether to thank my friend Elise for bringing this to my attention, or gently curse her:

High heels. For babies. That is all.

Also, when Fox News's Megyn Kelly starts sounding hard-hitting and feminist, the apocalypse is clearly nigh.

Under the knife: A thinner, sexier Strawberry Shortcake and Care Bears

Andi Zeisler — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 15:19:21 -0400

We've run articles on many a controversial subject here at Bitch, and readers have responded with appropriate ardor to such topics as fat suits, pro-porn theory, eating disorders, the "hasbian" phenomenon, and more. Yet some of the most impassioned letters we've gotten in the past year or so hinged on a short piece in issue #35 about the disturbing equine makeover of My Little Pony. (It's not archived on the site yet, unfortunately.) Responses to Jesse Rutherford's Love/Shove — which took a close look at the evolution of the 1980s toy-box staple and concluded that Hasbro's aesthetic tinkering has yielded an undeniably sexualized parade of ponies — ranged from assertions that it was "terrifically over the top" and "creepily overstated" to veiled accusations that Rutherford's interest in the redesign was "the kind of logic only someone who is unreasonably sexually obsessed with ponies would arrive at."

I was reminded of this the other day when I read a recent New York Times piece on the new makeover of Strawberry Shortcake, another classic of '80s playtime who continues to be a touchstone for girly nostalgia. It seems, according to the American Greetings company —Shortcake's sugar daddy — that today's girls weren't feeling the icon's Raggedy Anne styling, Calico-cat companion, and unhealthy preference for gumdrops over fresh fruit. (I was never a fan of the doll, so I can't verify personally whether I ever got the latter directive from Shortcake and her pals, but I will say that my childhood friend Pilar had the whole fruity family — Apple Dumplin', Huckleberry Pie, Orange Blossom — and the sickly, chemical scent of them emanated from her bedroom as a kind of pastel fog.)

List-less: Nerve takes on strong women in film

Andi Zeisler — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 16:32:02 -0400

Maybe I'm being too way too picky, but there is something deeply underachieving about Nerve's "Girl Power Top Ten," a list of the ten most—oh yeah, here it comes—empowering movies of all time.

Now, I would never come right out and suggest that perhaps having three dudes be the ones to make both of these judgment calls is going to, you know, limit the scope of things, but...okay, that's basically what I'm saying. Andrew Osborne, Phil Nugent, and Leonard Pierce, who coauthored "Chick Hits," get shirty in their introduction about the cluelessness of the media execs and pop-culture minders who've been so pleasantly surprised at the success of Sex and the City's big-screen bow, going on to write proudly that "We here at The Screengrab aren't afraid to get in touch with our feminine sides as we raise our Cosmos to these...films that put their empowered female characters front and center (without resorting to stripper poles OR big gauzy Prince Charming/Bridezilla wedding porn)."

And speaking of MySpace...

Debbie Rasmussen — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 19:50:30 -0400

but on a more positive note (well, admirable at least)...