Hats off to Barbie

Finally, girls can identify with a woman in the computing field.  The woman is Barbie.  Glasses and all.  Barbie has become a computer engineer…

 What a way to tear down the stereotypical image of the smart woman.  Barbie is a positive role model for young girls and is showing the world the gender appropriate attitude for women in the computer field dominated by the male “geek” is over…  Little girls can now identify with a role model who is accomplished and smart. No longer will women or girls have to choose between being a woman and being a “geek chic” as they call it.  Barbie is creating the blend.  Hats off to Barbie.

  http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/4/2010/02/500x_2010computerengineer.jpg
 unknown. “Computer Engineer Barbie Has a PhD In FUN (And Breaking Down Stereotypes).” <http://gizmodo.com/5470587/computer-engineer-barbie-has-a-phd-in-fun-and-breaking-down-stereotypes&gt;.

The Price of Beauty

VH1’s The Price of Beauty is a new reality show starring Jessica Simpson. The singer has now become a beauty advocate traveling all over the world to see how other cultures define beauty. “The Price of Beauty”, is designed to encourage young women to accept themselves for who they are and what they look like instead of trying to live up to the impossible beauty standards society has imposed on them. Jessica has also posed for Marie Claire magazine with no makeup, air-dried hair, and her photos have not been retouched… Oh Jessica, you have made the supreme sacrifice. Simpson who has admitted having her lips pumped up with Restylane has now decided she does not care what people think of her. “What other people think of me is not my business” Unfortunately, even though , Jessica Simpson’s cover of the May issue of Marie Claire magazine has everybody buzzing, Her show’s debut only attracted around 1 million people, getting beat by The History Channel. 

  

  

Ok, Jessica’s latest cause is a noble one and certainly she is a trend setter, however I have to wonder if she is really committed to this cause or is this just another one of her silly publicity stunts? If this show does not make it… will her next show advocate the benefits of plastic surgery? Actually, that may be a more appropriate cause for her. With cleavage hanging out in almost every photo she looks like she is competing for the biggest bosom award. I think that maybe our perceptive reality show viewers may be thinking the same thing.  

Nevertheless, just airing a reality series like The Price of Beauty could be a sign the climate of the media is about to change.    

jessica-simpson-no-makeup. http://static.thehollywoodgossip.com/images/gallery/jessica-simpson-no-makeup_166x216.jpg. thehollywoodgossip.com. n.d.  

“PIC: Jessica Simpson Poses Without Makeup for Marie Claire.” 7 April 2010. usmagazine.com. <http://www.usmagazine.com/stylebeauty/news/jess-simpson-poses-without-makeup-for-mays-marie-claire-201074&gt;.  

Salemi, Vicki. “Jessica bares it all!” SheKnowsentertainment. <http://www.sheknows.com/articles/814614/jessica-simpson-s-no-makeup-marie-claire-shoot-1&gt;.  

Law and Order: Special Victims Unit:Crime Drama that Educates

The focus of my final paper has been to question the role violence on television plays in real life violent crimes against women.  I have concluded there is no need for the graphic violent acts the television viewer is saturated with day in and day out.  I was actually feeling that crime dramas such as Law and Order: Special Victims Unit had to go and the depiction,  and verbalization of rape in this series was a little much.  I really had concluded a world without crime dramas would be a better place for all.  But once again, I sat down in front of the television to analyze Law and Order: Special Victims Unit.  Instead of the weekly rape, murder, and torture of women on the streets of New York City, this time the focus of the episode was the epidemic of rape and sexual violence in the Congo.  This is the first time I have seen a prime time crime drama address this very real issue that too few of us are aware. 

The rape of women and girls in the Congo is a wartime strategy and rape is used to terrorize the population so the local society will not react to the theft of their mineral wealth.

Thanks to Law and Order: Special Victims Unit, one of the most heinous crimes against the human rights of women in today’s world was addressed in an episode about a young Congolese woman who experienced the terror of rape and violence in her country and fled to the United States.  She is here illegally and lives in fear if caught will be returned to her homeland.  Without going through the whole storyline, she is witness to a rape and must testify in court putting her at risk of deportation.  This character displayed the strength of womanhood rarely portrayed in a crime drama.  This episode of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit was not simply entertainment but managed to educate the television viewer on the atrocities that are taking place on the other side of the world.  Atrocities many viewers may otherwise not have known existed.  Now I can say my living room is a better place for having Law and Order: Special Victims Unit in it.

 Sources cited:

Prendergast, Mariska Hargitay and John. How We Can All Help Women in the Congo . 17 March 2010. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mariska-hargitay/how-we-can-all-help-women_b_502411.html&gt;.

(Photo: AFP/Getty Images)

René Lefort. “Congo: A Hell on Earth for Women.” Le Nouvel Observateur (liberal weekly), Paris, France.

A Big Thank You to Brenda Leigh

A Big Thank You to Brenda Leigh

Kyra Sedgwick is one of my favorite actresses.  She is extremely talented and believable in her role as detective “Brenda Leigh Johnson” on TNT’s The Closer.  Her portrayal of this modern day woman detective has earned her the Golden Globe Award, and rightfully so.  Kyra Sedgwick,   as “Brenda Leigh Johnson” brings to television viewers a strong, independent and smart women.  She is attractive, but not beautiful and granted, she has her faults, sometimes her sweet tooth gets the best of her, and she is a control freak.  When all is said and done this, character can be a role model for any teenage girl or woman out there.  The Closer is a show that is more focused on “Brenda Leigh” then it is on the portrayal of violence against women.  The inclusion of explicit verbalization of sex scenes is almost nonexistent in this show.  Episodes involving rape, torture and the murder of women in many of the crime dramas on television are running rampid.  The Closer is a crime drama, so throughout the show weapons, murder and details of the crime are discussed.  However, the sleazy sexual innuendos’ involving every detail of a rape is not.  Thank you   

Television shows as if Law & Order the SVU has its share of violence, involving women and The Closer really is not explicit in its details of a sexual crime…  Unfortunately, I have to wonder if a show like The Closer will be able to compete with the array of crime drama focusing on female abuse.  Let’s face it, any show focusing on sex and violence is a hit.  I think it has more to do with the sex than the violence, however if the violence has to do with the sex, all the better.  The ratings soar.  I really have to wonder if “the sick mind” is turned on by the details of women who have been assaulted.  I also have to wonder if displaying the sex and violence in every detail on television and in the movies are putting women at risk.

I, for one enjoy watching a crime drama like The Closer.  However, I am afraid; to keep up with the “ratings” this series may have to add some sexual violence involving women.  How and why has our society come to this?  Does it go back to evolution?  Do the majority of television viewers prefer to see women brutalized?  Have viewers been waiting for all of the rules to be lifted so they can observe a women being raped and murdered?

 Somehow, I cannot picture Brenda Leigh in every segment discussing penetration and sodomy.  The question is can this hit show survive without sex and violence?  Time will tell.

 http://www.tnt.tv/series/closer/photos/

Fashion Week in New York: Change is in the Air?

 

Fashion Week in New York was a little different this year, and I must say I, for one was pleasantly surprised.

 Instead of our little, gaunt faced thirteen year olds, modeling   Calvin Klein’s fall collection, “Supermodels” from the 90’s, glided down the runway.  Granted, the models  are now  older,  and not sporting a body that would be lost in a size one.  This is what I like to see. 

“So, what I was trying to do here is not really represent the past, but encourage the future,” CK designer Francisco Costa said.  Really,  do hope you mean it?

 Costa, may be trying to change the image the fashion designers are responsible for creating in the first place, but I have to question the motives behind this change.  Is it true concern for our models that are starving themselves to death?  On the other hand, as usual, is it about publicity and going with the flow.  Oh well, I really don’t care what caused the designers to jump on this “bandwagon”, this is a start.

The Council of Fashion Designers of America hosted a panel discussion on changing the standard model “sample size”.  Finally, the industry is trying to bring about change.  This unfortunately took a model dying of an eating disorder three years ago. Now models are actually being taken off the runway for being too thin.  It’s about time…

Model Doutzen Kroes, 25, is a “Victoria’s Secret Angel” but says, “her fashion-show work has slowed to almost nothing”.  The reason?  She’s too big.  I don’t know; are we sending out mixed messages here?  It certainly seems that way.  Nevertheless, I guess change is in the air, now we have to keep the signals straight.

 

Sources:

Gallegus, Manuel. “Fashion Vets Raise Flags Over Runway Teens.” 20 Feb 2010. CBS News. eveningnews/main6227130.shtml?tag=cbsnewsTwoColUpperPromoArea>.

Samantha Critchell, AP. “As New York Fashion Week rolls out runway, too-skinny model debate turns to age.” February 10 2010. Business News. as-new-york-fashion-week-rolls-out-runway-too-skinWSny-model-debate-turns-to-age-30103/>.

http://media.onsugar.com/files/2010/02/07/4/191/1913634/96845549_10.jpg New York Fashion Week: Calvin Klein 2010runway,  Gallery, Designer, Splash · February 18, 2010

Don’t Go Grace

 

Holly Hunter plays Grace Hanadarko. Grace is an Oklahoma City police detective in the cable series Saving Grace. Does Grace need saving? I do not think so. She is true to herself and lives life the way she wants to. Grace sleeps around a lot, has an affair with a married man, drinks like there is no tomorrow and smokes. Grace is not the tender young thing.  Her small breasts are not hanging out, well not all the time anyway, and she is always putting flowers in her hair. She sports blue jeans and boots along with a leather jacket. This series does throw a little fantasy around, but I will ignore the angel Earl. I just enjoy watching who this woman is. We have a truly free spirit in Grace. No perfect images, No silly episodes showing the beauty with the big breasts taking down someone twice her size. Grace is completely believable as an Oklahoma detective.

Grace has problems, but one of them is not trying to live up to a perfect image. She just does not care. She is, who she is and does what she wants. She may not love herself but she loves every one in her life. Grace accepts the fact that she is a little self-destructive.  On occasion she does beat herself up, but don’t we all? I am not saying Grace is the perfect role model for a young girl.  She breaks all the rules, however at least she is not sporting the perfect image.

TNT has cancelled Saving Grace and I have to wonder why. Maybe ratings? I am not sure. If it is the ratings,  let us ask why. Not enough sex? Not enough boobs?

Sources:

ASSOCIATED PRESS,updated 2:34 p.m. ET, Mon., July 23, 2007

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19791575/

Women and Girls in the Media

Media cited for showing girls as sex objectsRealistic media-we need it now!

How do I feel? What do I think? Does my opinion really matter? Does anyone care if I am smart? The answer is no. What matters is that I have a 22-inch waist and a 36-bra cup size. Thanks to the media, I will spend most of my time trying to live up to an image. The image created by you; The Media.

The image of women set by the standards of the media is a perfect one. No pimples on adolescent girls and no stretch marks on the women who just gave birth. We are all skinny! Give me a break! I want to see what the beautiful people look like without the airbrushed photos and plastic surgery.

Every now and again women’s images in the media change, however, the images still portray what is perceived to be perfect. Either we have big breasts or small waists or we are twiggy thin. We have celebrities stating big is beautiful and then we see them hiring trainers and promoting diets products to lose weight. Help media, you are killing us, not to mention our young impressionable daughters, nieces, sisters and girlfriends. Portray us for who we really are. People with feelings and brains and maybe a bra cup size a.

You are causing us to get lipo, nose jobs and become inflicted with eating disorders. We obsess over how we look instead of who we are and the contributions we can make to society. Advertisements of the perfect woman sells the products of large corporations and they do it without any regard for the damage it inflicts on the psyche of women.

I think we should bring a personal injury law suit against the media They deserve it. As long as the media can sell the products of the corporations that pay them, they do not care. However, the media can never rectify the harm they are causing. This is not about women’s lib. This is life and many problems that you, the media are helping to create. Do you have any idea what it feels like to try to live up to the expectations you impose upon us? This is no fun. However, you continue to display your sexy, skinny ads because they sell. What a pity. I guess money is at the root of it all. This is evil!

Cosmopolitan. Ed. Marie Claire published by Hearst Magazines Division, Hearst Communications, Inc. © 2010 Cosmopolitan. 2010. Cosmopolitan. 27 01 2010

Jayson, By Sharon. ” Media cited for showing girls as sex objects from study: Girls objectified.” USA today (2007).