Mad Max

I saw Mad Max this weekend. I realized afterwards that having not seen the previous Mad Max movies tainted my experience. Truthfully, I didn't love the movie. SORRY EVERYONE. One of the things I like most about dystopias is learning how humanity destroyed the world. There wasn't much of that in the movie, since apparently it was covered previously in the series. I thought this was a remake. I don't know anything about movies, you guys.

I also really wanted to see some bad-ass, futuristic animals, but there were none of those either. So many better dystopias out there, you guys. So many.

For example.

Or maybe I didn't like it because all women hate action movies! When are Mad Max and Imperator Furiosa going to fall in love??!?!  Just kidding, actually, my favorite part of the movie was their not falling in love. [ACTUALLY, my favorite part of the movie was when I got carded to buy a ticket. I look under 17, you guys. I feel infantile and it's amazing.]

Obviously, I went to see the movie because I heard of its "overt feminist agenda" that men's rights activists are all riled up about. (I told my friend, Kyle, this, and he responded, "Men's rights activists? That's actually a thing?" Bless his heart.) If "overt feminist agenda" means showing men and women in equal roles, then thank god for feminism, right? It was refreshing to see a dominant female character, but still, I never felt like women prevailed over men. In fact, everything sucked for pretty much everyone, equally. Maybe that's the danger of feminism! We're all going to end up thirsty in a desert and it's all women's fault! Or something.  I honestly really don't know what people were upset about.

Then again, there was that once scene where Max handed a gun over to Imperator to do the shooting and I felt every man's penis retract into his body at that moment. World domination is around the corner, ladies!

But until then, make sure the government is okay with your contraception choice.

Are you for real [a feminist]?!

Feminism is all the rage now. Obviously, Beyoncé has had a lot to do with that.

Who run the world?

So do extreme right-wing conservatives, if we're being honest. When people say things like,

“What does it say about the college co-ed Sandra Fluke, who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex? What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She’s having so much sex she can’t afford the contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex. What does that make us? We’re the pimps.” [Rush Limbaugh]

and

“If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down." [Todd Akin]

other people are like "... the fuck?" and then they rise up.

But as feminism has become more "popular" so has criticizing feminism. And much of that criticism is coming from other "feminists".  It seems to me that feminism's biggest enemy is actually women. Instead of coming together in the name of equality, we are spending our time determining each other's value as feminists. Let's briefly pause and consider the irony of that.

...

I keep seeing this pop up all over social media -- this debate about who is a real feminist and who is not, and whether feminism is just a trend.  First of all, I'm not even mad about the idea of feminism being a trend. Don't we want more people on board? I'd rather feminism be a trend than jelly shoes (which actually are a trend again... so scratch that).  At least feminism can be a productive trend, is what I'm saying.

It's like, no one can ever be satisfied. We feminists want to take away the negative stigma associated with that word, and then when we finally do, we have to put a new stigma on it?  We're then going to say feminism is trivial, superficial?

"Why should we care what, exactly, gets someone interested in feminist thinking, as long as they arrive there eventually?"  [Callie Beusman]

Then there is the ongoing argument of whether you can be sexual and also a feminist. Again, if we stigmatize something, if we make it taboo, then we are part of the problem. For instance, if we focus on Beyoncé's sexuality alone, we are sexualizing her. We're doing that. 

Recently, notable "good" feminist, bell hooks, blasted Beyoncé for being too sexual, for resorting to taking her clothes off to sell records, blah blah blah.  (She obviously has not listened to Bey's album.)

"hooks was, essentially, calling out Beyoncé as a 'bad feminist' – a popular feminist pastime during which we arbitrarily determine who is or isn't doing feminism right. 

Her concern that girls might singularly internalize the notion that their worth is intrinsically tied to their bodies – and the desirability of those bodies – is equally well placed. At some point, though, we have to differentiate between concern and concern trolling. We have to trust that women can be feminists, good role models and embrace sexuality. We have to believe that we can hold different points of view without labeling each other bad feminists."  [Roxane Gay]

I've already written about this, but I'll say it again:  Beyoncé, in particular, is very clearly in control of her sexuality - she owns it; she is proud of it. And good for her. There are many, many women who believe in gender equality and also like to have sex. If we feel like we have to hide that part of ourselves, aren't we just perpetuating the notion that sex is dirty and wrong and that women shouldn't be doing it?

We need to move on. These conversations are not helpful; they are hypocritical. (And I suppose so is this blog post, but I've already spent a lot of time on it, so it's happening.)

"But the danger, the fear and, quite honestly, the more likely outcome, is that designing a flat shoe or casting a single model of color in a major campaign won't translate to a consistently diverse, female-empowered runway. A few collections inspired by Pussy Riot won't help us to elect a female president. And when fashion treats such important issues as trends, we risk losing the fight when they slip out of vogue." [Allison P Davis]

Or, the danger is that we are spending all our time evaluating women's level of feminism, rather than supporting each other.  The fear, quite honestly, is that people want to be hip and will let that get in the way of a cause when that cause becomes popular.  

But, for the record, I just want to make sure everyone knows I was a feminist before it was cool.

When (Elite) Women Lead

On Monday, I attended a lecture at Harvard entitled: "When Women Lead: Insights and Experience from Women in Power."  As you may have guessed, the audience was predominantly female, which was disappointing to me. Discussions about women and leadership are pretty much worthless if they do not involve men, but whatever. I'm sure all the guys were busy drinking beer and playing sports, or whatever (jokes).

Anyway, the lecture featured a panel of esteemed women, including:

Karen Gordon Mills, Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration Harvard University Class of '75 and '77

Jill Abramson, Executive Editor of The New York Times, Harvard University Class of '76

Edith Cooper, Executive Vice President and Global Head of Human Capital Management at Goldman Sachs, Harvard University class of '83

Janet Napolitano, President of University of California, former Secretary of Homeland Security, didn't go to Harvard University, so who cares? (more jokes)

Obviously, this is a group of remarkable women, but do you notice what most of them have in common? Harvard. Harvard affiliates speaking to a room full of Harvard affiliates. What I'm saying is this is an elite group of women. Had there been time, I would have asked the panel: "What would your advice be to women outside the Harvard community?

I don't mean to minimize any of these women's accomplishments - they are indeed impressive and important. And all of them are making strides to empower future women leaders, which is critical if we want to close the gender gap. But I couldn't help but notice and fixate on their elite backgrounds. I confess that I don't know these women's full stories, but I think it is fair to assume they were pretty fortunate, or at least lucky. Abramsom talked about spending her summers on Nantucket, where she was introduced to a family friend who worked for Time Magazine; this event spurred her career in journalism. Even Napolitano, who was the minority of the group as she never attended Harvard, admitted to having the financial means to be able to take risks.

This idea of wealth or privilege comes up a lot when we talk about Sheryl Sandberg and her Lean In campaign. That is to say, it's hard to imagine the average woman leaning in -- the single mom paying for daycare, the recent graduate with $60k in debt, women in public service making approximately 0 dollars, etc. Leaning in is not necessarily a possibility for everyone. It's like when we (and by we, I mean never me) tell people to pick themselves up by their bootstraps - some bitches don't have boots to begin with.

So, I guess the takeaway for me, though it wasn't even discussed, was that gender issues, like every issue I suppose, are deeply socioeconomic issues. I mean, duh. Women still get paid less than men, blah blah blah. Ultimately, closing the gender gap requires investing (financially) in women. You can only lean in so far when you're poor, nah mean?

For the record, my follow-up question would have been: "How do ya'll feel about Beyonce?"

The Weeknd

On Saturday night, I had a dream that I met The Weeknd in line for the bathroom at a bar and he invited me to sit with him and talk about feminism. WHAT?! I woke up sweating and panting. It was the most wondrous dream I've had since whenever the last time I dreamt about dragons was.

It's the dreads; they get me every time.

Are you all familiar with The Weeknd? If not, let me tell you about him: His name is Abel (!), and he's from Canada. He's also disgusting, misogynistic, possibly a sexual predator, and I'm in love with him. I'm not sure how to negotiate my feelings for him because he personifies everything I stand against, clearly. I feel guilty listening to his music, which I do almost always. I try to justify this by fantasizing (and apparently dreaming) that his musical identity is ironic, that he is drawing on people's most basic impulses to prove some kind of point (I haven't figured out what that point is yet...). Most likely, though, he is just high and entitled.

BUT THAT VOICE.

Everything I've ever said about girl power can be discounted by listening to this remix. I feel like I need to go to therapy about this.  Do you know how hard it is to be a feminist who likes hip-hop?

See what I did there?

Beyoncé

Beyoncé's new self-titled album has been on repeat on my iPod for over a week now. I'll be the first to admit I have not always been a fan of hers, but this album has blown my mind. BLOWN MY MIND. It's a perfect combination of femininity and feminism. Those two things can go together, believe it or not.

Of course, a lot of people have been hating on Beyoncé claiming that she is not a "real feminist", and to them, I have this to say:

1) The quickest/easiest way to be anti-feminist is by bashing other women, especially those on top, so good job.
2) Learn something about hip-hop. The industry is notorious for hyper-masculinity and objectification of women. Watch any music video for 30 seconds. Now here's Beyoncé taking ownership of her sexuality (and also occasionally Jay-Z) in a sophisticated way. And I say, GET IT, GIRL.
3) Speaking of Jay-Z, why do we barely even bat an eye when he proclaims himself "the best rapper alive", but criticize Beyoncé for her "overconfidence"?
4) The idea that women have to be perfect all the time is debilitating, not to mention one of the major reasons why the feminist movement exists in the first place. So how does it help to expect women to be perfect feminists? Guess what! Women can be empowered and influential and also like sex and make-up and fame.
5) Have you even listened to this album? Because, for real, it is incredible.

Nothing Was The Same

I am inappropriately obsessed with Drake's new album, Nothing Was The Same.

I honestly haven't cared much about Drake since he played Jimmy on Degrassi, and even then, I was more into Craig, despite the fact that he gave everyone gonorrhea in 8th grade because IT GOES THERE (Degrassi tagline).

100% gonorrhea

Anyway, I used to think Drake looked like Little Foot from The Land Before Time, but now I think he's sexy because we've both matured and also I've been single for a really long time.

Doppelganger

Moreover, Nothing Was The Same makes me understand what Amanda Bynes was talking about. And if you don't know what I'm referring to, you'll have to Google it since I'm too classy to repeat it here and also because my dad reads this sometimes. 

Wink.

On the album, Drake kind of/sort of flirts with feminism, which makes me even more *excited*, since it's almost impossible for me to listen to hip-hop without feeling like a hypocrite (but I do it anyway). Then again, he also talks a lot about all the money he has because that is apparently the only way to sell hip-hop records in America. So, it's a little bit confusing, but whatever. I'm still totally obsessed with it/him. 

Right.

PLUS, he's half black AND half Jewish, which means he could fulfill all my dreams of being in an interracial relationship with someone who will celebrate Jewish holidays with me. So, I really hope he's reading this. Well, I mean, everything except for the Little Foot part.