So,if anybody bothered to read my last post
(I have no idea if anyone reads this- you should read it damn it- it has pretty cherries now!) I'd like to explore these issues with the help of anyone who can be arsed getting involved; allocating space for personal reflect, answering specific questions, all the rest of it. So, write something in the comments page if you're into it. That would be swell. It would be better than swell. It would be dandy.
Toodle loo. Off to bed.
Friday, February 26, 2010
As Good a Time to Rant as Any
So. I've been thinking a lot about the relationship between sex and culture in Western societies (I'm not going to specify mainstream culture, as I think there can be some pretty significant overlap in what I am referring to-I will get there eventually, I promise).
Three separate "experiences" set me off/ got me thinking. One was a scandal surrounding some stock market dude being seen in the background perusing rudey nudey pictures of Miranda Kerr as some bank media rep was doing a report in the mainstream news. Initially I just saw this incident as a little bit piss funny. Then someone sent me a link from the Age newspaper that complicated my initial impressions.
(link here)
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/feel-sorry-for-kiely-but-pity-more-his-female-colleagues-20100204-ng33.html?autostart=1
To summarise, Cordelia Fine (who is a research associate at the Centre for Agency, Values & Ethics in the department of philosophy at Macquarie University)speculates that men [lack of emphasis on hetero] are influenced by sexual depictions of women to the extent it carries through to their dealings with female colleagues in the workplace. She cites a research experiment where one group of men (again sexual identity undisclosed) were exposed to raunchy objectifying advertisements, the other group shown ads where sexual innuendo was absent. All subjects were then sent off to interview a female job candidate. The former group were found to be more leering and dodgy; retaining physical information about the candidate but retrieving little data of substance. They were reported to rate her as less competent than the other group. Whilst I take these findings with a grain of salt and a large slice of cheese (study details are undisclosed)I still found it to be a fascinating hypothesis. Not so did the influx of hysterical guys in the comments section, many of whom came up with intelligent, witty and original retorts suggesting Ms. Fine is a lesbian, or so ugly no self respecting man will fuck her.Whilst I thoroughly agree that the images WEREN'T porn, and to categorise them as such offers no credence to an argument that attempts to discredit them, it was the responses to this article that got me. Oh yeah, gotta love all the "why do you blame him,when she is the one taking off her clothes?". Umm. That's HER JOB. His, I am presuming is to do the real work he is paid for.
TIRED NOW- loosing concentration and momentum.
The other incident was a Farsebook page set up by some tool of a teenage Catholic boy that had some name like "Kill a Prostitute So You Don't Have to Pay Her". Excellent. Nice to see archaic ideas of punishing whores haven't scootered away into oblivion.
My main gripe was encountering this story posted on a free publishing website where the synopsis pretty much follows the plot of the Hentai game RapePlay; girl gets kidnapped, girl gets continuously raped and beaten, blah blah blah. That made me wonder: have we really betrayed young girls so much that the only way they feel comfortable about expressing themselves sexually is within narratives or other frameworks where they have no agency at all.
So I have been wondering if I have walked the plank and landed on the good ship radical feminist, seeing misogyny and patriarchal oppression in every nook and cranny, hiding under every good child's bed, or if I am actually right and misogyny (rather than just sexism and objectification of women) is a lot more embedded in our every day lives than what I felt, say a fortnight ago.
Three separate "experiences" set me off/ got me thinking. One was a scandal surrounding some stock market dude being seen in the background perusing rudey nudey pictures of Miranda Kerr as some bank media rep was doing a report in the mainstream news. Initially I just saw this incident as a little bit piss funny. Then someone sent me a link from the Age newspaper that complicated my initial impressions.
(link here)
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/feel-sorry-for-kiely-but-pity-more-his-female-colleagues-20100204-ng33.html?autostart=1
To summarise, Cordelia Fine (who is a research associate at the Centre for Agency, Values & Ethics in the department of philosophy at Macquarie University)speculates that men [lack of emphasis on hetero] are influenced by sexual depictions of women to the extent it carries through to their dealings with female colleagues in the workplace. She cites a research experiment where one group of men (again sexual identity undisclosed) were exposed to raunchy objectifying advertisements, the other group shown ads where sexual innuendo was absent. All subjects were then sent off to interview a female job candidate. The former group were found to be more leering and dodgy; retaining physical information about the candidate but retrieving little data of substance. They were reported to rate her as less competent than the other group. Whilst I take these findings with a grain of salt and a large slice of cheese (study details are undisclosed)I still found it to be a fascinating hypothesis. Not so did the influx of hysterical guys in the comments section, many of whom came up with intelligent, witty and original retorts suggesting Ms. Fine is a lesbian, or so ugly no self respecting man will fuck her.Whilst I thoroughly agree that the images WEREN'T porn, and to categorise them as such offers no credence to an argument that attempts to discredit them, it was the responses to this article that got me. Oh yeah, gotta love all the "why do you blame him,when she is the one taking off her clothes?". Umm. That's HER JOB. His, I am presuming is to do the real work he is paid for.
TIRED NOW- loosing concentration and momentum.
The other incident was a Farsebook page set up by some tool of a teenage Catholic boy that had some name like "Kill a Prostitute So You Don't Have to Pay Her". Excellent. Nice to see archaic ideas of punishing whores haven't scootered away into oblivion.
My main gripe was encountering this story posted on a free publishing website where the synopsis pretty much follows the plot of the Hentai game RapePlay; girl gets kidnapped, girl gets continuously raped and beaten, blah blah blah. That made me wonder: have we really betrayed young girls so much that the only way they feel comfortable about expressing themselves sexually is within narratives or other frameworks where they have no agency at all.
So I have been wondering if I have walked the plank and landed on the good ship radical feminist, seeing misogyny and patriarchal oppression in every nook and cranny, hiding under every good child's bed, or if I am actually right and misogyny (rather than just sexism and objectification of women) is a lot more embedded in our every day lives than what I felt, say a fortnight ago.
I am at times, a cock up
That's awesome! I only wrote about three concise words in my profile, and managed to misspell the name of my fabulous city!Well done me.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
YAY FOR THE SLAM RALLY
Good to see the peeps parade in Melbs today protesting against the proposed eradication of our pub music culture. Well, the further bastardisation of it anyways. Holy shit , though. Warren Ellis looks like a hairy Biblical character at the moment. Have not seen the Dirty Three violinist since he used to look wasted in gigs during the 90s.
My House Smells Like Spew. What to Frigging Do?
At the moment my entire house smells like vomit and I haven't a clue how to successfully remedy the situation. I am domestic goddess fail. This is something that bothers me at times. Sometimes I marvel in my ability to rebel against basic principles of hygiene instead. When I wish to engage in much internal dialogue about how shit I am, all my faults come in handy though. Including this one. Yet, I wonder why it has to be so fucking hard. There is mess. One cleans mess. Simple. So why do II feel the urgency to draw politics into these basic boring facts of life? Why can't I just clean shit up, rather than wasting time speculating how much my biological possession of a vagina is leading me to get jiggy with the whole cleaning up caper. I am boring even myself.
Get better little spewy boy. I have enjoyed couch-ridden cuddles, even if they have more to do with illness rather than maternal affection.
Get better little spewy boy. I have enjoyed couch-ridden cuddles, even if they have more to do with illness rather than maternal affection.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Tim Winton "Breath"
I picked up a copy of "Breath." It won the Miles Franklin award. Winton is a renowned Australian author. I thought, it's all good.
When reading the first chapter, I was captivated. I wanted to know more about this misunderstood middle aged man. I wanted to decipher why people thought he was strange, why he had an insight into the death of a teenage boy that his paramedic partner couldn't grasp. I loved the wording, I loved the style. And then it was gone. My engagement completely evaporated.
Roughly three quarters of the novel is a meditation on Pikelet's adolescence. We get a glimpse of his precarious connection to and ultimate detachment from his family. We become familiar with his other relationships; his mateship with Loony, his adoration for Sando and Eva Sanderson, awkward failed romances between a teenage girl and his mentor's wife. We are introduced to his surroundings and how he spends his time. We follow him in his quest to ascertain his own identity. Most of these are universal themes. Therefore, it would stand to reason that a reader would have recognition of, if not empathy for Pikelet's experience. I didn't. Which is odd. I often write from the perspective of a teenager. I'm emotionally and mentally still probably only about sixteen. I still remember that part of my life clearly, and believe it has shaped me like no other period. So why was there no connection, and pretty much no interest for me in Pikelet's nostalgic memoir?
The absence of identification is the predominant reason. Although often used as metaphor, or an explanation of the mechanics of Pikelet's mind, the bulk of "Breath" is about surfing. I don't do sport. I don't get sport. And I guess I can't get past that. Whilst a lot of Pikelet's surfing was about experimenting with boundaries, recognising how close to the edge he could travel, where his flirtation with danger would take him, to me it was still about bloody surfing. These are all concepts (or a single concept explained in different ways) that I can identify with, but it wasn't expressed in a way that allowed me access. Some peeps in a GoodReads discussion reflected on the novel's ability to return them to a time of Summers long gone when they traveled to the coast and met the archetypal characters written about here. I never went to the coast as a child . I never met those people. I didn't have a gateway to this world provided by my own previous experience and Winton didn't create a space that filled in the gaps for my lack, or offer a literary landscape in which my lack didn't matter.
Even the relationships were really hard to care about. Pikelet and Moody's friendship encapsulates solidarity, jealousy, a sense of suffocation. We've all been there. Maybe it is a gender thing, but I couldn't relate, or feel, or care and I really thought I should have. His relationship with Sando, the adult ex-pro surfer is a little more complex and interesting. There is awe, idolisation, lust for approval then finally, hurt and betrayal. Again it didn't trigger the emotive response that it should have. It was only during the course of his encounter with Eva that any kind of legitimate feelings seemed to pass. Reflections on the erratic energy between the pair, swinging from lust, to love, to hate and back again seemed to evoke a passion dormant in Winton's protagonist until now. Again a range of emotions are explored; guilt, disgust, infatuation take place as these two lonely, misplaced individuals find a connection, but for the first time, it rings true.
In the last 17 pages Pikelet provides a concise summary of his life here after. This is the man I wanted to meet all along. I want to know why his marriage finally fell apart, seeing the reasons cited as only fractions of the whole equation. I wanted to know why he was institutionalised, why he carries the stigma of perversity, when he was never a willing participant, and if it's just because he thinks pregnant women look sexy, then maybe I'm less prudish than I thought. These questions are never really answered. The component that could have made this a great, great novel seems skimmed almost to the extent of being a succession of footnotes.
I finally did identify with Pikelet, or Bruce Pike as he is again called in adulthood. But it took until the last ten pages before the book's closure.
When reading the first chapter, I was captivated. I wanted to know more about this misunderstood middle aged man. I wanted to decipher why people thought he was strange, why he had an insight into the death of a teenage boy that his paramedic partner couldn't grasp. I loved the wording, I loved the style. And then it was gone. My engagement completely evaporated.
Roughly three quarters of the novel is a meditation on Pikelet's adolescence. We get a glimpse of his precarious connection to and ultimate detachment from his family. We become familiar with his other relationships; his mateship with Loony, his adoration for Sando and Eva Sanderson, awkward failed romances between a teenage girl and his mentor's wife. We are introduced to his surroundings and how he spends his time. We follow him in his quest to ascertain his own identity. Most of these are universal themes. Therefore, it would stand to reason that a reader would have recognition of, if not empathy for Pikelet's experience. I didn't. Which is odd. I often write from the perspective of a teenager. I'm emotionally and mentally still probably only about sixteen. I still remember that part of my life clearly, and believe it has shaped me like no other period. So why was there no connection, and pretty much no interest for me in Pikelet's nostalgic memoir?
The absence of identification is the predominant reason. Although often used as metaphor, or an explanation of the mechanics of Pikelet's mind, the bulk of "Breath" is about surfing. I don't do sport. I don't get sport. And I guess I can't get past that. Whilst a lot of Pikelet's surfing was about experimenting with boundaries, recognising how close to the edge he could travel, where his flirtation with danger would take him, to me it was still about bloody surfing. These are all concepts (or a single concept explained in different ways) that I can identify with, but it wasn't expressed in a way that allowed me access. Some peeps in a GoodReads discussion reflected on the novel's ability to return them to a time of Summers long gone when they traveled to the coast and met the archetypal characters written about here. I never went to the coast as a child . I never met those people. I didn't have a gateway to this world provided by my own previous experience and Winton didn't create a space that filled in the gaps for my lack, or offer a literary landscape in which my lack didn't matter.
Even the relationships were really hard to care about. Pikelet and Moody's friendship encapsulates solidarity, jealousy, a sense of suffocation. We've all been there. Maybe it is a gender thing, but I couldn't relate, or feel, or care and I really thought I should have. His relationship with Sando, the adult ex-pro surfer is a little more complex and interesting. There is awe, idolisation, lust for approval then finally, hurt and betrayal. Again it didn't trigger the emotive response that it should have. It was only during the course of his encounter with Eva that any kind of legitimate feelings seemed to pass. Reflections on the erratic energy between the pair, swinging from lust, to love, to hate and back again seemed to evoke a passion dormant in Winton's protagonist until now. Again a range of emotions are explored; guilt, disgust, infatuation take place as these two lonely, misplaced individuals find a connection, but for the first time, it rings true.
In the last 17 pages Pikelet provides a concise summary of his life here after. This is the man I wanted to meet all along. I want to know why his marriage finally fell apart, seeing the reasons cited as only fractions of the whole equation. I wanted to know why he was institutionalised, why he carries the stigma of perversity, when he was never a willing participant, and if it's just because he thinks pregnant women look sexy, then maybe I'm less prudish than I thought. These questions are never really answered. The component that could have made this a great, great novel seems skimmed almost to the extent of being a succession of footnotes.
I finally did identify with Pikelet, or Bruce Pike as he is again called in adulthood. But it took until the last ten pages before the book's closure.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)