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A Cultural Weakness: Why America Likes Its Women “Falling Apart” Rather Than Together
Naomi Wolf in the Washington Post offers a very insightful look at how American culture is obsessed with the women who are “falling apart”:
Most American women are becoming ever more comfortable with their capabilities as they break into new professional roles, learn how to do electrical wiring or automobile maintenance, tackle life insurance, IRAs and tax planning on behalf of the many configurations of family they are nurturing, or even put their lives on the line as warriors in Iraq. They are surprising themselves and the culture every day by not falling apart as they take on tasks that the prefeminist world was sure would lead them to collapse in a heap, needing smelling salts.Yet at the same time, the culture seems increasingly obsessed with showcasing images of glamorous young women who are falling apart — sometimes seriously, even fatally.
Wolfe goes on to note how Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Marilyn Monroe, Anna Nicole Smith and Princess Diana are the women who dominate the headlines.
What’s most interesting here, though, is the way Wolfe traces this fascination far back into American history. In fact, Wolfe claims, this sexist tendency to shift the focus away from strong, capable women began deep in the 19th Century when, in order to combat a burgeoning women’s movement, the popularized female images were “those of women pale and weak with tuberculosis, those who died young and frail, who could barely raise themselves up from their languid sickbeds.”
Although Wolfe doesn’t go there, her thesis helps explain America’s addiction to reality shows.
If you take a look at the Kat Angus and Addi Stewart’s recent list in the Edmonton Journal of the Top 10 worst reality shows (inspired by the dreaded premiere of NBC’s “Age of Love” Monday night), it’s amazing to see how much of their worst-ness comes at the expense of women. From “The Swan” to “Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?” to “For Love or Money,” Angus and Stewart point out how these shows got all their mileage out of making women appear desperate, shrill or just weak.
Speaking of “Age of Love,” Jenn Pozner at Women in Media & News performed a brilliant step-by-step deconstruction of the first episode as she watched it. Pozner has previously written about how reality TV degrades women for Ms. Magazine. Within the first 10 minutes of this latest sad example, the show had, according to Pozner, “wracked up so many of the genre?s contrived cliches that if you were playing a reality TV drinking game, you?d be sloshed by minute fifteen.” She explains:
? in this ?experiment,? one man has all the agency while dozens of women in their 40s and their 20s are expected to fight amongst themselves like children for his attention? single women over 40 are portrayed as pathetic, lovelorn losers (despite their accomplishments in life)
? women in their 20s are portrayed as sexy, nubile sirens (desirable as girlfriend material despite being depicted as ditzy and dumb; they even pose them against poles, get it?)
? the narrator promises that ?the claws will come out? as ?each week, you?ll see young verses old in a battle for love?
I myself tuned in for the first few minutes — but was so turned off and, frankly, bored by these well-worn sexist cliches that I couldn’t even convince the cultural critic inside of me to continue watching.
In light of Wolfe’s argument, though, Pozner’s close analysis provides damning evidence that — whether it be female celebrities or the “ordinary” women of reality TV — those cliches are still a dominant American ideology.
Posted at 9:06 AM | Permalink | | 
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February 16, 2009 at 11:34 am
When Einstein came to America in the late 1930s, he observed that in America, the men do nothing but work all day long, their entire lives so that the women can have houses and things to occupy their lives. As a young man in 2009, in the spirit of equality between the genders, I believe that women ought to have salaries equal to men. And work hours equal to me. And the availability of all jobs that men do. And, in exchange for all this, they should simply quiet down and stop monitoring men’s behavior in the work place. I have one fiancee. I don’t want 100. You may think that I am stupid, but that’s your opinion, isn’t it? Women STILL, after all this time, fail to realize that the true nature of WORK is neither MASCULINE nor FEMININE. It is neuter. WORK is a concept. A concept that can most easily be defined as “playing catch”. Any thing at work is a matter of playing catch. Whether you work with information or technology or work in hard labor. Person A gives a task, usually in the form of a direct command or order: “Do X”; “Move X”. Person B then follows the command. Next, Person B gives a command. Then person A follows it. That is work. Plain and simple. All day long 365 days/year. Women, who are gifted with the ability to be at once much more detail-oriented than men, also work within the space of perceived fear rather than actual fear. Example: “Did he like my dress as I sent him the email?” “Did SHE like my dress as I sent her the email?” These questions inside a woman’s mind are not sexual in nature. Rather, they are just the questions that correspond to a completely natural maternal instinct. However, the question remains: Should men be forced to contend with an infinity of questions and doubts that have been, are, and always will be irrelevant to the task at hand. It seems that American men and women are the brunt of some gigantic cosmic joke. No matter how many strides our society makes to integrate people and have them get along well and efficiently, it seems that human nature cuts the cloth the wrong way every time. I was a PhD student at a certain university. I proposed to a professor there to allow me to teach a class called “Having Work Work For Young Ladies in the 21st Century.” In this class, I planned to discuss work dynamics; power struggles, the importance of relationships and the some-times need to abandon “how I feel” about someone in order to get the task done… something along the lines of the old adage “principles before personalities”. The professor, a hard-core ultra-liberal, told me that I was out of line and sexist. However, out of the 1000 18 year old female students I surveyed of all races, 988 said that they would sign up for a class like that in a heartbeat. Those young women could see that I was trying to help them get a leg up, while getting along with their male co-workers. The 48 year old professor and ultraliberal only saw me as an enemy to some invisible cause of his, probably a mental vestige of the late 1960s. What was once considered “progressive” is becoming “regressive”. My little survey shows that the female students of the modern day and age have literally abandoned these anachronistic and draconian ideals of the politically correct Americans. These young women want the skills to build a future in a difficult and rapidly changing world. They don’t care who teaches them. A professor from the right - or a professor on the left. It is decidedly pathetic that these battles have invaded higher learning to such a degree. In case you are curious, I did not vote for either Obama (Socialist) or McCain (Fascist). I am still waiting for an actual American presidential candidate to come along - someone with common sense who makes the best decision possible for all of the people in the nation, regardless of their skin color or economic circumstance. A true leader - not a political ideologue bent on domination - either from a left-leaning perspective, or a right-leaning perspective. Here is a little political prediction for you, from one of America’s unsung intellectual elite: me. LOL! What a jerk I am! Anyways… here it is: After four years of Barack Obama and a nation on the brink of complete and total destruction from the inside, a la the Roman Empire, a populist president will emerge who actually 1. keeps the interest of the Constitution at heart 2. is right-leaning in terms of MONEY (i.e. money belongs to he or she who makes it and not to the government or anyone else for that matter) 3. is left-leaning in terms of social policy (i.e. sleep with whoever you want). This country’s paranoid fear of the sexual experience is another characteristic that makes us the laughing stock of other nations around the world. America, a country that watches Brittany Spears shake her booty on TV all night long or whose youth spends countless hours on the Internet engaged in the consumption of pornographic material still has trouble publicly viewing, in real life, affection between a man and a woman. Well, America, these are the people you elected: uptight, strict, regimented, subversively militaristic… sort of like a Nazi, if you stop and think about it. I don’t care what side of the political spectrum you place yourself or whether you paint yourself “red” or “blue” or, the new one: “green” (a code-word for a someone so environmentally conscious that their zeal rivals that of a Taliban suicide bomber).
Not being able to tolerate young men and women kissing is just pathetic… I don’t care WHAT color you are or what god you worship.
From one human being to another…. GROW UP.
Now, of course, you can feel free to bombard me with the long and predictable criticisms of white male jerk sexist moron blah blah blah.
But, what if I told you I spoke 4 languages?
What if I told you I dressed in nice clothes?
What if I told you I have lots of friends of all races?
What if I told you that I believe in America and in the Constitution, and small government and privacy for all CITIZENS?
Can you still pin me down and limit my identity to such a neanderthalic (that is a neologism… a new word) image?
Or, are you willing to start listening again?
The Patriots of this nation have not abandoned you, America.
We are just hidden, quiet, saving money, working amongst you.
You have no idea who we are.
But something wonderful is coming. You can count on it.
A two-step manuever: One step forward, into the 21st century, and one step backwards, into the 18th century.
It will re-stabilize our American Dream.
And the re-stabilization of a dream is hard work.
You have to consider lots of invisible factors, not easily measured by machines.
You have to use your EARS and LISTEN. That’s all.
So, frustrated and angry America, do not lose hope!
Do not lose faith!
Do not lose your footing.
You are still strong and proud people. You are still brave and hearty people. You are still sweet and kind people.
If only you would point all that good energy towards one another instead of pouring it into slanderous media outlets and worrying about what everyone else thinks about you, you would be OK!
Good luck, America.
And know that the Patriots are with you.