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Video

My stopmotion! It’s about how ‘feminine’ coded consumer goods will be remarketed as hypermasculinized in order to attract male buyers.

The Hunger Games vs. Ferguson

With the release of Mockingjay Part 1, the Hunger Games franchise continues to reach commercial success and remains wildly popular. This isn’t really surprising, our society loves books and films about dystopian futures (1984, The Matrix, Terminator etc.). We love to imagine how we would cope under oppressive governments, or in an outbreak of disease – as discussed in class everyone has their own zombi apocalypse plan. I think one of the things that pulls us to this kind of fiction is imagining ourselves in that situation – and that situation bringing out the best in ourselves. We imagine ourselves finding a cure, saving children or leading a rebellion to overthrow our oppressors. We imagine proving ourselves in the face of adversity.

So what happens when dystopia comes to life? On August 9th, 2014, unarmed Michael Brown, and 18 year old Black man was shot at point blank range by white police officer Darren Wilson after Wilson told him to stop jaywalking. Brown was kneeling on the street with his hands up in surrender when Wilson delivered a fatal shot to his head. All up Brown was shot 6 times. The Ferguson grand jury has just come to the decision that there will be no indictment of Darren Wilson – he will face no legal repercussions for his acts. In the aftermath of his death, Brown has been described as “no angel” by the media, while Darren Wilson has had great support – multiple Facebook support groups have been made for him with tens of thousands of likes, people have donated over $400, 000 to him (not that he needs it, he’s been on paid leave since he shot Brown and won’t even have to lawyer up now he’s escaped indictment). The resulting protests in Ferguson, where Brown lived, have been met with military style force and the national guard was called in today in anticipation of protests following the announcement of no indictment. If the events that have occurred in Ferguson were described in a novel, or portrayed in a film – we would, rightfully, be in full solidarity with Brown, be completely against the police and excitedly read through the events of the unending protests inspired by the bravery of the people of Ferguson. I feel like this would be especially true if the character in the book were white. In fact it would also be true if Michael Brown had been white. People will say ‘it’s not about race’ in reference to Ferguson, but I cannot imagine a situation where a white boy would even be shot for jaywalking in the first place, let alone have his killer walk free. That a white boy would not be shot for jaywalking really drives home the point of this all – Michael Brown was not shot because he broke the law, he was shot because he was Black. In the USA, a white police officer will shoot a Black man almost 2 times a week.  If we turned Ferguson into the Hunger Games, white people  are citizens of the Capitol, white police are the peacekeepers and Black people are the from the Districts. White people, unaware of our privilege, white police, abusing that privilege to violently assert dominance over Black people, and Black people, living in fear of being one of those 2 a week. The white population of America’s overwhelming support of Darren Wilson shows, most importantly the racism that continues to dominate North American society, as well as that we don’t actually like revolution, we want to turn our heads away from and ignore dystopian reality, we don’t care about justice or fighting when it is needed in real life. We just care about the idea of it.

Realistic dolls

Recently Buzzfeed posted this piece about the Lammily doll, a realistically proportioned doll that’s recently entered the market. This doll presents a stark contrast to the traditional Barbie – Lammily isn’t stick thin, has greater movement, has flat feet (rather than those shaped for high heels) and doesn’t seem to be wearing makeup. It is, as the website states ‘realistic’ in many ways. Which, obviously, is extremely important in today’s age where young girls are bombarded by messages telling them to be thinner, more feminine, more placid. And while the Lammily doll is an excellent toy to show girls they don’t have to listen to these messages, it still fails to combat one of the most pervasive and damaging beauty ideals – that of whiteness. Idealisation of white skin has been a symptom of European beauty standards – forced onto the rest of the world – that has been supported for centuries and continues to be today. This video of the ‘doll test’ with young children demonstrates the depth to which the pro-white and anti-black sentiments in society and the beauty industry effect children’s perceptions of beauty and character based on skin colour. With this still being so prevalent today and the devastating effects this kind of society hatred of darker skin has on PoC, it’s clear Lammily dolls are not yet tackling the most important parts of beauty ideals. Lammily’s website says dolls of different races are coming next year, but I think the fact that they started out with a white doll speaks volumes of what society values.

Kim Kardashian’s Paper photoshoot

The pictures from Kim K’s photoshoot for Paper magazine only came out a few days ago but have already taken the internet by storm. Unsurprisingly a lot of criticism has been thrown at Kim herself, with fellow celebrities criticising her nudity in light of her being a mother, or people photoshopping her poses into comical images. This is unsurprising, but still disappointing. While the criticism being levelled and Kim is unfair, at least one of the photos from the shoot merits it’s own critical analysis. This article gives a rundown of the history of racism behind the picture of Kim balancing a champagne glass on her buttocks. The photo, taken by Jean-Paul Goude is almost exactly the same as a picture he took and feature in a book called ‘Jungle Fever’, a racial slur. For comparison here are the pictures of Kim, and the original model Carolina Beaumont.

As the Grio article discusses, these images bear resemblance to the profile of Saartjie Baartman, an african woman who was the subject of freakshows due to the shape of her buttocks. According to this article from the New York Times in 2007, Baartman’s experiences are  “a symbol of the alienation and degradations of colonization, lost children, exile, the expropriation of female labor and the sexual and economic exploitation of black women by men, white and black.” It’s pretty clear how by making these pictures mirror Barrtman’s figure, Goude ignores the pain of her experience as an othered object and grotesquely twists her image into one of glamour. Whatever your opinion of Kim Kardashian, and while her knowledge of the implications of this photoshoot remain unclear, I think the brunt of criticism for this photoshoot should be focussed on Goude and his choice to delegitimise the suffering of Barrtman through his recurring flippant portrayals of her figure.

In response to online reproductive rights module

When reading through the online module about the film Children of Men, the character of Kee, who’s personhood is ignored as everyone focuses solely on the child she is pregnant with, reminded me of a recent occurrence in Ireland. An immigrant woman found out she was pregnant (as a result of rape) upon entering the country, and wished to have an abortion for cultural reasons, which was denied to her by the state who proceeded to force feed her when she attempted suicide, keeping her in hospital against her will until her child was delivered by c-section. This was clearly, done only with thought of the fetus/child in mind, the woman in question was viewed simply as an incubator; her emotional distress ignored and her bodily autonomy violated horribly. This is in the present day too; Ireland isn’t some sort of post-apocalyptic infertile society. That I’m able to draw this comparison is a reflection of how much work we have left to do in the fight for Women’s reproductive rights.

On another tangent, though the work of Dr. Henry Morgentaler and others like him lead to the legalisation of abortion in Canada, the fight for women’s access to abortion services is still a pressing issue today. BC has only 7 practicing clinics, 4 of which are located in Vancouver, this poses a huge geographic barrier for women living in rural areas who need to access these services – factors like taking time off work to travel, spending money on gas, the procedure itself and possibly overnight accomodation in Vancouver add up, making accessing abortion difficult even in this day and age. Furthermore, in the USA there has been a recent surge in laws restricting clinics from practicing abortions and thus greatly reducing access. This is the new pro-life strategy – if they can’t make abortion illegal, at least they can make it all but inaccessible.

I thought the online module gave a good overall look into reproductive rights with some interesting discussion points, though the discussion of the book The Handmaiden’s Tale was confusing without having read it, and how the slideshows lined up with the links on connect was also a bit confusing.

Forced reclamation of ‘queer’

Any time I read about Queer theory, such as in Chapter 7 of Cultural Theory (Storey, 2012), I find myself focusing more on the use of the word ‘queer’ than on any aspects of the actual theory. ‘Queer’ is everywhere today – it’s all but replaced LGBT as an umbrella term for the entire community, people now refer to the ‘queer community’ in the news, papers and everyday life. At my university in Australia we have a ‘Queer collective’, though at UBC we have ‘Pride UBC’ the group itself constantly uses the word queer as an umbrella term in event names and general discussion. Though I understand why so many people have jumped to replace LGBT with ‘queer’ – it’s vague and inclusive of every gender and sexual minority group without being a ridiculously long acronym – I resent that our culture has latched onto that word in particular. The problem is simply that queer is a homophobic slur. Though for many of us, using queer in a negative fashion seems like a thing of the past, it is still used as a slur in many places to this day. And current usage aside, it will always carry the weight of a slur. While many people will reclaim slurs and, for example, a lesbian may self identify as a ‘dyke’ in a challenge of the word’s harmful history, most people know it’s offensive to refer to any lesbian as a dyke, or label the lesbian community the ‘dyke community’. But for some reason society has made an exception for ‘queer’. By using ‘queer’ as an umbrella term for gender and sexual minorities we force people to ‘identify’ with a word that is used with hatred to abuse and dehumanise them both historically and presently.

Storey, J. (2012). Cultural theory and popular culture: An introduction. 6th ed. Pearson Education Limited: Harlow.