Rebellious Pixels produces this cool video mash-up remix of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Edward from the Twilight series, highlighting how creepy and stalker-like inappropriate Edward’s behavior is during Twilight, and how Buffy would have handled the behavior in a healthier way than Bella does. This latest version contains “pop up video” annotations that provide info about the remix and commentary on the action.
Whenever you confront, or see confronted, sexism on the internet, there is almost always a chorus of people doing a couple of things in response: 1) excusing the behavior of the people who are sexist, or 2) trying to defend the community in which the sexism is taking place by arguments such as “not all XX people are sexist; most of us are great people except for these few idiots.” or 3) saying things like “if you participate anonymously, you don’t have to deal with the sexism, so hide your identity and you’ll get to participate fully.”
Kate Harding blogs about a specific incident that fits this pattern – a 15 year-old girl who considers herself an atheist and wants to be part of a discussion on atheism posts on reddit in an atheism community about the book her mother got her for Christmas – and the girl gets an enormous number of rape threats and sexist, predatory comments from men who participate in that in the atheist community.
Skeptic blogger Rebecca Watson caught on to what was happened to the young woman on Reddit and wrote about it on her site. Subsequently, the comments on her post were filled with people excusing the behavior of the reddit folks as satire, people suggesting the girl should only post anonymously so she wouldn’t be subject to abusive comments, and people explaining that this is just the way the world works and we can’t change it.
Kate’s response on her site to the excuses in the comments on Rebecca’s blog is phenomenal, and worth saving for the succinct and appropriate answers to a number of common troll-isms, man-splaining and excusing behavior that serves to shelter misogynist abuse online.
I don’t want to seize a massive block-quote of her words because it wouldn’t be fair use, and her writing is also almost too succinct to paraphrase well, so please just go and read her post, and note that I love everything after this paragraph:
“I love that “you are awful, too” bit so much, I’d like to expand on it.”
The New York Times addresses a topic that feminists have been trying to illuminate for years – the use by journalists of the word ‘sex’ in descriptions of non-consensual criminal acts that more properly should be called “rape” instead, and the importance of correcting that error for our common understanding of what constitutes a crime involving rape.
Some readers, responding to The New York Times’s first reports on the case, strongly objected to wording in the articles that, in their view, either underplayed the details or wrongly applied the language of consensual sex to the narrative.
The objections focused on the most severe of the accusations against Mr. Sandusky, a former Penn State assistant coach. According to the grand jury report, he subjected a boy estimated to be 10 years old to “anal intercourse” in locker room showers at the university in 2002.
Jennifer Crichton, a reader from Manhattan, said The Times’s initial article on Nov. 5 missed the mark when it described the testimony of a Penn State graduate assistant about the incident. As The Times put it, he told the grand jury that he saw Mr. Sandusky “sexually assaulting a boy in the shower.”“Why is this described as ‘sexual assault’ and not as ‘rape’ “? Ms. Crichton wrote.
The importance of course is that sex is a consensual act between two persons who have given informed consent. “When the facts warrant it, journalists should be as specific as possible, they should avoid using the language of consensual sex and, when appropriate, they should call a rape a rape.” Those who were accused of sexual assault should contact the law office of Mark Diaz & Associates to help defend their rights.
From the Girl Scout Blog (excerpt):
As reality TV has become staple entertainment for young people and adults alike, tween and teen girls who regularly view reality TV accept and expect a higher level of drama, aggression, and bullying in their own lives, and measure their worth primarily by their physical appearance, according to Real to Me: Girls and Reality TV [PDF], a national survey released today by the Girl Scout Research Institute.
The study found that the vast majority of girls think reality shows “often pit girls against each other to make the shows more exciting” (86 percent). When comparing the propensity for relational aggression between viewers and non-viewers of reality TV, 78 percent vs. 54 percent state that “gossiping is a normal part of a relationship between girls.”
Regarding romantic relationships, reality TV viewers are more likely than non-viewers to say “girls often have to compete for a guy’s attention” (74 percent vs. 63 percent), and are happier when they are dating someone or have a boyfriend/significant other (49 percent vs. 28 percent).“Girls today are bombarded with media – reality TV and otherwise – that more frequently portrays girls and women in competition with one another rather than in support or collaboration. This perpetuates a ‘mean-girl’ stereotype and normalizes this behavior among girls,” states Andrea Bastiani Archibald, Ph.D. Developmental Psychologist, Girl Scouts of the USA. “We don’t want girls to avoid reality TV, but want them, along with their parents, to know what they are getting into when they watch it. Our national leadership program equips girls with the skills to decipher media fact from fiction and make healthy decisions for their own lives-separate from their sources of entertainment.”
Happy National Coming Out Day! I’ve been out 24 years, as of this date. I’ve been a very lucky woman – able to be open about my romantic life with everyone, happily married to a really wonderful woman. I’ve faced approximately my fair share of homophobia, but not for many many years. For those still coming to terms with their sexual orientation, GLSEN has a wonderful guide on how to prepare and plan for your own coming out.
A couple of things I’ve seen around the interwebs the last few days:
ANTHROPARODIE
A parody site of the Anthropologie clothing store. You will laugh your ass off; I guarantee. And I especially like that I get an Anthropologie ad on my site from this link.
Husbands: The Series
A very cute online series about two gay men who get drunk in Vegas and get married, and then decided they need to make their marriage work — written and produced by Jane Espenson.
File under: “Companies I’m no longer buying from” is this little gem:
Dr Pepper Ten: ‘No women allowed’
“To appeal to men, Dr Pepper made its Ten drink 180 degrees different than Diet Dr Pepper. It has calories and sugar unlike its diet counterpart. Instead of the dainty tan bubbles on the diet can, Ten will be wrapped in gunmetal grey packaging with silver bullets. And while Diet Dr Pepper’s marketing is women-friendly, the ad campaign for Ten goes out of its way to eschew women.”
Lovely. I hope you get at least one new client from this ad campaign to make up for losing me as a regular Diet Dr. Pepper drinker.
Speaking of Stupid Male Tricks, here’s another:
Wonder Woman’s Origin Story Re-written
In DC COMICS-THE NEW 52, Wonder Woman will have a new origin, in which she is the daughter of Hippolyta … and Zeus! In recent interviews, writer Brian Azzarello and artist Cliff Chiang have teased that readers should expect the unexpected in this edgier, horror take on the superhero genre and the king of the gods will ensure that nothing goes as planned for his defiant daughter.
Why is this a big deal? Imagine if Superman were not raised by the Kents, or if Batman hadn’t seen his parents killed as a young boy. What if the iconic defining characteristic of your favorite superhero were re-written completely? Wonder Woman is one of the Big Three in DC – Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman. Nobody is messing with the origin of the other two. And on top of that – Wonder Woman is a feminist icon: a child shaped of clay (lots of early Greek mythology precedent for that, as well as Hindu mythology) and infused with a soul by the female Greek goddesses, she was born of parthenogenesis and raised in an idyllic society of women – all specifically with the goal that she have the characteristics to stop violence directed at women and children as well as to bring humankind peace and justice. Now all of the sudden, she has a sperm donor? What happened to the “tool born of women to save women?” This sucks, DC Comics. I’m still going to read the book, but there better be some really compelling reason for doing this.
Some Personal Highlights From Geek Girl Con
A summary of a cool convention I didn’t previously know existed from Gail Simone, the current author of Batgirl, and former writer of Birds of Prey, Wonder Woman and a whole bunch of other DC comic books. Girl Geek Con isn’t specifically a comic book convention – it’s for girl nerds of all types and sounds like a blast, from every account I’ve read online. I seriously need to go next year.
Shoot. My blogging crutch went away. For the past five or six years I’ve been using a little-known and not very well supported delicious links tool to auto-publish the links I’ve saved to my site. It was easy because I could hit a bookmarklet when I was on an interesting page and delicious would save the page title and link and I could enter a description of what was interesting and tags about the post, and the tool would aggregate all the links and post them once a day. Easy, short, sweet, lazy. I knew when delicious got bought out that the tool was in jeopardy, and sometime after 2011-09-27 they finally turned off the functionality.
Damn damn damn. Now I have actually BLOG stuff. On my blog. That sucks.
I’m checking to see if there are other tools out there that can do the same type of thing. I’m thinking someone should have come up with an Instapaper.com tool by now, right?
So, here are some interesting pages I’ve looked at over the last few days….
Cultural Faux Pas: What are some cultural faux pas in New York? – Quora
“Stuff not to do in New York.” I’ll just keep that in mind… no, I won’t. I don’t care.
Kurt Vonnegut at the Blackboard – Lapham’s Quarterly
“But there’s a reason we recognize Hamlet as a masterpiece: it’s that Shakespeare told us the truth, and people so rarely tell us the truth in this rise and fall here [indicates blackboard]. The truth is, we know so little about life, we don’t really know what the good news is and what the bad news is.”
Stop Honour Killings
“The International Campaign Against Honour Killing is a project started by Diana Nammi Director and Founder of London-based charity IKWRO which provides support and protection to women faced with ‘honour’-based violence and forced marriage. The project was established in the aftermath of the murder of Heshu Yones, in a climate of growing awareness of ‘honour’ as an factor in women’s subordination. It was out of this awareness, and the understanding that ‘honour’-based violence, and oppression against women justified in the name of ‘honour’ are widespread, and not confined to any particular group, that the movement towards an international project, to inform journalists, academics and the general public and provide a platform for activists to discuss their methods, opinions and experiences, and to share their campaigns within a community.”
There aren’t too many mainstream television shows with lesbian main characters, but there is no shortage of online web series and shorts. Many of them are independently produced and rely on viewer contributions to keep production going. I’ve only seen the Girl Trash series so far, but have read reviews here and there — enough to assemble this list so I can start watching. I’m betting maybe you’ll be interested in watching, too.
Anyone But Me
Introducing a new generation: gay, straight, and ethnically diverse struggling with identity and modern relationships. From the Executive Producer/Writer team of Susan Miller (L Word and Thirtysomething) and Tina Cesa Ward (In Their Absence) Anyone But Me is shot on location in New York City and Los Angeles.
Seasons On, Two and Three are complete.
Girltrash!
A 9-episode web series by Angela Robinson, the sequel Girltrash! All Night Long is in production as a movie. It appears that the series is temporarily offline while the site is under construction. Robinson is a director and screen writer who worked on a number of series including The L-Word.
Out With Dad
A teenage girl and her single father. Rose is coming of age and coming out of the closet. All he wants is for her to be happy, and out with Dad.
Season One is complete, Season Two is coming shortly.
We Have to Stop Now
Dyna, sleek and cerebral, and Kit, quirky and spontaneous, are a couple. They are also a couple of therapists. And despite their wildly different methods, they’ve written a singular book on marriage called “How To Succeed In Marriage Without Even Trying”. Trouble is, their own marriage is falling apart, even after years of work with their own therapist, Susan. So, they’ve decided to call it quits. However, once their book hits No. 1 on the New York Times Bestseller list, they’re both not so sure that “quits” is a good idea…
Season One is available to watch free, Season Two is by subscription.
Vag Magazine
VAG MAGAZINE is not your grandma’s feminist magazine, though we support her as a woman. Go behind the scenes at this hipster third-wave feminist magazine with founders FENNEL, SYLVIE, and BETHANY, staffers HEAVY FLO (a hero on the roller derby circuit), REBA (truly a legend of gonzo feminist pop culture journalism), and MEGHAN (the lone holdover from fashion magazine Gemma, which the Vag founders bought out with the proceeds from their Etsy shop), as well as enthusiastic intern KIT, as they teach you how to be a better woman. This six-part web series stars and was created, written, directed, and produced by comedians from the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre.
B.J. Fletcher: Private Eye
With an all Canadian cast and crew, featuring Lindy Zucker and Dana Puddicombe in the leading roles, B.J. Fletcher: Private Eye is a distinctly new and unique production bringing to life strong female characters with the right balance of action, comedy, and diversity.
Seasons One and Two.
The Real Girl’s Guide to Everything Else
A journalist, nearly dropped by her agent because her work is too smart, political, lesbian and feminist, goes undercover as a glitter-wearing, shoe-obsessed, Cosmo-drinking straight girl.
Season One (Six Episodes) is available, with season 2 coming soon.
Seeking Simone – The Web Series
Seeking Simone is a lesbian web series about online dating. Follow the adventures of Simone Selkin as she dates her way through gay Toronto!
Season One and Two appear to be complete.
Girl/Girl Scene
Based on the lives and loves of four young friends, this series boldly goes where no other has gone before: between the sheets and into the minds and hearts of unapologetically queer women living in middle America. But underlying the many shocking and controversial moments is an important drama exploring the intoxicating extremes of modern day life and love.
Season One – Episodes 1 – 5 are available
Cat on The Prowl
A weekly video blog chronicling the attempts of out comedian Cat Davis to meet women in L.A. Part interview show and part comedy show, the series aired over 40 episodes in 2008 and 2009.
Venice
Venice is a web soap opera series and the creative concept of long time friends and artistic partners Crystal Chappell and Kimmy Turrisi. Venice focuses on the life of Gina Brogno — a single, gay, self-made interior designer — living and working in Venice Beach, California. The plot follows Gina’s human experience in connection with her various love interests, brother Owen, father The Colonel and myriad other characters that make up Gina’s network of relationships.
12 Episodes are available via subscription
The song is by The Imagined Village.
Source in order of appearance:
Raumpatroille
Lost In Space
Outer Limits
Doctor Who
The Giant Behemoth
Twilight Zone
Attack Of The 50 ft Woman
Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
Avengers
Forbidden Planet
Queen of Outer Space
Space 1999
V
Sapphire And Steel
UFO
Star Trek
Logans Run
5th Element
Andromeda
Barbarella
Soylent Green
Star Wars
Blakes 7
Mork And Mindy
Alf
Star Trek Next Gen
Starship Troopers
Earth Final Conflict
Contact
Lexx
Terminator 2
Firefly
Farscape
Torchwood
New Doctor Who
Startrek Voyager
SGA
Battlestar Galactica
Babylon 5
Space Above and Beyond
Aliens
Matrix
Terminator: Sarah Connor
Xfiles
Crusade
Gattica
Earth 2
Please take a few moments to go and sign this petition against defunding Planned Parenthood:
After months of budget negotiations, extreme anti-choice members of Congress are trying to force a shutdown of the federal government. This shutdown is not about disagreements over spending or taxes — it’s about a single-minded vendetta against Planned Parenthood and a cruel determination to cut women off from reproductive health care.
We cannot let this vengeful, narrow-minded assault on Planned Parenthood and the people we serve continue. We urgently need your action right now. Add your name to the letter we are sending Representative Boehner and his extreme colleagues today. Fill out the form at right to take action.
Federal money to Planned Parenthood and other family planning clinics goes to providing contraceptive services, sex ed, STI and HIV testing, and cervical cancer screenings. It doesn’t go to abortion – that is prevented by the Hyde Amendment. This is about basic women’s healthcare, and is truly a right-wing radical agenda.