Riding the fence is a bit annoying. I myself grow irritated with people that won’t take sides, if at the very least for “important things,” but I am now in that awkward spot. That uncomfortable position of “Tim said [insert meany Tim saying here], how could you not take my side!?”
>But Tim and I are bro’s too! Can’t take sides.
Yet, they don’t care. You’re still just as irritating as that mean ‘ole Tim.
However, it’s not because I don’t want to get involved in some petty spat. It’s a case of both sides being a little right and a little wrong. This is the case with Mulan. Mulan doesn’t only break down gender rules. Mulan doesn’t strictly re-enforce them either.
A] Mulan breaks gender roles in different ways.
1] Mulan expresses, with clear dialog [despite her singing] that she doesn’t feel as though she fits into her appointed role. “Look at me- I will never pass for a perfect bride- Or a perfect daughter- Can it be- I'm not meant to play this part?-…Who is that girl I see- Staring straight- Back at me?- Why is my reflection someone- I don't know?- Somehow I cannot hide- Who I am- Though I've tried.” In this Mulan isn’t suffering from Princess Jasmine syndrome. She doesn’t necessarily feel “put upon” by her “role.” Wherein Jasmine was running because she didn’t like her responsibilities, Mulan was instead fighting to embrace it. In this Mulan is saying “I am not this model of woman nor can I be.” It’s not often said so blatantly, if at all, in Disney female characters.
2] Mulan makes it a point to take on the role of a man. Not only does she dress and attempt to act as the opposite gender she fully takes it on and advances in it. Nor does she allow negativity to push her away from it. It even seems as though she grows to enjoy herself. It could be argued that her mental strength grows with her bodily strength.
3] There’s humour that follows a lot of the male’s perception of women and what women they “want.” Mulan: “How 'bout a girl who's got a brain- Who always speaks her mind?” Men- “Nah!// My manly ways and turn of phrase are sure to thrill her- He thinks he's such a lady-killer.”
If we don’t giggle at this, and other parts of the song as well, I think we aren’t “not getting it.” That men are shallow was supposed to be an amusing jab at stereotypes.
B] However, 1] That is a stereo type, and there are others as well. When ever the men act effeminate it’s as the mercy of ridicule and for the sake of humour. Such as when the “consultant” is mocked for being feminine, then proceeds to really “squeal like a girl.” It was funny, however his masculinity was at stake and being scoffed at.
2] Not only this, but what a man is supposed to be is expressed in the song “I’ll Make a Man Out of You.” and pushed on to Mulan, despite her being eager to master the presented challenge. It goes on about how “sad” and “spineless” Mulan’s troop of men are. The general consensus is about men having abnormal amounts of “inner fire” and mega awesome “focus”; that is, being a man is based entirely around mental and physical “strength” as defined by someone obviously far more macho.
3] Mulan has to “dress up” and “play a man” just to be accepted into this mold.
So, while I think Mulan does a good job of breaking a lot of gender rules I believe there are still some moments of reinforcing them.
I suppose we can’t have everything.
Friday, December 10, 2010
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
A little bit of everything
I want to do all 3 prompts briefly, as I feel they’re all important and this is one of our last ones.
----
I am inspired to read A Single Man and Little Children.
A Single Man struck a cord with me because of the nature of it. The bleakness of it was very appealing and it’s close examination of humans. Not just about gender either.
Little Children seemed interesting because of it’s somewhat ironic tone about not necessarily gender but identity. How we feel we’re supposed to be and the comparisons we create and standards we build simply on aesthetics.
-
I’m a watcher. Those creepy people that just stare at others type. I enjoy learning about humans and things they do and reasons if I’m lucky. I love humans. The blog, though I grumbled about it at the beginning, was fantastic in that I got to really know all my peers. I didn’t have to sit in the back of the room like some shady mo-fo to understand all of you. I just had to sit down and go through your blogs.
I know I’ve been a bit hard on some people at times but it’s really not out of malice or anger of some sort. I wanted everyone to grow and develop their thoughts better. Not to say they weren’t fine, but why not be as perfect as possible? I learned a bit of tolerance as well. Knowing what was saying too much or too little and how to formulate ideas without coming across as a douche. I’m not sure if I succeeded in that, but I tried.
I think all of you are wonderful in your own thoughts and have developed fantastic voices as the semester has progressed.
-
I want to be able to say that I would continue blogging. I did enjoy it. Despite my initial turn off it grew on me. It was the easiest way I had to write brief papers thus far and I didn’t have to stand in front of you to read them. I didn’t have to open my mouth for every idea that popped in to my head or censor my ideas. I could just sit down and write. It’s relieving really, especially seeing I can easily say my physical presence is very sub-par, if not complete shit, as opposed to that of my literary one.
However, blogging also makes me feel contrite. Contrite because I always feel as though I’m not only pushing my opinion on others, sometimes their mere presence is too much, but also because it makes me feel inflated and self-indulgent. This feeling of pretentiousness is what stopped me from blogging a long time ago. I’m not so smart, clever or good at anything that anyone should take anything I say to heart nor be forced to read it -speaking of which, my apologies for all the ramblings you guys have put up with. You’ve been good sports- I’m not so anything that I deserve any sort of attention for my thoughts, no matter how strongly I feel. There’s never so strong an injustice in my life that I feel I have a right to be heard.
Perhaps ‘self’ is something I need to re-evaluate before I pick up blogging again.
----
I am inspired to read A Single Man and Little Children.
A Single Man struck a cord with me because of the nature of it. The bleakness of it was very appealing and it’s close examination of humans. Not just about gender either.
Little Children seemed interesting because of it’s somewhat ironic tone about not necessarily gender but identity. How we feel we’re supposed to be and the comparisons we create and standards we build simply on aesthetics.
-
I’m a watcher. Those creepy people that just stare at others type. I enjoy learning about humans and things they do and reasons if I’m lucky. I love humans. The blog, though I grumbled about it at the beginning, was fantastic in that I got to really know all my peers. I didn’t have to sit in the back of the room like some shady mo-fo to understand all of you. I just had to sit down and go through your blogs.
I know I’ve been a bit hard on some people at times but it’s really not out of malice or anger of some sort. I wanted everyone to grow and develop their thoughts better. Not to say they weren’t fine, but why not be as perfect as possible? I learned a bit of tolerance as well. Knowing what was saying too much or too little and how to formulate ideas without coming across as a douche. I’m not sure if I succeeded in that, but I tried.
I think all of you are wonderful in your own thoughts and have developed fantastic voices as the semester has progressed.
-
I want to be able to say that I would continue blogging. I did enjoy it. Despite my initial turn off it grew on me. It was the easiest way I had to write brief papers thus far and I didn’t have to stand in front of you to read them. I didn’t have to open my mouth for every idea that popped in to my head or censor my ideas. I could just sit down and write. It’s relieving really, especially seeing I can easily say my physical presence is very sub-par, if not complete shit, as opposed to that of my literary one.
However, blogging also makes me feel contrite. Contrite because I always feel as though I’m not only pushing my opinion on others, sometimes their mere presence is too much, but also because it makes me feel inflated and self-indulgent. This feeling of pretentiousness is what stopped me from blogging a long time ago. I’m not so smart, clever or good at anything that anyone should take anything I say to heart nor be forced to read it -speaking of which, my apologies for all the ramblings you guys have put up with. You’ve been good sports- I’m not so anything that I deserve any sort of attention for my thoughts, no matter how strongly I feel. There’s never so strong an injustice in my life that I feel I have a right to be heard.
Perhaps ‘self’ is something I need to re-evaluate before I pick up blogging again.
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Ares and Aphrodite?
It is true that men and women use different parts of the brain more than others. Whether or not that study is wide enough or completely true is debatable as I’ve no time or patience to look in to it as extensively as I should, as of right now I will take the word of these Doctors studying it. At least for the time being.
Regardless, these findings are deeply concerning in several ways. The first being this: With these discovering and their implications having become “increasingly obvious,” why are our school systems -pardon me- still pieces of shit?
This information should have long since urge a massive change in educational content, if not to completely change it then to at least alter it appropriately. Even if it’s simply bumping down the content a grade [or more] lower.
So many people, too many to count it seems, are always raving about how smart their children are. If so many are, is that not saying something about children? We are underestimating children at young ages and therefore gimping them for the rest of their life. We expect too little and don’t push them hard enough to reach their full learning potential. That is not to say I’m in any way trying to lessen the importance of someone’s oh-so-smart child’s intelligence. That is not my intent at all. I am however implying that a lot of children are smart, a lot smarter than they are credited, and the potential to be so is in many other children. Our school systems are not set up for advanced children, because most children, in fact, are highly intelligent for their age.
But is it because they’re smarter than normal for their age or do we expect most children to be much dumber simply because they are children?
With that said, the differences in learning could also raise some problems. The standard for general education is excruciatingly low for our youth, then painstakingly high at University levels [which most newly graduates are extremely unprepared for]. If at elementary level and up were to adjust the way in which they taught according to sex, discrimination could still exist.
If a boy and girl were to learn in ways in which the other supposedly “learns best,” they could still remain un-accommodated. Or those that could be mixtures could be refused one or the other way in which they need. Even so, if either need accommodation from the other they may not be offered it because “studies have shown” that boy and girls learn entirely separately. This study does not appear to offer elasticity: it is always “the differences,” and offer no relativity.
Also, there raises the problem that already exists. If men “excel” in these skills and women “excel” in others, there’s leaving little room for either sexes to move into the other realm and puts all the more pressure on women [and men, depending] to perform. Especially, still, in the realm of mathematics. This should only be utilized as a tool to help more children reach their potential and more, and not as a way to force them to excel within a restricted area and no way to push out of it.
Regardless, these findings are deeply concerning in several ways. The first being this: With these discovering and their implications having become “increasingly obvious,” why are our school systems -pardon me- still pieces of shit?
This information should have long since urge a massive change in educational content, if not to completely change it then to at least alter it appropriately. Even if it’s simply bumping down the content a grade [or more] lower.
So many people, too many to count it seems, are always raving about how smart their children are. If so many are, is that not saying something about children? We are underestimating children at young ages and therefore gimping them for the rest of their life. We expect too little and don’t push them hard enough to reach their full learning potential. That is not to say I’m in any way trying to lessen the importance of someone’s oh-so-smart child’s intelligence. That is not my intent at all. I am however implying that a lot of children are smart, a lot smarter than they are credited, and the potential to be so is in many other children. Our school systems are not set up for advanced children, because most children, in fact, are highly intelligent for their age.
But is it because they’re smarter than normal for their age or do we expect most children to be much dumber simply because they are children?
With that said, the differences in learning could also raise some problems. The standard for general education is excruciatingly low for our youth, then painstakingly high at University levels [which most newly graduates are extremely unprepared for]. If at elementary level and up were to adjust the way in which they taught according to sex, discrimination could still exist.
If a boy and girl were to learn in ways in which the other supposedly “learns best,” they could still remain un-accommodated. Or those that could be mixtures could be refused one or the other way in which they need. Even so, if either need accommodation from the other they may not be offered it because “studies have shown” that boy and girls learn entirely separately. This study does not appear to offer elasticity: it is always “the differences,” and offer no relativity.
Also, there raises the problem that already exists. If men “excel” in these skills and women “excel” in others, there’s leaving little room for either sexes to move into the other realm and puts all the more pressure on women [and men, depending] to perform. Especially, still, in the realm of mathematics. This should only be utilized as a tool to help more children reach their potential and more, and not as a way to force them to excel within a restricted area and no way to push out of it.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Projection is not sexy
As human being we project too often. Perhaps it had not always been that way. Maybe back in Jesus’s time young men didn’t blame their mothers because they can’t control themselves when they hit their wives. Maybe when Virginia Woolf lived people were not so quick to place the blame of their short comings on others. Maybe people were different than what we once were, or perhaps we’ve not changed at all and only time has.
However, when people place the blame on those that are in the limelight for the problems of our generation and children, we have a problem. Though in a way it’s a bit of everyone’s fault if we’re really going to start point fingers. Everyone and everything influences or affects us in some way or another. Everyone.
As an example, we cannot fully ignore a stranger in the room. We cannot ignore the person walking in our exact path if we don’t want to collide. We cannot forget trauma. Our brains must go to snapping extents to do so if one is too shaken. People develop severe memory loss, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, and the list goes on. When things jar us or change us negatively we cannot neglect the presence of it of the lasting affects. However, all of these could be blamed on what someone else has done. What things outside ourselves has made us in to.
We much carry this idea with Celebrities or modern heroes. They do what they feel they must, what they know they can and what they can bare. What they want. Perhaps they wanted to be famous, perhaps they wanted to be seen or heard or understood. Whatever the reason, people do not often asked to be placed somewhere as an example of what people should aspire to. In the sense that people should do something with themselves. Strive for happiness. Make a living doing something they love and are good at. They do not enter into their profession hoping people see them as people and want to be just like them. At least no one rational and self-aware.
We’re all good people. We’re all bad people. Children should be taught this and should be cared for. Children need good examples in their parents, their siblings and should seek good peers because of their upbringing or know when it’s time to let bad one’s go because of good communication and trust in their parents.
This is not the job of people that happen to have lights shined into every aspect of their carriers and lives. Raising children to be wholesome people does not fall on the shoulders of other men and women. Perhaps they should not indulge their own musings publicly. Maybe there shouldn’t be degrading images of women plastered everywhere and characters that make men look like meat heads, charmless nerds or morons.
But it happens. If a parent is inadequate and children turn to images in media and their peers the responsibility still lies in the parents. If children have no proper parents it’s the job of other loving authority figures to be morally upright. Whoever is raising the child is at fault for any garbage that enters a child’s mind via television.
We cannot rationally or fairly blame people for being what ever they feel is themselves, necessary or wanted. We cannot frown on them and say that it’s their fault parents yank out their hair and teens are fucked and children are getting worse.
Role models are only role models when parents are not enough. When teachers are not enough. When peers fail and significant others fuck up again. We look to others for something better because we look to others for someone to blame. Perhaps if parents taught their children what they feel is truly moral or upright, to look to themselves and to take responsibility we’d find less disappointments and horrors molding our children.
-
I want to stress this point. Miley Cyrus is not responsible if your daughter grows up into a rebel. It's not a dancers fault if your daughter grows up to be a stripper. It is not the fault of a fireman with financial problems fault if your children looked up to him and now are in debt. Nor is it a novelty rapper's fault if your son or daughter shoot someone.
It is not the responsibility of others to raise people's children. The question is not whether they have an image they want to uphold or even who they are targeting. Image is their own standard and audience can shift. It is not image itself in question and whether or not they choose to uphold it. They have no obligation to uphold any image, imagined or otherwise. What is being questioned is whether or not they should hold themselves above faults and weaknesses for the sake of everyone else, especially children.
No. Your children are not other people's responsibility, no matter how much publicity they have. It's yours.
However, when people place the blame on those that are in the limelight for the problems of our generation and children, we have a problem. Though in a way it’s a bit of everyone’s fault if we’re really going to start point fingers. Everyone and everything influences or affects us in some way or another. Everyone.
As an example, we cannot fully ignore a stranger in the room. We cannot ignore the person walking in our exact path if we don’t want to collide. We cannot forget trauma. Our brains must go to snapping extents to do so if one is too shaken. People develop severe memory loss, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, and the list goes on. When things jar us or change us negatively we cannot neglect the presence of it of the lasting affects. However, all of these could be blamed on what someone else has done. What things outside ourselves has made us in to.
We much carry this idea with Celebrities or modern heroes. They do what they feel they must, what they know they can and what they can bare. What they want. Perhaps they wanted to be famous, perhaps they wanted to be seen or heard or understood. Whatever the reason, people do not often asked to be placed somewhere as an example of what people should aspire to. In the sense that people should do something with themselves. Strive for happiness. Make a living doing something they love and are good at. They do not enter into their profession hoping people see them as people and want to be just like them. At least no one rational and self-aware.
We’re all good people. We’re all bad people. Children should be taught this and should be cared for. Children need good examples in their parents, their siblings and should seek good peers because of their upbringing or know when it’s time to let bad one’s go because of good communication and trust in their parents.
This is not the job of people that happen to have lights shined into every aspect of their carriers and lives. Raising children to be wholesome people does not fall on the shoulders of other men and women. Perhaps they should not indulge their own musings publicly. Maybe there shouldn’t be degrading images of women plastered everywhere and characters that make men look like meat heads, charmless nerds or morons.
But it happens. If a parent is inadequate and children turn to images in media and their peers the responsibility still lies in the parents. If children have no proper parents it’s the job of other loving authority figures to be morally upright. Whoever is raising the child is at fault for any garbage that enters a child’s mind via television.
We cannot rationally or fairly blame people for being what ever they feel is themselves, necessary or wanted. We cannot frown on them and say that it’s their fault parents yank out their hair and teens are fucked and children are getting worse.
Role models are only role models when parents are not enough. When teachers are not enough. When peers fail and significant others fuck up again. We look to others for something better because we look to others for someone to blame. Perhaps if parents taught their children what they feel is truly moral or upright, to look to themselves and to take responsibility we’d find less disappointments and horrors molding our children.
-
I want to stress this point. Miley Cyrus is not responsible if your daughter grows up into a rebel. It's not a dancers fault if your daughter grows up to be a stripper. It is not the fault of a fireman with financial problems fault if your children looked up to him and now are in debt. Nor is it a novelty rapper's fault if your son or daughter shoot someone.
It is not the responsibility of others to raise people's children. The question is not whether they have an image they want to uphold or even who they are targeting. Image is their own standard and audience can shift. It is not image itself in question and whether or not they choose to uphold it. They have no obligation to uphold any image, imagined or otherwise. What is being questioned is whether or not they should hold themselves above faults and weaknesses for the sake of everyone else, especially children.
No. Your children are not other people's responsibility, no matter how much publicity they have. It's yours.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Give it to me baby
"You get what you want; you want what you get."
Oh how right you are graphically and musically out dated mini-movie-doc-type-thing. How right you are.
Being appalled at images in the media is common. We all have something we don’t want to see. Don’t want to hear. Could live without reading or every knowing because it repulses something within us. For me it’s negative things relating to children. Hatred against religion because it’s religion. Denying atheists and homosexuals the right to adopt because of biases.
However, I’ve grown loath in acknowledging movie gender stereotypes in things I enjoy. Not because I’m callused or don’t care. It’s just grown all the more annoying to want to sit down and enjoy my couch and snacks when some random image of some woman’s breasts come on screen; the relation to the comedy, horror or romance is little to none. When breasts are just there to be breasts is when it really gets under my skin. Which is usually 95% of the time.
That is not to say I have objections to the female. By all means, support that it is beautiful. Be proud of what you have, curves or not. I myself happen to be of the female sex and I have no qualms what so ever wit my anatomy except maybe a few extra pounds it wouldn’t hurt to shed.
However, when the female body is paraded as a type of sexual object. Female nudity is never there because it’s “unavoidable” or “necessary” as it would be in documentaries [there’s that sliver of 5%]. When there is female nudity it is always to objectify the woman to the male audience in some way, hence it’s presence in male oriented movies.
Not sure if any of you noticed, but full/breast and rear nudity isn’t ever in movies geared to women. Or “chick flicks.” We get to see ourselves everyday and homosexuality isn’t taken into account during production. Pardon my digression.
All this to say that despite me being repulsed by such things and being forced to completely ignore otherwise good movies or look away, I am but one person. One person in what’s possibly a very small minority.
Minority? Oh yes. Movies keep getting pumped out that have such lewd images because the minority is but a small handful of sand amongst a mile long shore of otherwise pleased viewers. While I may be apposed I am but one.
Relativity sets in also and works against me! That unfaithful tempest that it is. I also am sure I enjoy things that others will likely be turned off by.
Jenifer mentioned she hates horror films. I’m loath to admit I startle easy but I love them. I love seeing what people they attract, how the writer and producers, actors and directors, staff and all of the above decided to try and spook me this time. However, she also mentioned something else: where is the line?
When do I go from Saw to snuff? From getting a chuckle out of an absurd zombie killing spree to being aroused by inhumane torture of human beings?
Regardless of the extremes, I’m being fed something I want. I search it out and it’s there, waiting to take me with both hands [or bloody stubs] and embrace me. The same goes for the gender stereotypes and the objectifying of a person with emotions and feelings. When did she go from kick ass heroine to a sex kitten? When did her clothes go from being tight because that’s what necessary to being tight because she’s a busty female? However unappealing these images are to me they exist because they appeal to people.
We get what we want. Things exist because we eat it up, gorge ourselves in it like dry earth eagerly soaks up rain with is parched, gaping lips. If people didn’t want to objectify women, regardless of cause of reason, the images wouldn’t be there. If people wanted to see men as anything but strong and commanding or stupid, we would.
To be fair, mental stereotyping is necessary. It’s a helpful tool the mind uses to create shortcuts and thusly helps with memory and such. However, when those stereotype become damaging to how we view other human beings and how we group them, especially an entire sex, we must as a society be willing to change our views; We need to be aware of what we’re feeding ourselves and what we’re allowing to be conditioned into us.
Oh how right you are graphically and musically out dated mini-movie-doc-type-thing. How right you are.
Being appalled at images in the media is common. We all have something we don’t want to see. Don’t want to hear. Could live without reading or every knowing because it repulses something within us. For me it’s negative things relating to children. Hatred against religion because it’s religion. Denying atheists and homosexuals the right to adopt because of biases.
However, I’ve grown loath in acknowledging movie gender stereotypes in things I enjoy. Not because I’m callused or don’t care. It’s just grown all the more annoying to want to sit down and enjoy my couch and snacks when some random image of some woman’s breasts come on screen; the relation to the comedy, horror or romance is little to none. When breasts are just there to be breasts is when it really gets under my skin. Which is usually 95% of the time.
That is not to say I have objections to the female. By all means, support that it is beautiful. Be proud of what you have, curves or not. I myself happen to be of the female sex and I have no qualms what so ever wit my anatomy except maybe a few extra pounds it wouldn’t hurt to shed.
However, when the female body is paraded as a type of sexual object. Female nudity is never there because it’s “unavoidable” or “necessary” as it would be in documentaries [there’s that sliver of 5%]. When there is female nudity it is always to objectify the woman to the male audience in some way, hence it’s presence in male oriented movies.
Not sure if any of you noticed, but full/breast and rear nudity isn’t ever in movies geared to women. Or “chick flicks.” We get to see ourselves everyday and homosexuality isn’t taken into account during production. Pardon my digression.
All this to say that despite me being repulsed by such things and being forced to completely ignore otherwise good movies or look away, I am but one person. One person in what’s possibly a very small minority.
Minority? Oh yes. Movies keep getting pumped out that have such lewd images because the minority is but a small handful of sand amongst a mile long shore of otherwise pleased viewers. While I may be apposed I am but one.
Relativity sets in also and works against me! That unfaithful tempest that it is. I also am sure I enjoy things that others will likely be turned off by.
Jenifer mentioned she hates horror films. I’m loath to admit I startle easy but I love them. I love seeing what people they attract, how the writer and producers, actors and directors, staff and all of the above decided to try and spook me this time. However, she also mentioned something else: where is the line?
When do I go from Saw to snuff? From getting a chuckle out of an absurd zombie killing spree to being aroused by inhumane torture of human beings?
Regardless of the extremes, I’m being fed something I want. I search it out and it’s there, waiting to take me with both hands [or bloody stubs] and embrace me. The same goes for the gender stereotypes and the objectifying of a person with emotions and feelings. When did she go from kick ass heroine to a sex kitten? When did her clothes go from being tight because that’s what necessary to being tight because she’s a busty female? However unappealing these images are to me they exist because they appeal to people.
We get what we want. Things exist because we eat it up, gorge ourselves in it like dry earth eagerly soaks up rain with is parched, gaping lips. If people didn’t want to objectify women, regardless of cause of reason, the images wouldn’t be there. If people wanted to see men as anything but strong and commanding or stupid, we would.
To be fair, mental stereotyping is necessary. It’s a helpful tool the mind uses to create shortcuts and thusly helps with memory and such. However, when those stereotype become damaging to how we view other human beings and how we group them, especially an entire sex, we must as a society be willing to change our views; We need to be aware of what we’re feeding ourselves and what we’re allowing to be conditioned into us.
Friday, November 5, 2010
It's all an illusion.
"…even though most reviewers agree that the narrator is female, the only evidence that they marshal is highly contestable and merely exposes the often stereotypical and hetero-normative biases in their own reading practices."
Whether a clever rouse or some masterfully worked through with deep purpose, this truth holds strong amongst reviewers and even readers of the less critical nature. It appears as though many have not taken well to the tactic of a gender anonymous narrator for reasons that are simply irrational. Instead of supporting that all conceptions of gender are only those perceived by a reader, I’d instead like to inquire “why?”.
Why does it matter what the sex of the narrator is? How does it change the things that happened -though what has happened can be a bit skewed, as we’ve come to know the narrator themselves is unreliable- between the narrator and Louise? Why and to what end would it change the reader? It is irrelevant.
What would sex have to do with the worship of Louise’s body? The narrator is so very careful to take in everything he or she can take in. He or she use’s their very eye lashes as they memorize every scar and tissue that covers Louise. The memory of their hands will be unrivaled as he or she takes in every inch of flesh that he or she is able to touch. It is said that memory of scent is the strongest, and the narrator devours even the dark, erotic scents of Louise and is over-come with maddening desire because of it; As much as the narrator is driven to bliss by Louise’s taste. He or she takes in everything, consuming and being consumed by white hot passion that destroys and rebuilds.
Once more, why does it matter what their gender is?
The narrator is poetic and philosophic at best. Are only women drawn to romanticism? A decent portion of the most well acclaimed love poets were male. Are only men drawn to thinking/knowledge, and love thought as opposed to emotion? That the narrator is the product of a female mind is proof enough against that.
The narrator is griefed long after their separation. Does mourning require a sex? Did the disciples of Jesus have to be woman to weep when He was crucified? Are mothers more heart broken because a miscarriage was their baby boy and not their baby girl?
Assumptions can be found left and right, and while most agree it is female -though that is primarily due to their critical eye being turned upon Winterson- some conclusions have lead to men: “he [the narrator] broadcasts his current affairs without hesitation, even to near-strangers; it’s difficult to imagine that such love is not heterosexual.”
…What?
In short, only men ever discuss their sexual conquests and one cannot possibly fathom a woman ever doing such a thing. How absurd would that be?
How quick we are to push our own social conditioning between the lines when there is no space there that exists for it.
People cling to this even until the very end. After break up and potential death, still it is fought that the narrator must either be man or woman. Are we not dismissive of most break-ups and the second party’s [newly ex boyfriend or girlfriend] because of their sex? We use phrases like -pardon any skewing or staged sensations. It’s all rubbish, I know- “sounds like she was just another crazy bitch,” or “that’s totally something a guy would do, how insensitive!” As if to imply that women are bats hit mad with emotion and all men are drawn to being callus assholes.
Does it matter how they take in their parting and their reunion? Not in the least.
I ask again, what does it matter what their gender is?
Whether a clever rouse or some masterfully worked through with deep purpose, this truth holds strong amongst reviewers and even readers of the less critical nature. It appears as though many have not taken well to the tactic of a gender anonymous narrator for reasons that are simply irrational. Instead of supporting that all conceptions of gender are only those perceived by a reader, I’d instead like to inquire “why?”.
Why does it matter what the sex of the narrator is? How does it change the things that happened -though what has happened can be a bit skewed, as we’ve come to know the narrator themselves is unreliable- between the narrator and Louise? Why and to what end would it change the reader? It is irrelevant.
What would sex have to do with the worship of Louise’s body? The narrator is so very careful to take in everything he or she can take in. He or she use’s their very eye lashes as they memorize every scar and tissue that covers Louise. The memory of their hands will be unrivaled as he or she takes in every inch of flesh that he or she is able to touch. It is said that memory of scent is the strongest, and the narrator devours even the dark, erotic scents of Louise and is over-come with maddening desire because of it; As much as the narrator is driven to bliss by Louise’s taste. He or she takes in everything, consuming and being consumed by white hot passion that destroys and rebuilds.
Once more, why does it matter what their gender is?
The narrator is poetic and philosophic at best. Are only women drawn to romanticism? A decent portion of the most well acclaimed love poets were male. Are only men drawn to thinking/knowledge, and love thought as opposed to emotion? That the narrator is the product of a female mind is proof enough against that.
The narrator is griefed long after their separation. Does mourning require a sex? Did the disciples of Jesus have to be woman to weep when He was crucified? Are mothers more heart broken because a miscarriage was their baby boy and not their baby girl?
Assumptions can be found left and right, and while most agree it is female -though that is primarily due to their critical eye being turned upon Winterson- some conclusions have lead to men: “he [the narrator] broadcasts his current affairs without hesitation, even to near-strangers; it’s difficult to imagine that such love is not heterosexual.”
…What?
In short, only men ever discuss their sexual conquests and one cannot possibly fathom a woman ever doing such a thing. How absurd would that be?
How quick we are to push our own social conditioning between the lines when there is no space there that exists for it.
People cling to this even until the very end. After break up and potential death, still it is fought that the narrator must either be man or woman. Are we not dismissive of most break-ups and the second party’s [newly ex boyfriend or girlfriend] because of their sex? We use phrases like -pardon any skewing or staged sensations. It’s all rubbish, I know- “sounds like she was just another crazy bitch,” or “that’s totally something a guy would do, how insensitive!” As if to imply that women are bats hit mad with emotion and all men are drawn to being callus assholes.
Does it matter how they take in their parting and their reunion? Not in the least.
I ask again, what does it matter what their gender is?
Friday, October 29, 2010
Assumptions at their finest
Critics and readers alike will take in their own views and apply it, along with who the author is, to an authors work. In actuality, dissecting a writers work as a parallel to their own life has only recently been on the rise. T. S. Eliot would all at once violently refuse and enforce that he is in no way involved in his work if he could see the comparison made today. Yet, evidences of his disconnect with his own wife in The Wasteland are being conjured. Can see Joyce’s views on the church, society and often on gender throughout Ulysses. Rebecca West, an acclaimed feminist and journalist, dots her work with role reversal, yet involved Evadne with a male, her husband, in Indissoluble Matrimony as she herself had a fiery, long lasting affair with H. G. Wells around the time of it’s publication. At least Virginia Wolff had the gall to admit to her presence in her writing.
This scorning is a bit ironic in that a writer is a writer, an idea is an idea. In the end, neither have anything to do with sex.
It is amusing at best though, the way in which critics have plucked apart Written on the Body to be a lesbian novel. That the central focus of the narrators passion happens to be a woman is irrelevant to the feelings themselves. As are any of the obvious neglects of gender for the narrator. If there are hints to gender, they are ambiguous at best or shifting to frequently one couldn’t possibly grab a-hold of any one thread and claim it to be evidence of a man or a woman.
These roles in fact -clues if you will- are only one’s conjured up by the readers themselves. All “references” or “implications” to gender not only do not exist, but are completely fabricated by whomever is choosing to see them. Any claims to the narrator being bashed with images or literal wording of “penetration,” or the instance in which a past lovers snake startles the narrator because of its blatant crotch-length-in-height stature. Likely, the idea of a male, for some obscure reason, also gets doubted throughout the reading of the novel.
Regardless of whether or not the narrator is male or female, one also gets the sense of Louise being the submissive woman, as both figures [her husband and the narrator] make large decisions in her life. Jenifer asked us at one point during our discussions if Louise had been Luis, would it have changed the believability. The resounding “yes” only proved that as readers all markers of “gender” have all come from that exactly. The reader is the one to pre-suppose gender.
This is something Winterson seemed to be focusing a critical lens upon. Readers would not get the sensation of Luis being as reasonable because obviously Louise is exhibiting obvious “female” traits, is she not? What, with allowing the “dominant” figures in her life “rule” her. Quick to jump the gun, are we not? Quick to assume that no man could ever exhibit such levels of submissiveness, especially when it comes to the control of their relationships and bodies. Quick to forget that is was Louise who took on the male role of “perusing” to allow herself to become close to the narrator, was the one to ask if they were to have an affair, the one to call. The one to lead.
Self examination of how “open” one really is to the uselessness of gender and love should be conducted before and after reading Written on the Body. It will change how one sees gender and it’s irrelevance to blistering passion.
This scorning is a bit ironic in that a writer is a writer, an idea is an idea. In the end, neither have anything to do with sex.
It is amusing at best though, the way in which critics have plucked apart Written on the Body to be a lesbian novel. That the central focus of the narrators passion happens to be a woman is irrelevant to the feelings themselves. As are any of the obvious neglects of gender for the narrator. If there are hints to gender, they are ambiguous at best or shifting to frequently one couldn’t possibly grab a-hold of any one thread and claim it to be evidence of a man or a woman.
These roles in fact -clues if you will- are only one’s conjured up by the readers themselves. All “references” or “implications” to gender not only do not exist, but are completely fabricated by whomever is choosing to see them. Any claims to the narrator being bashed with images or literal wording of “penetration,” or the instance in which a past lovers snake startles the narrator because of its blatant crotch-length-in-height stature. Likely, the idea of a male, for some obscure reason, also gets doubted throughout the reading of the novel.
Regardless of whether or not the narrator is male or female, one also gets the sense of Louise being the submissive woman, as both figures [her husband and the narrator] make large decisions in her life. Jenifer asked us at one point during our discussions if Louise had been Luis, would it have changed the believability. The resounding “yes” only proved that as readers all markers of “gender” have all come from that exactly. The reader is the one to pre-suppose gender.
This is something Winterson seemed to be focusing a critical lens upon. Readers would not get the sensation of Luis being as reasonable because obviously Louise is exhibiting obvious “female” traits, is she not? What, with allowing the “dominant” figures in her life “rule” her. Quick to jump the gun, are we not? Quick to assume that no man could ever exhibit such levels of submissiveness, especially when it comes to the control of their relationships and bodies. Quick to forget that is was Louise who took on the male role of “perusing” to allow herself to become close to the narrator, was the one to ask if they were to have an affair, the one to call. The one to lead.
Self examination of how “open” one really is to the uselessness of gender and love should be conducted before and after reading Written on the Body. It will change how one sees gender and it’s irrelevance to blistering passion.
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