Tag: feminism

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What’s wrong with being basic? A defense of the Pumpkin Spice Latte

Plain black coffee is bland anyway

It’s finally Pumpkin Spice Latte season! And you can bet that I’ve already had three since the beginning of the month.

Though, with great power comes great responsibility: each year, myself and other PSL lovers have to fend off the perennial critique that the drink is basic.

To that, let me say two things: a) the pumpkin spice blend that Starbucks uses is no less than fantastic; and b) what’s so wrong with liking basic things?

We’ve come to attribute a lot of things to this idea of “basicness”: the image of a Michael Kors-clad young woman with a Hydroflask® in her hand and Kylie Jenner’s Candy K on her lips, ordering a smoothie bowl at brunch.

To me, this rhetoric is just another, more personal derivative of our performance-driven society. The logic behind it is that it’s okay to deride certain aspects of popular culture because it allows the creation of a cultural hierarchy.

We’ve learned to gauge our place in society based on others’ behaviours. This is normal; humans are social creatures. In our hyperactive, hyperproductive world, though, we are validated by what we bring to society — especially in the midst of a pandemic, as we are bombarded with tips on how to spend our time usefully.

So when we realize that the conversation about who can be more productive or who is working harder is fruitless, we turn to who is more cultured or has more individuality, traits that are measured by our tastes and interests.

If performance is no longer an accurate determinant of social worth, let personality be.

Twitter user Salvatore Maicki gave a perfect example of this in posting a picture of a textbook page that graphed various elements of our culture into neat rankings (personally, I identify strongly with the tweet’s caption). At the top, you can find highbrow examples like “ballet” or “Hamlet”; at the bottom sit the “paparazzi coverage of Kim Kardashian” and “Grand Theft Auto.” The essence of this unwritten hierarchy is there: the less akin your interests are to the elements at the top of the chart, the lower their considered worth — and thus the lower your perceived value in society.

This assumption does two things: it reinforces the elitist ideas that we’ve based our social constructs on, and it encourages us to see others as two-dimensional rather than as multi-faceted individuals.

Urban Dictionary, a decisively authoritative source on the subject, defines basicness as being “only interested in things mainstream, popular, and trending.” So how do you discern the difference between what is basic and what is simply good enough to be widely appreciated?

Billie Eilish’s music was cool in 2017; now, it’s overly edgy and try-hard. You had good taste if you wore those chunky Filas for the first two months they were trendy, you weren’t if you bought them the day it was collectively decided they were tacky.

But these are arbitrary gradings we’ve created to apply simple labels on those who surround us. This “over-valuing” of originality shames us for being interested in anything popular, and pushes this narrative that people can’t be smart and cultured while also religiously watching The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

Our tastes and interests are just that: they’re not telltale signs of a boring or daft character. Everyone thinks. Everyone has ambitions, opinions, and principles, and to expect these traits to be entirely encapsulated in aleatory preferences is simply unfair.

I’m an ardent believer in the “let people enjoy things” doctrine, and I have faith that people enjoy things that are considered basic not because they want to follow the crowd (though that may be one of the factors), but because they genuinely enjoy them.

People shouldn’t have to explain or prove themselves to anyone, especially not judgmental folk who roll their eyes at the sight of “PSL” scribbled on a paper cup. So, please, excuse me while I go get my fourth one this week.

 

Graphic by @the.beta.lab

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The rise and rise of pay-per-view nudes

“On that Demon Time, she might start an OnlyFans”

The moment I realized that OnlyFans had officially become a widespread mainstream topic was when I first heard these lyrics sung by Beyoncé on Megan Thee Stallion’s “Savage Remix” while mindlessly scrolling through TikTok. Before then, I knew it as a somewhat niche platform used mostly by the people I follow on Twitter. Like, “one of my friends’ friends has one!”, “this girl I follow on Instagram has been promoting her,” and so on.

“Should I start an OnlyFans?” has become our generation’s “screw this, I’ll just become a stripper.” With the same connotation of sex work being young women’s kind of shameful ace-in-the-hole, this slogan also mirthlessly shows how the sex industry has followed young people’s increasingly web-connected lives, as well as their heavily exploited desire for personalized experiences. In an online world where personalized ads, emojis, Google search suggestions, and YouTube recommendations have thrived, personalized sexual content was sure to follow.

Coupled with the gradual integration of feminism in the porn industry, we can see how despite seeing increases in traffic, oligopolist brands like PornHub and RedTube haven’t been able to compete with the practice of subscription-based services, which offer even more specific content options and, of course, the possibility of communicating directly with the actors themselves. These companies have also been under fire recently for profiting off videos of assault, abuse, and even child pornography, and for the discrepancy between actors’ pay and the sites’ revenues. The announcement that famous ex-adult film star Mia Khalifa’s total reported earnings were of $12,000 during the three months she worked with PornHub over five years ago became viral, as Internet users acknowledged the much larger amount that the site has made with her videos over the years. With Premium memberships unable to compete with some of OnlyFans’ prices—the lowest monthly fee being $4.99, versus $9.99 on PornHub and a whopping $29.99 on Brazzers — OnlyFans becomes a preferable and seemingly more democratic choice.

The coronavirus can be partially credited for gradually building up the trend of online nude content creation: when the pandemic hit and many lost their sources of income, they had to turn to the only accessible — and the most lucrative — option that every “How to Make Money from Home” article omits. It’s estimated that during quarantine, creator enrolment increased five-fold compared to last year, and the site’s audience grew by 80 per cent.

A few weeks ago, social media erupted at the consequences of popular singer and actress Bella Thorne’s joining the platform. She was accused of gentrifying it in cheating her fans of money they had paid for nude photos, taking clients away from content creators who need them to pay rent, and for causing the site to tighten its policies on how much creators could get paid and when.

Anything that enters the mainstream — whether it’s an artist, a new Netflix show, an app — will suffer in some way from all the attention and popularity, but there is usually a strong community trying to preserve its integrity. OnlyFans, on the other hand, is a platform whose creators were already facing many challenges, and who had little support from, well, anyone. Frequently leaked content was a problem well before the pandemic hit, and many creators were victims of extortion. Though we are experiencing a more liberated sexual culture than in previous generations, the stigma around sex work remains heavy in our society.

Even with a larger client base, only a minority of creators manage to make the exorbitant amounts shown off in viral social media posts. Because the internet doesn’t sleep, those who commit to making money online from sex-related content also take on longer work weeks: some have reported working anywhere from 50 to 80 hours a week, compared with the average person’s 35 to 40.

“What about your future career?” is the age-old burning question for anyone who joins the sex industry. Our parents all warned us that anything uploaded to the internet stays there forever. We can’t predict the opinions of future employers on OnlyFans accounts, and I may be naive in thinking this, but I can’t help but see mainstreaming the platform as a way to tame down the negative reactions to sex work. Stigma is broken by normalizing concepts, and by the time we have to apply for the positions that hold reputation to a high regard, I have hope that the taboo surrounding sex work will be much less felt in offices and social settings. The people around us right now, whose “friend of a friend” is entering the sex industry, are ultimately the ones who will decide whether sex work should continue to be a professional setback, or if it’s time we understand it like it is: a way of making a living just like any other.

 

Graphic by Lily Cowper

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How the legal system has failed victims of sexual assault once again.

Warning: this piece deals with mentions of rape, sexual assault and abuse. 

It all began on Oct. 5, 2017, with an article in the New York Times which contained accusations agaisnt Harvey Weinstein, a revered movie producer, of sexual harassment and unwanted physical contact by Ashley Judd and Emily Nestor. They were the first women to publicly come forward and share their experiences with Weinstein.

Although the #Metoo movement has existed since 2006, and was started by Tarana Burke, following her own personal experience with sexual abuse, the movement became widely popular in 2017. The use of the hashtag by Alyssa Milano on October 15 of that year is what revived it.

Burke’s goal was to “build a community of advocates, driven by survivors, who will be at the forefront of creating solutions to interrupt sexual violence in their communities.” The #MeToo movement is an amazing medium that has encouraged women to come forward with their stories. It helped them to no longer be afraid of sharing what they’ve been through.

The fact that Weinstein was sentenced to 23 years in prison instead of walking away free is a great victory, but why did it take over three years for him to be convicted? the legal system definitely has to become more tailored to these cases, as it can be traumatic having to tell time after time what these survivors went through, especially when they aren’t believed. It’s quite upsetting and unjust that these hearings take forever.

According to an article by CNBC, the maximum sentence for rape in New York is 29 years. This is yet another instance where the legal system continues to reduce the consequences of dire actions, especially when powerful people hire the best lawyers in the field. In order to keep this from happening again, the justice system has to change and become easier for victims to navigate. The stigma and discreditation of victims are some of the numerous reasons  why so many survivors are ashamed to come forward.

According to Beverly Engel, a psychologist at Psychology Today, three out four victims of sexual harassment decide against telling anyone in authority about the abuse. Instead, they choose to avoid the abuser, downplay the gravity of the situation or attempt to ignore what is going on. Feelings of shame, denial—especially when the victim blames themselves for  the abuse––and fear of consequences fuel the desire to stay silent. Combined with the fact that the legal system can be overwhelming to navigate without a lawyer, since some can’t possibly afford one, the system unconsciously grants privilege to the accused.

It’s honestly disheartening that we continue to live in a world where class and fame determine the chance of someone being taken seriously in a court of law.

If the legal system were to offer more options for victims to have proper representation, quicker court hearings and not have their stories questioned every second, we could make sure that more rapists and abusers end up behind bars.

As a society, people in positions of authority such as the police force and important players in the judicial system need to change their ways of viewing these survivors. Victim-blaming isn’t going to help anyone. Times have changed and the legal system needs to go through an enormous reformation for the better. 

 

 

Photo collage by Laurence B.D

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News

International Women’s Day 2020

March 8 was International Women’s Day (IWD) 2020.

IWD celebrates the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women, and serves as a reminder that much remains to be done to achieve gender equality.

This day has a long history – following the model of National Women’s Day in the United States, IWD was first celebrated in 1911 in Austria, Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland. It was then celebrated in Russia in 1913 for the first time, and in the following years, March 8 became the official day worldwide.

The United Nations began celebrating the day in 1975 but only started adopting an annual theme in 1996. The first theme was “Celebrating the Past, Planning for the Future,” and other themes since then have highlighted a variety of issues, from “Women and Human Rights” to “World Free of Violence Against Women.” This year’s theme is “I am Generation Equality: Realizing Women’s Rights.”

Over the last century, IWD has gone from protests in just a few countries to a worldwide campaign with support from organizations like the UN, UN Women and Amnesty International.

Since IWD was first celebrated, much progress has been made by women worldwide. They have obtained the right to vote almost everywhere, abortion is only completely illegal in 26 countries and partially illegal in 37, and there are women in almost all positions of power, from president – 59 countries have had a female leader – to CEO.

2020 and beyond

Despite the improvements in women’s situations worldwide and all the commitments/declarations of countries, corporations and organizations to achieve parity – such as the World Economic Forum’s framework for gender parity – much remains to be done to truly reach equality.

“Women have made a lot of progress, yes, but women are still dying, they’re still being killed by their partners, they’re still being disappeared and snuffed out, and there’s an impunity about it: it’s taken for granted that women can be beaten by their partners, aggressed, harassed, and violated,” said Marie Boti, spokesperson for Women of Diverse Origins, who organized the Montreal demonstration at Cabot Square on March 8. She added that this network of women’s organizations is hoping to bring back the militant tradition of IWD demonstrations.

As Canada faces a domestic violence crisis and a genocide of three decades of missing and murdered Indigenous women, Boti believes it is important to continue creating awareness about women’s struggles.

Boti said that even in North America, women are paid less than men for the same work – women in Canada currently earn about 0.87$ for every dollar earned by a man – while the largest burden of household and childcare tasks still falls on their shoulders.

In positions of power, women are severely under-represented: only a quarter of parliamentarians worldwide are women, and under 7 per cent of the Fortune 500 CEOs are women. In Canada, despite Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s promise of parity in his cabinet, women only make up 29 per cent of the House of Commons, and only one woman has ever been Prime Minister in the country’s history.

What about Montreal?

If we take a look closer to home, Concordia University’s spokesperson Vannina Maestracci revealed statistics that show that parity has been achieved. In the 2018/19 academic year, 50 per cent of students and 51 per cent of employees were women.

However, Maestracci’s student enrollment numbers split by faculty reveal that parity has not been achieved for every specialty. Although the Arts and Science and the Fine Arts faculties have more than 60 per cent female students, and the John Molson School of Business is close to parity with 48 per cent, there is a clear disparity among engineers.

The Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science, despite being named after the first woman in Concordia University’s history to obtain a PhD in building engineering, only has 24 per cent female enrollment, according to the numbers revealed by Maestracci.

Although organizations like Concordia’s Women in Engineering are working on reducing this gap, these numbers reveal that there are still many barriers for women in STEM fields in Canada.

 

Graphic by Sasha Axenova

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Opinions

The importance of Feminism in the 21st century

Graphic by Alexa Hawksworth.

Officially recognized since 1977 by the UN, the goal of Women’s Day has always been to pay tribute to the achievements of predecessors in the labour movements and the feminist movement that succeeded it.

The history leading up to International Women’s Day is rich and full of brave women who fought for more rights and equality in the societies they lived in.

Though it’s a day to celebrate the achievements of women and how far we’ve progressed, we need to stray away from patting ourselves on the back and becoming passive in the status quo.

I am honestly grateful to have access to education, voting and having rights in general. I am my own person and I have a say in matters that involve my body and choices. But the heartbreaking truth is that reality isn’t like this for every woman around the globe. Just because we’ve progressed, doesn’t mean that we can’t do more to finally achieve gender equality—the same dream that fuelled so many feminist icons in the past to fight for all women.

International Women’s Day is a celebration of feminism and how brave women took to the streets of New York to ask for rights and less detrimental working conditions in 1908.

This year’s theme, which was  #EachforEqual  is wonderful to me because it is reflecting on what we should all be doing and pondering during the rest of the year. The goal of challenging stereotypes, fighting bias, broadening perceptions, improving situations and celebrating women’s achievements is what we all need to be doing. Why do we have to celebrate women’s achievements only once a year? And why does it have to become another marketing ploy abused by corporations?

Female empowerment isn’t properly celebrated with cutesy merchandise that may take the form of a bright pink t-shirt with the slogan ‘Woman Up!’ written across it or with a BrewDog pink beer ‘‘for girls’’ (it was in poor taste, even if it was ironic). It’s all feeding into sexist advertisements—and we’re in 2020. Do we seriously need to continue having this conversation and continuing to treat stereotypical gender roles as social restraints?

The world isn’t all sunshine, rainbows and unicorns and I’m aware of that. This is why corporations need to do better and invest money in the cause all year long, not only showing support on March 8 to be trendy.

International Women’s Day should always be about realizing how much we have progressed but also recognizing our shortcomings, and how much we can improve and continue to pave the way for less privileged women. There are still 132 million girls who don’t have access to education and are forced out of school worldwide.

In fact, many of these girls are refused opportunities due to sexism and outdated gender stereotypes, where girls are perceived as being housewives and don’t deserve an education, unlike their male counterparts, as reported by World Vision.

These biases against women aren’t only happening in underdeveloped countries.

On March 5, the United Nations Development Programme came out with a report with findings that 90 per cent of men and women alike hold a bias against women especially in areas such as politics, education and business. These results are upsetting and show that there are still invisible barriers blocking the achievement of equality.

Feminism isn’t only a trademark to show off once a year.

The advocacy of women’s rights on the basis of equality of the sexes needs to be kept alive in 2020 and the years to come—so that all women around the world can accomplish their dreams and are finally seen as worthy of holding titles that were traditionally held by men.

We all have a role to play in making this a reality. 

 

 

Graphic by Alexa Hawksworth

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I’m just a female dirtbag, baby

Ever since first watching the 2000 film High Fidelity in high school, I found myself relating to the record store-owning protagonist Rob, played by John Cusack. Rob was a moody, unlucky in love music snob, too in touch with his emotions and stuck in the past— embarrassingly relatable. 

So, when I heard that High Fidelity was getting a TV remake, starring the iconic Zoë Kravitz as a gender-swapped Rob (now short for Robyn), I was instantly excited. My issues with the film had always been my cognitive dissonance between relating to Cusack’s Rob, but struggling with his toxic “but I’m a nice guy” demeanour—something I found inherently masculine and obnoxious.

Yet, High Fidelity (both the film and the new Hulu show) is shown through Rob’s eyes, as the character often breaks the fourth wall to talk to the camera directly. So when Rob is played by the dreamy Cusack, with his puppy dog eyes, you can’t help but be pulled into his guise, no matter how much of a dirtbag he is.

Watching the Hulu adaptation made me wonder why I felt the need to relate to Rob. I realized that while there has been no shortage of “cool girls” on screen, their range was always limited. The cool girl is never the main character. She’s often a foil placed in opposition to the stereotypical uptight, prissy, feminine character due to her chillness (think the iconic Gone Girl monologue).

In Hulu’s “High Fidelity,” Rob is undoubtedly cool—Kravitz just seems to bring that to everything she does. Yet, no matter how hip she appears on the outside, Rob is still a complex character with as much agency as any male protagonist. Like Cusack before her, Kravitz takes on the role of an utter dirtbag.

The female dirtbag may be a useful subversion of the cool girl archetype. BBC’s “Fleabag” made a huge splash in 2016 arguably due to its realistically messy, horny and self-involved main character, depicted by Phoebe Waller-Bridge. She’s well-dressed and creative, but deeply flawed in her relationships and unabashedly gross. Similar to “High Fidelity,” Waller-Bridge often faces the camera to engage the audience in her outer monologue. Sure she’s cool, but she’s in control of her own story.

There’s a misconception that for a female character to be “strong,” they have to be exceptionally smart, confident and capable. But, how many among us can truly relate to Captain Marvel or Buffy Summers? Not even mentioning these characters’ overwhelming whiteness and thinness. This outdated focus on strength should be replaced by an imperative for truth and realism.

One trend within this new wave of female dirtbag representation is that most of these narratives are helmed by women. The aforementioned 2020 “High Fidelity,” “Fleabag”—and we can’t forget the pinnacle of female grossness—”Broad City” were all created by women.

When women are allowed to shape their own stories, they’re bound to represent a more truthful depiction of the female experience—warts and all. 

 

Graphic by @sundaeghost

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Changing the way we talk about women in business

The business world can be a scary place. I wouldn’t know much about it, because I have rarely stepped foot into JMSB (unless I really had to pee).

The shiny interior and clean glass windows intimidate me. How can you keep the windows so clean, like dude, it’s downtown Montreal.

I have always been an “Arts kid.” Math, finance and economics are intimidating words that I don’t really understand. Although my dad has explained the stock market about 600 times to me, I still don’t get it. Anyways, what I lack in knowledge of numbers, I hope I have gained in communication and critical thinking. These tools have helped me understand the social world and contextualize my experiences.

The other day, I was having a conversation with a friend in JMSB. She expressed her concerns about how the school approaches gender differences in business. Quite like myself, she has a background in psychology, meaning gender differences and bias were no foreign concept. In psychology, we learn about the social construction of gender as well as biological differences. She explained that in business, her teachers often address gender differences with slides that proclaim “women are less direct and men dominate the conversation” without further explanation. This lack of context, explanation and acknowledgement of the trend as a stereotype is not only dangerous, it is enabling the behaviour. With my friend’s arts background, she can contextualize these factors and understands not to take them at face value. As she sits in the class, she wonders how many people around her understand not only that the gender differences exist, but why.

I have spent a lot of my degree attempting to understand the “why.” This is something that I often take for granted; I didn’t know any of this stuff before. For a lot of these business students, they won’t understand the “why” until they are taught. I have learned about toxic masculinity, social constructions of gender and what these concepts do to our behaviour. We cannot keep blaming the business world for not understanding why these gender discrepancies exist if the curriculum consistently lacks the tools to help.

No one is saying that men and women are not different. The gender differences that show up in the business world are real—but they are real because they are perpetuated by society, and not because they are inherently real. That is the issue with how these topics are being presented.

Let’s go over the stereotypes that usually follow women in business. According to The Harvard Business Review, “One set of assumed differences is marshalled to explain women’s failure to achieve parity with men: women negotiate poorly, lack confidence, are too risk-averse, or don’t put in the requisite hours at work because they value family more than their careers.” With these stereotypes usually follows, “women are more caring, cooperative, or mission-driven—are used as a rationale for companies to invest in women’s success.”

All this to say, these characteristics, when presented as rigid facts, help solidify the gender discrepancies in business. As a woman in business, learning about how you differ from men, without breaking down exactly why this happens, can be quite damaging. This is not something to be taken at face value. There is a social responsibility for unpacking gender differences.

I am in no way saying that it is more beneficial to get an arts degree. Heck—I probably won’t find a job once I graduate (let’s not go there), but what I am saying is that there are aspects of an arts degree that should be universally taught. Kind of like how I should know more about finance—and learn how to do my taxes. 

 

Graphic by @sundaeghost

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Dolly, they will always love you

I feel like the world has never been more divided. You’ve got “Red” on one side, “Blue” on the other and no one in the middle.

We are no longer listening to each other. We aren’t engaging with the opposition and everyone seems like, well, a politician. When was the last time you saw two people with completely opposing political views standing next to each other peacefully?

Oh, that’s right—at a Dolly Parton concert. 

A country music icon, Parton has managed to navigate through the celebrity world as an A-list singer/songwriter, without having a political opinion. This is truly unheard of.

This isn’t to say that Parton doesn’t have opinions. She has helped lead a working class women’s movement, with her acting, singing and songwriting of the hit 1980’s movie 9 To 5. This movie, starring Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin as well as Parton herself, focused on hardworking women wanting to be treated better in the workplace. This came at a time when women were extremely frustrated with their lack of rights. The theme song became an anthem for gender equality.

When this movie was readapted to Broadway, she told the red carpet in London, “It’s as relevant now as it was before, and with the #metoo movement this is a good time for it.”

She stands up for women, but never really calls herself a feminist. She is constantly crediting the men in her life, and has the motto that everyone should be treated equally.

Parton’s lack of political position comes at a very interesting time for the world. We are constantly trying to find public figures to lead us. We must like musicians that stand for a good cause, support comedians that are breaking barriers and make sure that like-minded people are the only ones allowed in our echochamber. Parton takes this concept and destroys it. Her diverse fans love her work, her brand and most of all, her. Most are not worried about what she stands for.

She explained to Jad Abumrad in his Podcast Dolly Parton’s America that it’s too much pressure to have a political opinion.

I hope I don’t let people down,” Parton told Abumrad. “They’ve put me up on this pedestal, I hope they don’t knock me off of it.”

Parton has been frustrated in the past with interviewers and the media constantly asking her about her political opinions. In 2017, when Trump had been in office for just under a year, Parton, Fonda and Tomlin all presented an award at the Emmys. The other women, being the powerful activists they are, made a pointed statement directed at the President. Dolly was expected to follow suit, but instead, she decided to make a boob joke.

“I didn’t like it,” Parton told Abumrad. “I had already told Jane and Lili that I wasn’t going to get into the politics of anything. I don’t do politics. I have too many fans on both sides of the fence.”

Whether or not you agree with Parton’s apolitical nature, it works for her. She is an incredible business woman and knows how to work the system. We cannot deny that her neutrality has helped her make a buck. By staying out of political discussions and navigating show business, she has unified two worlds in a way that we haven’t seen before.

There truly is no one like her. 

 

Graphic by @sundaeghost

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Let’s kill the cool girl trope

She’s pretty! She’s fun! She likes sports and hot dogs but still looks great in a little black dress! You know her well! She is the cool girl. 

A trope we see everywhere, whether she’s in the latest action movie, romcom, drama or even manifesting herself in a Jennifer Lawrence’s celebrity persona, trust me when I say —  everywhere. But, here’s a little secret — she doesn’t actually exist.

That’s right. The cool girl is not real, sorry boys! This is not to say that women are not cool, because trust me, they are. This is to comment on the fact that the cool girl we see in the media is made up and simply a manifestation of male desires.

To clarify, I am not saying that women are not naturally drawn to stereotypically male interests; that’s ridiculous. Women are complex, making their desires diverse and vast. I am simply referring to a systemic trope; one born from male writers, directors and producers who create a female character solely to fit the male gaze. It’s not just about her liking sports or fixing cars, it’s that above all these characters must be insanely hot. It’s a crucial prerequisite, characters have to look like Megan Fox or Sandra Bullock before they are even considered on the cool girl radar. People will say, “she’s not like other girls,” but ha! You’re wrong. Friends, she is like other girls, she just might be better at hiding it.

According to a video by The Take, many women go through a phase where they want to be seen as the cool girl and honestly, I can relate. After fiddling with my sweaty ponytail in an attempt to look effortlessly windswept when I was playing soccer with my guy friends, or trying time and time again to look cool in a baseball cap, I have given up. Cool girls might seem effortless, but I can assure you — they’re not.

The Take explains that the cool girl is often juxtaposed with a very uptight and traditionally “girlier” version. This girl is shown to like more stereotypical girly things such as shopping, painting their nails, and does her makeup, a girl who is seen as annoying, superficial or less-than by the male characters and audience. The cool girl and the girly girl are both very demeaning to women and are both portrayed for the sole purpose of living and dying for male attention. These tropes plant deep roots of internalized sexism between women, often turning them against each other.

To be the cool girl you must renounce your gender, separating yourself from stereotypically feminine characteristics, while also being flawless. How exhausting!

Once we identify these patterns, they are very difficult to miss. When was the last time that you consumed a movie, television show or book where there was only one redeeming female character? I have a feeling you won’t have to look very far.

All this being said, things are getting better. Jennifer Lawrence has calmed down, and at the same time, we are starting to see representation of many interesting and emotionally intelligent women on screen.

Can you imagine? Female characters that reflect the multidimensional interests, motivations, hobbies, hopes and dreams of real people! Female characters showing each other love and support and not putting each other down to gain credibility. Movies like Bridesmaids and Gone Girl address this stereotype head on, using humor and even fear to explain the ridiculousness and the damage of continuing to write women this way.

So let’s move away from “being one of the guys,” and let her just be. Who knows, maybe you’ll find that real women are pretty cool after all.

 

 

Collage by Brittany Clarke

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Opinions

Michelle Williams, what do you mean “vote in your self-interest”?

Michelle Williams first won my heart not too long ago.

Her role in The Greatest Showman, more specifically her performance of “Tightrope,” embodied everything a complete hopeless romantic like myself feels when in love: faith, devotion through highs and lows, “mountains and valleys, and all that will come in between.”

The 2019 Golden Globes honoured Williams with a Best Actress in a Limited Series award for her role in Fosse/Verdon. Although I didn’t watch the show, reviews were great: Rotten Tomatoes gave it an 81 per cent rating, while IMDb had a 7.9/10 rating. Knowing her — loving her — I will say she deserved it, and that’s that!

Except that it isn’t.

Much like the popular tendency of celebrities to get political at award ceremonies, Williams took the opportunity to emphasize the importance of voting for women. She spoke beautifully about the importance of choice, and how thankful she was for being acknowledged for the choices she has made as an actress and as a person. She added that she’s grateful to “live in a society where choice exists, because as women and girls, sometimes things happen to our bodies that are not our choice.”

In a way, this is all anyone ever wants — to live where, once you look back, you recognize your own handwriting, as she put it. Now, I think it’s important to note that Williams was not at all addressing an international audience in her speech. She was specifically speaking to American women, encouraging them to employ their right to vote. Even more so, she urged women to vote in their own self-interest.

“Wait, what,” was my exact reaction. To this day I’m unsure if I misunderstood it, or she really meant it that way, but to me, “self-interest” should never be what fuels a democracy. A modern society is a collection of different people coexisting in the same place — asking each and every one of them to think of their own self-interest when it comes to matters that will unquestionably and unequivocally affect the other is not only wrong, it’s absurd. As Williams pointed out in that same sentence she preached for self-interest, “it’s what men have been doing for years.”

Since when do we want to do what men have been doing in matters of democracy and the world? I mean, two World Wars, literally countless acts of colonial violence, and abuse of power historically led by men, why would we ever want to do what they have been doing?

Women, exercise your right to vote. Do it so the world “looks a little more like us,” but also make sure that “us” isn’t just an inverted version of the selfishness and cruelty that a world led by white men has brought us. The world looks so much like men because they’ve chosen so selfishly that there was no room for otherness — instead of self-interest, how about public-interest?

 

 

Graphic by @sundaeghost

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Don’t fall for the Girlboss scam

Surely you’ve seen the branded content.

Whether it’s on a millennial pink T-shirt, a sassy coffee mug, or the former Nastygal CEO, Sophia Amoruso’s memoir that started it all, #Girlboss culture has become inescapable online and off.

The girlboss moniker is attached to overwhelmingly white, cisgendered women who have achieved lucrative careers in their field of choice; generally the business sector. The term’s purpose is to encourage women to climb the corporate ladder, in hopes that if more women are at the top of historically male-dominated industries, they will become more ethical and egalitarian.

Girlboss culture didn’t come out of nowhere. Girlbosses are just the millennial manifestation of the decades old “girl power” movement. Girl power started in the 1990s as a result of the radical “Riot grrrl”  feminist movement. Riot grrrls would play underground women-fronted punk shows, circulate handmade political zines, and preach radical self-acceptance. Whereas Riot grrrl was a bottom-up DIY scene, girl power was the market’s top-down commodification of Riot grrrl’s ideals.

For example, The Spice Girls are often cited as a prime example of girl power, yet the band was assembled by two (male) managers connected to major label Virgin Record . Like much of girl power culture, The Spice Girls were manufactured to sell a product, and secondly, to sell the idea of “empowerment” to young girls.

Empowerment remained an important notion in the transition from girl power to girlboss culture. “Empowerment” is one of those words that has become so ubiquitous in popular culture that it has begun to lose much of its original meaning. By definition, empowerment means gaining control over the actions and choices in one’s life.

Since girlboss culture is targeted to mostly white, middle to upper class women in the west, I struggle to see how this veil of empowerment is necessary. Girlboss culture is not about making sure women have the education or structural means to achieve careers, it is simply bolstering already-privileged women into higher levels of financial success. Thus, empowerment is just a trendy word to rally behind that serves no real purpose other than making powerful women feel good about their accumulation of wealth.

Additionally, the notion that a company with women at the top is inherently more ethical is highly flawed. In the case of Amoruso, the original #girlboss of fashion retailer Nastygal, she had several allegations against her company’s culture of image consciousness and lack of accountability and respect for those working under her.

This “trickle down” mode of feminism will not work. Instead of placing our faith in a handful of corporate women to try to change the system from within, why not focus on structural change that will improve the lives of everyday women and other marginalized groups? It will be hard to try to hack at patriarchy without taking capitalism to task as well. Feminist practices don’t need to always be “practical.” Pushing for large structural change, rather than sticking more women into an already broken system, is the only way forward.

Graphic @sundaeghost

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Feminism is not for sale

As trendy as it is, the fundamentals of the feminist movement in no way translate to lotion sales, hair products or even a new pair of running shoes. Industries are taking the ideology of feminism and exploiting the heck out of it.

This is not new. We’ve seen this with many brands geared toward women. Whether its Nike or Dove, these companies have endorsed women empowerment, and it’s working for them. This isn’t to say that everything they are doing is wrong, but it is important to analyze the oversimplification of patriarchal structures that are at play.

Sometimes these messages are backhanded, anti-feminist ways to enforce beauty norms and sell products that will both empower you, erase your wrinkles and minimize your pores. Other times, these messages feel aligned with the core values of feminism and hit us right in the feels.

As we move forward, predictably, large companies selling products to women, move with us. When I watch a Nike Ad geared for women with an uplifting and emotional song playing in the background, empowering language and impressive glistening olympians, this is good advertisement.

It is masked by a message that makes me feel like I have agency and strength even though I know that Nike is just trying to make money. I’m hungry for this representation.

I know that companies need to understand the social climate in order to sell things, that’s how marketing works (after all, I took marketing 101 in first year). Perhaps this means that these feminist advertisements, though oftentimes hollow bandwagon tools, are more or less harmless, and I need to calm down.

First of all, don’t tell me to calm down. Secondly, let’s take a closer look at what modern feminism actually looks like. This movement was born out of necessity for human rights. It needs to encompass intersections of marginalized groups in society, such as racialized people and members of the LGBTQ community. These groups have been advocating for the rights of those around them for years. This is something that white women have been benefiting from, as they move through society with much more ease, representation and safety.

Inter-sectional feminism is not mainstream. The rights of non-white, non-cisgendered women are still largely lacking, stigmatized or pushed out of the main conversation. Ironically and unfairly, it’s because of the work of these communities that feminism has gained enough traction to be used commercially. This amplifies a pattern of exploitation and alienation.

Let’s get back to advertising. The reality is, it’s becoming cool to be politically correct. Historically people have hesitated to bring women’s rights to the forefront of mainstream media, but now it’s profitable.

If you’re thinking that this is the most obvious thing in the world, I urge you to observe the next time an ad comes out, with inspirational music and a tear-jerker narrative about a girl overcoming her oppression. We’re all guilty of retweeting it, making it our Instagram story, and being fooled by the companies who play a large part in our oppression in the first place.

Engaging in a feminist conversation takes energy and patience. It takes listening, learning and being humbled by the stories of those that are affected by gender inequality. It takes analyzing the system that causes the oppression. These industries are biting off more than they can chew. At the core, they are just selling products.

Listen, I’m not trying to take on every industry that ever used feminism in their campaign. Surely we can argue that some good probably has come from a Dove Beauty ad or a period commercial. I’m sure that within these trends lies some authenticity and people who actually care about this fight.

I just think it’s important to keep a critical lens and remember that at the end of the day, feminism is not perfect, still evolving and most definitely not for sale.

 

Photo by Britanny Clarke

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