I’ve heard Savage argue against strict monogamy a million times, and it’s always been compelling, but Ryan’s explanation of how it all started absolutely floored me.  He explains that before the advent of agriculture, monogamy simply wasn’t in the best interest of the individual or the community.  In pre-scientific hunter-gatherer society, children were seen as much more communal– the connection between sex and birth had not yet been made.  Once agriculture was in the picture, domesticated animals began to illustrate the link between sex and birth– and with that came the significance of propety and ownership.   Only then did humans both know where babies were coming from, and have the incentive to know whose babies belonged to who.  In order for each individual to know which children he should leave his land to, he must know which children were his– and thus, he must control who the women were sleeping with.  And so, with the possession of land came the possession of female sexuality.  As Ryan puts it:

That’s when this hunger to control female sexuality really entered human behavior.  Before, when property is shared, and property wasn’t really even an important concept in pre-agricultural society, why would you care who a woman’s having sex with?

HOLY SHIT!

Both Savage and Ryan agree that it’s difficult to know how to apply this knowledge to modern human behavior– the “now what?” part.  But simply understanding where these ideas of possessing and controlling female sexuality came from is incredibly interesting.  It’s also important for us to be reminded that even our longest-held values are not innate and inevitable- -they come from somewhere.  They were born out of specific circumstance.  And, from an economic, social, and historical perspective, it’s pretty fascinating that it can all be drawn back to land ownership.  Long before the idea of capitalism even existed, the developing distinctions between private and public were informing human behavior in a very powerful way.

In a slightly unrelated video, Savage applies this idea to one of the most modern human behaviors around right now– sexting.  He argues that the backlash against it has to do with our overwhelming desire to control female sexuality:

We fear and long to control female sexuality.  With all the talk about sexting, you don’t really hear about pictures of dicks.  You hear about pictures of tits.  Because?  Because?  we don’t think women– particularly young women– own their own tits.

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Any regular readers of Blogging Molly already know that I think Dan Savage one of the most important voices for sex and gender equality/liberation out there.  I’d love to hear any thoughts from people who’ve read Sex at Dawn. The more we are aware that our understanding of sexuality is constructed and not innate, the more we have the ability to develop it into something far more healthy, nuanced, and tolerant.

Really, really good question.  Turns out, it’s unconstitutional.

In the wake of DOMA, it is only sexual orientation that differentiates a married couple entitled to federal marriage-based benefits from one not so entitled. And this court can conceive of no way in which such a difference might be relevant to the provision of the benefits at issue. By premising eligibility for these benefits on marital status in the first instance, the federal government signals to this court that the relevant distinction to be drawn is between married individuals and unmarried individuals. To further divide the class of married individuals into those with spouses of the same sex and those with spouses of the opposite sex is to create a distinction without meaning. [emphasis added]

YES!  Also, this:

…this court may conclude that it is only irrational prejudice that motivates the challenged classification. As irrational prejudice plainly never constitutes a legitimate government interest, this court must hold that Section 3 of DOMA as applied to Plaintiffs violates the equal protection principles embodied in the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. [emphasis added]

It’s pretty amazing to see bias and bigotry called out for exactly what it is– “irrational prejudice,” and “a distinction without meaning.”

It’s also interesting to see the 10th amendment being used to protect the rights of a minority– an idea that is largely absent from the teabag narrative about states’ rights.  Dan Savage said it best to Tony Perkins on CNN back in 2008, when Prop 8 was overturned:

“The constitution exists to protect the rights of vulnerable minorities against the tyranny of the majority.”

Thanks to Coakley and this Massachusetts federal judge, the constitution is doing just that.  This is very good news.

Two of them aren't even wearing shirts!

Geena Davis, an actress who I must admit I know very little about, has recently conducted a study on representations of women and girls in popular media– specifically children’s movies and shows.  The results are depressing, if not surprising.

In G Rated films (the top 101 grossing films from 1990-2005– not sure why CNN just put out this info now)

• Fewer than 1 out of 3 (28%) of the speaking characters are female– both animated and live action
• More than 4 out of 5 (83%) of narrators are male
• 85.5% of the characters are white, 4.8% are black, 9.7% are “other

When they broadened their scope to include the top grossing PG, PG13, and R movies, 73% of the characters were male.  Also, females were 5 times more likely than men to be seen in sexy clothes and 3 times as likely to be thin.

The tidbit that floored me: female characters in G movies rated movies “wear virtually the same amount of sexually revealing clothing as female characters in R rated movies,” according to Davis in this CNN video [emphasis added].

The website with all the research is here, and kudos to Davis for providing such a clear, extensive study.  I find myself referencing “representations of women in the media” a lot, and it’s so helpful to have specifics like this to point to.  It’s also wonderful that she’s focusing on children’s media– as Davis says:

If we have such devaluing and disempowering images from the first media that women consume, it sets the table and enculturates yet another generation of children into seeing women and girls as lesser status than boys and men.

Right on.  I knew there was a reason I didn’t like Disney movies as a kid– if you don’t like princesses, there’s really not that much on the table.

Watching the Joan Rivers documentary made it painfully clear to me how much looks are always, always a factor in how we perceive women comedians.  But what seems especially painful to me is that this judgment is not always coming from men.  Women– even feminists– hell, often feminists– offer up their critiques of women in comedy, and a woman’s looks are not always left off the table.  It’s the responsibility of feminist writers to be critical of what we see, and to analyze the implications of a woman’s performance and the positive and negative aspects of what that performance offers.  But if you believe, as most third wave feminists do, that each woman has a right to her own individual experience and a right to represent herself however she chooses, then perhaps it is time for women to become a little more forgiving of one another.

A helpful example of this is how some feminist writers talked about Tina Fey a few months back.  Fey’s amazing Liz Lemon character on 30 Rock is perpetually insecure, always the victim of (hilarious) ugly jokes and fat jokes, always single and awkward with men, always embarrassing herself.  Her SNL episode featured similar frumpy, downtrodden characters.  Lots of bloggers, Double X included, were not having it.  The column featured not one but two pieces criticizing Fey for “denigrating single women” and accusing her of seeking “married lady’s revenge.”  Both articles made good points about Tina Fey’s positionality, arguing that as a successful, beautiful, married woman, it is not fair for her to be perpetually mocking single women.  It’s an interesting question, but to me it demonstrates a very problematic presumtuousness on the part of the writers to tell a comic how to be a comic.

First of all, it’s not any other woman’s job to tell a woman whether or not she’s insecure.  Tina Fey has not always been successful, she hasn’t always been married, and she hasn’t always been a sex symbol, so there’s nobody in the world who can tell her she’s not allowed to joke about insecurity.  As anyone who has EVER been insecure knows, those feelings die hard, and they don’t always go away the moment you have some degree of success.  But, more importantly, Tina Fey is a smart, intelligent writer and performer who is doing great things for women in comedy.  Whether or not you dig her specific brand of humor, isn’t it more helpful for us to support each other, as women, in a field where women need all the support they can get?

So, back to Munn.  As most of the above mentioned feminist writers (who, for the record, are some of my favorite writers) have said, it’s too soon to tell whether she’s a great fit for The Daily Show or not.  It’s also too soon for me to decide whether she’s super funny– the stuff I’ve seen (specifically, her shoving gross food into her mouth) I’m not crazy about, but that doesn’t mean that she’s not talented.  That she’s super hot doesn’t mean she’s untalented either.  True, when you Google her, you’ll find lots of sexy bikini poses– but as feminists have long been arguing, women should be allowed to be sexual and still be taken seriously.

Certainly, as smart, curious, critical women, it is our job to always be questioning, to always be asking ourselves about the significance and meaning of what we’re seeing.  But when it comes to women in comedy, I think it’s just as important for us to be equal parts supportive and critical.  To criticize content is one thing, but to criticize individual women is something much more damaging.  For now, let’s give Munn some time to find her voice, and hope that the writers give her good stuff to work with.  She might suck, but we shouldn’t assume she will just because she’s a hottie.  And let’s hope that The Daily Show continues to open some long awaited doors for women.

There was a girl at school who wore a T-shirt that said, ‘THANKS, CONSTANCE, FOR RUINING THE PROM.’ … It was ridiculous. Maybe I should wear a T-shirt that says, ‘YOU’RE WELCOME’ on one side and ‘LESBIAN WHO RUINED THE PROM’ on the other.

But the Girl Who Ruined Prom is now the Grand Marshall of the NYC Pride Parade.  She’ll also be at the White House tonight for a ceremony “recognizing the contributions of LGBT Americans,” according to Jezebel.  Wanda Sykes brought her to the GLAAD awards, Ellen DeGeneres gave her a scholarship, and she’s going to see “American Idiot” on Broadway while she’s in NYC.

Let the record show that ALL of these things– WAY more fun than prom.  Congrats to Constance, and love to all the other LGBT teenagers out there.

Rivers was a rising star for a long time, despite some of the outrage and controversy she stirred up– much of which was simply because she was a woman, some of which came from her truly offensive material.  She was making abortion jokes before Roe v. Wade had even passed– (“She’s been back and forth to Puerto Rico to have 14 appendectomies”), and she makes a pretty funny anal sex joke for a woman in her mid seventies.  In the film, she makes a joke about Helen Keller (she hates kids but she would have liked Helen Keller) and is heckled by an audience member with a deaf child– Rivers’ skillful handling of the heckle shows exactly what an incredible, if slightly vulnerable, performer she is.  But even with all the truly awful stuff she’s said, Rivers speaks of how often she’s been told it’s “wrong” because “women shouldn’t say such things.”

It was only after Johnny Carson blacklisted Rivers, after she accepted an offer for her own late night show, that her career started to plummet.  In an interview with Tribeca Film, Rivers responds to why she thinks Carson acted the way he did:

I think because I was a woman, he never thought I’d leave him. I’ve looked back over the years, and everybody in that group left– David Brenner left, Bill Cosby left– this was all the same group– George Carlin… He was never angry at any of them. I left, and it was like, “You have cut off my arms. How could you leave me?” It was insane.

From a comic’s point of view, it is insane.  Absolutely insane.  She was a favorite of Carson, and once she was given a great opportunity for herself– basically, to get out from under Johnny’s shadow– she was shunned.

The movie has its brutal moments– it paints Rivers as a kind of tragic hero, driven by blind ambition and insecurity.  But it also treats her with respect, and despite her desperate persuit of success, she is also a sympathetic and compelling character with a staggering amount of talent for both writing and performing.  There’s a litany of reasons that Rivers’ career took a turn for the worse, including an absent manager and wreckless spending habits, but the movie makes it clear that Rivers deserves to be taken much more seriously than she has been in the last twenty years or so.  If the reviews so far are any indication, this documentary will get people to talk about Rivers for something besides her plastic surgery.

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This should be rather unsurprising news to anyone who’s either a guy or has a guy friend, but it still has some interesting implications for the different ways guys and girls are socialized to deal with their emotions.  Take a quick mental survey of popular representations of heartbreak, for women as compared to men– what do you think of?  In popular media, when women are heart broken, we see them get together with girlfriends, eat ice cream, and watch romantic comedies.  Magazines and websites for women, from Cosmo to the Frisky, constantly offer lists for ways to get over a break up that mostly emphasize spoiling yourself and turning to your friends for support.

Guys, though?  When I think of guys and broken hearts, I think of rock and roll.  Break up songs.  The Beatles, Bob Dylan, the Magnetic Fields.  Stephen Merritt and Craig Finn are pretty good at talking someone through heartbreak using pills and multiple forms of alcohol.  Really, few things go better with heartbreak than rock songs– and few things go better with rock songs than the glorification of substance abuse.  And while there are certainly women who sing amazing rock and roll songs about the pains of love, its rare to see portrayals of women using the rock-and-drinking-and-drugs method of healing in pop culture.

So, while the study shows that men and women deal with love related grief differently, I think it’s more interesting to look at why.  The researchers suggest that it could be generational (apparently men are more likely to be children of divorce than women), or related to the socialization of boys to hide and/or internalize their vulnerability.  But the media also feeds us ideas about how either gender should act in a given situation.  I know a good amount of women, Blogging Molly included, who would sooner reach for a drink and a Mountain Goats album than reach for chocolate and a Jennifer Aniston movie.  And I know a good amount of boys who need to talk out their hurt with their friends.  But as long as there are powerful cultural messages about how each gender should behave, there will be plenty of boys who are afraid to talk for fear of seeming like a Sex and the City girl.  Which means there will continue to be plenty of drunk, emotionally pent-up boys– which is no good for anyone.

Earworm is at it again, with a mash-up of this year’s summer jams.  His new piece, Like OMG Baby, features the likes of Ke$ha, Justin Bieber, Rihanna, Usher, and a whole lot of other people I’ve heard blasting from car stereos in Bushwick but never could have identified.  I think it’s pretty fantastic.

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If you are skeptical about pop music, and are horrified to have found yourself enjoying Tik Tok, then welcome to the club.  It’s a slippery slope– pretty soon you’ll have Bieber Fever.  And that is a serious testament to the skill of DJ Earworm.

Grace Chu has the highlights of the Larry King interview with Gaga here.  They mostly involve shout outs to the queer community in honor of Pride month, praise of her fans, and the following statement:

I am a feminist.

Happy Tuesday, and happy Pride month.