Posts Tagged: media
CBS’s ‘Elementary’ is Back to Break New Ground
Last week, season two of CBS’s number one drama, Elementary, premiered. I, of course, was sitting attentively on my sofa, blanket around my shoulders and snacks in my hands, ready to greet one of the best, most progressive, and aggressively pro-women television programs I have ever seen.
“Orange is the New Black”: The Pornstache Problem
Note: Spoilers ahead I’m going to first give “Orange is the New Black” credit where it’s due. This show has had extremely positive reviews with a main female cast, highlighting different walks of life, and showing genuine personality traits the audience can relate to. It’s centered around Piper Chapman, a woman who is doing time for carrying a suitcase of drug money 10 years before. Throughout her time in a women’s prison, she meets a wide variety of characters each with their own storylines. Though it’s one of the most refreshing and progressive shows of our time, it draws attention from reproductive justice followers.
Searching for Consent (From Your Partner, and in TV)
I have a bit of an unhealthy obsession with a show called Teen Wolf. Yes, it’s (very loosely) based off of the 80’s movie Michael J. Fox was in where he’s got wicked sideburns. Yes, it’s about, you guessed it, adolescent creatures of the dark. Yes, it’s on MTV. And yes, it can be so, so cheesy. I’ve been known to fiercely advocate it just as much as I hyper-criticize it. And I certainly criticize it, for falling into some of the same problematic traps so many other T.V. shows fall into, particularly those which are supposedly meant to represent young people. But, it excels in ways I hardly ever (or never) see from other cable TV programming.
This is (Racist) America
I had an entirely different post planned for today. However, when I got home from working a midnight shift, and I saw this article on my Facebook Feed, I knew that post would have to wait. It seems as if quite a few people are upset that Nina Davuluri, the new Miss America, happens to not be white. In fact, she isn’t just not white, but is brown, Indian-American, though a lot of people are seemingly confusing her for being Arab, which apparently means she’s a terrorist. Because all Arabs are terrorists—right, my bad @pizzo_nick, thanks for the reminder. I’ll be sure to inform my Arab friends of this fact. The tweets are disgusting, blatantly racist, and apparently a lot of people’s ancestors must have spontaneously generated from the Purple Mountain’s… Read more »
What do Rick Ross and Miley Cyrus have in common?
It’s been less than two weeks since Miley Cyrus’ “twerking” at the VMA’s started a social justice firestorm. She was highly criticized for her appropriation of black women, but commended for her promotion of sex positivity. On stage and in her music videos, she casts black women as sexualized props and background for her interpretation of “hood music.” Miley claims she is “’bout that life.” Are you really Miley? Really? You get a faint clap for owning your body and sexuality, but you don’t get to do it at the expense of black women through music. Rapping, its roots from West Africa, transcended into blues and eventually jazz poetry. Our modern interpretation of rap is racialized, sexualized, and is assumed to often deal with sex, drugs, and alcohol.
19 Anti-Choice Stars and Counting: The Heartbeat Bill and the Duggar Family
What does the Heartbeat Bill of Ohio and the family of 19 Kids and Counting have in common? Recently, the parents of the family, Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar, were keynote speakers at a banquet for Faith2Action, a conservative, anti-choice group to help announce the Heartbeat bill. People have been surprised, asking: Why that family from 19 Kids and Counting? What most people don’t realize is that the stars of the hit reality TLC show 19 Kids and Counting are anti-choice stars. In fact, their entire show is almost entirely fueled by their anti-choice politics. Every aspect of their PR is created to perpetuate their message, making them stars in the conservative arena.
What Facebook Continues To Tell Us About Violence Against Women
Cross-posted with permission from Fem2.0 **Trigger warning – This post contains strong language and graphic descriptions.** There is a photograph being shared in Facebook of a woman cowering in a corner, eyes downcast, as large man standing in the foreground swings his fist at her head. The caption reads, “Women deserve equal rights. And lefts.” AT&T, American Express, Cubesmart and Ancestry.com are among the page’s sponsors today. This image has been reported to Facebook repeatedly. Their response is: “Thanks for your report. We reviewed the photo you reported, but found it doesn’t violate Facebook’s Community Standard on hate speech, which includes posts or photos that attack a person based on their race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, gender, sexual orientation, disability, or medical condition.” The “joke” isn’t offensive. What is offensive… Read more »
Surprisingly Sex Positive: A Review of “For A Good Time Call”
Spoiler Alert “For a Good Time Call” follows Lauren and Katie, former college enemies whose desperate situations – Katie can barely afford her (late grandmother’s luxury) apartment, and Lauren’s boyfriend kicked her out to chase skirts in Italy – bring them together, as roommates and business partners. To give a little background, Lauren is bold, witty and unapologetic about who she is; Katie, on the other hand, is very reserved, bland, uptight and almost unlikable at first. It makes sense that they were college frenemies. A few weeks ago, my roommate returned from a RedBox with the film, “For a Good Time Call.” When she said it was a movie about two women who start a phone sex hotline out of their apartment, my initial thought was I don’t know… Read more »
Olivia Pope Strong Powerful and Dependent : When can Women Truly be Independent?
I’m not much of a television buff simply because I usually never have the time to devote to it, but a show that has caught my attention and interest (thanks to my lovely roommate Drae) is Scandal. The premise of the show is based on a powerful woman, Olivia Pope, who is known through DC as “the fixer” because she fixes the problems that powerful people put themselves in. Olivia is intelligent, successful, and just a bad ass in general. That is, until she gets around her love interest in the series, the President Fitz, who is married. Olivia and Fitz had an affair throughout the entire campaign to the white house and seemingly fell in love, but through a lot of ups and downs they are always torn apart…. Read more »
Artistic Allyship: Considering Social Implications of Hollywood, Broadway, and Mainstream Art
By Sarah Bernstein, Chapter Member, Oberlin College Last week my family went to see The Book of Mormon, the latest Broadway musical hit. Mormon is a sing-song baby born from the creators South Park. It parodies religion, sexuality, race, other musicals, comedy, capitalism, Disney— it pokes fun at everything there is to make fun of. It does so pretty successfully. Rolling Stone Magazine deemed Mormon a “new gold standard for Broadway… marching into legend,” The New York Times called it “the best musical of the century.” While I am a big-time showtune lover, my infatuation with “the Broadway musical” started to fade-fast somewhere around my junior year of high school. Call me a cynic, but I think the shows are overbudgeted, overpriced, overproduced, and tell mediocre-at-best stories. Still. The Book… Read more »
