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talkpoliticsAriel Levy is an American journalist and author. She took part in a TV documentary series in which she and the camera crew documented the behaviour of a group of young women, and she later wrote a book, 'Female Chauvinist Pigs' in which she criticised what she saw.
For her, the raunchy, boozy behaviour of these women was not what feminism was supposed to be about. From the Wiki entry-
At The New Yorker magazine, where Levy has been a staff writer since 2008, she has written profiles of Cindy McCain and Marc Jacobs. At New York magazine, where Levy was a contributing editor for 12 years, she wrote about John Waters, Donatella Versace, the writer George W. S. Trow, the feminist Andrea Dworkin, the artists Ryan McGinley and Dash Snow, Al Franken, Clay Aiken, Maureen Dowd, and Jude Law. Levy has explored issues regarding American drug use, gender roles, lesbian culture, and the popularity of U.S. pop culture staples such as Sex and the City and Gwen Stefani. Some of these articles allude to Levy's personal thoughts on the status of modern feminism.
Levy criticized the pornographic video series Girls Gone Wild after she followed its camera crew for three days, interviewed both the makers of the series and the women who appeared on the videos, and commented on the series' concept and the debauchery she was witnessing. Many of the young women Levy spoke with believed that bawdy and liberated were synonymous.
Levy's experiences amid Girls Gone Wild appear again in Female Chauvinist Pigs, in which she attempts to explain "why young women today are embracing raunchy aspects of our culture that would likely have caused their feminist foremothers to vomit." In today's culture, Levy writes, "the idea of a woman participating in a wet T-shirt contest or being comfortable watching explicit pornography has become a symbol of strength"; she says that she was surprised at how many people, both men and women, working for programs such as Girls Gone Wild told her that this new "raunch" culture marked not the downfall of feminism but its triumph, but Levy was unconvinced.
Yeah - I think she has hit it on the head. Go read the 'Ariel Levi' entry in Wiki for the full story, but I think she has encapulated what I have tried to say on here before: namely that the sexually promiscuous, drink and drugs culture that callow young men of all ages rejoice in is not a good thing.
Perhaps Femisists revolt at the double standards that expect women to be civilised, polite and demure while men are allowed and even encouraged to behave like pigs. If that's the case- I agree that the double standard is wrong and ought to be ended in society.
But rather than allow women to lower their own standards and behave as badly as their male counterparts, I would hope that society would instead insist that men behave with the maturity and intelligence that we have traditionally expected of women. It is not enough to say that 'women should not be having casual sex and wild drinking parties' - men should not be doing this either.
Yes, I agree with Levi - 'bawdy' and 'liberated' are not synonymous, and I would hardly call this sort of behaviour acceptable in men. The rock stars who go and trash hotel rooms and get paralytically drunk are just behaving like spoilt kids in my book, they are not some sort of hyper masculine males that the rest of us should look up to or try to emulate. Seriously, if people all go down the bar after work, have a few drinks and let their hair down after ma hard day at work, that's fine. but when the bar gets wrecked in a fight afterwards, or people get sent to casualty to sober up, or wake up with a hangover in the police cells - I think society has every reason to be concerned, whether it's men or women involved.
In the UK, relaxing the drinking laws has not led to a drop in crime - in fact we are seeing drunkeness and its attenndent violence on the increase, and increasingly, women getting involved as participants in violent , drunken behaviour. And while we should not blame feminism for that, we should expect more Feminists like Ariel Levy to stand up for civilised behaviour and not join these male louts of many age groups and social classes in a race to the bottom.
But that's my view - what's yours?
For her, the raunchy, boozy behaviour of these women was not what feminism was supposed to be about. From the Wiki entry-
At The New Yorker magazine, where Levy has been a staff writer since 2008, she has written profiles of Cindy McCain and Marc Jacobs. At New York magazine, where Levy was a contributing editor for 12 years, she wrote about John Waters, Donatella Versace, the writer George W. S. Trow, the feminist Andrea Dworkin, the artists Ryan McGinley and Dash Snow, Al Franken, Clay Aiken, Maureen Dowd, and Jude Law. Levy has explored issues regarding American drug use, gender roles, lesbian culture, and the popularity of U.S. pop culture staples such as Sex and the City and Gwen Stefani. Some of these articles allude to Levy's personal thoughts on the status of modern feminism.
Levy criticized the pornographic video series Girls Gone Wild after she followed its camera crew for three days, interviewed both the makers of the series and the women who appeared on the videos, and commented on the series' concept and the debauchery she was witnessing. Many of the young women Levy spoke with believed that bawdy and liberated were synonymous.
Levy's experiences amid Girls Gone Wild appear again in Female Chauvinist Pigs, in which she attempts to explain "why young women today are embracing raunchy aspects of our culture that would likely have caused their feminist foremothers to vomit." In today's culture, Levy writes, "the idea of a woman participating in a wet T-shirt contest or being comfortable watching explicit pornography has become a symbol of strength"; she says that she was surprised at how many people, both men and women, working for programs such as Girls Gone Wild told her that this new "raunch" culture marked not the downfall of feminism but its triumph, but Levy was unconvinced.
Yeah - I think she has hit it on the head. Go read the 'Ariel Levi' entry in Wiki for the full story, but I think she has encapulated what I have tried to say on here before: namely that the sexually promiscuous, drink and drugs culture that callow young men of all ages rejoice in is not a good thing.
Perhaps Femisists revolt at the double standards that expect women to be civilised, polite and demure while men are allowed and even encouraged to behave like pigs. If that's the case- I agree that the double standard is wrong and ought to be ended in society.
But rather than allow women to lower their own standards and behave as badly as their male counterparts, I would hope that society would instead insist that men behave with the maturity and intelligence that we have traditionally expected of women. It is not enough to say that 'women should not be having casual sex and wild drinking parties' - men should not be doing this either.
Yes, I agree with Levi - 'bawdy' and 'liberated' are not synonymous, and I would hardly call this sort of behaviour acceptable in men. The rock stars who go and trash hotel rooms and get paralytically drunk are just behaving like spoilt kids in my book, they are not some sort of hyper masculine males that the rest of us should look up to or try to emulate. Seriously, if people all go down the bar after work, have a few drinks and let their hair down after ma hard day at work, that's fine. but when the bar gets wrecked in a fight afterwards, or people get sent to casualty to sober up, or wake up with a hangover in the police cells - I think society has every reason to be concerned, whether it's men or women involved.
In the UK, relaxing the drinking laws has not led to a drop in crime - in fact we are seeing drunkeness and its attenndent violence on the increase, and increasingly, women getting involved as participants in violent , drunken behaviour. And while we should not blame feminism for that, we should expect more Feminists like Ariel Levy to stand up for civilised behaviour and not join these male louts of many age groups and social classes in a race to the bottom.
But that's my view - what's yours?
(no subject)
Date: 10/5/11 14:12 (UTC)