The words flash on screen: "The height of intensity." Next to the dramatic text is a photo of a young woman in a gown sitting in a limousine; she hugs a basketball like she might her non-existent date. Later, the screen announces: "A passion for commitment." We're shown a shot of another beautiful young lady wearing precious pearl earrings and a shoulder-baring dress, while staring directly into the camera with her smoky eyes. Such are the assets of Florida State University's women's basketball team, according to its spiffy new Web site.
The video introduction does show us several snapshots of the girls with sweat pouring down their faces and posing in their jerseys -- scenarios that are actually relevant to the game -- but the glamour shots are garnering controversy. Each player has a bio paired with a photo of her in a shiny dress lounging in or against a limo. One group shot captures the whole team inside the luxury vehicle, their uncomfortable grinning faces reflected in the metallic ceiling. As a university press release explains, the intended message of the site is: "Women athletes are powerful and beautiful" -- assuming they're gussied up like princesses. There's nothing subversive about the site. It's not like they're shown playing a game in their gowns, makeup smeared by sweat and dresses torn to tatters at their feet, or absurdly attempting to pass a ball between their legs while wearing a floofy floor-length skirt. This isn't a critical commentary on the sad limitations of beauty ideals, it's a desperate attempt to conform to them.
I suspect this isn't merely an attempt at sexing up female athletes in order to improve the team's visibility. Carnal Nation points to "Training Rules," a new documentary about homophobia in women's collegiate sports. The film focuses on the story of Rene Portland, the Penn State University women's basketball coach who was accused of repeatedly discriminating against players she suspected to be a lesbians. Female basketball players have long had to fight against the stereotype that they're gay and, after watching the preview for "Training Rules," it's hard not to wonder whether this straight-gals-going-to-the-prom photo-shoot is evidence that it's still the case.
No one knows the definitive difference between men and women. That may sound like the dubious thesis of a women's studies 101 essay, the result of feminist philosophy carried to its ultimate political extreme, but it's plainly true. For proof, you need only read Ariel Levy's sprawling article in this week's New Yorker about Caster Semenya. Not only does it offer the richest telling yet of the scandal surrounding the 18-year-old runner by grounding it in the history of sports and racism, and the culture of the 18-year-old's hometown in South Africa -- it also puts it in the absurd and unscientific context of sex testing.
We can all easily sketch out the differences between the sexes: Women have breasts, ovaries, a uterus and a vagina; men have testicles and a penis -- end of story, right? For most folks, it is, but then there are the exceptions: A person can be born with one testicle and one ovary, or with a penis, uterus and ovaries. Someone with XY chromosomes can have both a vagina and undescended testes because of a condition that blocks their bodies from responding to testosterone. You can have two X chromosomes, one of which is merged with a region of the Y chromosome. And, and, and ...
I could easily go on, if you had a couple of hours. As Alice Dreger, author of “Hermaphrodites and the Medical Invention of Sex,” tells Levy, "People always press me: 'Isn't there one marker we can use?' No. We couldn't then and we can't now, and science is making it more difficult and not less, because it ends up showing us how much blending there is and how many nuances, and it becomes impossible to point to one thing, or even a set of things, and say that’s what it means to be male."
The International Association of Athletic Federations, which is investigating Semenya's sex -- still! -- "does not define the criteria that its group of experts must use to reach their determination," Levy reports. Dreger, a professor at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, refers to it as the unscientific "I know it when I see it" approach. Worse still, the organization allows for any athlete to undergo testing if someone, anyone raises a stink about his or her sex. In Semenya's case, all it took was a speculative blog post and the gender hounds were unleashed. The good news is that IAAF is holding a conference at the start of the new year to review its policy -- but it's hard to be too optimistic about the outcome considering that they're asking the wrong question to begin with.
Levy, however, asks the right question: "If sex is not precisely definable, how else might sports be organized?" She considers a couple of different solutions to this foundation-shaking query: There is the possibility of categorizing athletes "by size, as they are in wrestling and boxing" (downside: "women would usually lose to men") or "skill level" (downside: "the strongest elite female athletes would [almost always] compete against the weakest elite male athletes"). A more drastic scientific approach would be "to divide athletes biochemically" since testosterone has an enormous impact on athletic performance. In that case, "the division would be determined not by gender but by actual physical advantages that gender supposedly, yet unreliably, supplies," she concludes.
Of course, international athletic competition isn't about fairness and equality; ultimately, someone is supposed to win. "Different bodies have physical attributes, even abnormalities, that may provide a distinct advantage in one sport or another," she argues. For example: The many N.B.A. players with a condition that causes growth hormones to go into overdrive and the double-jointed Michael Phelps with his primate-like arms and legs. If the speculation about Semenya's biology is true, why is her particular abnormality worth policing? The IAAF attempts to control for potential physical advantages by dividing athletes by sex, as opposed to any other criterion because it's the easiest shorthand we have -- in sports and generally in navigating day-to-day life -- but this case shows just how incredibly fallible it can be. Unfortunately, Semenya is suffering now because it's so much easier to point the finger at her than it is to call into question the way we've organized sports -- and, as Levy puts it, "the way we've organized our entire world."
On Friday, I speculated there might be a feminist reason to defend the "Twilight" phenomenon (though not necessarily the content of the books or movies): If nothing else, its popularity could teach Hollywood that female audiences matter. In that respect (and several others), "Twilight Saga: New Moon" is off to an even better start than anticipated. According to Entertainment Weekly's Adam B. Vary, the movie shattered a bunch of opening weekend records -- with an 80 percent female audience. Says Vary, "movie theaters have not seen this much business since 'The Dark Knight' thundered into cineplexes in July 2008, and it bears repeating that all those dollar signs this weekend came by far from the purses, pocketbooks, and wallets of women."
All right, I'll officially say that's a good thing. And now Sady Doyle, occasional Broadsheet contributor and blogmistress of the fabulously named Tiger Beatdown, has gone and given me yet another feminist angle on "Twilight" to consider. ("Twilight" is officially the new Sarah Palin: I hate everything it stands for, but since so much of the reaction to it is sexist, I keep feeling compelled to defend it. Sigh.)
Doyle admits to a fondness for Robert Pattinson, who plays vampire Edward Cullen in the series, although she does not admit it's partly because he's hot. Other than that, she covers the reasons why I, too, am fond of the surprisingly candid and self-aware young star -- "Robert Pattinson talks shit about the projects he is in. Robert Pattinson is honest about the fact that he is not the best actor" -- with a bonus articulation of something I'd never considered: "And Robert Pattinson's main source of employment is facilitating his own objectification, which he does, but also complains about all the time. Robert Pattinson is... Megan Fox, basically!
That Fox/Pattz comparison is so apt, Sady's not even the only ladyblogger in my Google reader who made it today. And the difference in our reaction to each of those actors' being subjected to an audience's lustful gaze says a lot about who's meant to be looked at and who's meant to be listened to in this culture. "People outside the superfan matrix don't tend to have strong feelings about The Pattz," she writes, "but they do tend to get all squirmy and giggly and uncomfortable with the way that so many women relate to his filmed image (for example, by screen-printing it on their underpants) and/or his person." All that raw, ridiculous, pointless lust is just so unseemly. And when The Pattz speaks in interviews about how strange and oppressive it is to be the object of a million fangirl fantasies, or how awful his character is ("the more I read the script, the more I hated this guy"), those of us outside the superfan matrix like him more for it. That poor guy! He can't go anywhere! People expect him to be something he's not, just because he's good-looking and plays such a one-dimensional character, desperate people can project whatever they want onto him. Isn't that sad? But that whiny, stupid Fox girl, on the other hand -- where does she get off complaining about getting paid to look hot? "We have no problem with objectifying Megan Fox," says Doyle. "We just have a problem with everything she says, and specifically the things she says wherein she takes issue with being objectified. We just hate her."
Much like we hate those women buying Edward Cullen underpants (among other products) and making Robert Pattinson's life difficult. "Because those women are acting in a way that is typically reserved for men. And they're treating Pattinson like a girl." The objectification of women in pop culture, writes Doyle, is both so common as to go unnoticed and inevitably "tacky as all hell, aesthetically."
[A]nd so criticizing it, in an aesthetic way, seems pointless. Congratulations, you went looking for art in a product intended to provide boners and came up empty. Surprise! But when girls do the exact same thing -- when they prove themselves capable of the exact same sort of objectification, and the exact same goofiness or tackiness or unrealistic fantasy in the name of getting off -- well, it freaks people out. It's weird. Why are they acting like this? Don't they know that Robert Pattinson is a person? Why are they treating him like a big chunk of meat? Why doesn't Edward Cullen act like a real guy would? Etcetera!
Let me be clear: I think those are all perfectly reasonable questions. It's just that I think they're perfectly reasonable questions to ask about the objectification of Megan Fox, and every other Action Movie Girlfriend in history, as well. Treating a man just as poorly as women have long been treated in films made for young male audiences is not the kind of gender equality that gives me hope for the future. But thinking critically about why folks become so offended when they see that happening might, in fact, lead to a bit of progress. Why is it so unsettling to see a young male actor dehumanized, but not his female counterpart? Why do we sympathize with a man saying it's hard to be nothing but a pretty face, but vilify a woman who says it? Whether or not you can answer those questions, if you can at least spot the difference, you are obliged to do one of two things. In Doyle's words: "Be less weirded out by the fact that ladies are getting all freaky about Robert Pattinson. Or be MORE weirded out by the dudes getting all het up about various lady movie stars."
For now, I'd recommend both. Ultimately, I'd love to see more movies made for all audiences that go beyond a cheap appeal to our basest fantasies; recognizing and resisting objectification of anyone in pop culture is a goal dear to my heart. But it would also be nice if, in the meantime, people recognized that women and teenaged girls have our own base fantasies, and quit acting like it's headline news that we have real human libidos, which are sometimes activated by pretty young things who stand around doing very little in blockbuster movies. Just as surely as "New Moon" has proven that catering to a female audience can be as lucrative as catering to young men, it's proven that one-dimensional sex objects can sell to lady audiences as well. So, while it may not get beyond one obnoxious stereotype of female desire -- violent, overprotective dudes get us hot! -- at least it busts the myth that there's no such thing.
"I bet you thought that I was soft and sweet," goes Adam Lambert's new song, which he debuted at the American Music Awards Sunday night. But you were wrong! "There was groping, dragging and bondage outfits," said the L.A. Times Pop & Hiss blog of the American Idol runner-up's performance. Better yet: Emo boys kissing. And of course, Lambert dancing provocatively as he sang, "I'm about to turn up the heat/I'm here for your entertainment."
If you're like me, you're thinking, "What's not to love?" But if you're like some Pop & Hiss readers, apparently, you're thinking, "What about the children?!"
Within minutes of the American Music Awards coming to an end, irate viewers had begun writing in. Reader Kathie Kunish declared that the telecast should have been rated 'PG-14,' and user 'penny' noted that she had to cover the eyes of her 10-year-old daughter.
Reader Richard Bowen agreed, posting on Pop & Hiss, 'I know he wants to break out and show the world his dangerous side, but why alienate an entire population of kids to do it?'
Um, because that's part of showing your dangerous side? Who says, "I want my image to be hotter and edgier, but still completely appropriate for a tween audience"? Not Adam Lambert, bless him. "I'm just trying to have a good time onstage," he told Pop & Hiss. "It's a sexy song. It's 2009, it's time to take more risks. It's about entertainment. People want to be surprised. It's too bad that people are so scared."
And of course, what goes unspoken is what people are scared of: The gay. If it were just about a sexually suggestive performance on a prime time awards show, there would be no news; as Lambert points out, female performers like Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and Madonna "have been risqué for years." But when it's a man groping both men and women onstage, and throwing in a same-sex smooch, we must protect the children! "Honestly," says Lambert, "there's a huge double standard."
Compare Lambert's performance last night with Britney's rendition of "I'm a Slave 4 U" at the 2001 Video Music Awards and see if you don't agree.
Immediately after reading about the new cervical cancer screening guidelines, which recommend delaying pap smears and having them less often, a friend sent me an e-mail reading: "I mean, should this month's headlines be summed up as, 'New medical guidelines recommend that women get a lot less healthcare than they used to?'" Indeed, this advice comes on the heels of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force's controversial new guidelines that bump the suggested age for mammograms up to 50. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which issued the new pap smear guidelines, says the proximity of both news items is strictly coincidental and that its new position has been in development for quite some time.
Some skepticism on women's part about these relaxed standards makes sense after years of repeatedly being pinned with pink ribbons, lectured about the importance of yearly paps and hit over the head with pamphlets about the lifesaving HPV vaccine. That's especially true for those of us who know women -- some in their 20s and 30s -- with breast or cervical cancer. As my friend wrote, it feels a bit like the overarching message is: "Chill out, chicks! It's just cancer!" Yeah, and it'll just kill you!
That these new guidelines come amid a contentious healthcare debate has also raised paranoia that this is part of an effort to lower healthcare costs -- at the expense of women's health. The impossible-to-avoid Sarah Palin took to Facebook late Thursday to air her worries about this shift in the wisdom about pap smears: "There are many questions unanswered for me, but one which immediately comes to mind is whether costs have anything to do with these recommendations," she wrote. "The current health care debate elicits great concern because of its introduction of socialized medicine in America and the inevitable rationed care." Many other Republicans have jumped on the "rationing" bandwagon as well. (Yeah, now they care about women's healthcare!) Judy Norsigian, executive director of the Boston Women's Health Book Collective (aka Our Bodies Ourselves), told me that "we have a discourse at the moment that is dominated by right-wing rhetoric that the Democrats are all about denying healthcare services."
The truth is that Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of health and human services, insists that the breast cancer screening guidelines will not change "what services are covered by the federal government." (Also, insurance companies claim they won't change mammogram coverage and, as David Dayen points out on FireDogLake, "the procedure is mandated at [age 40] in 49 of the 50 states.") The Obama administration has yet to address the new standards for cervical cancer screening -- but medical opinion on the benefits and risks of pap smears is far less contentious than when it comes to the mammogram debate (which has been going on for decades).
Cindy Pearson, executive director of the National Women's Health Network, an independent consumer-advocacy group, told me that the suggested pap smear routine "is not at all about cost-cutting," but instead "improving women's health." Most women's bodies are able to fight off the virus that causes cervical cancer -- but, when a doctor does detect infection through a test for the virus or the appearance of "disturbed cells" on the surface of the cervix, they typically provide treatment that very well might be unnecessary. This isn't just an issue of experiencing bothersome "cramping, discomfort and missing some work" after having the abnormal cells removed, she says -- "what's actually happening is it's weakening the cervix in some women so that they can't support a pregnancy full-term."
My question for her was why doctors haven't instead adjusted their response to the discovery of the virus' presence -- was it in the interest of avoiding malpractice suits? She explained that the medical community operates under the mantra of "if you see it, you treat it." Essentially, the new cervical cancer screening guidelines reduce the likelihood of a doctor seeing it, so as to avoid their treating something likely to clear up on it's own. "Sometimes there are cases when you say, 'Watch and wait,'" she says, "but almost no one does it."
It just goes to show that you have to be your own advocate when it comes to navigating the healthcare system. As Mary Elizabeth Williams wrote earlier this week about the new mammogram standards, "What’s optional for one woman may be the difference between life and death for another." She also added that "blanket guidelines are just that -- they're fine for covering the many, and they are not laws we have to follow." A woman and her doctor still have to take into account her individual history and particular risk factors. That has always been the case and continues to be so. As Norsigian from Our Bodies Ourselves said: "You give women the scientific evidence and let them make their own choices."
A man is supposed to take care of his children. If he gets a woman pregnant, he's expected to step up and take responsibility. But what if that man discovers that the child he thought was his own -- the kid he read to, cuddled and tucked in at night -- is another man's? Then who is responsible for the kid -- the biological father or the nurturing adoptive dad? That is the quandary increasingly being raised by DNA tests. As Ruth Padawer writes in a fascinating cover story for the upcoming New York Times Magazine, the rise of paternity tests -- bought on the cheap online or at local drug stores -- have revealed "just how murky society’s notions of fatherhood actually are."
Mike L., the lead subject in Padawer's piece, found evidence of his wife's affair with a coworker and decided to have L., his 5-year-old daughter, take a DNA test. The results arrived in the mail: He was not the father. "I ran upstairs, locked myself in the bathroom and cried and dry-heaved for 45 minutes. I felt like my guts were being ripped out," he says. Mike separated from his wife, Stephanie, and began paying her child support because, he says, she claimed Rob, L.'s bio-dad, had refused. Things continued on this way for several years, until he got news that Stephanie would be marrying Rob, and that was too much to bear. He asked a Pennsylvania court to relieve him of parental responsibility, but a judge ruled that Mike was the legal father, not Rob.
Padawer explains, "Once a man has been deemed a father, either because of marriage or because he has acknowledged paternity (by agreeing to be on the birth certificate, say, or paying child support), most state courts say he cannot then abandon that child -- no matter what a DNA test subsequently reveals," she continues. "In Pennsylvania and many other states, the only way a non-biological father can rebut his legal status as father is if he can prove he was tricked into the role -- a showing of fraud -- and can demonstrate that upon learning the truth, he immediately stopped acting as the child’s father." In Mike's case, the judge ruled that he was the legal father because he stuck around even after the DNA test -- in other words, because of love, not fraud.
"I pay child support to a biologically intact family," Mike says. "How ridiculous is that?" Pretty ridiculous when you consider that Rob gets to live with L. and play the role of papa; and Mike only gets to see her on the weekend. As vexing as this case is, though, we hardly want courts to devalue the unbreakable bond that can develop even in relationships without genetic ties. At some point, DNA can become rather irrelevant. The truth is that Mike's utter adoration of L. jumps off the page; he is a doting, indulgent father. L., now 11 years old, still sees him as her daddy and he wants it to remain that way -- he just doesn't want to pay child support to the woman who cruelly cuckolded and defrauded him. As far as the law is concerned, though, he can't have it both ways. There are many different ideas for how to best address the issue -- from limiting paternity challenges to the first two years of the child's life to widespread DNA testing at birth (I picture Maury Povitch being wheeled from delivery room to delivery room: "You are not the father! You are the father!") -- but all are imperfect.
Paternal uncertainty is one of the many biological inequalities of reproduction (see also: pushing a human being out of your vagina) and, as evolutionary psychologists tell it, getting stuck raising some other schmo's kid is a hard-wired male nightmare. But if you had any doubt that we humans are more than our base evolutionary imperatives, this article should convince you: For all his rightful resentment, men like Mike show that family is thicker than blood.
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