Christina Hendricks is not my role model

It's nothing personal, it's just that "have big breasts" is not high up on my to do list. You'll have noticed last week the fuss over Lynne Featherstone, the equalities minister's comments on Hendricks and what a fantastic role model she is. The poor woman has been misquoted to a degree, with the Fail attributing to her "All women should aspire to be a size 14" (I can find no independent verification of her saying this and no other article uses this quote). Nonetheless, here's yet another minister/celebrity/journalist, no doubt well meaning, completely missing the point.

For a start, Christina Hendricks does not, as Featherstone claims, have any more of a realistic or attainable figure than Kate Moss/Victoria Beckham/latest popular target of skinny bashing. Yes she's a size 14. That's the average in this country. That's where any similarities with the average woman in this country ends. Hendricks might be a size 14, but there is not an ounce of fat on her. She's a size 14 because she's one of the few people out there who is genuinely "curvy" - she's got a generous chest and wide hips, coupled with a trim waist and long, lean limbs. In other words, she has an hourglass figure. Something around 8% of the female population is born with, and that cannot be achieved through any amount of diet, exercise or even surgery. Yeah, REAL attainable.

Secondly, as I've argued before, and hence will not give over too much attention to now, replacing one ideal of female physical perfection with another does not help. I couldn't be a size 14 if I ate nothing but lard for a month (and even if I could, I still wouldn't look like Christina Hendricks because I've got narrow hips and a small ribcage). All that achieves is shifting the pressure to conform from one group of women to another.

But thirdly, and more importantly, if we're going to start talking about role models, and what what women had ought to be "aspiring" to, could we leave the physical appearance out of it? Might we try aspiring towards academic and professional success? I know it's "out there" as an idea, but maybe Diane Abbott or even Featherstone herself are better role models than Hendricks, or that other cultural zeitgeist, Kelly Brook? Just a thought.

All Women Are Ugly (Except Kelly Brook)

Can you conceive of a world in which any woman can leave the house without fear of a photographer in the bushes, crouched like a predator, waiting to photograph them without their permission and sell those photographs to tabloids, who will ensure that even her most minor flaw is highlighted for the world to see and ridicule?

No? Neither can the Mail, apparently, because approximately 30% of their articles are based on the above formula.

This week, it's Peaches Geldof in the firing line. Now, I'm no real fan of Peaches but the Mail's obsession with is really quite inappropriate. Take this week's slew of articles for example. Starting with a creepy article about her 'extra curves' which features no less than seven pictures of her in a bikini. It would be bad enough, but it's also astonishingly hypocritical: "Last week, Peaches was the subject of cruel internet jibes when she was pictured looking bloated and out of shape at a water park in the city" the article simpers, quasi-sympathetic. And yet which paper ran the story originally? Interestingly, I can't seem to find the article online anymore, but the Mail reported on her 'unflattering' bikini, 'tacky' tattoos and 'bloated' abdomen with almost masturbatory glee.

And even though I can't find the original article, the Mail has kindly provided me with two more examples: This one, which insinuates that since Ms Geldof is wearing a loose-fitting black dress, she must secretly despise her body despite stating several times that she's quite happy the way she is, thanks, and is a lying liar whose pants are on fire. And this one, which rips into her 'unflattering' outfit and snidely points out that she 'drew attention for all the wrong reasons'

But! If you thought you could evade Fail scrutiny by being slimmer than Ms Geldof (who, being at LEAST a size 10, is the Mail equivalent of a pygmy hippo) think again! Two nobodies from an American TV show were this week criticised for being 'painfully thin'. How dare they assume they have the right to show off their bodies when it's quite clear they are imperfect? Everyone knows there's no such thing as naturally skinny people.

In fact, unless you're Kelly Brook, you may as well not even step out of the house. The Mail loves Kelly Brook. As the sheer abundance of non-stories about her wearing clothes, or not wearing clothes, can attest. And let's not forget that she's the only woman over the age of 21 who is allowed to wear a short skirt. Put that minidress away, old crones!

Mind you, is any of this remotely surprising coming from a paper which suggests that a 5'4 woman 'ballooned' to 9st?

The Daily Misogyny

I fucking hate the Mail. I would happily pulp all known copies of the Mail and turn them into papier-mache sculptures of Germaine Greer and Emmeline Pankhurst sticking their middle fingers up at Piers Hernu (in fact, I might do that anyway)
In this case, I think the swear word is justified; I know they say that profanity is the last resort of the barely literate (or something) but bollocks, sometimes a well-time f bomb is the most effective way of emphasising just how godawful something is.

‘Non-stories’, usually involving celebrities appearing in various states of undress seem to be on the increase recently, pushing their body-fascist agenda.

Skim across the Mail’s website today (I did it, so you don’t have to) and the following articles appear at various points on the Sidebar of Doom:

Sarah Jessica Parker has ’sinewy, bony legs’
Elle McPherson ‘has lumpy foot’
Natalie Imbruglia ‘wears same dress twice’
Estelle ‘has new teeth, looks better’

It’s fairly standard dross and typifies the kind of judgemental non-story the Mail specialises in. There is no story in these articles; they are not in the least bit newsworthy. Just a couple of pictures of an invariably female celebrity not conforming to the rigorous aesthetic standards the paper sets. However small their deviation (and really, who gives a shiny shite whether Natalie Imbruglia wears a dress twice) it’s written as if the celeb has left the house in, say, full Nazi regalia (they'd probably quite like that) or perhaps with a strap-on and nipple clamps.

The really unpleasant thing about it all, though, is that it encourages us to pass judgement on anyone who is in any way different – be it because they dress in an unorthodox way (or perhaps dare to wear clothes they spent good money on more than once) or because parts of their body are ‘imperfect’. It is symptomatic of a society obsessed with criticising women who have not spent every hour of their life moulding themselves to fit the current image of perfection. So Sarah Jessica Parker has muscly legs and is a bit on the slender side. Who out there thinks this is significant? Who out there cares?

It might be fluff, but it’s also becoming the norm; where once we might have brushed these things aside as just a symbol of the incredible diversity of the human body, or a celebration of freedom of choice, they are now held up as fodder for mockery. Not only is it extraordinarily rude, it’s pretty depressing too.

A Brief History Of The Hourglass (Or 'Work Will Make You Fat')

Did you know that the hourglass shape is under threat (despite being a figure possessed naturally by only around 8% of women?)

There's a problem with the fetishism of the hourglass figure, and it's that so much of it is based around this mythological assumption that women pre-20th century were all possessed of 36-24-36 figures, with bountiful bosoms and waists you could wrap a hamster round. The Fail, perhaps due to its obsession with women of 'a certain era' (i.e, pre Women's Lib, when good little women were seen and not heard and spent their days making their husbands dinner and not enjoying sex) is particularly fond of flying the hourglass flag. The article linked to bemoans the impending doom of this body type, despite the fact that very few women are fortunate enough to be blessed naturally with this Holy Grail of shapes.

You don't have to be a historian to know that women have always come in a wide variety of shapes, and these shapes have all been immortalised, at some time or another, by painters and sculptors - from the abundant curves of Ruben's women to the full busts of Amadeo Modigliani's nudes and everything in between, women have always been varied. It's not a modern phenomenon - Boticelli's Venus has little waist definition in comparison to Velazquez's depiction: the beauty ideal has changed with the centuries.

The hourglass figure was particularly coveted during the Edwardian period. Much is made nowadays of the detrimental effect the modelling industry has on young girls; how the 'thin is in' ideal has provoked anorexia among so many, and how celebrating the hourglass, as the Mail article seems to suggest, is somehow a remedy to the crushing self-doubt perpetuated by the unrealistic ideals of 'size zero'. And yet the hourglass figure has proven itself to be terribly oppressive.

You see, the hourglass is determined by a woman's genetics. Being a size 10 does not guarantee you hourglass credentials; your hips and bust must be proportionate, your waist markedly slimmer. It's a matter of shape, not of size, and of fat distribution rather than content. I'm a classic pear shape (slim ribcage, small waist, large hips and bottom) and have been despite ranging from a size 6 to a size 10; as my weight has changed, my shape has not. My bone structure is such that I will always have proportionally larger hips than waist. And breasts? Fuhgeddaboudit. (As my dear mother once told me, "From the back, you're like Lara Croft. Then you turn around...")

The hourglass shape, for those women not born to it, was obtained through punishing, restrictive corsets; the damage to bones and bodily organs was torturous. Some women became unable to support their own upper bodies without the corset as their ribs and spine had become so distorted. The desire for a body shape that was not their own so damaged some women that their bodily organs became permanently displaced.

These days, we have our own instruments of torture; the push-up bra, squashing breasts into a shape nature clearly did not intend. The magic knickers, sucking us in. They may be more subtle, but the point clearly remains; if the hourglass shape is so healthy and natural, how come we're going to increasing lengths to fake it? Liposuction, breast and bum implants, all creating the illusion of a shape fetishised despite its rarity. The Mail article suggests the hourglass is worshipped now precisely due to its rarity but let's face it; it's always been rare. We have just forsaken the painful, restrictive methods favoured by our forebears to create it. And rightly so.

The article ought to be take with a pinch of salt, as always; it can't be a coincidence that in a survey sponsored by Triumph (an underwear company whose sizes start at B cup) has the hourglass figure projected as the ideal. But if the Mail thinks the hourglass figure is somehow a healthier, more attainable ideal, it's just kidding itself - only through the luck of genetics or surgery can a woman become a hourglass. Body facism comes in all shapes and sizes, and writing disparaging remarks about Agyness Deyn in a bikini is just plain nasty (and the writer dares to call herself a feminist!) "I'm rather enjoying sitting back and watching other women struggle to attain the shape I've had since my teen years" she writes, perhaps missing the point so many feminists have been trying to hammer home for so long; championing one shape over another is inherently oppressive and exclusive. Since art across the centuries has celebrated a vast variety of female shapes, perhaps we modern, enlightened types might think to do the same....?

(Oh, and as an infuriating post-script: the article actually suggests that women's waists are becoming fatter in countries where 'women are more economically independant' - Work will make you fat! You heard it here first)

Feminist Rage™ - the brand you can trust?

The Big Bad Feminist. It’s a cliché we all know and loathe – ugly, hairy, either too fat (and therefore minging) or too thin (and therefore bitterly bustless), lesbian because she’s been rejected by men (because we all know that’s how sexuality works!) and yet somehow hoping for some nice chap to “turn” her, possessed of a Victorianly hysterical victim complex, possibly vegan, and probably wearing organic hessian dungarees. But above all, angry. Not in a torrid, “feisty one, you are!” fuck-or-fight kind of way, but... well, dear me, pass the smelling salts, in a terribly unseemly, unfeminine way.

And of course, it’s all that ire and bitterness that makes her not only angry, but pathologically enraged almost to the point of statemented disability. To your left, ladies and gentlemen, the lesser-spotted Feminazi! See her (because it is always a “her”, naturally) stalk through free-range lentil markets! Witness her trade communist propaganda leaflets for mung beans! Recoil in horror as she kicks random innocent men in the balls! ...Yawn, verily. Haven’t been there, will never get the T-shirt, because it’s a load of groundless bollocks. Where exactly this stereotype comes from is more of a mystery (oh yeah, apart from the fevered imaginations of tabloids and louts’ mags) and I have yet to meet an avowed anti-feminist who’s ever met a real live feminist, let alone one like that.

... Are you waiting for a “but” yet? Because the problem is, there is one. Passion is integral to any kind of conviction or activism, usually on the angry side; strong belief in anything engenders a will to fight for it. And what a telling phrase that is in its aggression, for ’twas ever thus; when societal evolution goes awry, revolution is always against its status quo, whether that be slave-trading or whaling or serfdom or rule by monarchy.

Or sexism. I was struck reading Kira Cochrane’s interview with the author of Living Dolls: The Return of Sexism with how struck she was by Walter’s apparent calm; the article even opens, “I'm trying to establish just how often the feminist writer Natasha Walter gets angry”. Of course, Cochrane is no numbNuts, quickly championing the validity of feminist rage, and I am not about to rehash her article – but it got my pretty little head thinking. So much feminist debate and defence (even on this blog of late) centres on dismantling the fictional bully-girl/self-appointed victim who roams the organic markets of our adversaries’ imaginations, and in some ways, rightly so. Certainly none of the feminists I've met conform to this stereotype – if anything, quite the opposite.

Whether it’s contentedness born of having worked out what they believe and want in life, the independence and originality that tend to accompany openness to unpopular ideas, the fact that a well-developed sense humour is so essential to sanely navigating an insane world, or what, I don’t know – but all the female feminists I've known or met are confident, positive, witty, and generally just fun. What’s more, a great many (if not most, in my personal experience) are also – shock and rocky horror – in fulfilling, stable relationships. Mostly with – nurse! the sal volatile and a fan, at once! – heterosexual feminist men. It also bears mentioning that, on the whole, they’re a pretty damn good-looking bunch too (not “just” to their fellow feminists, I might add; a fair few models grace our ranks, donchaknow. I think that says a lot about how society treats even the “lucky” women who conform to its beauty myth). Overall, feminists are generally pretty productive, happy people – quite strikingly so.

And this is all fine and dandy except that, directed to non-, or (more to the point) anti-, feminists, it falls on frantically-plugged ears further deafened by the sand in which their owners’ heads are buried. Deciding whether to engage with these people at all is of course a Hobson’s choice between preaching only to the converted and trying to reason with what is often the intellectual equivalent of a brick wall, but if any debate is to be undertaken, I think we need to change its terms.

There is a tendency (understandable given the PMT-ridden, irrational-not-intellectual popular “bloody women” construct) to shy away from our emotions in feminism, to show how detachedly logical it all is. I think this is a mistake because it can be not only transparently disingenuous, but also a spectacular own-goal. Maintaining the kind of Socratic serenity needed to argue protractedly for feminism is a noble but (for a good 99% of us, anyway) impossible goal, and I would challenge most human beings of any socio-political persuasion to defend something they’re passionate about that dispassionately without an unholy amount of Valium.

Ironically enough, I think we stand a better chance of maintaining calm by acknowledging turmoil; in a debate so popularly (gender-)constructed as women’s emotional overreactions vs. what “everybody knows” the world is “really” like, as passion vs. reason, we’re missing a trick by buying into that binary. It’s a truism that the personal is political; I believe passion and reason are just as intertwined. “Angry” is an adjective not an insult, and even our worse dismissal, “bitterness”, cannot be triggered in a vacuum; we shouldn’t be trying to explain how feminism isn’t angry and bitter, but why it has reason to be. There are few more logical laws than that of cause and effect.

So really, so what if they call us us angry feminists; what's it to us when we can cogently articulate why our anger makes perfect sense? But wait, what’s that rustling in the bushes? To your right, ladies and gentlemen, the greater-spotted “make me a sandwich” brigade! Watch in amazement as they fail to argue their way out of a Subway bag.

The New Body Facism

"Real women have curves!" "Men prefer curves!" "Curvy is in, skinny is out!"



How many times have we all heard those phrases in the past 12 months or so? Facebook is awash with groups titled "Curves are beautiful, size zero should be illegal", "Real Women Have Curves", "F**K Size Zero, I love my curves". Channel 4's documentary series, Battlefront, has even commissioned a campaign against size zero (http://battlefront.co.uk/campaign/who-wants-to-be-a-size-zero-anyway/) From the national press, Cosmopolitan to the blogosphere, the seachange in public opinion is clear to see - skinny is out and a more attainable, more "womanly" figure is in. Great - right?



Wrong. Indulge me, if you will, fellow feminazis, and I shall explain why the rise of "curves" is just as pernicious as so-called "skinny culture".



First off, this new culture of curves is NOT about celebrating fuller figures, it is about denigrating slender women. How many more screaming "So Skinny She Looks Like She'll Break!!!" headlines on the frontpage of Heat Magazine, how many more paparazzi shots of "Worryingly thin Lindsay" in the Dail Fail, how many more scare-mongering ITV documentaries on the "dangers of size zero" before people realise that there is no new culture? The culture is exactly the same, it's just that the target has changed. We've swopped fat-bashing for skinny-bashing and exchanging one prejudice for another isn't an advancement in women's rights, it's a step sideways.



Secondly, to the "more attainable, more womanly" part. Who is to say what is "womanly"? Women come in all different shapes and sizes and only a fool would try to attribute a higher level of feminity to one over the other. Really this argument belongs to the first point I made - it's not about celebrating so-called "womanly" figures, it's about taking a dig at slimmer women, saying they're "manly", less "real". Who cares which women we're picking on, as long as we can still pick on women, hey?



As for "more attainable", let's investigate this, shall we? In the last week two websites; MSN Lifestyle and the Daily Fail have run articles on the "most desirable" body shapes, with an emphasis on "curvy" woman such as Kate Winslet, Halle Berry and eponymous Kelly Brook. The Fail, in particular claims this as a great victory for women, because such figures are supposedly more realistic a goal for the average woman. Really? Neither Winslet, Berry nor Brook can be more than a size 10 at most, and with the average dress size in the UK now up to a 16, that's quite a gap. More pertinently though, "curves" of the type that these women have are not something you can ever achieve. They have big breasts, and wide-set hips, set off by tiny waists. No matter how much you diet you can't change the width of your pelvis, you can't grow your breasts without implants - you're either born an hourglass shape or you're not. Don't get me wrong, I think Winslet, Brook et al have fantastic figures (as do Kate Moss, Cheryl Cole and Victoria Beckham) but promoting them as "better" role models than your average supermodel because their figures are "more attainable" is ludicrious because a girl with a straight-up-and-down body type has as much chance as naturally growing a second head as she has of ever looking like Kelly Brook.



What I'm trying to say, in my tired, rambling way, is that despite the rhetoric, we are still being sold an unachievable dream. All this adds up to is a continuation of the body facism we all know and hate, which tells women they should look a certain way and chastises those who fail. All switching the hatred from large women to thin women achieves is to alienate one group of women, to make one lot of women feel good at another lot's expense - in short, it is turning women against each other. I've said it before on this blog and I'll say it again: divide and conquer is a tool to keep women down - we'll never beat sexism if we're too busy being at each other's throats.

The moral of this story is, body facism is alive and well, and women, more than ever before are encouraging it. The aforementioned Facebook groups are almost all founded by women, and boast an almost all-female membership. Women have grabbed onto this trend with both hands. Your mission, should you choose to accept it? Stop it. Revoke your membership to "Real women have curves", write to Heat and ask them to stop demonising women who happen to naturally be less than a size 10 and even more so the ones who are unnaturally thin, because last time I checked, laughing at women with eating disorders wasn't helpful, just cruel. If you're a man, write to women's magazines and tell them that actually men don't "prefer curves" but that different people have wildly differing tastes. If you're a woman, write to women's magazines and tell them to stop insulting your intelligence, and that implying slim women are unnattractive to men is no friendlier than shouting "you're going to die alone, fatty!", and no better for the female pysche as a whole. Hug a skinny girl.

Who Wants To Be A Size Zero Anyway? I do, actually, because that's the way I was born, and it's impossible for me to be anything else.

The Politics Of The Bikini Line

The somewhat hyperbolically-titled "To Wax Or Not To Wax: Have women ever faced a greater dilemma?" raised some interesting questions for me, and after discussing the matter with my fellow femis, here's a blog on this apparently terribly important matter.

The article itself seems to gently persuade the reader to 'give it a go', which irritates me somewhat because it seems very evident that she doesn't actually want to. It bothers me that Rowan Pelling compares a painful, expensive procedure which literally rips the hairs from their follicles with hot wax to...buying a pair of racy stockings. "It suggests a woman has put a bit of extra effort into seduction." Pelling states, which is a horrible smug little sentence, almost suggesting that a woman should depilate herself in order to show she's actually putting some effort into her sex life, regardless of the fact that stockings can be put on and taken off with no pain, discomfort or itchy regrowth. Pelling gives the illusion of choice whilst not so subtly promoting the joys and 'benefits' of a hairless undercarriage...even Iranian women do it, she simpers, as if Iranian women ought to be the benchmark of backwards sexual practises.

Of course, the real issue here is addressed in the comments. A startling number of people argue that a Brazilian is cleaner, which is complete rubbish (if it were cleaner, wouldn't thousands of years of evolution have gone some way to addressing that? And if hair is so unhygenic then why aren't men removing theirs?) Among other things, pubic hair cushions and protects the genital area, keeping it warm and protecting the (very) sensitive skin down there. It also traps and holds pheremones, which are an integral element of human sexuality as we understand it. There's a reason we all have pubic hair! (and besides, hair or no hair, if you don't wash regularly it will be unhygenic!)

Of course, it should be up to the individual whether they want to bare all, and in an ideal world we could say that every woman has that freedom of choice. But thanks in part to the rampant pornification of society, and the expectation for all women to match the plucked and preened centrefolds young boys are growing up with as their representations of the naked woman, there is an immense amount of pressure on women to have the full Brazilian wax. There's a strange idea that women with pubic hair are somehow unkempt and untidy, and therefore ought to spend countless woman-hours removing every last sprig.

What Rowan Pelling should have made abundantly clear is that any man who tries to persuade his partner to wax or shave when it's quite clear she doesn't want to is being a domineering prick. It is a decision that should be made by the owner (or non-owner) of his or her own pubic hair. If a woman wants to have a full Brazilian, or even just a bikini line trim, fair enough - that's her decision, and nobody has the right to tell her she's wrong. But there's a lot of unfair pressure on women to imitate this fashion statement, the fear of being found unsexy or not making enough effort to seduce. We're already cowed into removing our underarm hair and leg hair whether we like the idea or not (a practise made popular in the early 1900's - not so long ago!). Surely 'what lies beneath', abdundant foliage or otherwise, should belong to us, and only us?

The Daily Mail: Legitimising lechery since 1896

Let me preface this rant by stating that I am not a prude. It's unfortunate that I have to state this, because I would hope that most sensible-minded people would be able to see the difference between a woman terminally pissed off at the way women's bodies have become public property for sale and exchange and a woman afraid of the female form. Hell, the human body is an amazing thing - an infinitely variable masterpiece of evolution. But that would be too highbrow for the Mail.

So with that said, here is today's bone of contention: "Proof that men just can't help looking at women's boobs", an article which manages to insult both men and women in one dash of its greasy misogynist fists, as well as cleverly shoehorning Kelly Brook into the article as an irrelevant piece of window-dressing. According to the article, a whopping 47 per cent of men notice a woman's boobs before anything else. Which, er, directly contradicts the headline - less than half of men notice a woman's chest first. And that means that more than half of men look elsewhere.

But let's forget this small, unimportant statistical detail, because without it there'd be no basis for an article essentially stating "Men are going to look at your tits whether you like it or not. Deal with it". And this is insulting to both genders. It suggests that men are drooling morons driven by their basest instincts and are incapable of escaping their caveman urges to check out a lady's fertility (based on her cup size, naturally) It suggests that they cannot engage their brains enough to realise that there is a living, thinking woman behind those two lumps of mammary tissue - 'it's evolutionary!' wails the article, in an attempt to portray dirty-mac wearing perverts as perfectly reasonable men acting on instinct. Well, Mail, if this is indeed the case, how come more than half of men are able to "resist" this "natural urge" to park their peepers in a woman's cleavage?

The comments are the usual hovel of despair and decay:

I could have told them this and saved tem a lot of money. What gets me is, women wear a plunging neckline and then complain men do not look them in the eye. Give us some time-we will get to your eyes, Honey ! Admit it, you like it or you would all be wearing turtlenecks.- Bernard ex pat, Pawleys Island USA

In many ways this comment is exemplary of the most depressing type of comment: the right to own and possess women's bodies. Because what Bernard is suggesting is that, unless a woman covers herself from head to toe (Perhaps in an oppressive burkha! Ho ho, the irony) she is automatically consenting - nay, asking - to be regarded as a collection of component body parts to be measured and weighed and rated from 1 to 10. Which is utter bollocks, of course. If I wear a short skirt, it might be because I feel warm, or I like the skirt. It isn't because I'm asking to be judged by every passing man.

"Breast size is a lot like Coke and Pepsi. Men have a preference but will take whatever's on tap. As long as it's not flat.- rebecca, mallorca

Of course! Because if you admire a lady with less than a B cup, you must be gay. Or not a man. Rebecca knows these things.

I am often tempted to pin a £50 note or a photo of a nice pair of shoes to my chest just so I can walk around shouting "Hey lady, eyes up here, talk to the face" when women look at them.Why do women who put the goods on show then moan that people look at them?- brad, NIMBY

This inflamed arsehole is the worst of the bunch, by far. Not only does he employ the old and offensive stereotype of Teh Wimmins being drawn to pretty shoes or banknotes of a high value (as if men aren't!) he refers to breasts as 'the goods'. 'The Goods'! Did I miss the memo stating that my breasts were a commodity? Did I miss the meeting where it was decided that if I wear a low cut top of any kind I obviously deserve to be ogled? No. When I buy a V-neck in a shop, it does not come with a certificate stating that, on wearing the garment, I have turned myself into an object for the perusal of any man that might wish to reduce me to pieces of aesthetically pleasing meat. (Or, judging by the shouts of 'Grow some tits!' I often encounter whenever wearing said garments, less-than-aesthetically-pleasing. Hey, looks like rebecca was on to something...)

The fact is, this whole article is filled to the brim with rancid shit, and coming from a paper that preaches sexual morality, that claims to despise the sexualisation of our 'yoof', it's somewhat ridiculous to have to swallow the idea that women should submit to the lecherous gaze of the poor primitive male, that unfortunate creature who is but a slave to his instincts. Because to believe that would be to cheapen and insult the male gender, to objectify and dehumanise the female gender, and to reduce the infinitelt comples ideas of beauty, aesthetics and attraction to sneaked peeks at cleavages and surreptitious glances at the bra-line.

Let's all laugh at fat people

More Daily Mail body fascism

A brief one today, but the Daily Mail is inviting us to laugh over pictures of 'some of the skinniest and most desirable' celebs 'looking as if they have been let loose at a hamburger stand' (because eating lots of burgers is the only reason people are fat, ever!) The whole article reeks of spite and bitterness. I've been very slim for most of my life and yet I cannot stand the perceived superiority a person is imbued with if they are thin. Of course, it's not enough to just be thin, because there's the 'right' kind of thin (with large breasts and a dayglo tan) and the 'wrong' kind of thin (any of the following: small boobs, prominent collarbone, UGLY KNEES.)

On the other end of the scale is the frankly irritating idea, as presented by commenter 'Brucie from Liverpool', that big girls are 'real women' (so I suppose skinny girls are just pretending?) You just can't win, really. Where's the middle ground here? You know, the one which embraces the reality that all women, regardless of their body shape or size, are equally real and equally deserving of a little bloody respect.

Popstars: The Rivals *

You know how Cheryl Cole and Danni Minogue hate each other? Oh, they're always at it like cats and dogs, never have a nice word to say about each other. Danni's jealous you see, because Cheryl is younger than her, and because younger automatically means more beautiful, of course. The rivalry between them has got so bad that all at war has erupted on the set of the X Factor - a style war. Every day they try to outdo each other in that uniquely feminine way, with their outfits. so far Danni's trouncing Cheryl (apart from an embarrassing incident yesterday when they turned up both wearing the same shoes - NIGHTMARE!) and boy, isn't she smug about it.

Dear reader, you may have noticed that the previous paragraph is pure, unparallelled bollocks. I don't know Danni Minogue or Cheryl Cole, they're pop singers and judges on a tv talent show; I live in Essex and have savings totalling 47p, our worlds have yet to collide. They've never publicly said a bad word about each other, no "sources close to (either) star" have been quoted dishing the dirt on their "feud" and there's no evidence whatsoever that any more thought has gone into their outfits every day of last week beyond recognising the need to not leave the house naked.

Yet the Fail has presented every one of the ideas stated in the first paragraph as fact. Daily. I don't like the X Factor (though I'll admit to watching the auditions - yes, I'm a horrible person), Cheryl Cole (the "tv personality" I suppose, as I don't know her as a person) irritates the hell out of me and I have no strong feelings towards Danni Minogue, but Cod, I know every detail of their "feud", thanks to saturation coverage in the Fail.

It started when Cheryl joined the show on the last series. The Fail reported on the day of her appointment that Danni would "obviously feel envious and threated by her younger, thinner rival". She "could not compete" looks-wise, simply because Cheryl was a decade younger. Before filming even started they reported that Danni "would hate" Cheryl. All pure speculation, of course, and ignoring key points like the fact that beauty is subjective and thus not ruled by age and dress size.

And so it went on, and goes on, the last week being dominated by reports of how the judges were "trying to outdo each other" with their choice of clothes, with daily updates suggesting that one was "smug" and the other "furious at being outdone" without ever providing any evidence other than a photo of each of them smiling gaily, and quotes regarding "rumours" that they started, and have not been reported anywhere else.

If you're wondering what my point is, it is this. This "feud" is as manufactured as Girls Aloud theselves. It exists only within Fail writers own minds. Yet they slavishly report on it every day, along with innumerate other "catfights" between female celebrities for which no evidence exists. Why? Because they get to perpetuate their own ridiculous views on female beauty, by both implicitly and explicitly implying that Cheryl is 'more beautiful' because she is younger, and that more beautiful is 'better'. This in turn encourages women to judge each other on these terms and society in general to dismiss women as petty, insignificant creatures obsessed with make-up and clothes. Female solidarity is replaced by in-fighting; the Patriarchy rumbles on undisturbed.

The idea behind this blog was to bring our own brand of Facebook activism into the wider world, where we might one day help to inspire change. With that in mind, while there's no petition to sign and no ombudsman to complain to, we can all do something to help fight this characterisation of women as shallow bimbos in constant competition with one another - don't believe everything you read. At least if you read it in the Fail.

* With apologies to those quite rightly uninterested in fake tv talent contests.

Middle-aged woman in ageing shocker

Sorry for my absence in recent weeks I have been, um, otherwise engaged.

Also, the piece I was due to tear to shreds – a sickening article in The Telegraph where a quite frankly amateurish “scientific” study on rape at the University of Leicester was further misinterpreted to say that a. women who dress provocatively deserve a raping and b. men who sleep around a bit are more likely top be rapists (puh-lease!!) – was pulled and apologised for by the aforementioned pseudo-intellectual right-wing rag. Cheers to Ruth for pointing it out though.

However, I have found something else to get my hairy, gluten-free goat. The Heil website leads with this piece:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1198795/Elle-Macpherson-shows-fine-Bodywork-46-gleams-car-launch.html

To spare you the horror of having to read these loathsome twats’ ‘work’, I will summarise:

- Elle MacPherson has some cellulite just above her knees.

- The fact that Elle, 45, has some cellulite just above her knees is of some surprise.

- Elle is 45. Elle shouldn’t be 45, or something.

- And, the biscuit-taker (direct quote):

'Creping is also more common in skinnier people. Fat tends to pad out the skin and supports it more. If you have a very low body mass index like Elle does then basically you have skin travelling over muscle with no fat in between. Whereas if she was slightly plumper, she would not have the creping phenomenon as much.'

Ooh I could crush a grape.

So women should not have cellulite. They also, it seems, should not get older. Especially not if they are supermodels. Furthermore, they should not be skinny. Yet, inevitably, people get a. older and b. their metabolism slows down.

So what to do? Cull all women above the age of 35. Especially if they’re really attractive former models. Shit, time’s running out Karo…

Love all?

So Wimbledon is finally over, and I'm breathing a sigh of relief for two different reasons. First of all, I don't enjoy tennis; it's dull as anything and so far as I can tell, designed exclusively for the upper classes. Who else would pay £12 for strawberries? However, for the week Wimbledon was on, I happened to be working in an office full of people who think tennis is the sport of kings, or possibly Gods, and as such the big screen in the reception area where I worked was duly switched to the BBC for all day coverage, leading to there constantly being a gaggle of suited bankers hanging around my desk all day chatting almonst themselves (or worse, to me) about the tennis. This, in case you were wondering when I was going to get to it, leads me to the second reason I'm glad Wimbledon is over: it brought out amongst these men and women such misogyny that I had to spend seven hours a day restraining myself from reaching over the desk and smacking them in the mouth.

I speak, of course, about Venus And Serena Williams. Now I never heard anyone once comment on Andy Murray's physique (a bit weedy looking, if you ask me) or ponder if the male player who was 6'7 had an unfair advantage. But when it came to the Williams sisters, two dedicated atheletes who are famously known for having the muscular physiques of, um, a dedicated athelete, the bile poured.

"Oh, I hope she doesn't win - look at her, she looks like a man", "yuck, I hope she gets knocked out, she's revolting, so manly", "it's unfair for them to get this far, they look like men", "I prefer Venus to Serena, at least she's a bit more feminine looking..." - yep, my charming colleagues, male and female, were rooting against two talented players because they don't have the most feminine of physiques (I'd also ask whoever wrote the book saying muscles were a masculine attribute, but I fear that's a different topic for a different day).

It just goes to show how thin the veneer of equality we have these days truly is. Yes, we can have female atheletes but heaven forbid they actually *look* like atheletes. Women players now get equal prize money to men, but we only really approve if they remain slim and delicate, and you know, non-threatening. Because that's what it's about, isn't it? We, men and women, don't like strong women, still. Women should be fragile, delicate, submissive, or so the Patriarchy would have us believe, so we freak out when someone comes along who challenges that ideal.

Add to that the fact that Wimbledon officials have admitted to putting the most attractive female players on centre court, regardless of ranking, or the importance of the match (hence Serena Williams, 2nd in the world found herself playing an important match on court number 2, which attracts virtually no tv coverage while two unknown but nubile blonde beauties battled it out for the cameras on the centre stage) and the constant lingering close-ups of whichever women in the audience that day had made the sartorial mis-step of wearing a low-cut top in the sweltering heat, and I think we can all agree tennis is a strong contender for the prestigious title of Most Sexist Sport Ever.

Oh dear Cod.

Woman in not 100% utterly perfect shocker.

This article can't be serious. Can it?

I'd love to see "Daily Mail Reporter"'s flawless body, if he/she feels it's acceptable to criticise someone for having a slightly odd thumb.

This is quite possibly the most ridiculous case of body fascism I've ever encountered. From an objective viewpoint, Megan Fox is an attractive woman (not that it should matter whether she is or not), and to write an article trying to claim she isn't purely for having a slightly short thumb is absolutely ludicrous.

Yet, of course, they still find an excuse to publish multiple pictures of an scantily-clad woman, despite simultaneously castigating her for not being quite 100% perfect.

Has the Fail somehow descended into self-parody without us even realising?