Media_Justice
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As summer begins I am often looking forward to the sun kissing all parts of my skin. I can't wait to visit the beach, which is one of the few spaces I find peace of mind and am reminded that there's so many bigger things out there and that my problems are just a small speck of something larger. In addition to this ritual beach trip and the sun kissing my skin, I know I must prepare for another type of exposure: showing my ink.
As a fat sexologist of Color who is also inked and over six feet tall with a disability, there is often an additional element of awareness that my body is being read by others. This is something that has come up for me since I was 18 years old and began to adorn my body with images, words, and symbols that are meaningful to me. As I've aged, I've continued the journey of using my body as a canvas, it sounds cliché, but it's true! There have been many issues that have come up for me as someone who is getting older and my multiple identities intersecting in various spaces have resulted in extremely diverse interactions with people and amazing opportunities to share and create knowledge.
One of the reasons I chose to write about tattooing, or ink as I like to call it, is because I believe that tattooing is a form of creating media. As someone who started their first ever tattoo with symbols and words, I've had a very interesting path to figuring out why and how I want to choose an image or term and on what part of my body I wish to do so. I know today, that just as I put glitter on my camouflage jacket back in the early 90s, that my tattoos also send a message about who I am, what I wish to represent, and how I choose to move my social justice agenda forward.
It's real. It's fleshy and short and caramel-colored and honestly, it's bigger and lumpier and weaker than I wish it was just now. But that's my business. I can do some things about that or not to a certain extent. How much I care varies from day to day. You can think I'm fine or a fat slob, that's your business, whether I like it or not. But what you cannot do, what you should never even wish you could do, is torture my body or anyone else's in order to get rich selling an impossible fairytale about bodies on the teevee, and then pretending It's All True and if the rest of us can't measure up, we just don't want it badly enough. Or, rather, I suppose you can, but you will burn in Hell for doing it. And I don't even believe in Hell.
I've been sick to my stomach for weeks reading Golda Poretsky's three-part interview with Kai Hibbard, a former finalist on NBC's weight-loss boot camp aspirational reality show, The Biggest Loser. It's gut-wrenching (pun intended) and I can't urge you strongly enough to read the whole thing, but let me bottom-line it for you here: that feel-good show about fat people literally re-forming their sad bodies (and by extension, sad lives) through steely determination, exercise and a healthy diet? It's a lie. The whole thing. Start-to-finish. A "week" isn't a week (sometimes it's as long as 14 days), inspiring trainers are actually terrifying dictators more concerned with tv-friendly results than the eating disorders they're instilling, and triumphs of will are really stories about captives gritting through the torture of working out for up to 7 hours dangerously dehydrated and on serious injuries.
In other words? In order to sell us the fairytale that every body can look the same if we all just work hard enough to be healthy, NBC and the producers of this show create a completely unattainable ideal and, in the process, blithley hobble the health of the very "average Americans" we're supposed to emulate.
And on the heels of that, this fresh dump crapped out by Dove, supposed champion of "real" women, casting for their next ad campaign, looking for only "real" women with "FLAWLESS SKIN, NO TATTOOS OR SCARS! Well groomed and clean...Nice Bodies..NATURALLY, FIT Not too Curvy Not too Athletic."
So, dear Unilever, dear NBC, dear Jillian Michaels, dear anyone else who's ever tried to sell me fictional "health" in order to make me feel like a failure so that I'll buy more of your crap: Eff you. You can be my fake friend all day and all night, and I'll still see you for who you really are: the enemy of my strength. And don't be mistaken: I'm getting stronger every day. And I'm not alone.There are legions of us who are stronger than ever, strong enough to know that any food we can swallow is better for us than your lies. We reject social acceptance if we have to be broken or controlled to get it. We know that verbal abuse isn't love, scars don't have to be flaws, and less weight doesn't always equal more health. And we're telling. We're whispering these secrets into more ears every day. We're shouting them from rooftops where we can.
You want to watch a number get smaller and smaller? Just count the days left you have in power.
Media_Justice
Media_JusticeIt’s not often that I have conversations about abstinence that are completely in-depth and devoted just to that topic. Often, the conversation is introduced in a larger conversation about choices, healing, sexual assault, contraception, and communication. As I prepare to teach a sexuality course at the private Catholic college I work at, I realize that I need to have a good selection of media (specifically songs) that discuss this reality.
Thus, I started to ask my friends about songs that discuss abstinence but that are also accessible and non-corny. When I do have conversations about abstinence I usually ask the youth I’m working with what type of sex they think people can have. I break down “sex” to include at the very least: vaginal penetration, anal penetration, and oral sex. We talk about how there are various body parts that people can do different things with by themselves or with a partner. I then share with them how some people think abstinence means maintaining their “virginity,” which is defined as a hymen. This means that some people may engage in oral or anal sex to remain a “virgin” and consider themselves abstinent. I share how it’s important for them to define how they want to define abstinence for themselves because potential partners may define it differently. It’s important to know what boundaries you have prior to someone asking to cross over them.
I’ve just fallen in love all over again with some classic songs I’ve been reminded of recently. As I prepare to teach a new summer course on sociology and sexuality these are some jams I’m thinking of teaching.
Janet Jackson’s “Let’s Wait Awhile” which features Taimak for those of you who are old enough to remember the fantabulous film “The Last Dragon.” Her lines “Let’s wait awhile, before we go too far. I didn’t really know to let all my feelings who. To save some for later, so our love could be greater” are amazing teaching tools that help promote discussions about assertive and passive communication.
Media_JusticeThey’d played “Gay Vatos in Love” live on several recent tour stops, and the reaction was sometimes mixed, Pacheco said. “It can be polarizing.” So, he added, “we had to find a way to suck people in without giving it away.”The singer says he now prefaces the song by asking audiences: “Do you believe in love?” The response is almost always enthusiastically affirmative. “People are like, ‘Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!’ And we just start singing.” Pacheco laughed.Still, the song consistently challenges comfort levels among some listeners, the singer admitted. “I think people get confused, they don’t know where we’re coming from. Some people ask, especially in the Spanish press, ‘Who’s gay in the band?’ So there’s an assumption there.”(When reporters ask about the sexuality of the band’s membership, Pacheco says he sometimes responds with a purposely blank, “I don’t know.”)“For us it’s a bigger issue,” Pacheco went on. “We felt that [gay rights] is just another in a long line of underdogs, so I think we connected to it on that level. It was totally natural for us to take that stance.”
Media_JusticeSome of you may never have guessed with all my critique and commentary on popular culture, I don’t have cable. Not only do I not have cable, but also I only get about four channels since the conversion as I still use rabbit ear antennas. Much of my consuming of media occurs between these four channels and catching things online. So, forgive me if I’m super late with discussing the anti-sexting campaigns that I just recently saw a advertisement for earlier this month.
While staying in a hotel in a very secluded city for a conference, I watched cable for the first time in months. As I watched MTV, I saw a commercial sponsored and created by MTV regarding anti-sexting. This topic is not new for you Amplify readers or parents of Amplify readers , nor is this topic new in the sexuality and sex education conversations. What is new for me is interacting with this new cyber-specific support, resources, and laws.
You see, I grew up without a computer or cell phone. I had to memorize telephone numbers! When I was in undergrad I was using a word processor. I know what dial-up sounds like, and that the Internet used to be called the “information superhighway.” Today, for me, is the future! With all this technology (i.e. “modernization”) there do come more challenges and laws about monitoring such activities (a post about “Net Neutrality” and what that means for all of us regarding protecting Internet freedom is forthcoming).
Did you know that plus-size women are hotter than Victoria's Secret models or Pussycat Dolls?
On the face of it, that seems to be the takeaway from the scandal that broke this week when plus-size retailer Lane Bryant accused ABC and Fox of discriminating against their new lingerie ad just because if features fuller figures. Here's the ad:
Lane Bryant says that the two networks treated their ad differently than they have similarly revealing Victoria's Secret ads, demanding unreasonable edits and denying them airtime on prime shows like American Idol and Dancing With the Stars (a show which, as the picture below demonstrates, clearly isn't shy about showing female flesh:)
If that's so (and Lane Bryant has since provided some documentation backing up their claim), it's a little astonishing on the face of it. After all, this is how less-than-skinny-model-perfect bodies are usually portrayed in ads: to asexual, comic effect:
So what gives? Why is a size 16 woman in bra and panties suddenly too hot to handle for a network that puts Pam Anderson in spandex on at 8PM?
It has to do with a (not-so) little thing we call appetite. See, bigger women aren't just scary to the mainstream culture because we refuse to adhere to Hollywood beauty standards. We big gals freak people out because we refuse to deny our appetites. And if you've got a woman who isn't ashamed to want what she wants - even if what she wants is simply to not starve herself - you've got a woman who can't be controlled.
Put another way: Nicole Scherzinger's body may be sexy, but it's far from threatening. In fact, the lead Pussycat Doll has made her career by sculpting herself into the most mainstream idea possible of the ultimate male fantasy. But plus-size women (I'm deliberately not saying "fat" here, because I just don't think Ashley Graham, the model featured in the ad, is fat by any measure) obviously can't be controlled in their appetite for food, so who's to say they can be controlled in their appetite for (*gasp*) sex? And any woman whose sexual appetites can't be controlled and directed is obviously far too threatening to the status quo to be allowed to into the "family hour." You know, that sacred, wholesome time of night when we gather 'round the television to watch Bikini Girl.
Media_JusticeThis post is 5 months in the making! Last year I heard the song Pon De Floor somehow, I really can’t remember since it’s been years since I listened to the radio. Then while watching So You Think You Can Dance, the remaining dancers did a group number to the song. That’s when I knew the song was at a new popular high. It’s rare when a Dancehall song becomes so popular we see it on primetime television. So my interest in the song, the performers, and the origins was piqued.
After doing some searching I found the video for Major Lazer’s Pon De Floor. I was immediately excited because the dancing in the video was very much the kind of Dancehall I find fascinating, yet also complex as it is overly sexually graphic. Basically performers are reenacting some sexual activities on the dance floor, yet are doing so in a way that challenges our ideas of athleticism in dancing in this way. Another aspect of the video that I was excited about was that the women dancing were large bodied women. Some may even call them “fat dancers” yet for me their bodies were so much like my own it was as though I was watching myself dance.
When I realized I needed to learn more about the group I did some online searching and put in a request for a Gchat conversation with my homeboy, musical genre guru extraordinaire: Hugo who writes about DJ music and its connections to identity and society and provides his own mixes for free at his online home American Pupusa. I like to call Hugo my “musical mentor.” My online searching led me to the shocking knowledge that Major Lazer is a fictional Black cyborg created by two White men, Diplo from Philidelphia (of M.I.A. fame), and Switch from the UK who specializes in “House” music. When I realized that two White men created this image of Major Lazer, created the music, and then used Black and brown bodies in the videos I knew I had to talk to Hugo as soon as possible! There was just too much to unpack on my own.
Congratulations. You have written a column encouraging dudes to rape drunk girls, and it's now earning you 15 seconds of internet fame. Well played. I hope you're making the most of your moment.
Here's the thing though: you're using my body to do it. Your "edgy" little missive does more than puff up your resume -- it also tells the world that if I (or any woman) drinks in public, I've irrevocably consented to pretty much any sexual act with any guy I might make eye contact with, regardless of what I actually want to do with my own (admittedly drunk) body. So suffice it to say I take this a little personally, and I've got a few things to say about it.
First, don't kid yourself into thinking you're groundbreaking or even original. People have been telling women who "misbehave" that they deserve/secretly want "whatever happens to them" since the dawn of time. The threat of rape is one of the main ways women have been controlled throughout history. So, way to go on telling drunken sluts they asked for it. It's been such a taboo subject for so long. In Opposite Land.
Second, you really think poorly of straight men, don't you? Do you honestly think most guys can't tell the difference between a woman who's into having sex with him, and one who is freaked out, passed out, or too drunk to consent? Or is it that you don't think most guys care about the difference? Either way, that's cold. And, according to good research, it's also false - most rapes are committed by a very small minority of men, who know exactly what they're doing. The rest? They prefer to get down with women who are actually enjoying themselves. But why be bothered by a little thing called research when you're busy making a name for yourself on the internet?
Third, your editors should be ashamed of themselves for publishing your flimsy victim-blaming crap. Free speech is a legal standard, not a journalistic one. Journalists are supposed to, y'know, have ethics. And fact-checkers.
Fourth, and lastly, please go directly to hell. I have just as much right as any man does to go out and have a few drinks without having a violent felony perpetrated against me. I am sick to death of my body being used for the amusement of jackasses like you, even theoretically. You may think a scandal is good for your ego, or your career. You may even be right about that. But trading women's safety for a little notoriety is a deal with the devil if I ever heard of one. And I hope you pay.
Media_JusticeWhile visiting Trinity College this week I asked some female-identified students what their thoughts were regarding Kiely Williams’ new video “Spectacular.” I have yet to hear too many conversations among their/your community about this video. This question is similar to my question asking you all what you thought about Eryka Badu’s video that was getting so much attention a few weeks ago.
One hundred percent of all the people present had no idea who or what I was talking about. So we went to the Internet and found the video. Upon seeing her face, several of the women identified Kiely from her Cheetah Girls days and we watched and listened to the video together. It was a very fascinating conversation. If you have yet to see the video check it out.
We then watched Kiely’s response to the public’s discussion on her video, which you can see below:
Many of my favorite homegirls are writing about the video. I first read the analysis from the Crunk Feminist Collective that my homegirl Maegan La Mamita Mala Ortiz had shared. Then my homegirl Janna wrote a piece about how this song seems to be an anthem for “drunken blackout sex” which teases out a few areas that are often overlooked. My homegirl AJ, who is the Sexual Correspondent for Racialicious.com has a recent piece up: Not So “Spectacular”: Kiely Williams, Black Erotics, and Sexual Responsibility which highlights several points regarding sexual assault, imagery, and HIV and STI rates among Black people living in the US. AJ then shared the writing of Carolyn Edgar who wrote Pimps Up, Hoes Up: Sexing Your Way To Your 15 Minutes of Fame which analyses this and a recent video created by a young woman of Color named Kat Stacks who identifies as having slept with numerous singers, rappers and/or celebrities.
