Chadors and Crotch Shots
3.31.06
I love NPR. First a film review of Basic Instinct II starring Sharon Stone about the ice pick wielding novelist who bares all for the movie going audienc and then an interview with real author Mary Gordon and her new book Pearl. I came in at the end of both but loved the contrast between hearing how Sharon, now 48, cannot possibly outdo Sharon, 34, partly due to the film's bad direction adn partly due to the fact that, well 14 years later, what shocks us any more? Mary was speaking about fundamentalism and how at the base of it is fear, and mostly fear of women. She was struck when visiting muslim countries at how the sexes are always separated in public and in places of worship. I've always noted how newspaper photography shows protesters in these countries as angry mobs of men; we so rarely see women participating in any type of visibly vocal process in these nations that cover up and constrain their females.
So I think of Sharon spreading her legs for millions of American viewers and a Shadman somewhere covered in a full body chador, never baring her privates, perhaps ever. Amazing the breadth of human tolerance for nakedness. I'm exposed to varying levels of un-dress daily in my community and my culture and, frankly, nothing fazes me these days. What would a newly immigrated woman from one of these cultures think of us? The devil's candy? Misguided? Liberated? With television and satellites available virtually everywhere, surely it's no secret that most women who expose a lot of flesh in the world don't get raped daily. Or attacked. Or seomtimes, even noticed. Are we really less respected in a man's eyes because we are proud of our sexuality, our sensuality as I've heard some Muslim women opine? Are they more respected when kept from driving, allowed a narrowly proscribed public life, kept uneducated?
Who's happier in their day to day lives? The woman who can access education, employemnt, the newest $400 "pencil" jeans, orgasm on demand, a triple non-fat pfeffernusse latte and her Yogi via internet? Or an Orthodox mother of 7 who may never have to consider more than her role in a family and all the respect and responsibilities, restraints and restrictions that includes? Does either stereotype really exist underneath the Pilates trained 6 pack abs or the schmatta enriched belly pooch?
Why is a woman's crotch so terrifying? Boys obsess about them as soon as they learn waht they're for and now women want to surgically enhance them to look more like pre-pubescent girls. My mother used to hate spiders and said Freud likened the insect to that pubic maw. She was quite sexually active during my youth; was she afraid of her own needs? Why do we like to call a vagina a "pussy" which is also what we call a wimpy person. It is soft and furry, yes, but a cat can also clamp on to you with viscious claws. The vagina dentata. What original male was attacked by a female reproductive organ to pass down such lore through the ages? Is it because, when sexually arounsed, we really do lose our minds, our cognitive abilities (just listened to a clip of a talk on hormones and behaviour which mentions how oxytocin, that love and breast feeding chemical, makes women gaga for their new mates and newborns)? They say a man thinks with his penis; what does a woman do with her vagina? Go shopping?
So Sharon's new character goes on another killing spree and Mary Gordon works on a new book about her mother's descent into Alzheimers. Women using their given talents, whether acting or writing, to tell stories about our different archetypes. I must say, I'm grateful to live in a culture where I can choose to see a strange woman's twat, if I want to; but that if I don't feel like it, I can just as easily pick up a book instead. How many of my sisters around the world have that freedom?
I love NPR. First a film review of Basic Instinct II starring Sharon Stone about the ice pick wielding novelist who bares all for the movie going audienc and then an interview with real author Mary Gordon and her new book Pearl. I came in at the end of both but loved the contrast between hearing how Sharon, now 48, cannot possibly outdo Sharon, 34, partly due to the film's bad direction adn partly due to the fact that, well 14 years later, what shocks us any more? Mary was speaking about fundamentalism and how at the base of it is fear, and mostly fear of women. She was struck when visiting muslim countries at how the sexes are always separated in public and in places of worship. I've always noted how newspaper photography shows protesters in these countries as angry mobs of men; we so rarely see women participating in any type of visibly vocal process in these nations that cover up and constrain their females.
So I think of Sharon spreading her legs for millions of American viewers and a Shadman somewhere covered in a full body chador, never baring her privates, perhaps ever. Amazing the breadth of human tolerance for nakedness. I'm exposed to varying levels of un-dress daily in my community and my culture and, frankly, nothing fazes me these days. What would a newly immigrated woman from one of these cultures think of us? The devil's candy? Misguided? Liberated? With television and satellites available virtually everywhere, surely it's no secret that most women who expose a lot of flesh in the world don't get raped daily. Or attacked. Or seomtimes, even noticed. Are we really less respected in a man's eyes because we are proud of our sexuality, our sensuality as I've heard some Muslim women opine? Are they more respected when kept from driving, allowed a narrowly proscribed public life, kept uneducated?
Who's happier in their day to day lives? The woman who can access education, employemnt, the newest $400 "pencil" jeans, orgasm on demand, a triple non-fat pfeffernusse latte and her Yogi via internet? Or an Orthodox mother of 7 who may never have to consider more than her role in a family and all the respect and responsibilities, restraints and restrictions that includes? Does either stereotype really exist underneath the Pilates trained 6 pack abs or the schmatta enriched belly pooch?
Why is a woman's crotch so terrifying? Boys obsess about them as soon as they learn waht they're for and now women want to surgically enhance them to look more like pre-pubescent girls. My mother used to hate spiders and said Freud likened the insect to that pubic maw. She was quite sexually active during my youth; was she afraid of her own needs? Why do we like to call a vagina a "pussy" which is also what we call a wimpy person. It is soft and furry, yes, but a cat can also clamp on to you with viscious claws. The vagina dentata. What original male was attacked by a female reproductive organ to pass down such lore through the ages? Is it because, when sexually arounsed, we really do lose our minds, our cognitive abilities (just listened to a clip of a talk on hormones and behaviour which mentions how oxytocin, that love and breast feeding chemical, makes women gaga for their new mates and newborns)? They say a man thinks with his penis; what does a woman do with her vagina? Go shopping?
So Sharon's new character goes on another killing spree and Mary Gordon works on a new book about her mother's descent into Alzheimers. Women using their given talents, whether acting or writing, to tell stories about our different archetypes. I must say, I'm grateful to live in a culture where I can choose to see a strange woman's twat, if I want to; but that if I don't feel like it, I can just as easily pick up a book instead. How many of my sisters around the world have that freedom?
posted by Barbery at 3:48 PM
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