#the patriarchy is drenched

[tariah23]

Let me get off twitter but yeah, this is what black and brown women have been saying forever tho.

[yellowfoot-06]

Suburbian Nuclear Family but its a butch and her wife.

[talcite]

To non-binary, trans, and genderqueer friends, and other MOGAI friends: it's not your fault to feel unrelatable with, excluded from, isolated by, and/or ostracized by both sides. The both sides can either be the binary genders, be your own label and another label, or even the queer community and the cishet society at large.

Because this place isn't yet perfect. We have to admit that BS and AHs exist everywhere, and being queer (or another identity) doesn't necessarily make the person a good and trustworthy person. Our society is long drenched by patriarchy, cissexism and dumbass gender isolationism, it contaminated and indoctrinated everybody's mind since a young age. It also takes time for queer people (and possible allies) to unlearn all the rubbish society dumped in and heal from internalized queerphobia.

Assilimating without difficulty isn't the only right way to live. Being unable or unwanting to join the majorities doesn't make you any less than valid, and doesn't make it more unlikely to live a fulfilled life. Your worth isn't determined by social recognition. Know that you are righteous, and gain your autonomy back, believe that time will eventually tell the truth.

[salemsdog]

faut faire danser les femmes.

My story begins in the end. With the sun beginning to char my porcelain, riding red and violet over miles of atomic mass. By the end of the road, my shoes were worn with broken nature. But before my death, I rode a mountainous sea away from a barrel-chested man, namely put as my husband. The rock first came to me in a nightmare while aboard the SS. Mary. I had traveled overseas before, and it was a quirk of fact that the ship, no matter how goldy, always cradled like a misrun carriage, bumping over unpolished granite. So shook the landscape in my nightmare as well. There was a mincer in front of me. It was placed beside a rock. In the dream, the widescape was covered in thin sheets of sand. The trees were wild and howled like wolves strewn into the raging sky. Careful she crept; she was not me because the I in my dream had no feet. Simply an eye of the mind that granted a view of myself from whatever window looked down onto this horacescape. I directed her to walk closer to the mincer. It was then that the rock started to bellow out in simple waves of anguish. It was yelling to be set free against its ugly titanium restraints. She almost pitied it. The woman would take the mincer with a static, almost illuminary hand but stare at the rock with an unmoving notion. Salt wavered into the air as her limbs began to feel spent; she could feel the boat pulling her back to the shores of minimal consciousness closer every nanosecond, grappling her away from the original deed. The rock was lying dead like a cold fox, claiming its early spot in hell. Waiting for the final gut of termination. She could crush the rock, but what then?

It didn’t make her a predator.

I would have vowed to never harm my husband once I had awoken in my saddened condition and out of that harsh story. For it would bring me lower than the man himself. I knew I was now truly running, running away from the midwave heat that bit close to my clothes and flamed the cage that once housed my books, my telescopes that let me talk to the stars late in the evening when my husband singed tableside decks with his less than pleasant cigars. That did not stop the wafting from following up to my attic window desk of cinnamon and sage. My hand would soon slip during a Sunday night preparation. Sending the iron stove into flames. I had no children and no cathel. Only the prophetic nightmares that came with sniffing the dark herb that crawled its way around our lowly manor of the Greylands. This city chewed with iron teeth and ordered around symmetry like no other grandiloquent beast of the nile. My husband’s old trophies of gunfire gave proof to that undeniable fact of discord that harbored no matter what section of the earth you journeyed forth. They sit stacked mildly rusted under his mantleplace, topped with fleets of dust and mice shit. Before settling, I knew no bounds to fiction. I was as free as a clipped animal could ever get. But once trapped inside a new hellish biome, those old newspapers and telegraphs of the world above became my primary resource as another additive to my perpetual escape. Meconium, isocyanate, the air of another hellnever roadside three thousand miles from ours. All futile in my grand ruse of escape. So I ran, caught to the nearest station west of that long country road. Farther and farther till the SS. Mary was no longer a dream on a yellow postcard lost among the plethora of letters sent in from faraway ports of the world. A secret subscription I had along with the many other secrets I kept from my man.

It rose above anything I had ever seen in my life and took me far, far away.

There was a shortage of oil on our land being stolen by a neighboring townscape just north of the rolling hills. The red men they were called. Their thieves would hound every plant that drenched oil from the underearth. Weaning in heinesy and destruction caused an uproar in an already fatale patriarchy. Our people were starting to see straight through tradition and into welfare. It took the turn of a thousand tides—the crease in the economy—to fully shelter this idea of severity. Our foundation was losing itself. Soon there were no more ports to transfer goods, no more fleets to deliver those postcards I so greatly admired per month. So there I sat, perched between litters of luggage and briefcases of fine men and women boarding the middle-class section of Mary’s idiom. Watching as the moon followed our ship to the enemy lands. Waiting for the sky to shift into a new sun, waging a war blessed foul. A great woman once said sweat is the tears from God shedding down a lubricant for the wind. It took running from my husband to fully furnish the belief and inspire a devil within me to work this war like it was my bitch. Down a winding road and past crowds of townsfolk once I had reached beyond the Pillsbury pines and down crossroads over the next.

Once I had pitted rest, I could breathe into an air of freedom. Though this was the land of thieves, I had never felt such liberation. It had been shrouded by a hand of doubt along the journey, but once I set food on that port, the sky seemed to smile, though it was dark. Lines of people stretched beyond the dock. I bristled my way through the red men and women, most likely refugees from our gray land, returning with the upcoming tension. For it was better to die in your homeland than in a foreign region of gray.

My first pit stop arrived at a little colosseum of wine and scum. A harlet house off the ends of the coast, needing but a small stroll to reach. There I thought more about the rock in the dream, furrowed the lace fabric between the tips of my fingers and composed a conversation with a stranger. I introduced myself to the other woman by the name of Aerodromea. She returned with Venetia Lamauth. Venetia wore the dress of service, a reminder of another blast upon destiny the more she spoke of her life in a mellow, rustic voice, strands of blonde curtaining her cresed forehead. Though she’d chuckle and promised matters of satisfaction with her life, there were patches of fur on her coat. Her Greek nose tinted pink and a swooping tail tucked under the bench. This she could not see. She would speak of hellhounds and endless labor while I poured additional liters into her glass cup, eyeing her hawk-eyed husband all the while. Locals seemed to take my untimely visit rather cautiously. For good reason, of course. By the time dawn was heaving shots of navy into the dark skies, I had visited more women than postcards had ever visited the steps of my manor in those five years of unbearable habitance. Their tails were always tied messily, some with oozing blisters and painful-looking creases where the fold had been tied. Their noses were sometimes swollen or greased with expensive lotions in an attempt to mask the protruding fact, etching closer and closer to the surface of realism.

In the dark hours, they’d complain of an instrumental burden. God, it was loud they’d say, leeching my hands as if I had been the only acknowledgement of liability in centuries. The screeching strings blended against the howls of wind in a sorrowful juxtaposition. Waning restless nights for them all.

The first I took was Venetia. I instructed her to leave her coat and wreath of restlessness. She brought forth her finest Jane shoes and let down her honey lemon hair. We plowed hand in hand through the forest. I begged God to keep this opportunity close in hand as we followed those breathing strings through shrubs and dry logs left for dust in the dark. The first glimpse of the violin-wielding beast appeared behind the shade of a red willow. For it had been my first time seeing the thing face to face as well. My grip only tightened in Venetia’s hand as she held still, her breath shallow. For I had but a dream to go off of; this was a foreign sight to Venetia’s eyes I had to remember. Soon the plains were not reliant on the two of us. Both the houses were empty and scarce of life. The grasslands are blooming with thin-nosed critters. The beast’s violin became rushed and ridgid throughout the nights to come. Weaving in knowledge to me that we were improving and changing as a people. The hunt persisted and, in turn, the absence as well. Left for catharsis in the wind and rid us of this ancient rigorous distraction on the forest floor. Pooling like thick oil.

“Who am I if not misunderstood?” her gayety was sweet as jewels.

Venetia murmured in a hushed tone as she clasped my hand in hers, her gaze lingering over the carcass. We welded the night together as air raids rang out, shaking the dirt around our feet. Every limb of the beast was strewn in a puddle of rubicund. By dawn, Venetia’s eyes were glassy and her fingers blistered and bruised in destined work. A morning croaked, and a chorus of silence followed. Charing my skin and lacing back the cradle of the Mary. Both lands were quiet now; not even the rock under us spit a tune.

[teahoused0ll]

True crime is always frustrating to listen to. I think about the scumbag men I've had in my life. The narrow misses, the violence, how they cannot keep their hands to themselves, how very few are willing to confront the uncomfortable things the other men in their life do. The things they do. I think about how if I protected myself with my hands or an object, I would get the heaviest punitive punishment possible. If my boyfriend, husband, father, brother did it then it would be less harsh. I think about the men who would defend him, who'd say I had it coming and who was denying men the true nature of men. I think about how I've survived but so deeply scarred, and all times I've reached for help have been so drenched in the same toxicity. Victim-blaming rhetoric. How do you recover when it's a genuine fear that danger lurks around every corner? And no, this does not include trans men, and we need to make that distinction of lived experiences. They suffer under this same oppressive patriarchy too. Nor does it include the numerous other marginalised men, many who are convenient scapegoats and not permitted "boys will be boys".

[synthient]

Probably observations that have been made by plenty of people over the last century, but:

Fascinating how the Evil and Unnatural control that Dracula wields over people, is mirrored against the Good and Natural control of men over women; the rich over the poor; the British over backwards and savage foreigners; doctors over the insane.

Fascinating how much the Jonathan's Spooky Castle Adventure segment is subtextally about the horror of feminization. On the obvious level of being subject to sexual violence, sure, but also on the level of being trapped in a domestic space that you're not allowed to leave. The person who's the greatest threat to you is the also the person you've been made absolutely dependant on. You have to keep up a cheerful facade, play along with his social games, and pretend to be too stupid to realize you're a prisoner, if you want any hope of survival.

Fascinating how much the rest of the (surface level) text is dedicated to frantically backtracking that (early, subtextal) insight. The Heteropatriarchal Gender Order is actually the greatest thing in the word! Look how rosy and wholesome the scooby gang polycule is! (Again, our cute jokey pseudo-polygamy is mirrored against their barbarous 3 brides). Yet all the while, the inherent grotesqueness of these relations can't help bleeding through the sentimental trappings - the "euthanasia is such a beautiful word" bit springs to mind

Fascinating how our Three Heroes are, respectively, representatives of The Psychiatric Order, The British Nobility, and American Colonial Expansion (Quincy specifically gets congratulated on the recent Texan secession from Mexio). Fascinating how Dracula and Van Helsing never actually face off directly - everything is mediated through Mina, and it all comes down to a brainwash-off to see who can control her better.

Fascinating how Jonathan's feminization narrative is also haunted by the specter of institutionalization (via the Renfield subplot, which barely ties in with the main story on a surface level). It's not the horrors themselves that affect him the most - it's not being able to trust his own perceptions. (It's the idea that if he really had been "mad," then his imprisonment would have been justified).

Fascinating that the book later goes to great pains to show that he's Regained His Manly Vigour And Has A Knife Now, yet his emasculation still clings to him in the Dracula-based cultural consciousness: he's composited with Renfield to keep that emasculation from infecting the hero in the 30s; he's the unappealing weak prettyboy of the 90s love triangle; he's Shaggy in the scooby gang (unrelated to the Serious Analysis, but it is deeply funny how obvious the Velma=Mina/Daphne=Lucy/Fred=Arthur inspo is now).

Fascinating how much the ultimate question of the book is "What's the Right way to do gender? (and therefore do whiteness/Britishness/patriarchy/colonialism/capitalism?) The answer, apparently, is that both sexes should aspire to a "a woman's brain and a man's heart" - Mina's man-brain, and the Five Guys' woman-sensitivity - while still dutifully playing the roles of their "natural" power dynamic. The obvious inverse is a woman's brain with a man's heart - and is that not Dracula and his "child brain;" the brides and their "cold hard voluptuousness"?

Fascinating to read Mina and Jonathan as effectively the same character (with Mina picking up the gender-power themes Jonathan left off, in a more socially-acceptable vessel). Fascinating how strong the religious cognitive dissonance is throughout. And of course, the whole thing is drenched with Bram Stoker sending some gay little letters to Walt Whitman (as every single victorian gay guy apparently did), then seeing the Oscar Wilde trial and Freaking Out

[not-available-for-comment]

Current favorite books, by genre: Horror

Note that these are faves, not Most Pures, Least Problematics, nor Objectively Bests. Proceed accordingly.

The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher

Horror portal fantasy/isekai featuring a recently divorced young woman who is working at her uncle’s tiny and eccentric taxidermy museum as she decides what to do with herself. Several deeply disturbing scenes and ideas that I still think about. One thing I like about T. Kingfisher’s books is that the protagonist usually has friends but rarely has a love interest. Idk if that’s unusual to the genre but I find it refreshing.

Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle

Rose is the godly and submissive daughter to her conservative evangelical parents. She would never waver in her faith or her commitment to godly behavior. But. But her parents are weirdly invested in her dating a boy she only likes as a friend. And she starts seeing a mysterious woman in a staff shirt from the local conversion therapy camp. Even in places where no one could possibly be. She has hazy memories of happiness with a person she no longer knows. And she’s started… vomiting locusts? (Idc if I haven’t finished this one, it’s a favorite anyway.)

Beneath The Rising by Premee Mohamed

Nick Prasad’s best friend Joanna “Johnny” Chambers is brilliant and beautiful and fascinating, a child prodigy who’s saved the world several times over but still finds time in her busy schedule as beloved international genius superstar to spend time with minimum-wage-earning everyman Nick. Until Johnny’s invention of a form of clean energy seems to somehow set the world ever more askew. Then Nick and Johnny end up bound together in a quest through cosmic horror to find the tools they need to set things right. But what set things wrong to begin with? And what are Nick and Johnny? To each other, and to themselves? Honestly not particularly scary (to me at least), but the exploration of Nick and Johnny’s complicated relationship is so well done and perfectly observed that it makes me insane.

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

A young woman leaves a stifling home life behind to investigate a haunted house with a small team of amateur investigators. There is definitely something wrong with the house, but the other investigators offer the promise of friendship. I honestly don’t want to say more, because it’s SO subtle and well done. My absolute favorite haunted house story so far, hands down.

Carrie by Stephen King

Look, I know this one is old hat. Literally King’s first published novel iirc. But. But I was absolutely fucking furious at the patriarchy when I read this book, and watching a blood-drenched teen girl blow up a gas station with her mind because the world was cruel and unfair was EXTREMELY cathartic. You can criticize it all you want, but this is my fave.

Dracula by Bram Stoker

The man, the myth, the legend. By which I mean Jonathan Harker, of course. Look, it’s tumblr, I’ve got a Dracula Daily tag, you know the drill. Absolute best cast of characters to get routinely disrespected by adaptations for 12 decades running. And Jonathan’s diary is extremely solidly written gothic horror imho.

Sunshine by Robin McKinley

Probably the only vampire novel aside from Dracula that I really, really, really love. Rae, also known by her nickname Sunshine, has an ordinary, everyday life as a baker of famous cinnamon rolls for her stepfather’s coffee shop. Then, she’s kidnapped by vampires. Not because she’s strategically important, powerful, beautiful, or tasty. They just needed a living human to use as a pawn in some kind of internecine power struggle, and she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But, somehow, she’s able to piece together bits of luck and will and memory to survive. She’s not the same afterwards. How could she be? How does she fit into the loving, close-knit world of the coffee shop now that this terrible, tremendous thing has happened to her? And what does she do when her brief disappearance won’t stay neatly folded away? A lot of McKinley’s books explore trauma and recovery in some way, but this one is my personal favorite, from the warm if chaotic world of the coffee shop, to the building of the larger world half destroyed by but fascinated with magic, to the cat and mouse game between Rae, the cops (the book doesn’t quite say ACAB but it does say Cops Have Their Own Agenda Which May Not Be Yours), and the vampires. It deserves to be more popular than it is.

Widdershins by Jordan L. Hawk

Look, this will either be your cup of tea or it won’t. It’s an independently published m/m romance set in a fictional town in Massachusetts that exists at a nexus of cosmic horror. It’s in first person, which I personally dislike for romance novels. But it’s darkly, wryly funny, with an intensely autistic-coded narrator who has focused his entire life on learning dead languages and working at the town’s mildly cursed museum, until a beautiful private detective begins slowly drawing him into the investigation of a trustee’s son’s murder. It’s sudsy, spooky, sexy, vaguely ridiculous, sometimes gross, and compulsively readable. It starts a (completed) series, and while I didn’t care much for the second installment, I’ve started the third and it’s promising so far. The first book also works well as a standalone if you’d rather leave it there.

Stand Still, Stay Silent by Minna Sundberg

This online comic is one of my favorites: 90 years after a plague causes much of the world to be overrun by eldritch monsters, a ragtag group of adventurers ventures into a contamination zone in search of valuable artifacts, new experiences, and possibly more. A really engaging art style, charmingly written characters, really neat monsters, a nice sense of the numinous, and some tantalizing hints about the origins of the plague. To my mild surprise, the artist has apparently become a born again Christian and terminated the series. I have the whole thing in hard copy but have been holding off finishing it because I don’t want it to be over.

———

Well I suppose I’ve put off making dinner for long enough…

[puffy--fish]

Ten Ways You Know it’s a Film About Girlhood & Horror

1. Lots of blood (periods)!

Horror movies about girlhood do not shy away from the use of blood, especially the inclusion of periods to signal transition into womanhood and facing female puberty.

Ample use of blood is already found in the horror genre, but when incorporating the theme of girlhood, blood can hold other metaphors specific to female adolescence. The most prevalent example is period blood: commonly used to signal a loss of a girl’s innocence and preparation for the tumultuous era of teenage girlhood. Most famously, Stephen King’s Carrie (1974) uses period blood as a sign of Carrie’s incoming mental changes. The book begins with Carrie bleeding out in the showers and being pelted with tampons by her peers, unknowing of what a period, and ends with a murderous Carrie on a rampage, completely drenched in pig blood and the blood of her classmates.

2. Revenge story

Women who live under patriarchal expectations are often taken advantage of and have their demands unfairly unheard, so girlhood being explored in horror films gives space for revenge stories against those who exploit women.

Because women face innumerable injustices under patriarchy, horror films about girlhood are a way to switch the power dynamic and explore realities where girls are able to reclaim control of themselves, taking revenge on systems that restrict their freedoms. Excellent examples include The Girl hunting down men who hurt women in A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014), Jennifer’s bloody, brutal revenge on the men of Devil’s Kettle who exploit her in Jennifer’s Body (2009), and Needy’s similar revenge on Low Shoulder, the band who murdered Jennifer. For all these girls, revenge against abusers returns power and justice to them, feeling safe when they are in control.

3. Sexual trauma and exploitation

The violence and pure terror of sexual assault that countless women fall victim to finds a perfect home in the frightening landscape of horror films.

Victims of sexual assault often find themselves abused by those with more power than them, whether it’s physical or metaphorical power. Losing control of one’s bodily autonomy is not only a traumatizing experience, but also a scary one well suited for the horror genre. Jennifer’s Body effectively captures the fear and exploitation of women by patriarchal powers, such as early 2000s bands taking advantage of the devotion of young teenage fans, by making Jennifer’s murder an allegory to sexual assault. The shot of a drunk, confused, and utterly terrified Jennifer having the van doors shut on her by Nikolai, the lead singer of Low Shoulder, instills fear within the audience from not knowing what Low Shoulder is going to do with her and that it’s going to be the last time we see her. To add to the horror of Jennifer’s violent murder, when Jennifer recounts the story of her death to Needy in her bed, dizzying, disorientating flashes of red cover the screen as the part where she’s stabbed plays in order to convey the sheer brutality and atrocity of how Low Shoulder exploited her life for their own material gain. Jennifer’s assault and its implications were horrific, which is why it perfectly fits in a horror movie to tell the cruelty of exploitative patriarchy.

4. Virginity and sexual purity

The glorification of a woman’s virginity stemming from patriarchal expectations fuels a double standard surrounding the conversation around sexuality, which is reflected in ways that the horror genre ties virginity and terror together.

Under patriarchal expectations of women to be less sexually active and desire less than their male counterparts, women face more unwanted scrutiny around their intimate relationships and have their own bodily autonomy controlled. In horror films, girls who die first or face a bad ending tend to show more of their sexuality than the pure “final girl”, such as Nancy, a power-hungry goth girl who’s honest about her sexual history with Chris and even tries seducing him again, being locked away in The Craft (1996) or Jay’s torment by “It” for the entirety of It Follows (2014) for sleeping with her boyfriend Hugh. Another prime example is during the “Innocence” (Season 2, Episode 14) episode of the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003) where Angel’s transformation and consequential hate of her encapsulates Buffy's punishment for losing her virginity to him. Because it’s explained that a true moment of happiness would steal away Angel’s humanity, Buffy feels responsible for Angel’s demonification, regrets sleeping with him, and feels shame for herself, especially after Angel says “If I knew how easily you’d give it up, I wouldn’t have even bothered.” This line clearly exemplifies the double standard regarding sexual purity between Angel and Buffy. The punishment for a girl losing her virginity is a punishment for women who break out of the restriction on their bodies and challenge the stigma around female sexual purity.

5. Monstrous feminine sexuality

Women who own their sexuality are conveyed as promiscuous and disposable in the horror films, often being punished first with murder or demonic transformation as a warning on how to act under expectations of being pure.

A woman having autonomous control over her sexuality is frequently viewed as monstrous, wrong, and worthy of being killed first in horror films. Think of Randy Meek’s first rule to survive a horror movie in Scream (1996): “You can never have sex.” Sex, especially female sexuality, is suppressed under outdated, misogynistic views about the freedom of women, so if a woman steps out of line during a horror movie, she is brutally reminded on how she should've acted. An excellent example is It Follows, where Jay is literally followed for the whole movie by a supernatural entity that murders her friends and threatens to kill her just because she catches a curse from sleeping with her boyfriend Hugh. The entire premise of the movie is Jay and others being punished for their choices to have sex. However, more female-directed films, such as Jennifer’s Body, have a larger tendency to explore autonomous female sexuality without punishing women for it. Jennifer, who isn’t even a “backdoor virgin,” is mistaken for a virgin, murdered, then transformed into a man-eating monster. Though, she spends much of the movie thriving after she feeds, having the camera pans across her body after she skinny dips in a lake to clean off the blood of a boy she just murdered or having rock music play as she throws her hair back to  continue tearing a boy’s stomach apart. Power is in Jennifer’s hands when she fully uses her demonic powers and sexuality.

6. (Homoerotic) female friendship

Ally-ship and friendship are just some of the ways girls band together in support of one another under the scrutiny of patriarchy, but the complications of sexuality and insecurity often lead to close, homoerotic female friendships or the horrific consequences of a fallout between female friends often seen in horror films about girlhood.

As a horror film progresses on, if there is a female friendship in focus, its strength is often tested through the many horrors that the plot throws at the girls. The friendship either falls apart from internal conflicts, such as Nancy and Sarah’s fight over the god Manon and Chris in The Craft, spurring further horrors to occur in the plot from their fallout, or the girls stay stronger than ever by facing these adversities together, such as Ju-ran and Yeon-duk in The Silenced (2015). The lines between friendship and fallout or strong, eternal friendship or romance are extremely fine.

7. Male gaze

The intersection between girlhood and men is heavily explored within female-led horror films, often exploring the conflicting cross between desire for male approval and resisting the oppression of the male gaze.

Often more than not, archaic gender roles in a heterosexual relationship lead to a difficult power imbalance between partners. There’s a need for validation and approval, but simultaneous boundaries for being respected and never lowering yourself for someone else. Wanting to be wanted in a non-objectifying, thoughtful manner is a complicated balance to define. The embodiment of this struggle is Nancy from The Craft, who grew up with a neglectful, sexually abusive step-father and has a consequential difficult relationship with men. Her sexuality desires men, which explains why she transforms into Sarah to take advantage of Chris and seduce him at a party, but when Chris pushes the real Nancy off him and tells her that she's “just jealous” of Sarah, Nancy completely switches. She channels the other side of the coin, lashing out at Chris for his manipulation of women and projecting all her frustrations with indifferent, abusive men in general. In contrast, Elaine from The Love Witch (2016) offers a completely different view on approaching relationships with men. She begins The Love Witch fully believing that disregarding her own desires and offering everything (mostly her body) to men is the best way to find “the one”, but she ends the film holding a knife covered in the blood of her brainwashed boyfriend, still engrossed in her unachievable fantasy of the ideal man. She fully encapsulates and fulfills male desire, yet all her boyfriends die and she falls in love with a fantasy. The right approach is clearly not Elaine’s.

8. Subversion of gender roles

The subversion of gender roles and alternating between aggressor vs. victim is a way for women to reclaim control in horror films, often relating to a revenge plot. 

Power and control for women are reduced under a patriarchy, so by switching gender roles, women lose the common “damsel in distress” trope in horror and shift toward a direction where they take back power from antagonists, such as the “final girl” trope or utilizing their monstrosity/supernatural abilities. The switch of power dynamics and its relation to gender is easily found in A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, where The Girl uses her vampirism to hunt men at night, stalking and staring at her prey down as if she’s literally a wild predator. The perfect encapsulation of power being experimented with is when Arash and The Girl are in her bedroom and he first approaches her when her back is turned, leaving her vulnerable to him. However, she slowly turns around and stares him down, tilting his head upward without resistance and leans in for his neck. The gesture is intimate, but threatening with how much control she has over his mortality. What separates her from being a villain is that she reclaims power to seek out justice, only bringing an end to deserving men who hurt women.

9. Good girl/bad girl dynamic

Many traits of a good girl vs. bad girl in horror are characterized by themes specific to girlhood, such as sexuality and purity.

If the protagonist and antagonist of a horror film are both girls, the protagonist is usually seen as the good, morally righteous girl while the bad girl is punished for having traits seen as evil. For example, the good girl is most likely to be less sexually active than the bad girl, who is often made promiscuous and (socially) impure. The good girl/bad girl dynamic is plain and shallow between well-meaning Sarah and overambitious Nancy in The Craft, but the good girl/bad girl relationship between Needy and Jennifer in Jennifer’s Body is more nuanced and complex. Needy is the good girl to Jennifer’s bad girl, but in certain ways, both girls also embody the other type of girl. Because of Jennifer’s Body having feminist undertones, Jennifer’s sexuality isn’t punished, rather it gives her power and spurs the plot to develop (she uses her sexuality to lure in men throughout the film). She isn’t just a simple bad girl the audience can dislike for killing boys, rather she’s a sympathizable girl who was exploited by men indifferent to the value of her life and forced to feed on men to live. For Needy, murdering all of Low Shoulder in revenge for Jennifer’s fate and having sex with her boyfriend Chip on screen put her outside of the traditional good girl archetype, but she still counts as one. She cruelly commits murder and breaks the golden rule of horror movies to not have sex, but it’s with someone she’s in a relationship with and the murders were justice for the exploitation and loss of her best friend, which give her crimes (having sex is not a crime, but sometimes horror does treat it that way) valid motivation. Under a feminist lens, the good girl/bad girl dynamic is better able to explore how some traits are seen as good or bad in girls and the misogynistic standards that built the expectations films set up for good girl/bad girl characters.

10. Mother-daughter relationships

Mother-daughter relationships are essential to the theme of girlhood and when the topic is tied with horror, the toxic, codependent part of these life-long relationships can be explored further.

Mother-daughter relationships are integral to the experience of girlhood because a mother provides a main female role model a girl looks up to while the mother has a responsibility to improve her daughter’s future. If there is a mother-daughter relationship in a horror movie, it often explores a daughter’s need for her mother’s validation, the mother’s need for control, and the daughter’s responding, often violent resistance. Such a relationship is most famously found in Carrie, where Margaret White’s religious fanaticism and overwhelming need to safeguard her daughter from “sins” led her to abuse Carrie who endured it for years, building up her murderous outburst even causing her their own deaths.

[doctor-seamonster]

Story time.

I was at the George R Brown convention center in Houston for an anime con one time, I'd say it was probably Oni-Con 2006 or 2007?

Way back in the long, long ago, booths in dealers' rooms freely sold Japanese snacks. Pocky, Ramune and whatnot. I don't know if this was actually technically legal for them to do back then, but they certainly don't do it anymore.

But it was just part of the whole experience, you know? (Even if buying a couple boxes of Pocky would cost you as much as a dvd.)

Anyway, certain venues, including the GRB, did have some sort of exclusivity contract regarding food vendors, so no one else could sell food there. Which meant that anime cons at the GRB didn't have dealers selling snacks.

The GRB absolutely was not going to miss an opportunity to make an extra buck off an event, so for that year their own snack vendors sold Pocky.

This being the 00s and me being a young anime nerd, pocky was manna from heaven, so I couldn't resist buying some.

Mind you, in 2023, you can buy Pocky at Walmart. But back then it was hard to find and expensive, so even though it was like five bucks for one small box, I still picked one up and took it to the register, along with a couple other things.

The cashier, a perfectly nice woman, black, a little bit older, maybe late 40s, early 50s, listed each item as she rang it up. Saying the name out loud in her rather distinct AAVE accent.

When she got to the Pocky, she said, very confidently and matter of factly:

"Chi-nese cookie!"

Now, I was a hardcore weaboo shut-in, not quite old enough to buy beer. And I had spent the bulk of the previous two decades as a feral child, as you may know. And terms like "white privilege" and "patriarchy" hadn't quite entered the popular lexicon at that point in time, but boy howdy was I drenched in them.

All that plus a general inability to shut my mouth. (Which I still have, despite improving in other areas...)

However, I did have one thing going for me. I was polite nearly to a fault. So I didn't say anything at the time and while I've never told anyone this story before, those words have quietly haunted me for the last decade and a half.

Around this same period of time in my life, I met one of my friends for the first time. He's been one of the closest, dearest and most valued friends I've ever had. I was best man at his wedding.

I absolutely do not in any way remember the first time we met or anything at all about the meeting.

It might've even happened the exact same day for all I know.

But I sure as fuck remember someone calling Pocky "Chinese cookie"...

[ao3feed-samjack]

you, being a woman

read it on the AO3

by Literatus

Months after Daniel's death, SG-1 visit a planet drenched in patriarchy and Sam bears the brunt of their rain-forced, week-long stay. Wet, annoyed, and constantly cold, the only silver lining she can see is that, this time, she's fake-married to Jack.

Her mom always said to seize the joy where she can, and Sam's nothing if not a trier.

Words: 15674, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Fandoms: Stargate SG-1, Stargate - All Media Types

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Categories: F/M

Characters: Sam Carter (Stargate), Jack O'Neill, Teal'c (Stargate), Jonas Quinn

Relationships: Sam Carter/Jack O'Neill

Additional Tags: Post-Episode: s05e21 Meridian, Canon Related, Canonical Character Death, (it's Daniel), Off-World, Misogyny, Sexism, it's a patriarchal world, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, (but Sam kicks his ass)

read it on the AO3

[oediex]

You know what, yeah, that bell hooks quotation wasn't appropriate, it doesn't say what the person who added it think it says.

But I don't think it's fair to say that that man who everyone is pissing on somehow claimed we had to "hold his hand" or "coddle" him or whatever. Or even that women had to do it.

He never once even mentioned the word 'woman' in that post. I'm not excluding that that what he was implying - it's very possible! - but what he said was "the left", and let's be clear, this is his understanding of what the left is. I saw people saying that a "self-proclaimed leftist" should understand that his answer was still drenched in patriarchal thinking. But he never once proclaimed he was a leftist. Perhaps he thinks he is, but all he said was that he got "out" of the "alt-right". For all we know, that means he voted for the Democratic Party and we, who are on the left, all know that's not the fucking left.

The question that was posed was how do we keep young men from turning right wing, and he offered an explanation. An explanation! Not an excuse! Again something that a lot of people just assumed.

And yes, it was a flawed explanation, and yes he has some things to learn, and yes it was uncritical and terribly phrased.

But can we recognise that not everyone has the necessary critical thinking skills to completely dig their way out of the overarching ideology that fucking rules our lives? Critical thinking skills aren't something that we are born with. It's something that is learned, something that you have to train. It's a never-ending project. And from what I know of the educational system in the US? That's not where you get it.

Speaking of bell hooks, at least she understands this. In that book (The Will to Change) she writes that "most men never think about patriarchy - what it means, how it is created and sustained." She writes how the patriarchy sees men's violence and the one emotion they're allowed to have, anger, as "natural". Understanding the patriarchy is something that has to be learned, and you either figure it out yourself by reading, but most of us probably had someone in our lives who talked to us about it, taught us about it, and then we might have started reading more about it.

What if you don't have someone like that? What if all you hear is that the things feminists tell you is bad is what was imprinted on you as "natural" to you?

Here's bell hooks:

Yet no one talks about the role patriarchal notions of manhood play in teaching boys that it is their nature to kill, then teaching them that they can do nothing to change this nature—nothing, that is, that will leave their masculinity intact.

Here's what she says of her own brother:

As patriarchal thinking and action claimed him in adolescence, he learned to mask his loving feelings. He entered that space of alienation and antisocial behavior deemed “natural” for adolescent boys.

She clearly pinpoints the moment of these patriarchal ideas taking hold to be in adolescent, and the question that was posed was, what can we do to stop that from happening? I've seen people say that nothing can be done until we change the material conditions that make it so that men systematically have power over women. And yeah, undoubtedly that is a fight we need to have. But is that truly the only way we can keep (some) boys from falling into the grasp of the (alt-)right? Is there no hope in at least reaching them in the meantime?

I've seen a post saying, "omg of course he goes for misandry" and while misandry isn't real in that men are not systematically oppressed, that doesn't mean that there aren't some out there who express hatred or disgust of men. That's not what the left stands for, obviously, but it is not absent. Here are some comments from the notes on some of these reaction posts (and presumably these are all people who consider themselves leftists):

"you should be hunted for sport"

"makes me want to commit homocide"

"kys right now"

"'leftists constantly said i should die' yeah fucking right"

"we need to double male loneliness and I'm not even kidding"

"I HATE MEN AND THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT. THEY HATE US MORE AND THEY HAVE ALL THE POWER TO DO ACTUAL HARM TO US. Misandry is NOT FUCKING REAL but I wish it was"

"we should kill people who don't get it"

Is that hatred of men (non-systematically)? Not all of it, but some of it definitely or possibly qualifies. And it sure does look like some people (who probably think themselves leftists) think this man (or men in general) are the "scum of the earth" and that they want him/them dead. How else do you interpret some of these phrases?

Now imagine that this is something that you encounter online, and with the help of the stranglehold of the patriarchy, whispers of right wing ideology, confirmation bias, and negativity bias? I can imagine you might end up concluding they "hate you for your immutable traits" (remember patriarchy teaches boys that violence and anger is natural to them) and that they "blame you for everything that's wrong in the world".

Is that the right conclusion? No. But as much as being able to use reason is part of being human, so is not being immune to ideology and propaganda. We wouldn't fucking be where we are right now if that wasn't the case.

How do we teach boys that anger and violence aren't "immutable traits"? How do we educate them about the power of the patriarchy? Well, where does it have to come from if not from the fucking left?

Does it have to be you? No. Does it have to be women? Also no. It's probably good if it's men, and especially men who themselves walked with the right at some point (if someone has already been pulled into the right, rather than catching them before).

It can be a woman though, if there's someone who wants to do it. I don't mind doing it if someone wants to talk about it. Will I be nice? No, I won't hold back and I will tell them if what they're saying is wrong. Will I coddle them? Fuck no. Will I keep trying if someone clearly isn't listening? No. Will I be compassionate? Yeah, I think I will.

Because compassion is really important when you're trying to keep people from falling into the far-right, or even if you're trying to get them out of it (which again, isn't what we were talking about in the first place).

Here's Pete Simi, professor of Sociology, talking about Life After Hate, an American non-profit that tries to help people leave the far-right:

The organization was started by former hate group members who have been doing a lot of outreach in terms of providing testimonials and trainings to schools and law enforcement and other community groups across the country. The focus of their message is the importance of using compassion to inform prevention and intervention efforts and aftercare for individuals who want to change their lives but may need various types of support. I think LAH is a very promising development and I hope it will continue to find the resources that it needs to expand the services it provides.

Being compassionate doesn't mean coddling. It doesn't mean holding their hands and it doesn't even mean being nice to them. It doesn't exclude holding people accountable for their views. It does require patience, though. And I understand that if someone is holding the belief that you are not allowed to exist, that isn't something you can do. And that's fine. It doesn't have to be you.

But somebody has to do it, and it has to be someone on the left.

Now none of that means that the suffering of men under patriarchy, and the fact that this has to be addressed loud and clear, are more important than the suffering that women, and especially women whose oppression intersects with other levels of oppression. I've seen some tags on reaction posts that stated "omg of course centring men in discussions of gender" - but the post was about men. That was the whole starting point!

Because men do suffer under the patriarchy. And it's pushing them to the right, towards misogyny and racism, unless they develop the necessary critical thinking skills to understand their own suffering. And you know who thinks so too? bell hooks.

Often men, to speak the pain, first turn to the women in their lives and are refused a hearing. In many ways women have bought into the patriarchal masculine mystique. Asked to witness a male expressing feelings, to listen to those feelings and respond, they may simply turn away.

Since men have yet to organize a feminist men’s movement that would proclaim the rights of men to emotional awareness and expression, we will not know how many men have indeed tried to express feelings, only to have the women in their lives tune out or be turned off.

It is a form of abuse that this culture continues to deny. Boys socialized to become patriarchs are being abused. As victims of child abuse via socialization in the direction of the patriarchal ideal, boys learn that they are unlovable.

The patriarchal model that tells men that they must be in control at all times is at odds with cultivating the capacity to be responsible, which requires knowing when to control and when to surrender and let go. Responsible men are capable of self-criticism. If more men were doing the work of self-critique, then they would not be wounded, hurt, or chagrined when critiqued by others, especially women with whom they are intimate. Engaging in self-critique empowers responsible males to admit mistakes. When they have wronged others, they are willing to acknowledge wrongdoing and make amends. When others have wronged them, they are able to forgive. The ability to be forgiving is part of letting go of perfectionism and accepting vulnerability. At the same time, constructive criticism works only when it is linked to a process of affirmation. Giving affirmation is an act of emotional care. Wounded men are not often able to say anything positive. They are the grump-and-groan guys; cloaked in cynicism, they stand at an emotional distance from themselves and others. Affirmation brings us closer together. It is the highest realization of compassion and empathy with others. One of the negative aspects of antimale feminist critiques of masculinity was the absence of any affirmation of that which is positive and potentially positive in male being. When individuals, including myself, wrote about the necessity of affirming men and identifying them as comrades in struggle, we were often labeled male-identified. The women who attacked us did not understand that it was possible to critique patriarchy without hating men. Indeed, recognizing all the ways that males have been victimized by patriarchy (even though they received rewards) was a way of including men in feminist movement, welcoming their presence and honoring their contribution.

“in order to create loving males we need to love males” means teach boys that they can be themselves without being less of a man. it means being encouraging and nurturing of their emotions so they don’t become cold and hateful. it means showing boys, early in their lives, that they have value outside of what our society deems proper masculinity. what it doesn’t mean is that it’s our job to handhold men who see women as walking sex toys through the concept of empathy, and maybe if we’re really really nice to them and don’t say things that hurt their feelings they’ll stop killing us for saying no

[anthonysstupiddailyblog]

Anthony's Stupid Daily Blog (798): Thu 23rd May 2024

Checked out last night's Dynamite. The opening match was a very entertaining encounter between Will Ospreay / Orange Cassidy vs Trent Beretta / Roderick Strong. I know WWE do a lot of matches featuring two people involved in separate feuds teaming up to face their opponents but there's a reason: it adds intrigue to a feud (as Ospreay/Cassidy vs Beretta/Strong proved) and in my opinion AEW needs to start doing them more. During the Bryan Danielson vs Satnam Singh match Sonjay Dutt went to clear the announce table so that Satnam could slam Bryan through it but he accidentally caused the table to fall to bits and I'm sure at this moment Maffew from Botchamania's eyes lit up as he knew he'd have guaranteed material for the next installment. Never thought I'd say this but Satnam Singh put in a good showing against Danielson. He can't do that much but he's more agile than most giants. I think they should book him like WWE booked Braun Strowman during his crazed monster phase The 3 way match between Hook / Shibata / Keith was good but the crowd was dead mainly because there wasn't an ounce of build so they didn't care. Also what was with that finish? Hook had Bryan Keith in RedRum while Shibata had Keith in a figure four which caused the ref to declare Hook and Shibata co-winners. Surely the ref should've asked Keith whose submission was hurting him more and he should've won. We got a match between Konosuke Takeshita and Matt Sydal where Sydal didn't even get an entrance. They could've justified this by having Sydal protest Christopher Daniels' firing and the Bucks respond by taking away his entrances. Afterwards Jon Moxley came down and hit Takeshita with the microphone to build heat for their up coming IWGP Title eliminator match. After Mox hit Takeshita they should've had Takeshita assault and bloody Wheeler Yuta or intimidate Rene backstage to add some extra heat for their match at Double Or Nothing. Good match between Black and O'Reilly but again crowd was dead because there was no hype. What made it worse was the guy in the crowd trying to start a "This Is Awesome" chant out of the dead silence. The blood at the end of Black v O'Reilly was cool but the crowd was dead because there was no build. They should've had Black cut a promo in the barbed wire cage then get drenched in blood & then have Black challenge O'Reilly to a match on Collision to exact revenge. After the match Black was stood alone in the ring and was drenched in a stream of blood from the ceiling. This is actually how Taz has his fake tan applied. We got a segment where Christian tried to escape from Swerve in a car but was blocked by a returning Prince Nana which was magic. Hopefully Tony is starting to realise that you can't expect to grow an audience with JUST great match after great match, you need to have this extra stuff too. Also the recurring story throughout the night should've been Swerve taking out each member of The Embassy and The Patriarchy before his match with Nick Wayne in the main event…instead of just him having a match in the middle of the card like he has since becoming champ. I still don't get why Tony Khan is being portrayed as the face in this AEW vs Bucks storyline. Surely the story should be the Bucks & the AEW originals are angry at Tony for bending over for CM Punk and Tony should be going "Punk & the ex WWE guys are money not you!"

[rmelcher]

##Things Fall Apart

'The Morning Show' on Apple TV is the best and most pertinent political drama I've watched since Aaron Sorkin’s 'The West Wing'. Both deal with power in the hands of people presented as ordinary human beings. Sorkin’s drama was of a different time and climate. It expressed the lingering idealism of the baby boomer generation. In a later show, ‘The Newsroom’, Sorkin explored the confluence of politics and media. As in ‘The West Wing there’s the sense of an omniscient moral order, watched over by benign patriarchal authorities, represented by Jeff Daniels and Sam Waterston, that invariably delivers on the side of truth and Justice (Law and Order).

‘The Morning Show’ is a product of another century, when that very authority is under question and uncertainty reigns in the shadows of every institution. Its political and interpersonal machinations are at least as complex as those in another show of the era, ‘Succession’. Both deal with issues of power and authority, but ‘Succession’ takes a more comedic approach, while ‘The Morning Show’ more aggressively and tragically addresses the real world.

In ‘Succession’ the patriarch and his entourage are portrayed as fools, inhabiting an environment of almost cartoonishly excessive wealth and power. This is not a place where people have jobs, it’s where they have ‘positions’ somewhere within the arcane mazes of control. It’s a world drenched in male ego, where both men and women thrive and survive only by ruthlessly manipulating each other to gain the approval of the king. It’s ultimately a game of abject surrender, in which a gaggle of fools gambol just at the boundaries where comedy and tragedy meet. In the end nothing in that world has substantially changed, and we go home satisfied that everyone pretty much got served what they deserve.

Inspired by the real life sexual abuse scandals that emerged during the MeToo scandals that lead to the fall of power brokers at Fox News, ‘The Morning Show’ doesn’t hold back in aggressively challenging the power of the king and the patriarchy. It takes the path of tragedy, in which the hubris and foolishness of each player is met with individual consequences.

‘The Morning Show’ is about struggle and a heroic journey toward redemption. Every character is brought to the edge of a precipitous fall, and is severely tested with the choice between pure survival and risking everything for the pursuit of clarity. As in classic tragedy a sacrifice of innocence is required in order to bring down the king. No one emerges unscathed.

At the end of the first season we’ve witnessed the inevitable fall, and are left with a little grief mixed with a sense of possibilities. The show leaves us with a hopeful motto, ‘sic semper tyrannies’, which translates, ‘thus always to tyrants’.

[existentialmagazine]

Review: Delving into dark wave and dreamy sounds all at once, emize shares her new reflective single ‘return the gaze’

Brooklyn-based producer and artist emize has grown from her classical training within her youth, originally finding herself through drama in impressionist music and creating orchestra scores in her teens. Later inspired by SOPHIE, FKA twigs, Arca & Object Blue, emize began to take her skills into the world of industrial, thundering, and yet delicate sounds, a merging of her orchestral days into something more electronically ladened. In the quiet of her bedroom, her music was her confidant, and now within her forthcoming EP ‘text me when u get home’ she begins to show off her previously unseen capabilities. Her latest offering from this body of work is the remarkable ‘return the gaze’, a profound and reflective take on the state of our modern world.

Listening to emize is like the dimming of a movie theatre for the most dramatic opening sequence, with goosebumps rising along your arms and your heart racing, you know right away that what you’ve gotten yourself in for is one hell of a ride. As ‘return the gaze’ begins with the most abstract assortment of sounds alike nothing else you’ve heard before, the futuristic world of emize will quickly become one you wish to soak yourself entirely within. From a static, whirring distortion to heavy electronic pulsations that set a striking base of beats, ‘return the gaze’ almost feels like it’s laced in the scenes of a neon-lit alleys amidst a bustling cyberpunk city, not just instrumentally distinct but completely transportive in the soundscape it delivers. Things lurk more into a dark-wave approach for the verses interruption, lingering in drawn-out synth that’s almost like muffled sirens; intermittent pounding beats and a spoken-sung approach from emize drenched in warped vocal effects for that added technological foundation the song seems to reside within. Things take a complete shift for the pre-chorus though as emize softly haunts through a flowing higher range and airy delivery, a moment of delicacy and intimacy as though this were emize’s respite in a world otherwise always watching. Paired with this sincere moment are loosely played electric guitar strings and subtle beats, an intentionally stripped-down break that sets you up for the calm before the storm. Things don’t rest for long though as emize has other plans, coming in bold and unafraid for a groundbreaking chorus, thumping through your earphones with bombastic layers of multiple beats, drum clashes and high guitar strings strung out and contorted for effect. At over three minutes in length, ‘return the gaze’ has a lot more to offer in the journey of its sound, but we’ll leave it up to you to discover those secrets.

Though we couldn’t help but compare the sound to that of a neo-city of sorts, ‘return the gaze’ lyrically reflects on the streets of the real world we live in, clasping around a sense of disturbing and almost jarring sound shifts to deliver a narrative weaved with deep significance. Writing of the everyday experience that comes with existing as a woman, ‘return the gaze’ snaps back at the male gaze and the systems in place across the world like patriarchy, sexism, capitalism, and the horrendous rise in things like anti-Asian hate crimes, meaningfully seeking change from the corruption and policies that continue to fail us. From one of the opening lines ‘everything that we’ve been told, play nice’ , emize seems to touch on the way women often find themselves fearing for their lives when approached and leered over, always told to be mindful of their words and reactions rather than the abusers face their crimes. As she continues that ‘I’ve seen ones like you before’ , emize ensures it’s clear that we are surrounded by these people who abuse their power, unsafe and left to fend for ourselves without protection. But things take a darker turn when she sings ‘quietly I’ve been chasing’ , a snap back at the fearful encounters and instead turning the tables, leaving the predator to become the prey. Locked in this standoff, the hook of the single rings out ‘return the gaze, don’t walk away’ , holding her place in a world that does not allow her the courtesy of simply being. Rallying for the creation of a ‘new world’ , ‘return the gaze’ is an anthem with a message, an urge to retake power from old white leaders who make policies at the expense of QTBIPOC and people at the margins.

Check out ‘return the gaze’ for yourself here to take on the expedition that emize’s sound takes you on, as well as an unsettling message within created to really leave you thinking deeper.

Written by: Tatiana Whybrow

Photo Credits: Steph Pan

// This coverage was supported and created via Musosoup, #SustainableCurator.

[denimbex1986]

'On July 21, two long-anticipated films made their debut in theaters: Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer.”

As expected, each movie had a titanic showing at the box office. The biopic featuring the “father of the atomic bomb” has grossed over $700 million, while the movie starring the iconic Mattel doll has grossed over $1 billion, a first for a film led by a female director.

Since the announcement of their shared release date, the two films with polar opposite aesthetics have been joined at the hip. The internet has run rampant with funny jokes and memes asking viewers which movie they’ll see first. In the “Barbenheimer” War, are you on Team Barbie or Team Oppenheimer?

Each film is an achievement in artistry and filmmaking. Gerwig and Nolan should be proud of their respective films, as each serves as a stellar addition to their already fantastic careers. “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” will surely rake in numerous prestigious award nominations once awards season begins.

However, I, admittedly, have been on Team Barbie since the beginning of the “Barbenheimer” War. While I fully expected Nolan’s biopic to be better than “Barbie,” I had clearly underestimated Gerwig’s ability to craft compelling, human-driven narratives. While both movies are marvelous in their own right, “Barbie,” in my view, does just Kenough for me to view it as the superior film.

First, the art design of “Barbie” is breathtakingly beautiful. Obviously, the movie is infinitely more vibrant than the mute, melancholy exterior of “Oppenheimer.” While that is no fault of Nolan’s film, I personally value color and art design in film very highly, and “Barbie” has such design in spades.

The movie occurs in two main settings: Barbieland and the Real World. In Barbieland, the environment is drenched in pink, from the roads, to the dreamhouses, to Barbie’s signature cruiser. The set design transported the audience into a life-size version of their childhood mini-Barbie neighborhood. The costume design, as well, is striking. While nearly every character is a version of Barbie or Ken, they all have unique looks that aid them in developing their own personalities. The film, simply put, is a gorgeous sight to behold.

Next, the ensemble is one of the film’s greatest strengths; specifically, Barbie, Ken and Gloria each have unique, engaging personalities that flourish thanks to their actors’ performances. Barbie, played by two-time Academy Award nominee Margot Robbie, is a character with greater depth than initially perceived. Robbie gives a phenomenal performance, as her subtle choices reveal more and more of the inner turmoil Barbie feels about death, the patriarchy and human complexity as the movie unfolds.

America Ferrara played Barbie’s real-life owner, Gloria, toiling away from anxiety over the prospect of death and neglect from her teenage daughter, which results in her playing with Barbie dolls again as a coping mechanism. Ferrara does impeccable work portraying the hardships of being a working mother. Her now-famous monologue to the Barbies, where she explained the complexities and impossible standards innate to being a human woman that they nevertheless have to reach, helps them snap out of their Ken-induced patriarchy trance.

The standout, in my view, though, is undoubtedly Ryan Gosling’s Ken. Gosling gives what I believe is an Oscar-worthy performance throughout the film. He devours every second of his screen time with hilarious line deliveries and over-the-top acting.

While his acting is exaggerated and cartoonish, he’s able to imbue the character with enough emotional depth that the audience still feels connected to Ken. He perfectly captured every wrinkle of Ken’s character: he’s naive, vindictive and shallow, and it all stems from his desire to get Barbie to notice him.

Her lack of attention makes him jealous and angry, and after witnessing the Real World’s rampant patriarchy and sexism, overturns Barbieland’s established sociopolitical systems in favor of a system that allows the Kens to rule.

Each of these characters serves as the film’s emotional core, and the actors did wonderful jobs bringing these fictional beings to life.

Most of all, what makes “Barbie” such a great movie and ultimately makes it better than “Oppenheimer” are the movie’s themes. Going into the theater, I expected a lighthearted family film about the popular plastic doll; I never expected to be met with such an introspective piece with witty Easter eggs of humor. Gerwig and her co-writer Noah Baumbach penned a film consumed with themes of patriarchy, family and what it means to navigate these issues daily as a human being.

Through Barbie’s perspective, the audience gets to see the violence of patriarchy and male insecurity: we see familial struggles between a mother and daughter with different views of the world; and finally, we see Barbie experience humanity’s messy, gushy, sometimes frightening entanglement of thoughts and emotions that never truly go away.

The Barbies save Barbieland from Ken’s tyranny. Ken gets to develop as his own person and break away from the societal expectation of being just Barbie’s boyfriend. Gloria and her daughter got to save Barbieland and grow closer. There’s no such satisfying conclusion for Barbie but, instead, a new beginning.

In the final scene, Barbie took the hands of her creator, Ruth, and experienced the full spectrum of human emotion. She asked Ruth if she can be human, and Ruth said she doesn’t need to ask to be human.

Therein lies the theme of humanity that resides at the movie’s core: as humans, we don’t have to ask to live, we just do, and by being alive we engage in what all of life has to offer at all times, both good and bad.

Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” is a remarkable work of art, and I’d understand if some audiences feel more drawn to it than Gerwig’s film. However, very few films could top “Barbie’s” emotional resonance. The design, acting and themes are all brought together masterfully under Gerwig’s direction. The film made me laugh, nearly cry and most importantly, think about my place as a human being in the world. I wholeheartedly loved the movie and I fully believe it is the superior film to “Oppenheimer.”

Ironically, a movie about a plastic, lifeless doll is one of the few pieces of tremendous media that captures the joys and tribulations of being human.'

[subiysu-chan]

Sexy badass chicks are bad character design and writing

First of all, they are highly unrealistically portrayed, which breaks the immersion quite a bit and often clashes with the tone of the story. Now, the only kind of setting in which it makes sense is fantasy, and fantasy with rules that state certain humanoids are overpowered. 

Personally, I find many male models for perfume adds to be sexually repulsive. I have nothing against effeminates men, but this level of conformity and artificiality is to me quite off putting. I’m straight, not robot-sexual. 

Also, even if they are basically half-naked, often times sexy badass chicks would have no signs of how intense physical activity and combat has affected them physically. In fact, a way to remedy this would be to try and make them attractive in a more androgynous way, something many series actually do quite successfully. 

Moving on to writing. These characters are unlikeable. Some try to make it into feminist message. Which is ridiculous, since many of them are written to be so destructive, that frankly, most of the most toxic masculine characters tend to be less brutish and frankly, it makes me want to support the patriarchy they oppose. 

Now, an exception to this is Oscar de Jarjayes which is frankly amazing. 

A one that to me is a disaster but somewhat salvageable is Marie-Josephe Sanson. In the first part of the manga, Innocent, Marie-Josephe is frankly evil, but she does have some likeable features and traits, and most of her vileness can be explained. In Innocent Rouge, she’s portrayed as the “dawn of a new era” and a “new hope for tomorrow”. She in the second season: castrates a man for daring to insult her, rapes (?) her husband and horrifically abuses Zero. Plus, her particular type of abuse sure doesn’t repeat what she endured, but it’s so calculated and “for your own good”, and so horrific on such a tiny baby that I’m like...No, please stop harming Zero. Because her abuse instead of repeating a cycle or being the product of clumsiness and/or distress, it’s...Not exposing baby to violent mobs, drenching them in irritating liquids (in this case, blood), putting weird masks on their heads even though their necks are still puny and using them as a shield is...wow. How is that considered breaking the cycle of abuse?!