Something about this website makes me sick to the stomach. Baby girls wearing high heels. Now we're thrusting sexuality on them even before they can say 'goo-goo' let alone 'I'm hot'.
It's bad enough that young girls have to deal with men (and women) sexualizing them even before they have a chance to come to grips with their own sexuality. But now we're turning little babies into objects of desire...
Whose gonna lead the charge against this one?
Monday, June 23, 2008
Rape as a war crime!
Finally! The UN has recognized the use of rape as a weapon of war and in genocide and ethnic cleansing. An article discussing the issue is found in the LA Times,
The question is, how long before many countries begin adopting this domestically? How long before law makers come up with a code that recognizes rape in peacetime and rape in a time of conflict as different?
The question is, how long before many countries begin adopting this domestically? How long before law makers come up with a code that recognizes rape in peacetime and rape in a time of conflict as different?
Friday, June 13, 2008
Neighbour's Envy, Owner's Pride - II
Product envy occurs when people disparage another person's possession of some THING, for no apparent reason. Men and women succumb to product envy for different kinds of products. Men's product envy is more gadget based (at least judging from the overwhelmingly techie sample I am exposed to). Women's product envy encompasses everything - house, car, shoes, bags, clothes, etc. I must qualify here that not everyone has product envy. I think product envy is most pronounced in insecure people. I have seen people insecure about career, weight, looks, height, color of skin surround themselves with several products. Apparently it keeps them secure.
Perhaps I too shop because of some insecurity. But for the most part (and this is a confession) I am insecure only about my weight. That's where I slip most easily and shamelessly give in to the Beauty Myth. But I usually catch myself in time to do something constructive about it. The heaviest I have ever been is 130 pounds, or 61 kilograms. At about 61 kgs I can no longer peer down at my face without seeing the puffy outline of my cheeks and I realize I ought to let go of those mochas and brownies for a while. Sigh!!
Mostly, I am neutral to someone else's possessions, and enthusiastic if anyone acquires anything. It doesn't affect me. I am happy if someone else is. But I do wish this were universally true. It isn't.
But consumption of products doesn't just generate 'product envy'. Sometimes what you consume becomes who you are. It seems these days you get singled out for what you consume. If you want to to fit into geekdom, you need to dress informally, have tons of gadgets, an X-box and an unlocked iphone. If you want to fit into housewife-dom you need to ENJOY Gray's Anatomy. If you want to fit into MBA-dom you need to have a sexy phone, crisp pants and a subscription to the Economist. To fit into Ritual Roasters in SF you better have tons of Apple products. So every culture and counter-culture has a certain consumption pattern linked to it, which gives it legitimacy in a very weird way. If you consume something in common with someone else you are considered part of a clique. No one expresses it better than the makers of Coach Handbags, who have something called a 'Coach Clique' online. I have two Coach handbags and found this out when trying to figure out what the return policy was. I have refrained from joining the Clique online, but realize that by virtue of carrying such a handbag I demonstrate myself as a part of some larger collective of women who possess such a handbag.
What is really mind-boggling about this phenomenon is how 'possession' has become a marker for inclusion. No one talks about the group of deprived people. To be in possession of something ( a home, a car, a diamond ring) is to be empowered, organized, successful. Alternatively, to NOT own something is to be disorganized, nomadic, poor... and..(this is going to be controversial but I'm going to say it anyway) have a right to whining about how you don't have something. Of course there are extremes of deprivation. The really really very poor people (RRVPP) who have NOTHING. Then those whining, suburbans who crib about not having money to eat at fancy restaurants every week.
On a national scale what you consume becomes a marker for whether you can be included in a national community or not. Does anyone remember the case of the Islamic girl in NYC called Tashnuba who was called in for questioning in 2005 because she listened to Mullah Omar on the radio and not to Bon Jovi, as a girl her age was 'supposed' to do? The fact that she did not consume a typical product from the music industry meant she was weird, plotting against the country. Her donning of the burqa meant a rejection of current Abercrombie&Fitch sort of consumption pattern.
I have digressed substantially from the original intention of writing about product envy. I keep thinking back to Onida's catchphrase - and wonder if a lot of domestic squabbles are about not possessing enough to arrive at some nondescript social status. Such anxieties do drive many people crazy. Many times product envy degenerates into intense personal dislike for the person who possesses these things. She/He becomes an object of criticism. A woman, for instance, who has a large diamond ring is accused of showing off or orchestrating/manipulating the man who gave it to her. Wearers of teeny-weeny clothes and high heels, if women, are Barbies. Shoppers like me are PROBABLY (or so the assumption goes) really dumb and stupid (to fit in with the stereotype) or should dress shabbily and be LEFTY.
In popular culture people who 'possess' more than others are now getting celebrity status. The focus on their shoes, clothes, bags and alcohol-induced antics has given birth to an entire industry of celebrity watchers- tmz.com, E!, etc etc.
Ending is better than Mending! Brave New World's little slogan can't be more true than it is today. Rene Descartes will probably turn several times in his little grave when I say this - I HAVE, therefore I am!
Perhaps I too shop because of some insecurity. But for the most part (and this is a confession) I am insecure only about my weight. That's where I slip most easily and shamelessly give in to the Beauty Myth. But I usually catch myself in time to do something constructive about it. The heaviest I have ever been is 130 pounds, or 61 kilograms. At about 61 kgs I can no longer peer down at my face without seeing the puffy outline of my cheeks and I realize I ought to let go of those mochas and brownies for a while. Sigh!!
Mostly, I am neutral to someone else's possessions, and enthusiastic if anyone acquires anything. It doesn't affect me. I am happy if someone else is. But I do wish this were universally true. It isn't.
But consumption of products doesn't just generate 'product envy'. Sometimes what you consume becomes who you are. It seems these days you get singled out for what you consume. If you want to to fit into geekdom, you need to dress informally, have tons of gadgets, an X-box and an unlocked iphone. If you want to fit into housewife-dom you need to ENJOY Gray's Anatomy. If you want to fit into MBA-dom you need to have a sexy phone, crisp pants and a subscription to the Economist. To fit into Ritual Roasters in SF you better have tons of Apple products. So every culture and counter-culture has a certain consumption pattern linked to it, which gives it legitimacy in a very weird way. If you consume something in common with someone else you are considered part of a clique. No one expresses it better than the makers of Coach Handbags, who have something called a 'Coach Clique' online. I have two Coach handbags and found this out when trying to figure out what the return policy was. I have refrained from joining the Clique online, but realize that by virtue of carrying such a handbag I demonstrate myself as a part of some larger collective of women who possess such a handbag.
What is really mind-boggling about this phenomenon is how 'possession' has become a marker for inclusion. No one talks about the group of deprived people. To be in possession of something ( a home, a car, a diamond ring) is to be empowered, organized, successful. Alternatively, to NOT own something is to be disorganized, nomadic, poor... and..(this is going to be controversial but I'm going to say it anyway) have a right to whining about how you don't have something. Of course there are extremes of deprivation. The really really very poor people (RRVPP) who have NOTHING. Then those whining, suburbans who crib about not having money to eat at fancy restaurants every week.
On a national scale what you consume becomes a marker for whether you can be included in a national community or not. Does anyone remember the case of the Islamic girl in NYC called Tashnuba who was called in for questioning in 2005 because she listened to Mullah Omar on the radio and not to Bon Jovi, as a girl her age was 'supposed' to do? The fact that she did not consume a typical product from the music industry meant she was weird, plotting against the country. Her donning of the burqa meant a rejection of current Abercrombie&Fitch sort of consumption pattern.
I have digressed substantially from the original intention of writing about product envy. I keep thinking back to Onida's catchphrase - and wonder if a lot of domestic squabbles are about not possessing enough to arrive at some nondescript social status. Such anxieties do drive many people crazy. Many times product envy degenerates into intense personal dislike for the person who possesses these things. She/He becomes an object of criticism. A woman, for instance, who has a large diamond ring is accused of showing off or orchestrating/manipulating the man who gave it to her. Wearers of teeny-weeny clothes and high heels, if women, are Barbies. Shoppers like me are PROBABLY (or so the assumption goes) really dumb and stupid (to fit in with the stereotype) or should dress shabbily and be LEFTY.
In popular culture people who 'possess' more than others are now getting celebrity status. The focus on their shoes, clothes, bags and alcohol-induced antics has given birth to an entire industry of celebrity watchers- tmz.com, E!, etc etc.
Ending is better than Mending! Brave New World's little slogan can't be more true than it is today. Rene Descartes will probably turn several times in his little grave when I say this - I HAVE, therefore I am!
Neighbour's Envy, Owner's Pride - I
In India there is this little television making company called Onida, which used to have an advertising campaign with the catchphrase "Neighbour's Envy, Owner's Pride". The TV usually had a satanic/demonic sort of masculine creature (complete with forked tail, trident and horns) draped all over the telly. In the background you could hear a neighboring couple squabbling about something. Apparently, the campaign deployed a very 'keep up with the Joneses" sort of logic. The neighboring family quarreled because they didn't have the Onida telly.
It is very recently, that I have started thinking of creating a concept to explain this phenomenon (and I contend it IS one). I call it 'product envy'. Product envy occurs when the acquisition of something by an individual leads to a desire to acquire the same in another individual in a sort of demonstration effect.
Now most people find it really problematic to reconcile the fact that I am lefty with the fact that I also have a penchant for nice clothes (not necessarily expensive) and shoes. To me being lefty is an aspect of my personal politics. I don't think one has to look like a complete slob t0 be considered lefty. But to many people if you are lefty, you can't be shopping, you can't be hoarding shoes in your closet (as I do) and you certainly can't be wearing perfume all the time. The JNU-jhola lefty is also just an indigenous stereo-type. It is a fashion statement and many JNU types (also like me) shop regularly at a brand name clothes line, namely FabIndia (which is not exactly cheap either).
To me consuming products was a way of life. Something I had grown up with. The politics of the left entered my life much later than the time that my personal fashion preferences were forged. Apparently, the argument often goes, I need not bash up on neo-liberalism if I consume the very products neo-liberalism produces. I should instead embrace neo-liberalism. The reason why these arguments often take the shape they do is simply because many people elide the fact that one is left-leaning with the supposition that one is also deeply communist, opposed to capitalism, etc. Nothing could be further from the mark. Being anti-capitalist does not necessarily stand for someone who hates all brands and everything with the established order. It means one dissents against certain production regimes, unfair trade practices, the exploitation of labor in the developing world, etc and hence pushes for change.
So I have struggled for some time to understand this. Would people find my politics more palatable if I dressed down? If I wore the torn sneakers or frayed jeans and flipflops. If I had unkempt hair or if I wore hippie skirts, kurta and jeans? In many ways if you dress in the expected way people have an easier time mapping your politics onto your appearance. But for the most part, they react in pretty much the same way regardless of how you dress.
In the last two years I have seen many couples fighting. Most often the fights boil down to finances - either too much or too little. Wives coming in from India to the US and wives in India have certain expectations. They want to be taken care of and indulged. This doesn't always happen. Men prefer saving for a new car, laptop or down payment for a house. I have heard women complain about not having eaten at expensive restaurants, not getting birthday gifts, or tricking husbands out of money to have some more to spend. Men are curious about other men's salaries, they compete in a very different manner, which I must confess I don't fully understand, so I will mostly restrict my comments to the female side. A friend of mine recently told me how in the middle-east men compete to give gifts to their wives. So if person A gives a Chanel handbag to his wife, person B cannot gift her a bag from XoXo.
Often I have seen people (both men and women) withhold approval of another person's house, car and gadgets for no apparent reason. Alternatively, they find fault with it. Almost as if finding fault is an exercise in asserting power. A control-drama, if you will! I usually gush when I like something, but just observing other people's behavior I realize others become sour and quiet when they see something they like and don't possess it themselves. Some people will also focus on the things that are 'not right' during a dinner party, for instance - the potatoes have too much salt, etc. (I remember this one incident a 15 years ago when a very critical woman called Pinky Aunty once told my Mom, "Everything was perfect, but I found one mistake. The cake in your Alaska Bombe should have been a sponge cake". My mom, a career educator for two decades, who was refreshingly not obsessed with cooking (but could cook up a storm if she decided too) was pretty annoyed, but thanked Pinky Aunty for the input. At the time I didn't understand the manner in which adult women compete. Reflecting on this incident, I realize my reaction to this comment would have been absolutely virulent. My mom, on the other hand, handled it gracefully with a smile, always the perfect hostess. Note to self: should learn something from my mom about handling situations in which I get angry, instead of turning into the Incredible Sulk.)
To be continued...
It is very recently, that I have started thinking of creating a concept to explain this phenomenon (and I contend it IS one). I call it 'product envy'. Product envy occurs when the acquisition of something by an individual leads to a desire to acquire the same in another individual in a sort of demonstration effect.
Now most people find it really problematic to reconcile the fact that I am lefty with the fact that I also have a penchant for nice clothes (not necessarily expensive) and shoes. To me being lefty is an aspect of my personal politics. I don't think one has to look like a complete slob t0 be considered lefty. But to many people if you are lefty, you can't be shopping, you can't be hoarding shoes in your closet (as I do) and you certainly can't be wearing perfume all the time. The JNU-jhola lefty is also just an indigenous stereo-type. It is a fashion statement and many JNU types (also like me) shop regularly at a brand name clothes line, namely FabIndia (which is not exactly cheap either).
To me consuming products was a way of life. Something I had grown up with. The politics of the left entered my life much later than the time that my personal fashion preferences were forged. Apparently, the argument often goes, I need not bash up on neo-liberalism if I consume the very products neo-liberalism produces. I should instead embrace neo-liberalism. The reason why these arguments often take the shape they do is simply because many people elide the fact that one is left-leaning with the supposition that one is also deeply communist, opposed to capitalism, etc. Nothing could be further from the mark. Being anti-capitalist does not necessarily stand for someone who hates all brands and everything with the established order. It means one dissents against certain production regimes, unfair trade practices, the exploitation of labor in the developing world, etc and hence pushes for change.
So to many people who disagree with the left (and those who don't truly know anything about the left and hence disagree with it) I am a very easy target. If I stand in nice shoes and say something about getting rid of sweatshops in China, most people have a knee-jerk reaction, "look who's talking". Pejoratively, people like me are called BoBo's or bourgeois bohemian.
So I have struggled for some time to understand this. Would people find my politics more palatable if I dressed down? If I wore the torn sneakers or frayed jeans and flipflops. If I had unkempt hair or if I wore hippie skirts, kurta and jeans? In many ways if you dress in the expected way people have an easier time mapping your politics onto your appearance. But for the most part, they react in pretty much the same way regardless of how you dress.
In the last two years I have seen many couples fighting. Most often the fights boil down to finances - either too much or too little. Wives coming in from India to the US and wives in India have certain expectations. They want to be taken care of and indulged. This doesn't always happen. Men prefer saving for a new car, laptop or down payment for a house. I have heard women complain about not having eaten at expensive restaurants, not getting birthday gifts, or tricking husbands out of money to have some more to spend. Men are curious about other men's salaries, they compete in a very different manner, which I must confess I don't fully understand, so I will mostly restrict my comments to the female side. A friend of mine recently told me how in the middle-east men compete to give gifts to their wives. So if person A gives a Chanel handbag to his wife, person B cannot gift her a bag from XoXo.
Often I have seen people (both men and women) withhold approval of another person's house, car and gadgets for no apparent reason. Alternatively, they find fault with it. Almost as if finding fault is an exercise in asserting power. A control-drama, if you will! I usually gush when I like something, but just observing other people's behavior I realize others become sour and quiet when they see something they like and don't possess it themselves. Some people will also focus on the things that are 'not right' during a dinner party, for instance - the potatoes have too much salt, etc. (I remember this one incident a 15 years ago when a very critical woman called Pinky Aunty once told my Mom, "Everything was perfect, but I found one mistake. The cake in your Alaska Bombe should have been a sponge cake". My mom, a career educator for two decades, who was refreshingly not obsessed with cooking (but could cook up a storm if she decided too) was pretty annoyed, but thanked Pinky Aunty for the input. At the time I didn't understand the manner in which adult women compete. Reflecting on this incident, I realize my reaction to this comment would have been absolutely virulent. My mom, on the other hand, handled it gracefully with a smile, always the perfect hostess. Note to self: should learn something from my mom about handling situations in which I get angry, instead of turning into the Incredible Sulk.)
To be continued...
State of Denial
I just read this in the WSJ, dated June 13, 2008.
"Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal are expressing more confidence in the Federal Reserve and Chairman Ben Bernanke, though they foresee slow growth and suggest it is likely the US is in a recession or will soon tumble into one."
WOW! These guys catch on FAST! :D
"Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal are expressing more confidence in the Federal Reserve and Chairman Ben Bernanke, though they foresee slow growth and suggest it is likely the US is in a recession or will soon tumble into one."
WOW! These guys catch on FAST! :D
Friday, June 6, 2008
Lash-Back to the Backlash
Ok.. seems like I need to up the ante!
I got a surprising backlash against my first post. Some friends took it personally, even though the post was not connected to them and did not talk about them at all, except as the jesting and friendly voice on the other end of the line.
I was told the blog was shoddy material. I actually agree. I was trying to write something and rehashed something from an old post that I wrote. For anyone who has looked at my computer, I have this really heavy folder called 'Writing' where I store unpublished blog posts, movie reviews, short stories, tidbits of pretty writing, etc. Once in six months I browse through this folder, like something I wrote several years ago and decide to put it online. The '11 things I want to tell people' are a rehashed version of something I wrote a long time ago.
My husband also thinks I should be doing more with the blog and not just venting. I do agree. But sometimes I do need to vent, especially because there are certain things you cannot tell friends or family. Sometimes no one has the time or patience to hear you out and I sort of see my blogs as a nameless entity to whom I can unburden myself. But the contradiction is, why do I then want people to read it? I would say it is simply vanity. I write something, I want people to read it and comment on its brilliance.
The problem with the old post is that it is NOT brilliant. In fact it's silly, petulant, foot-stomping writing. But honestly, I did enjoy writing it. Got to sharpen my claws a little bit. And I kept most of my fur. Sometimes writing anything, even just nonsense and gibberish, is so therapeutic, I would do it without taking into account the consequences of what I am writing. But I do understand that once you get on a public forum, there is a certain level of responsibility that comes with circulating material. People do form opinions based on words arranged in particular sequences, they do judge you by what you are saying. They choose to associate or dissociate with you based on what you say and how you say it. Nothing wrong with that.
I am prepared to face the consequences of what I write. But can writing exist simply for the sake of writing itself, or can I employ this at the service of something bigger. Ideally, I would like to do that, but being human, I do get caught up in the nitty-gritty of corporeal living - making tea, doing the laundry, cooking, cleaning, socializing, etc etc. Sometimes the writing that comes forth is frustrated with this living and its pointlessness and even more angered at being caught in this cycle and having no escape. The writing leads the charge against those who enjoy this life, and CANNOT SEE the big picture, cannot experience their own slavery as anything more than a ubiquitous culture of consumption. I experience my slavery every single day, but I also see how by just living the way I do I enslave others - the Chinese sweatshop workers, the dead birds I eat on beds of rice, the people who have to care for me and deal with me - the unstable, indifferent, nihilistic chick.
Some individuals get caught up in this bee-swarm of alphabets, words, sentences and grammar. And they get angry, or hurt or feel insulted. But for the most part they also live their lives making others angry, hurting other people and insulting them too. I have been angered, hurt and insulted as well by several people many times over. Perhaps this is how the world is supposed to weave itself. As a series of lash-backs against backlashes. This is how we proceed - thesis! Anti-thesis! Synthesis!
The pen is not only mightier, but sharper, more precise and infinitely more damaging than the sword. So say we all!
This blog will get better! That is a promise!
Best
V
Another ho-hum week
The top 11 things I would tell certain people if I could
1. Please buy deodorant
2. Don't you think you should wax more often? I say this with some flourish to a man.
3. Read a book!!
4. Stop being such a lazy ass.
5. I know you cheated on your wife and now she won't say anything 'cos she went around telling everyone how great you are and she thinks she looks really stupid. What she needs to do is kick you out of the home. Oh wait, she thinks you're making all the money for her in the future.. Oh well I guess she deserves what she gets. But even though she is downright stupid, that doesn't change the fact that you're an ass.
6. Stop feeling sorry for yourself all the time. It's very draining on everyone around you.
7. Get over your nationalistic attitude. You sound like a rabid nut job.
8. Get a life!
9. You REALLY need to get laid
10. You CAN say something nice about another person once in a while. When you don't, you just appear jealous or like you have an ulcer up your butt.
11. Related to 10 above. Stop bitching about your best friend.. not fair when the poor girl can't even speak the same language as you.
Oh and if I know you and you're reading this, don't try and guess if I am writing about you. You're giving yourself far too much importance. Save me the embarrassment of saying this straight to your face.
Gosh! It IS liberating to be writing freely after all this while. Since I was feeling really guilty tonight about neglecting my grey cells and ignoring my cerebral fluids I decided to liven things up in my head a bit by FINALLY reading Madness and Civilization from scratch. I also have to confess that there is something liberating about Foucault talking about the orchestrated exclusion of people in the 'interior of the exterior'. This stuff makes perfect sense to me. Although apparently it is fashionable to pretend that Foucault DOESN'T make sense to you.
It's becoming harder to voice opinions because most people have a pre-conceived notion of how much your opinion matters if you wear really high heels, giggle often and/or are chatty. I have been nicknamed Barbie so many times, it's becoming pretty tedious. Someone once called me a trophy wife also and as I put the phone down chuckling to myself while guzzling the second cuppa in two hours, I kinda said out loud, "a trophy wife who earns her own living?" That's gotta be new!
I wish people could come up with a new moniker for me. Something like BITCH PH.D, or PINKO FEMINIST HELLCAT in HIGH HEELS!! (For those of you really smart 'uns reading this, you've probably caught on to those names by now.. and if not, you're probably scrambling to Google these names and figure out what contemporary reference you missed, so as not to look to stupid in front of your own laptop.)
So what is this blog about? Well, I'm still deciding. I really liked the title when I saw a cauldron with the words written across it in an issue of B.I.T.C.H magazine. Googled it and found out that Bitchcraft is apparently a porn flick as well... and for some perverse reason, I was completely sold on the name. I want to make this an informal, easy to read blog about troubling issues, but also use some space for personal venting. I also thought I would invite three co-authors for this blog, but have changed my mind since. Please don't subject me to the FBS for this. Comments and suggestions are welcome.
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