now you patriarchy now you don't

Back when I was reading the book on women in media (Douglas, I think it was), I recall a chapter that discussed Charlie's Angels in-depth. I'm pretty sure I quoted that section at length, but one part I didn't quote but has stuck in my head was how Charlie's Angels -- the show, not the characters -- attempted to have its feminist cake and eat it, too. Or maybe I should say: to eat the cake while denying the cake existed.

Here's the logic: patriarchy is, in simplistic television terms, when men as a sex, a gender, and as a rule, strive to keep women in the position of second-class citizens. Okay. Demonstrating/illustrating the patriarchy in television, therefore, is showing men being male chauvinist asshats. So far, I'm still with the logic.

But here's what Charlie's Angels was arguing, by having the consistent villain of the piece be a sexist asshat: they were reducing -- Douglas argued -- the concept of 'patriarchy' as 'something all men buy into and intentionally (or unconsciously) support, engender, propagate, and generally make sure men stay the only sex with any significant rights or privileges' to 'here are some guys who are asshats". In short, the reduction subtly undermined the feminist argument that the patriarchy is a problem with men as a self reinforcing whole, by positing that if you could just get rid of these (specific, bad) men, there'd be no patriarchy. Rainbows and puppies for everyone!

( Which is where the having the cake -- men are sexist! -- and denying it -- but only certain bad men! -- comes into play: and thus into commentary on women-in-media of kdramas, jdramas, and tw-dramas. )

reality or unreality?

One of the other threads in Where the Girls Are was a discussion of one of Bette Davis' earlier melodramas (co-starring a young Humphrey Bogart), Marked Woman. Loosely based on real-life case, Bogart's character convinces Davis' call-girl ("hostess" for censorship purposes) character to testify against a big mob boss. Over the course of the film, it becomes apparent that there's a strong attraction between Davis' low-class character and Bogart's upper-class prosecutor character. Yet at the end, when Bogart's character obliquely suggests that they try and make a go of it, Davis' call-girl turns him down.

The book's assessment of this was that the introduction of reality -- that there was no future in a relationship that crossed such class barriers -- actually turned the film into a subversive work. By showing all the potential of such a relationship, and then reminding the audience of the reality (and thereby removing any chance of a Cinderella-like unrealistic happy ending for the sympathetic female lead)... it actually pissed women-audiences off. It made them say, "why must it be like that? why can't she finally get a decent guy?"

I was reading that book while also working my way through one of the kdramas -- can't recall now which -- but not like it matters; many of them run together when it comes to the Cinderella themes. (Per my previous post, especially when it's poor-girl-who-works-hard manages to snag the chaebol/rich-boy prince. Hell, if you watched kdramas and mistook them for reality, you'd think chaebol-boys grow on freaking trees.) Over and over, the dimwitted but hard-working and well-meaning poor girl gets chosen instead of the highly educated, cultivated, and ambitious rich girl.

( The reality of that is... well, it can happen, but it's so rare as to rival hen's teeth. )

Which is better? To watch the fantasy and have it fire you up to believe the world could be like that? Or to see the reality and get really freaking pissed off because you hate living through that yourself, and want to work for a day when that onscreen misery is nothing but a distant memory?

a few things

From a Salon essay about the English-language translation of The Ringbearer, a satirical/parodic take on The Lord of the Rings. First, tying into both myth-making and a broader pop culture application, per the issue of fantasies in re women's roles, this food for thought:

"The Lord of the Rings" wouldn't be as popular as it is if the pastoral idyll of the Shire and the sureties of a virtuous, mystically ordained monarchy as embodied in Aragorn didn't speak to widespread longing for a simpler way of life. There's nothing wrong with enjoying such narratives -- we'd be obliged to jettison the entire Arthurian mythos and huge chunks of American popular culture if there were -- but it never hurts to remind ourselves that it's not just their magical motifs that makes them fantasies.

And an intriguing reaction from the reviewer, too, in the final paragraph:

Yeskov's "parody" -- for "The Last Ringbearer," with its often sardonic twists on familiar Tolkien characters and events, comes a lot closer to being a parody than "Wind Done Gone" ever did -- is just such a reminder. If it is fan fiction (and I'm not sure I'm in a position to pronounce on that), then it may be the most persuasive example yet of the artistic potential of the form.

And since translations and language have been on my brain, this paragraph from an interview with Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small Things:

To be able to express yourself, to be able to close the gap—inasmuch as it is possible—between thought and expression is just such a relief. It’s like having the ability to draw or paint what you see, the way you see it. Behind the speed and confidence of a beautiful line in a line drawing there’s years of—usually—discipline, obsession, practice that builds on a foundation of natural talent or inclination of course. It’s like sport. A sentence can be like that. Language is like that. It takes a while to become yours, to listen to you, to obey you, and for you to obey it. I have a clear memory of language swimming towards me. Of my willing it out of the water. Of it being blurred, inaccessible, inchoate… and then of it emerging. Sharply outlined, custom-made.