I Could Be Your Hero, Baby

I’m up to my ears in research paper-writing, so this will be quick and probably very scattered, but this article from Newsweek brought up several interesting points, I thought. 

First of all, I really like Rachel Maddow and watch her show whenever I can–she may represent a younger generation, as the article implies, but not in the annoying way that that description so often hints at. She’s not self-impressed, she’s not too over the top. She’s really intelligent, quick on her feet, and just really warm and engaging, but not in a way that allows her guests to walk all over her. I still find it somehow strangely thrilling to watch Maddow, who, as the article states is a self-described “butch dyke” having a friendly, respectful back and forth with crotchety old Pat Buchanan, the man who once tried to get a New York Gay Pride Parade canceled and wrote in a syndicated column that women are “”simply not endowed by nature with the same measures of single-minded ambition and the will to succeed in the fiercely competitive world of Western capitalism.” Of course I know that they are both civilized adults and it’s not exactly Nobel Prize worthy for them to be able to hold a conversation. But they seem to genuinely like each other and whenever I catch them bantering back and forth, I can’t help it…it warms my cold, cold heart a little bit.

Anyway, the first interesting thing that the Newsweek article mentioned was the question: “how does a liberal, left-leaning “Rachel Maddow Show” behave when a left-leaning president is elected?” I am sure MSNBC and Rachel Maddow with it will be just fine. But, it is sort of an interesting and somewhat unfortunate consequence of having a two-party system that whenever one party is in power, the opposition party strengthens and with it the media that are more closely aligned with that party. The Republicans have proven particularly adept at exacerbating this phenomenon, with such fallacious constructions as “liberal media bias.” One of the most fascinating books I’ve read in the past few years was “Blinded By the Right,” David Brock’s sociopolitical autobiography about his decades spent toiling for the far right media machine and his political conversion (spurred, interestingly, by his research for a would-be smear book on Hillary Clinton…long story short, he ended up kind of liking her). Anyway, the book is really fascinating in its belly-of-the-beast perspective of the world of conservative journalism and politics in the 1980s and 90s and one of the things he talks about is the rhetoric which is so skillfully employed by the right. This idea of a liberal bias in the media is one specific example he discusses, but more on that another time.

The other thing that struck me about the Rachel Maddow article was her assertion that she has no idols, no heroes. She says that “If you’re 35, you don’t have heroes. Watergate and Vietnam sort of killed heroism.” It’s interesting to hear that because I actually think that my generation, which is less than one generation behind Maddows, is pathologically obsessed with heroes and heroism to the point that I think we’ve forgotten what that word means. If 35 year olds had Watergate and Vietnam, my generation has, well, for starters more or less everything about the Reagan administration and the Gulf War, if you keep going to the young kids today, they have 9/11, Iraq…but for my generation and the next, we haven’t abandoned heroism, we cling to it–we seek it out, desperately.  I say “we” slightly disingenuously. The whole “heroism” thing makes me a bit uncomfortable. The word is so liberally applied that its meaning has been more or less obliterated. One reason I’ve never been able to bring myself to watch the show “Heroes” (even though I love Kristen Bell) is because the show is not about heroes–it’s about superheroes, and that is not the same thing, and I find calling the show “Heroes” misleading and annoying. Maybe this is a personal pet peeve, but I think there’s something about the coverage of “heroes” that doesn’t make sense. A fundamental part of “heroism” has always been doing something incredibly selfless and not seeking any recognition for it. And I think the second part of that description is very important. If Peter Parker had gone around in the streets being like “guess what I did last night!” and then gone on Oprah to cry it out in front of a studio audience, he wouldn’t have been a hero. He would have been a jerk with special powers. So, when I see “heroes” who do something legitimately amazing and then go around on the talk show circuit and rehash the story a hundred times, it sort of cheapens the whole thing, makes a spectacle out of something which should have been a private moment of human triumph, bravery, connection, love, or whatever. Interestingly, I now find myself back to that idea of the media and modern narcissism I was talking about the other day. In fact, I think Montana Miller’s words are completely apropos in this context as well–”If it’s not recorded or documented, then it doesn’t even seem worthwhile. For today’s generation, it might seem, ‘what’s the point of doing it if everyone isn’t going to see it?’”

Cease and Desist

The mainstream media’s seemingly endless barrage of banality with regard to First Lady fashion continues in the latest of a long string of articles devoted to dissecting the style choices of First Ladies past and present (in this case, Hillary Clinton, Laura Bush, and Michelle Obama). To read this article, one would think that Michelle Obama’s choice of gown for the upcoming Inaugural Ball was actually a key policy issue worthy of the review of an emergency lame duck session of Congress (or at least an audience vote on Dancing With the Stars). The thing is, if Michelle Obama loves clothes, that’s great. There’s nothing wrong with that and I’m not saying she shouldn’t. I just don’t understand why it was newsworthy in the first place, let alone after dozens if not hundreds of articles have meticulously dissected every fashion choice this woman makes, drawing sweeping sociological, psychological, and political conclusions from the color of a dress or the shape of a neckline.

This particular article quotes Mandi Norwood, former editor in chief of Shop Etc., who is now writing a style guide directed at Michelle Obama. Ms. Norwood says, “Most previous first ladies have appeared to believe that displaying an interest in fashion and style undermines the importance of their role. They’ve subscribed to the old-fashioned view that a woman should de-sexualize herself or dress like a man if she wants to be regarded as intelligent and of good conscience.” While I know looks and fashion can be a double-edged sword for women in the way Norwood is describing, she seems to discount another obvious possibility–maybe some of them just don’t care that much about it. Sure, Hillary Clinton definitely toned down her femininity while running for President, but as First Lady, it seems to me that her style choices were mostly not very premeditated–she just had other priorities. And the thing is, there should be nothing wrong with either Hillary Clinton’s lack of interest in fashion or Michelle Obama’s apparent love of it. Norwood’s comments almost seem to hint that any woman who doesn’t embrace fashion must be purposefully denying her womanhood and sexuality out of some old fashioned sensibility about roles for women. It’s pretty ludicrous to suggest that Hillary Clinton of all people, a woman who came pretty close to being President and is about to be named Secretary of State, is mired in antiquated ideas about gender roles.

As much as I believe that it’s perfectly fine for a strong, modern woman to be interested in fashion like Michelle Obama, I also think it’s equally fine for a strong, modern woman not to be, without people suggesting that she’s trying to deny her womanhood or desexualize herself. That’s what real empowerment is about–choices, and embracing the reality that womanhood and femininity are not monolithic concepts.

Quick Follow Up

Jezebel has a really thoughtful, interesting write-up of the teen’s webcam suicide I wrote about yesterday (“Virtual In-Vanity“). The Jezebel piece focuses more on the the mentality of the online audience, but also touches on some of the themes of exhibitionism and performativity of actors in the online world as well, writing “There is a loneliness and a patheticism that comes with such a thing; for every person trying to be an internet star, there are five or six just trying to be noticed by somebody, anybody at all.” The piece goes on to quote Montana Miller, a professor of popular culture at Bowling Green University, who talks about the “generational desire to live in the most public way possible,” saying “If it’s not recorded or documented then it doesn’t even seem worthwhile. For today’s generation it might seem, `What’s the point of doing it if everyone isn’t going to see it?’”

Virtual In-Vanity

This heartbreaking and very disturbing story on CNN about a Florida teenager who committed suicide on his live webcam while viewers egged him on and chatted back and forth about whether he would succeed got me thinking about the ways the internet has changed and continues to change reality and human interaction. My first reaction, besides revulsion, was that there seems to be something strangely antithetical about committing suicide in such a public, dialogic forum. Suicide seems to me the ultimate act of hopelessness, of isolation and disconnection, from other people and from the world around you. I think it’s a fascinating commentary on our mediated world that, even in death, the only thing that, as the saying goes, everyone does alone, this poor kid’s behavior demonstrated the kind of performative, outwardly-focused presentational awareness, a narcissism of sorts that characterizes so much of online social interaction.

I was talking to a friend yesterday who is working on a project dealing with Myspace, specifically Myspace comments (the messages Myspace “friends” leave each other on their profile walls) as an exemplification of this same sort of online narcissism, and it reminded me of this story, which I’d just read. I’ve never used Myspace, but have been on Facebook for years and I’ve seen this mutual narcissism/voyeurism steadily growing within that space. In the relatively early days of Facebook when I first joined, users had only the comparatively limited forum of the Facebook profile to personalize with such information as your dating status, home town, religious beliefs, favorite music, and an open-ended blurb called “about me”. At the time I remember being a little embarrassed to post such things as my political views and favorite activities for all to see. Part of me enjoyed being able to craft an image for myself, to see some kind of a skeletal, one-dimensional version of me cohesively represented in a little box–neat, clean, definite, and much simpler and more easily digestible than the three-dimensional reality of my life. Especially as a somewhat shy, reserved person, I think I relished the chance to let the profile represent me to people better than I felt I might be able to. At the same time, I did feel a vague sense of embarrassment, the same embarrassment, in fact, that kept me from starting a blog for years–the feeling that there was something incredibly presumptuous in assuming that anyone would want to hear what I thought or know a bunch of random information about me.

Over the years, I’ve had that feeling again and again as Facebook has become more pervasive, providing an ever greater variety of  ways to exhibit one’s self publicly–photo albums and video, all kinds of “applications” which let you, for instance, display a map showing everywhere in the world you’ve been or a little box that shows your friends what music you’re listening to at that very minute. Most recently came the “news feed”, a somewhat creepy feature which aids and abets the stalker in all of us by showing us a running list of all of our friends’ most recent facebook actions–who just changed their “relationship status”, who wrote on whose wall, who became friends with whom, etc. At the same time, Facebook also added the “status message” feature which allows users to post a short message, which informs their “friends” of their current whereabouts, feelings, or plans. It took me a long time to come around to the status message. Something about writing into a window which forced me to discuss myself in the third person was just too much for me. But, even that has come to seem much more normal to me and I will probably even put the link to this post up in my status message after I finish writing. At least in my personal experience and observation, it seems to me that the internet continues to facilitate ever-greater potential for narcissism and self-display. Other forms of media certainly encode these values as well, but I think it is the internet’s participatory and productive elements that reify messages by allowing individuals who were primarily consumers of these values previously to become producers and reproducers of them as well.

Keep Your Brands Off My Country

Expanding upon my post, “Notes on a Scandal” from a few days ago, I want to point your attention to another incredibly relevant, well written argument on the effects of commercialization and drive for profit on media. If this is a topic that you’re interested in, check out Robert McChesney’s Rich Media, Poor Democracy: Communication Politics in Dubious Times. I haven’t read the whole thing yet but what I’ve read so far is an accessible, clearly articulated case for greater media regulation which looks at the micro and macro level of the current media landscape, arguing that the media is fundamentally shaped by commercial interests in a number of pervasive ways.

While I’m on the topic, this CNN headline (“Obama Poised to Rebrand America, Experts Say”) caught my eye yesterday. The article discusses the work Obama seems poised to do toward restoring the United States’ standing in the world. I thought the choice of the word “rebrand” was incredibly interesting, especially since I’d just written my blog post about the overpowering encroachment of commercial mentalities and agendas into the news media. Though this article wasn’t about politics, exactly, seeing “Obama” and “branding” in such proximity made me think about a theme that crossed my mind often over the course of this election cycle– the idea of branding as an absolutely crucial element of politics. This is particularly evident during election cycles and I think one reason for Obama’s great success was his and his team’s incredible understanding of this fact and mastery at establishing a compelling, cohesive, appealing brand. Of course, I think for the most part, Obama’s branding did not represent false advertising–I really believe he is the real deal, a product of the highest quality, to continue the metaphor. But it’s certainly undeniable that his ability to create a narrative, a rallying call, a multi-platform, modern, stylish media campaign, was one of the keys to his campaign’s success.

I’m sometimes fascinated to think of what Presidential campaigning must have been like a hundred, even two hundred years ago. It’s almost incomprehensible. And it’s certainly interesting to think about how the media saturation not only changes the face of politics, particularly electoral politics, but how it changes the profile of who can be successful in the political arena and how that success is achieved. I wonder–do we know more about our candidates and politicians now that every little detail of their platforms and their personal lives is constantly dissected and redissected, ad infinitum, or is it possible that what Pat Aufderheide calls the “media smog” actually makes it more difficult to see the forest for the trees, more difficult to discern the truth as we are inundated with ever more information?

Ummm…

Hey, wait a minute! I didn't know Dana Carvey did a Hillary Clinton impression...

CNN is currently illustrating their front page top headline about Hillary Clinton’s possible- looking- more- likely- all- the- time- just- go- ahead- and- announce- it- already- why- don’t- you appointment as Obama’s Secretary of State with this picture. Seriously, people, in the past 6 months there have probably been literally millions of pictures taken of this woman–are you honestly going to tell me this was the best one you could find? Looks like someone on the night desk is getting payoff checks from Bill O’Reilly…

Note: I’m changing the title of this post–the words “Do Not Want!” above Hillary Clinton’s picture gave an impression I wasn’t going for!

Notes on a Scandal

Speaking of scandal, I think it's pretty scandalous that this guy ever became President of the United States

In the new issue of The Indypendent, writer Arun Gupta discusses the mainstream political media’s obsession with scandal. In his piece, “Scandalicious: Why Political Reporting Feasts on Drama and Trivia”, Gupta argues that scandal-mongering is a cash cow for corporate, mainstream media and that this explains the aggressiveness and frequency with which scandals are pushed on media audiences. This part of the argument doesn’t seem very groundbreaking or controversial–my guess is most people who have any degree of awareness about media consumption have some understanding of this. 

Gupta argues that this scandal-mongering continues despite the fact that a recent survey about the election campaign showed that “77% of voters wanted to hear more about the candidates’ positions on the issues.” I’m a little skeptical of this. I don’t doubt that the figure is accurate, that 77% of voters did state their desire to hear more straightforward policy talk on the news. I don’t even necessarily doubt that 77% truly felt this way. But I do know that there is a lot of evidence to show that people’s stated preferences and their actual television viewing habits are often widely divergent. Scandal is compelling–more so the more salacious it is. That’s human nature and that’s exactly why it’s so lucrative for media conglomerates. Most viewers can’t help themselves (er, ourselves), even if their stated wish is for more substance and less fluff and misdirection.

Gupta’s goes on to discusses scandal-mongering and sensationalism in the specific context of the election. He argues that the media’s obsession with drumming up scandal, and the public’s obsession with gobbling it up are not inevitable. He claims that if the public became more politically aware, better educated about politics, history, and economics, that in-depth, investigative journalism would be able to grab more of the market share and, at least to some degree, replace tabloid-y political reporting with more issues-based, fact-based content. I agree with him for the most part, but I’d like to play the devil’s advocate a little bit with his argument. I do believe that improving our education system, particularly in the areas mentioned in the article, would contribute to a more informed public and that it might give to a higher level of journalistic accountability and a demand for more issues-based content. I’m just not sure that it is necessarily as simple as Gupta makes it sound.

I’m thinking of Laurie Ouellette’s 2003 article “TV Viewing as Good Citizenship? Political Rationality, Enlightened Democracy and PBS“. In this article, Ouellette explores the ideas of media and democracy (specifically in the context of PBS) and issues encountered by reformers trying to broaden the audience of more elevated, fact and discourse based, politically and socially aware programming, to expand democratic engagement and counteract what were perceived as the corrupting, inferior, lowbrow forces of much commercial television. She explores issues of class and normative, elitist assumptions about what constitutes elevated, worthwhile, intelligent public discourse. Ouellette not only discusses why these efforts failed to achieve their intended goal, she also points out that all media content, including, and in some ways especially, more high-brow, intellectual content is fraught with many normative assumptions and dynamics of power. In fact, she argues that it is often a fine line between participatory democracy and social control, for historical, politicical, and economic education and discourse inherently contain a particular world view and require the acceptance of “an aesthetic and political order governed by higher authority” (Ouellette, 120).

Gupta also fails to take into account another form of education that might render profound changes in the media landscape were it more widely incorporated into U.S. schools–media literacy education. This is a field I’ve been learning more and more about, one which helps children (and adults) build the critical and interpretive skills and awareness of the multitude of media of all forms each of us consumes daily. Media literacy tends to be structured in such a way that it focuses on broader analytic tools and seeks to foster a greater sense of awareness and healthy skepticism of all media content. Programs around the country, and around the world, have shown remarkable success at introducing a broadly applicable sense of critical awareness and sense of empowerment to children across the socioeconomic spectrum, giving them the skills not only to process the media they ingest differently, but to actively participate in the creation of their own media of various forms.

Part of me thinks maybe the issue should not be framed as either/or, but as both/and. Sure, scandal-mongering journalism should not dominate the public discourse as it currently does, but I wonder if any amount of education or heightened awareness of the constructed, commercialized nature of media will fundamentally change the fact that people love salacious, scandalous stories. I’m very media-aware and I still find it very difficult to resist a good scandal sometimes, whether it’s Britney Spears’ latest meltdown or Sarah Palin’s latest gaffe. I could resist if I wanted to, but sometimes I simply don’t. I don’t think that’s a reflection on a lack of political, social, or historical knowledge–I think it’s mostly just human nature, the same instinct that makes people gawk at a car accident, the fascination, the obsessive curiosity about the fortunes and misfortunes of our fellow human beings. Of course I think it’s incredibly important to be informed about history and politics, to be media literate and aware. That knowledge gives you a broader awareness and understanding of the significance of the choices you’re making as a consumer of media and as a citizen. It empowers you and gives you the tools to advocate for the change you want to see in the media. But while I’d love to see more “serious”, fact-based, investigative types of journalism take center stage, a part of me also hopes there will still be room in the spectrum for a little bit of scandal.

Quantum of Silverman

A little addition to my earlier post (“Quantum of Bias“) about sexism in the new James Bond movie–the latest issue (December 2008) of Harper’s Bazaar magazine features a photo shoot entitled “Bond. Jane Bond.” In which Sarah Silverman plays the role of Bond in a sort of tongue in cheek spoof of the archetype. I don’t want to make any arguments that this subverts any of the stereotypes I discussed in my original post or changes the discourse in any meaningful way–I don’t think it does. More than anything, it’s just silly. On some level I think the argument could be made that spoofing the archetype with Silverman as Bond highlights the strong element of the ridiculous inherent in the Bond movies. But I don’t think I’m even willing to go that far. After all, I definitely don’t think Harper’s Bazaar tends to operate on the level of subversive social/cultural commentary when conceiving ideas for fashion spreads. But in any case, you can look at the photos here.

The Tipping Point?

Apropos of nothing: Why is mainstream media so obsessed with giving every issue and topic its own special catch phrase and graphic?

Tina Brown’s newest project, the news blog The Daily Beast, today published the findings of a poll they conducted post-election looking at a broad array of issues pertaining to attitudes and opinions about women, politics, and the media. The poll, conducted with a group of 1000 men and women voters from across the political spectrum, reflects a lot of interesting disparities between the attitudes and beliefs of women and men as well as between younger and older women about whether and to what extent women face unequal treatment, particularly in the media. It also explored attitudes about women in power and their abilities to provide effective leadership, compared to men.

The official report of the findings, entitled  The Barrier That Didn’t Fall , does not break down the results along gender or other demographic lines, which is unfortunate because many of the most interesting findings have to do with the gaps that appear to exist between men’s and women’s perceptions of these issues. Fortunately, The Daily Beast included some of these results in their write-up of the poll results.

The study found that the women polled overwhelmingly felt that women receive unfair treatment by the media as well as in politics, in the workplace and in the armed forces. In fact, 61% of women agreed with the idea that there is a gender bias in the media, compared to only 19% who did not and fully 72% agreed that women were being treated unfairly in politics. Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, and Michelle Obama were all considered role models by the women in the survey and a whopping 85% agreed that a female President would bring valuable qualities to the office that most male candidates lack, rejecting the notion of women as too weak to effectively govern. Finally, 70% of women contended that candidates’ physical appearances and attributes are not a legitimate topic of discussion.

Several interesting facts complicate these numbers. First of all, older women seemed to feel more strongly about gender disparities and media treatment of women, including women in politics, than did younger women. This is not a huge surprise to me, though I continue to find it frustrating and at least somewhat counterintuitive. While I was at NOW last year, I had many discussions with people about the generational divisions within the feminist movement, and even witnessed the phenomenon firsthand, to a limited extent. I think  a lot of second-wave feminists still tend to understand women’s activism through the lens of the movement as it was in the ’60’s and ’70’s, and feel in some sense that the younger generation of feminists, my generation, take for granted many of the things for which they worked so hard. Meanwhile, younger feminists sometimes look at these older guard of feminists as out of touch with the current realities and issues emerging and reshaping the movement and the new avenues through which activism in the 21st century often occurs. I think part of the issue has to do with this changing face of activism– what it means to be an activist, how one asserts their views and opinions in a constructive way and how a social movement enacts change most effectively. So, while I think there is some element of apathy in many young people today (as there is, I think, with every generation), which is reflected in this survey and should certainly be actively worked on and counteracted, it seems to me that it’s often greatly over-emphasized or misunderstood. I think there is some amount of mutual generational misunderstanding that manifests itself in feminist activism and ends up being a divisional and counterproductive force within the movement.

Speaking of feminist activism, perhaps the most shocking (to me) statistic the poll results presented, though it probably shouldn’t have been, was the fact that only 20% of women surveyed would describe themselves as feminists. Even more shocking, only 17% would want a daughter to consider herself a feminist. Wow. I don’t really understand what it is about that little word that scares people in this country so intensely, but it does. Pat Robertson said at the 1992 Republican Convention, “The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians” and this archetype seems to be so deeply ingrained that even women whose lives exemplify the ideals of feminism often resist the label. I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard a woman say “I believe in women’s equality, but I’m not a feminist.”

Another disturbing set of findings of the poll were the disparities between men’s and women’s attitudes toward these issues. The men in the survey rejected the notion that a media bias against women existed, though they agreed that gender biases do exist in the realms of politics and the workplace. 40% of the men surveyed openly admitted to feeling sexist attitudes toward the idea of a woman President with about the same percentage contending that a male is “naturally more suited” to carrying out the duties of the highest office. There was also some disparity between women’s and men’s perceptions of equality in the home. While there was a more or less even split among women on whether they thought women in the US were treated equally in the home, the men surveyed contended by a 2/1 margin that no gender inequality existed in the home.

This poll presents so much raw data, it’s a little difficult to draw a single cohesive conclusion from it. But I agree with The Daily Beast’s analysis that the overwhelmingly negative and frustrated attitudes of the women in the survey towards the treatment of women in the media and politics as well as in the workplace, the military, and to some extent even in the home, suggests the potential for a revitalization of the women’s equality movement. I felt that kind of energy building tremendously during Hillary Clinton’s candidacy in a way I’ve never before felt so manifestly in my lifetime and while there were some that felt disillusioned by her loss of the nomination, I don’t think that energy I felt just vanished with Clinton’s capitulation. I don’t think it will by any means be a quick or straightforward process to give widespread, cohesive form to the broad frustrations expressed by the women in this survey, or to channel these feelings into constructive action, but I do believe that now is a crucial moment to try to do so. To put it in the most trite way possible, organizations and movements of reform and change need to strike while the iron is hot, while the treatment of Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama and Sarah Palin is still fresh in people’s minds and while these issues still have people fired up and ready for change.

Brick Collage

I started this blog to coincide with my master’s degree studies in media studies and, in choosing the name “Bricolage” for it’s title, I implied my intention to incorporate a diverse range of topics, ideas, media, and thoughts. So far, I realize, I’ve been primarily focusing on women’s issues, particularly issues of women in the media. While this is a main interest for me and one of the focuses I hope to bring to my graduate studies, and to this blog, I do intend and hope to broaden this forum to include many other things. This week, and probably for the next few weeks, though, I’m incredibly busy with school work and haven’t had the time or creativity to find or write about a broad range of issues. I enjoy writing about women’s issues and so I’ve been going with that. And I’ll certainly continue to do so. But, I’m also looking forward to eventually making this more of a proper “bricolage”–a thing constructed, somewhat haphazardly, from a variety of diverse sources, using multiple methods, dictated by what is available and what can be made to work, even in unexpected, new ways.

Anyway, carry on.