Beyonce

Good morning, folks! Here's all the feminist and feminist-adjacent news on our radar this fine morning.

• Who says online activism doesn't get results? Reebok has dropped Rick Ross as a spokesperson in the wake of his rapey lyrical outing on the track "U.O.E.N.O." The company's statement reads, in part, "While we do not believe that Rick Ross condones sexual assault, we are very disappointed he has yet to display an understanding of the seriousness of this issue or an appropriate level of remorse." [TMZ] 

• With the capital murder trial of former abortion provider Kermit Gosnell now underway in Philadelphia, Women's Law Project looks at how Pennsylvania's longstanding attitudes toward legal abortion made it possible for Gosnell's crimes to go unreported for so long. [Women's Law Project]

• In a rare move for the fashion industry, the summer lookbook for U.K. high-street clothier Debenhams features models who are plus-size, older than 40, of different races, and, in one case, a Paralympian. Hopefully, this won't be a one-off move. [Refinery29]

• Now that the likes of Beyoncé and Nicki Minaj have embraced it, has the word "ratchet" become a compliment? Insert side-eye here. [The Cut]

• If all you know about children's singer Raffi is that he's responsible for that infernal "Baby Beluga" song, time to get reacquainted: In the wake of Canadian teen Rehtaeh Parsons's suicide, he's using Twitter to speak out against rape culture and bullying. [ThinkProgress]

• Pro-choice fans of Edensoy milk, better start looking for an alternative: Eden Foods founder and CEO Michael Potter is trying to impose his sex-is-for-babies beliefs on the company's employees, suing the Obama administration to protest its mandate to cover contraception for workers. [Salon]

• Connie Britton will play the love interest of Girls' Adam Driver in the ensemble film This Is Where I Leave You, a flip of the typical May-December romance setup that definitely counts as exciting and mold-busting Hollywood news. Also in the film: Tina Fey, Jason Bateman, and Jane Fonda. Stoke your anticipation with the book, which is awesome.

As ever, share your own fave reads from this week in the comments!

 

We live in an era where anyone can increasingly curate their own personas, even us “normals” as 30 Rock's Jenna Maroney would say. Any nobody with the internet can create and filter the public perception of their personality, but of course this self-conscious curation is most obvious with pop stars—Lizzy Grant turned into Lana Del Rey, Christian pop singer Katy Perry became whipped-cream-loving pop superstar Katy Perry. 

No one is better at this than Beyoncé. With Life Is But a Dream—the documentary directed, written and produced by Beyoncé herself that aired on HBO this weekend—Beyoncé appeared to give fans an intimate peek into her life while actually delivering, of course, a carefully constructed portrait.

The film is a mishmash of home videos, selfie Photobooth confessional videos (always sans makeup and looking flawless) and more typical documentary style video. It’s not completely linear—it’s more like you are watching a collage, a scrapbook of moments in Beyoncé’s life.

 

We all love Beyoncé. It’s practically engrained in our cultural fabric at this point. But what about Beyoncé’s incredibly talented, sorely underappreciated younger sister, Solange?

While Beyoncé crafts incredible mainstream pop, Solange has created an EP, True, that draws from the mainstream and places it in the margins. True is a refreshing, stripped-down take on what we’ve become accustomed to in pop music. And I’m not the only one who thinks so; True ended up on many year-end lists and Solange is currently touring with sold out shows and snagged the cover of the February/March issue of Fader.

I want the Knowles sisters to take over pop culture. Judging from this EP, I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.

Welcome to the latest installment of Ms. Opinionated, in which readers have questions about the pesky day-to-day choices we all face, and I give advice about how to make ones that (hopefully) best reflect our shared commitment to feminist values—as well as advice on what to do when they don't. This week, how to be the perfect feminist by accepting you're not the perfect feminist.

Dear Ms. Opinionated,

As a feminist I am always trying to stay up to date on news, research and blogs like Bitch. Lately, though, I have been feeling very muddled. I vocally criticize objectification of women in TV and movies, yet I am a huge fan of artists like Beyoncé and Rihanna who are marketed as sex symbols. I go on about the lack of coverage and opportunities for female athletes but I rarely watch women's sports myself. I tell my friends not to worry about their weight, but I get upset when I put on a few pounds. I confront sexual harassers on the street yet my sexual fantasies often involve domination by men. I tell myself that everyone is feminist in their own way, but it also seems that most activists and websites espouse a "right" way to be feminist. I can't help feeling that I am doing it wrong or not enough. How do I (and other women reading) reconcile all of these contradictions?

Sports pundits are still be trying to make yesterday’s Super Bowl all about the actual game (and yes, that 108-yard touchdown was pretty impressive), but let’s be honest with ourselves—the real winner of the game was Beyoncé’s halftime performance. And not just because she didn’t lip sync or because of the holograms, but because of the fact that for the first time in recent memory, women of color were the main focus of the show. Women who could dance. Women who could sing. Women who could play instruments with sparks shooting out of them. 

And yet, still, predictably and sadly, there are people (many of them women) who want to make the show about the fact that Queen Bey wasn’t wearing saggy denims and an ill-fitting University of Somewhere sweatshirt. Instead, she wore a dominatrix-esque boydsuit that got rapidly smaller as the performance progressed. In a thread on the Binders Full Of Women Facebook community, the slut-shaming began with a speed that could make Oreo’s head spin.

It was a strip-tease! Why do women always have to be taking off their clothes! This does nothing to advance the position of women because there was too much skin visible!

Really? Didn’t we just have this conversation like a week ago when she was on the cover of GQ?

Men’s magazines are dubious during the best of times, but so far 2013 is bringing out their worst. Last week, eyebrows were raised by this flimsy GQ profile of Beyoncé Knowles, where author Amy Wallace says Bey's “as hot as fish grease.” This week, the same eyebrows are hitting the ceiling over Esquire’s bizarre, condescending profile of Megan Fox, in which Stephen “Victim of Feminine Contempt” Marche simultaneously exalts and pities Fox for her “bombshell” good looks.

Welcome to the first proper installment of RetroPop! A blog in which I, your humble guest writer, bring together my loves for the Billboard Hot 100 and bodacious bits from female artists of the past. It’s all based on my argument that lady-related pop messages of today are no less worthy than pop messages from the canon of women artists throughout history, and that by comparing them a bit maybe we can have some fun and give today’s female pop stars a bit more cred in the process. (Possibly making us "thinking girls" feel less guilty about bustin’ a move to Beyoncé? Added benefit.)

Today, in this first true demonstration of the RetroPop mashup style, we’ll take a look at some parallels between Carly Rae Jepsen’s dancelicious song of the summer, “Call Me Maybe,” and my favorite Jane Austen novel, good old Pride & Prejudice (P&P).

Considering how restrictive so much kinky clothing is, when does sexy cross the line into sexist? Is shoe-horning oneself into corsets, latex or agonizingly high heels just part of fetishism, or is it just another way in which the female body is molded and manipulated? Today, I'm peeling back the PVC to find out...

This has been another week! Here's what we've been reading.

• s.e. smith weighs in on the tragic shooting in Colorado this morning, asking why we blame "crazy" people for acts of violence. [xoJane]
• Check out this awesome and super insightful dialogue on the intersections of race and feminism and more! [Tiger Beatdown]
• Oh, I'm cringing right now. Longtime Google executive, and new CEO of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, believes in equal rights, and that women are just as capable, if not more capable than men in many dimensions, but doesn't identify as a feminist because she doesn't have "militant drive" and a chip on her shoulder??? Get with it, Marissa! Where the heck would you even be right now without feminism? These "opportunities" for women you speak of weren't just handed to us. [Feministing]
• Mike Le discusses frustrations with the lack of Asian and Asian American characters in Joss Whedon's shows. [Racebending]
• This week in Olympic athlete discrimination: Highest ranked Olympic weightlifter Sarah Robles can't get sponsored because she doesn't fit the model athlete image? Well, she's got one sponsor, but still, come on! [Slate]
• Megan Dietz tackles issues around weight obsession, diet culture, and all sorts of things that plague societal standards of beauty and body image. And BBC's global weight calculator is certainly not helping the matter. [The Hairpin/BBC]
• Uh oh, Slate's advice columnist, Emily Yoffe (Dear Prudence) isn't giving very sound advice, and frankly, just comes off as totally rude and condescending. "Stop acting like a parody of a gender-studies course catalog and start acting like a loving wife." Seriously? Drunk sex is not always consensual sex, and nonconsensual sex is rape. Point blank. [In These Times]
• Hooray! VIDA – Women in Literary Arts recently launched their blog! [HER KIND]
• Healthy San Francisco, the city's health insurance program for uninsured residents, to remove its trans exclusions. One step closer to trans inclusive healthcare everywhere! [Bay Area Reporter]
• And just because I'm a little obsessed, you should look at this side by side comparison of this young fan's shot-by-shot recreation of Beyoncé's "Countdown." It is actually perfect. [Videogum]
• Portland update: The Portland Queer Music Festival is this weekend! Come for the music, stay for the queers!

What have you been reading, musing, raging, or raving about? Share your thoughts in the comments!

When Beyoncé took a stand for all "single ladies," no one in my then-same-sex relationship had as of yet put any rings on anything and I was pretty happy about that.

After thoughtful and difficult conversations, however, my person and I agreed on a compromise: I came around to the romantic angle and legal benefits of marriage, and my person agreed to completely re-inventing every wedding tradition that I found problematic.

Then came the issue of the ring.