Mysogyny

"Bitch Is The New Black" squealed Tina Fey on SNL and this black feminist didn't find it at all funny. Actually, I thought the squeal had a tinge to white supremacy in it.

So now we have Marie Cocco at the Washington Post saying this :

Most of all, I will not miss the silence.

I will not miss the deafening, depressing silence of Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean or other leading Democrats, who to my knowledge (with the exception of Sen. Barbara Mikulski of Maryland) haven't publicly uttered a word of outrage at the unrelenting, sex-based hate that has been hurled at a former first lady and two-term senator from New York. Among those holding their tongues are hundreds of Democrats for whom Clinton has campaigned and raised millions of dollars. Don Imus endured more public ire from the political class when he insulted the Rutgers University women's basketball team.

Would the silence prevail if Obama's likeness were put on a tap-dancing doll that was sold at airports? Would the media figures who dole out precious face time to these politicians be such pals if they'd compared Obama with a character in a blaxploitation film? And how would crude references to Obama's sex organs play?

Not all black and/or colored people in this country believed the very black OJ Simpson was "not guilty" in the death of his very white ex-wife, Nicole Brown. I believe he conspired to kill the mother of his children. I also believe was physically involved in the scene of the crime --if not during, then after the deed was done. Even though I believe he got away with murder in ways more Shakespearean that I would care to count, what I do agree with everybody who says the OJ Simpson murder trial was historic.

First, it gave the common person a closer look at the criminal justice system. It taught more than a few people the nuances of being tried for murder vis a vis manslaughter or homicide. There's no going back to trial once aquitted for murder; a painful realization to the millions who thought trying OJ Simpson on that count was a good idea.

Yet the most important lesson learned by the Simpson trial was how far the United States was socially from the days of "To kill a mockingbird". Why? The OJ Simpson trial proved that money and infuence can indeed a black man a "not guilty" verdict.

Which is why, when I read of Mr. Simpson's being held in a county jail without bail, I couldn't help but feel that justice, although deferred, will finally be served. OJ Simpson is waiting looking down the barrel of 30 years in prison for, of all things, stealing "back" his own football memoribilia from associates he claims were going to sell it without his consent.

Little by little I am getting more media traction and, quite frankly, I am down with that. I am going to post about a TV appearance I made on NY-ABC about two weeks ago but right now I am going to point to you to Farai Chideya's show on NPR, "News and Notes". I was on the show's Blogger Roundtable with Baratunde Thursoton in NYC and Avery Tooley in Washington DC shooting the breeze on the black elite's split between Obama and Hillary, on how Obama is redefining blackness and, more somberly, on the LaVena Johson case.

These 20 minutes are, by far, the funnest I have had in a loooong time. I used to be a voice over artist and, quite frankly, if I had to choose between being in front of a camera or microphone and typing, I would go for the talking --because its easier on the body. And as I said that, I still have my issues when it comes to on-camera work, but that's topic for a whole 'nother post.

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Ugh.

If there ever was a big media juxtapotion of capitalist imperialism and mysogyny this has got to be the one.

This particular portrait haunts me. Not because there is anything wrong with the girl, but because there is everything wrong with making her a piece of exotica.

She may elicit comparisons with the madonnas of the Renaissance; but I feel our Afghani girl was shot to look more like a pre-Raphaelite painting. Check out especially the ladies created by Dante Gabriel Rossetti.

With their dreams of brotherhoods, medievalist fantasies and nymph fetish, the pre-Raphaelites artists can be considered one of the most anti-women aesthetic movements of European. I would like to make the point that it is particularly mysogynist exactly because their style was meant to represent women as precious objects.

So when I look at this ironic juxtaposition at The New York Times, I read it not just as a joke. Looking at it closely it speaks volumes about the way in which Americans not only regard women but 'foreign' or colored women.

Call it the Pier 1 Imports effect.

Anything that is not the 'mainstream' American culture or looks like is treated by the purveyors of 'haute taste' as a commodity, as another tradeable piece of furniture or accessory of interior decor.

What better way to say mom, "I Love You", than to tell her she is a fat and ugly troll that needs to be nipped and tucked if she ever wants her kids to not walk in shame next to her or for her husband to bang the teenage bagger at the Stop 'N Shop.

What: The hot gift this Mother's Day is not a Macy's gift, but gift certificates for enhancements and/or procedures at a plastic surgeon's office.

Daughters and sons want their mothers to recapture the Fountain of Youth and to look like the hot models and actresses that grace magazine covers. In addition to breast augmentations and enhancements, families are vying for their mothers to get microdermabrasions, facial peels, Botox injections and cellulite reductions.

Who: Dr. Stephen Greenberg, one of the leading doctors in the NYC area, is selling a record number of gift certificates to husbands and children for their loved one. Next month, he will be one of the first doctors in the region to offer the new miracle treatment PERLANE (R) that effectively reduces facial fold and wrinkles in a non-invasive procedure. Dr. Greenberg is available for interviews and can also demonstrate the procedures that mothers want in time for their big day. CONTACT: BRUCE LYNN (516) 827-7773

Source: Dr. Stephen Greenberg

Un-effing-believable.

This guy is out in Long Island so that may explain some of the shameless cheerleading of body dysmorphia.

So let me get this straight : Edwards is so-so among the netroots for months on end. He hires two feminist bloggers to help run his online campaign but after they become the targets of mysogynists-are-us The Catholic League, he fires them --and badly, may I add.

So two months after the women were dragged through the mud, somehow the crowds at DailyKos and MyDD find John Edwards to be good enough to be their president?

Matthew Yglesias / Clinton Doomed!:
Jerome Armstrong rounds up online preference polls, revealing the big three going 42/25/13 on dKos, and 43/34/8 on MYDD. In third place, of course, is Bill RIchardson. Barack Obama's in second. And that's John Edwards with the commanding lead. Hillary Clinton's a distant fourth, pulling in three and four percent respectively. She does better in a MoveOn poll -- 11 percent -- that actually places her in fifth behind Dennis Kucinich's surprisingly strong 17 percent. Jerome makes a valiant effort to spin this as demonstrating something other than the netroots being out of touch with general Democratic sentiment, but is good enough to concede that he doesn't "expect Clinton to get blown away with single-digits." And good for him.

Given the brou-ha-ha over Markos' comments about online violence against women, what does it say about the people who have made these two sites the most important online money-makers for the DNC? Or is John Edwards doomed to the same fate that befell his 'netroots' predecessor, Howard Dean?

I am actually surprised that MSNBC has told Imus "allez, out!" I had to check Imus' ratings for the show because, you know it would have made sense if the show was floundering.

Well ... it seems somebody has a spine at MSNBC's parent company, NBC.

The TV Guy reports that Imus' morning simulcast was doing so well, CNN decided to change it's morning anchor line-up to stopgap the ratings blood-bath.

I am still cynical about this whole fiasco, but I'm going to applaud this move by the cable broadcaster. It seems they not only listened to the public uproar but actually follow the advice of key employees in the company. I don't know if Al Roker was one of those employees, but I love what he publish in his post, "Not in my house" :