Yay for JJJ!!
After visiting newborn baby Jade at the hospital yesterday, I had to struggle through peak hour traffic but the journey was far less arduous for the triple J interview on Hack. This US chick called Ariel Levy was interviewed in relation to her new book “Female Chauvinst Pigs: Women And The Rise Of Porn Culture” (http://slate.msn.com/id/2126570/entry/2126575/#ContinueArticle) and another Australian woman, Anna Brownfield, (erotic film maker/ uni lecturer) contributed some commentary about the issues.
It was more pertinent to the American situation but still of relevance here too. Anyway, they talked about the impact of Britney - the sexy virgin - and Paris - the gal who answers the phone during sex cos she’s so into it - as templates of this performance oriented sexiness that was actually devoid of substance like sexual feeling. Kissing other girls for the shock value and not cos it actually is enjoyable for the individual girl. These are teenage girls who service the boys with head jobs and don’t get any back for themselves. So much for the sexual revolution…
It was such a funny discussion as the issue is so fraught with paradox and contradiction and I myself find it very hard to articulate the barrage of feelings and impressions of pop culture sexuality. Women deserve genuine sexual empowerment but the public realm expression becomes so dodgy in an environment where the misogynist whore/virgin dichotomy is alive and well. Beyond anything else, the public expression/exploration of sexuality is such an individual and subtle thing but its homogenized commodification in the mainstream sometimes makes me despair of the whole endeavour at times. Muslim women have some edge on us - all they have to do when they get home is take off their veil, show off their mane and they are sexy. What does a women need to do in this culture to be sexy??
We all want to beautiful, to be sexy, to be desireable and special but not to denigrated or worried about how we would come across. Our culture has a lot of boundary issues. Very concerning to hear that 9 billion $$ is spent in the US on sex education “just so no” abstinence classes. No wonder they have the biggest teen pregnancy rate in the developed world. We are moving in the religious right direction unfortunately and have no room to be complacent.
It was just synchronicity when I got home and saw Chrissie Amphlett interviewed on The 7:30 Report. (http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2005/s1491503.htm) She wrote such vulnerable yet provocative songs about sexuality and yet she exploded with such rage and anger. She wanted to present sexuality but didn’t want to be reduced in the mind of the audience as being a pushover slut. She personifies the contradiction of female sexuality perfectly. She has just released her autobiography.
So that’s 2 books I shall have my eye out for!