“I’m the man! I’m the man! I am the man!” ABC’s new show, Man Up, opens with three grown men sitting on couches reassuring each other that they are men, as they coordinate a complex attack on the enemy’s base in an online war game. Television has always commented on what a man should be, how a man should act, and how a man lets the world know, “I’m the man!” In Man Up’s case, it’s through the headset of a video game – showcasing and lamenting the diminished role of physicality and power in today’s man. As a boy grows up, he is molded, shaped and guided by his father, his teachers, his celebrity heroes, and the fictional characters he sees on the small or silver screen. In the case of television writers, they have clearly delineated three paths that young boys can follow: the manchild, the manwhore, and the man as an island.

The manchild or the “pre-adult” has gained a lot of attention with the recent success of the Brat-Pack and Judd Apatow.  But for a long time, television has been glorifying the man who never grew up or smartened up.  In the 1950’s, The Honeymooners premiered with perhaps the biggest manchild ever, Ralph Kramden, whose get-rich-quick schemes always failed. Fifty years later, Ray Barone in Everybody Loves Raymond is literally a manchild unable to move away from his overbearing parents, relying on his mother and wife to clean the house, take care of the kids, and cook dinner.  In both of these cases, and numerous others, the main characters are portrayed as lovable buffoons unable to truly succeed in life, but also as men we can root for and laugh with. Young boys are taught that it’s funny to rely on people and that life is best spent having a good time, playing golf and hanging with the other men at the Raccoon Lodge. Success will come, or it won’t, and everything will be taken care of.

Another trope in the storied history of television is the manwhore, the man who treats women as objects and toys. Recently, there’s no better example than Charlie Harper from Two and a Half Men, who is with a new woman (or sometimes multiple women) every night.  The manwhore character offers intrigue and drama, charisma and seduction, but it also has a darkside. While this season’s new shows like New Girl, 2 Broke Girls and Apartment 23, have been deservedly praised for bringing female comedians to lead roles, the inciting action of each pilot is a man cheating.  In New Girl, Jessica is forced to find new roommates after catching her boyfriend with another woman.  Max in 2 Broke Girls has the same story, and June in Apartment 23 catches her fiancé with her roommate. While it’s nice to see television writers move past the confining gender role of the serious housewife, they continue to push the idea that men are prisoners to their sexual drives and lack the capability to treat women with respect and love. Manwhores live a fun lifestyle that many men dream of, but it leads to broken relationships and betrayal, which happens to not be so fun in the real world. Perhaps if they weren’t so heavily emphasized in the fictional world, real men would dream of following a different path.

As the famous saying goes, “No man is an island.” In the television world, this is true, unless that man is intelligent. While it’s easy to criticize the portrayal of men in television as dimwitted womanizers, that is certainly not always the case. House portrays one of the smartest doctors in the world who handles cases no one else can solve. Numbers showcases a brilliant mathematician, Charlie, who helps solve crimes for the FBI. In Lost, there are numerous smart male leads; Jack is a well-respected doctor and Ben is an all-knowing leader. What these characters all share besides their intelligence is their lack of substantial relationships. House manages to alienate everyone he comes into contact with, Charlie only befriends other intellectuals, Jack has failed romantic relationships both on and off the island, and Ben manipulates everyone and works alone. According to television, if a young man wants to be an academic, he better be ready to be on an island.

When will a well-rounded, charismatic and realistic man appear as a true model for the malleable minds of young men? Perhaps this season: CBS’s new show How to Be a Gentleman holds promise by tackling the role of masculinity and pits two characters against each other vying to be the titular gentleman.

Is it the small, sweater-vest wearing high school nerd with no friends or the bodybuilding, smooth-talking bully that acts like he’s 13?

Then again, perhaps next season.

Image from ABC

From Arlyn:

“If you are: feminist, feminist-leaning, feminist-questioning, queer, homosex, interested in watching an amazing strip tease, curious about creative imaginings of Genesis, wondering what Eden might look like without Adam, a fan of jazz standards, super impressed when people can improv entire plays (or if you simply love Elizabeth Swanson and want to see something she’s created and directed)… GO. WATCH. EDEN. Last show: tomorrow 8-9:30pm.”

Recently, the University announced that they will be banning freshmen in the Class of 2016 and subsequent years from taking part in the “rush” process for Greek organizations. Greek life is not officially recognized by the Princeton administration, but three sororities and eleven fraternities are active on campus and traditionally recruit freshman new members in the fall or early spring of the school year. Currently, it is unclear what form this rush ban will take. Presumably, non-freshman students caught conducting rush processes in which freshmen are involved will be subject to disciplinary action, as will the rushees themselves.

Full disclosure: I am in a Princeton sorority. As a freshman, my experiences in the Greek system at Princeton were unspeakably valuable. I am disappointed that other students will be denied similar experiences in the future, but that is not the main reason I am upset with the impending ban. The University claims that the ban is designed to prevent freshmen from narrowing their circle of friends prematurely, and that it will tackle the noble issue of socioeconomic stratification amongst students along with the sense of social exclusivity and privilege that students who participate in Greek life are assumed to hold. There are some elements of truth here; there are also a number of assumptions being made.

I am personally not convinced that Greek communities truly and irrevocably stratify students by race or class. Inevitably, students who are able to pay Greek dues are those who have access to some sort of disposable income. Princeton accepts a great number of privileged students, and membership in a community that requires some financial contribution reflects this. However, this does not mean that one must be, or should be, from a wealthy family to be a part of Greek life at Princeton. A number of Greek people I know work an extra campus job in order to pay their dues themselves, rather than relying on their families.
As for racial stratification, consider this. Does the administration criticize other student groups who are made up of a certain racial majority, by name or by nature? Consider the Society of Black Engineers, Triple 8, or Naacho. None of these groups discriminate against potential members due to their race, but it’s undeniable that there is a certain racial majority within them. But, because the racial majorities of these groups are non-white, it is not perceived as a problem. I don’t think that Greek life operates under a spoken or unspoken policy of white preference any more than I think PSAT has a policy of South Asian preference.
And then we have gender. By being all-male or all-female, Greek communities exclude those who identify as the “incorrect” gender. However, is this more problematic than Expressions being an all-female dance group, or the Nassoons an all-male a cappella group? There are plenty of co-ed groups, not to mention fraternity-esque societies, that Princeton students can pursue. To attack sororities and frats for being single-sex seems unfair, given the single-sex status of so many other campus groups. So, while I agree that the issues of class and race stratification are much more complex and require a great deal more dialogue, the argument that gender stratification of certain groups is a problem that prevents freshmen from making friends does not resonate with me whatsoever.

Gender, race, and class aside, my problem lies with the message that the administration is sending through their justification of the ban: that freshmen are too naive to make their own decisions regarding their social affiliations. The ban is being packaged as a piece of social justice, for the good of Princeton students. But why do freshmen need this administrative interference, this “protection”? Should an 18-year-old coming to a world-renowned university be treated like a child, or should they be informed and left to make their own decisions?

Yes, freshmen are “fresh” — an 18-year-old does not an emotionally mature adult make.  It is also true that, when it comes to Greek life, getting credible information is very difficult. Part of the mystery lies in the fact that Greek life, by necessity, operates under the radar. I can, from a practical point of view, understand why the administration worries about unsavory elements of Greek life. However, I simply cannot agree with an administrative decision to limit freshmens’ personal choices.

I would hope that Princeton accepts students who they perceive to be young adults, not children. I hope that they accept students who know the difference between right and wrong, who are not afraid to say “no”, who try new things, who broaden their horizons, and who stand up for what they want and what they believe. When it comes to Greek life, the majority of Princeton students do say “no”. To suggest that enough of those who participate in Greek life as freshmen are too young to know better, and would make a different choice if they were forced to wait a year, calls into question the intelligence and decision-making capability of Princeton freshmen.

As an 18-year-old, I needed guidance, and I needed a safety net when things went wrong. The University provided both of those things adequately. What I did not need, and certainly would not have appreciated, was a blanket policy telling me that I was too young to make a choice for myself — that I needed to wait until next year, for my own good. Why? Because I would be unable to withstand certain pressures. Because I could not be trusted to make the right decisions for myself. Because if I made a decision I regretted, I would not be able to extricate myself from the situation. Because I was… a freshman.

Photo from specvthis‘s flickr

Last night, Twitter and various blogs lit up in response to the way Vogue Italia has chosen to title a certain style of earring. (The commotion is a bit belated; it seems the earrings have been online for over two weeks, but comments on the article have more than doubled in the last 24 hours.) The set of women’s earrings are called “Slave Earrings,” which, as you’re probably thinking, is just plain old racist. But as I read people’s responses to the articles, I found plenty of racist assumptions going around not just from Vogue, but from the people upset with them as well.

In many of the complaints, users write that the title is racist against African Americans (and African American women more specifically), but that’s only half the picture–if that. Maybe Vogue could defend the title if the earrings were the same design worn by “women of colour who were brought to the southern United States,” but they’re not. It comes as no surprise that American slaves didn’t wear jewelry and certainly not enough to yield a reproducible style. Thus, the style has no basis in American slavery, so to say it’s an affront to African Americans in particular misses the point (and, as you’ll see, is probably racist itself).

The racism comes from the fact that Vogue designed the earrings in styles from Africa and Asia that were worn, in the vast majority, by people who weren’t slaves. I’ve seen lots of (non-contemporary) photos with women wearing this style of earring and they usually have captions like “villager” or some other non-denigrating term for “person.” In Vogue’s head, “Creole” and “African” are synonymous with “slave.” Now that’s racist. (This also illustrates why those whose first image of ‘Slave earrings’ was limited to blacks in America might want to think twice about their own associations.)

But the worst part of this has nothing to do with race or any particular instance of slavery at all. Vogue‘s perverted glamorization of slavery per se is what is unacceptable. There’s nothing about the designs themselves that are inherently offensive, but the “Slave” name turns a dehumanizing institution marked by violence, rape, and thorough economic, political and social disenfranchisement into “chic.” What’s worse, the designers seem to be ignorant of the fact that slavery still exists in many forms, with 70% of those being women and girls not unlike the people Vogue hopes will wear the earrings. I imagine some fashion philosopher saying the earrings sympathize the wearer with slaves in some uplifting, progressive way. But given the disparity in wealth and well-being between the women who would wear the earrings and the slaves the earrings “glorify”–never mind Vogue’s role in that disparity–there’s no spin on this that doesn’t leave a bitter taste in your mouth.

What should Vogue do? Apologize and change the name of the earrings, for starters. But I’m actually more interested in what they were intending to do in the first place. I find it suspect that an institution whose main business is defining taste would do something so thoroughly tasteless and “not realize it.” But even if we give Vogue the benefit of the doubt, they’ve still made an all-around morally objectionable and fundamentally offensive fashion statement which is just a faux pas.

photo from NATALIE PHOTOS‘ flickr.

The White House reported today that a compromise on the debt ceiling seems to be within reach, hopefully bringing to an end the drawn-out bickering that left us all feeling a bit disgusted and disappointed with the state of our government. Elsewhere in the country, hundreds of other debt deals were negotiated this past school year that also involved uncomfortable compromises–albeit over much smaller sums of money.

The Huffington Post recently reported on Huffpost Women that a surprising number of college students–mostly women but some men as well–are turning to “sugar daddies” to help pay off hefty student loans. Using websites such as SeekingArrangement.com, students with insurmountable debt can find wealthy older men (usually much older) who are willing to help pay off loans in exchange for sex, companionship, or both. The site isn’t limited to college students, but the site’s creator estimates that of the approximately 800,000 people signed up for exchanges, 35% are students. To bring that number a bit closer to home, Harvard has 231 registered sugar babies. The article doesn’t give a number for Princeton but it sure raises an uncomfortable question: would you become a temporary prostitute to go to college?

Princeton has strived to make this question irrelevant. Since 2001, Princeton’s financial aid office has provided grants instead of loans to ensure its seniors graduate debt-free. That doesn’t mean students don’t have to hold campus jobs or make other sacrifices back home, but it does mean they are spared years of working hard to pay off a mountain of debt. Compare this to the average 2011 grad which, according to the Huffington Post, owes $27,200. With no economic upturn in sight and a terrible job market for 22 year-olds, it’s no wonder that more and more students are feeling the need to pay off their loans by less conventional means.

Two such students featured in the article have used SeekingArrangement.com multiple times but feel very differently about their situations. Taylor, a 22-year old student at Hunter College, agreed to have sex with a man in his 50s for $350 in cash, an experience which left her feeling “dirty” and depressed about what she had to do to pay tuition. Readers are meant to feel similarly dirty and worried as we read about the wrinkled man she has to lather with sunscreen and her fears that a client may be a serial killer. For those familiar with the ‘Craigslist Killer,’ the idea that college-educated women would risk their lives to pay off debt is difficult to understand. But the article is careful not to judge its subjects for the choices they make, reinforcing the reality that privilege is not spread evenly. On the other end of the spectrum is Jennifer, a 23 year-old grad from Sarah Lawrence College who has three or four clients at any one time. Jennifer acknowledges the risks associated with sex-for-pay services but maintains that she only sleeps with men she feels comfortable with. Other women quoted on the site relish the consistent and generous paychecks after months of limited or unsteady employment.

The different viewpoints of the students involved in these arrangements make it difficult to condemn or condone the practice outright. On the one hand, education should be a fundamental right that every American has access to without having to sacrifice physical integrity or safety. Students are not forced to enter into these kinds of relationships, of course, but it is clear that many students turn to sugar daddies out of desperation instead of genuine desire. The power dynamic in these situations is clearly tilted toward the sugar daddy, who holds the student’s physical and mental safety–and college diploma–in his hands. This seems antithetical to the point of higher education itself, which at its most basic level presumes to save young people from ending up on the streets (and perhaps turning to prostitution) by promising them good paying jobs in the future. The high costs of college, however, are flipping things around by saddling students with piles of debt that some feel can only be paid off by resorting to prostitution. As one reader commented on the Huffington Post website, students no longer pull themselves up by their bootstraps, but by their bra straps.

On the other hand, advocates of legalizing prostitution argue that women and men should be able to use their bodies for economic gain if they want to. Ballerinas, contortionists, and athletes use their bodies to make money, so prostitutes should be allowed to as well. I recognize this analogy has many faults: prostitution, unlike weight lifting, is often a product of poverty, sexual abuse, and a lack of opportunity, and is easily exploited by pimps and clients. But the point is that many people use their bodies in order to make ends meet; how others decide to judge them for it is another matter entirely. In this specific situation, college-educated women are willingly signing up to please men who help them obtain an incredibly valuable piece of paper. Instead of a lifestyle, many sugar babies see these arrangements as a perhaps unfortunate but ultimately beneficial step toward obtaining financial independence. As a college student myself, the idea is nauseating and scary, but so are a lot of things people do for money. Why is this choice any different?

Princeton recently sent out online reminders that tuition for the upcoming year is due soon. How are you getting the money?

by David Walters

Today while I waited in the doctor’s office, I got the chance to read this profile in the most recent Vanity Fair on our current Secretary of State and former presidential hopeful, Hillary Rodham Clinton. (I could go on at length about the objectification that Vanity Fair’s ads and imagery subject [exclusively white] women to, but I digress.) The article is rather long, but it gives a comprehensive look into the life of a woman who is not only a brilliant politician, but who takes a reasonable, sympathetic approach to negotiations with oftentimes unreasonable, unsympathetic leaders. She understands that you cannot rely on platitudes and stereotypes as a means of international relations; she understands that guns, drones, and repetitions of the word “democracy” are not enough to fix the serious problems facing many of our allies and even more of our enemies. “Doctrines,” the cabinet’s outlook goes, “[are] for the doctrinaire.”

All of this is refreshing–inspiring, even. While we blindly invaded two countries that weren’t harboring the guy or weapons we were looking for, it was nice to see the administration take bin Laden out at the risk of far fewer of our (and others’) citizens–all with Clinton at the foreign policy helm. Thus, I was heartbroken when I read this quote from Clinton in the article:

“I’ve had a fascinating and rewarding public career … I think I will serve as secretary of state as my last public position and then I’ll probably go back to advocacy work, particularly on behalf of women and children, and probably around the world.”

This is tragic, and not just for feminists looking to see an intelligent, progressive woman as President, but for any American who wants to keep their country out of the messes that Republicans have gotten us into time and time again. If Obama wins the 2012 election, Clinton is the best hope of keeping progressive, human-centered policies on America’s docket in 2016 and (ideally) again in 2020.

Of course, you might argue that Clinton should run for the position now since she’d be a better President than Obama has been. I haven’t given much thought to whether she’d govern better than Obama, but either way a successful campaign would require her to attack the very President she serves under, which would make her a bad Secretary of State. This, in turn, would make her a poor Presidential candidate. Perhaps this was a Catch-22 set up to remove Obama’s biggest rival from the 2012 election, but it’s the political reality. A 2012 run, then, isn’t a particularly good idea and it doesn’t even look like something she’s considering. But is Obama even going to win? Shouldn’t we cut our losses and have Clinton run now since Obama’s on his way out?

My fingers will be crossed until next year November, but as poor as the American public’s opinion of Obama is now, there are no other viable alternatives in the 2012 election and I expect that he’ll win. No one has stepped up on the Democratic side and the Republicans don’t have a better solution. In fact, if you look at the history of it–the absurd spending on two misguided and fruitless wars (unless you think replacing a despot with anarchy in Iraq is “fruitful”); the obsessive removal of restrictions and taxes on the wealthy “job creators” (that is, if you’re in India or China); the shrinking of the “failed stimulus” bill that economists both in 2009 and now say should have been bigger but was made smaller at Republicans’ behest–the current Republican orthodoxy has and will only make the problem worse.

Thus, I, like some other political analysts, expect a 2012 victory for Obama, which means the next “real” election–when the Republicans have a serious chance of taking the White House and sending the country back into another recession (and probably another war or two to distract us from it)–is in 2016. With the likes of Michelle Bachmann signing pledges that suggest family dynamics for any woman–never mind the black ones–were better during the times of slavery, feminists and people with common sense everywhere should be alarmed.

Come 2016, I don’t know another candidate who will be better vetted and trusted to pick up the Democrat mantle than Hillary Clinton. America’s experience with and respect for Hillary Clinton will certainly out-rank any other potential candidates, Democrat or Republican. This holds true especially if she again serves as Secretary of State or even Vice President to Obama in his 2012 term. Even when she ran in 2008, the only argument that stuck with voters about her gender was that she might not be taken seriously by leaders of more conservative, chauvinistic countries. Her success as Secretary of State has not only negated such fears, but shown how silly they were in the first place. Her successful election would not only be an enormous landmark in the feminist fight, but probably the largest asset it ever had. Clinton is a tried and true warrior for women’s rights–even if another Democrat does win in 2016, the fight for human equality probably won’t have as much steam as it would under Clinton. Clinton in 2016 is the feminists’ biggest hope.

Of course, whether or not to run for President in 2016, when–as the article astutely points out–she will be 68, is a deeply personal decision for Clinton. She has already done so much and left an impressive legacy for herself and any woman or man who follows. But if John McCain can, at 72, run on a platform that mostly benefitted the most benefitted, I hope Clinton’s deep passion to help the least advantaged citizens of this country can fuel her at least one more time. So Hillary, please, please, PLEASE continue advocating for women and children, but do it from the White House. We need it.

image from Angela Radulescu‘s flickr

In a New York Times editorial released yesterday, the editors decry a recent trend among Republicans. They argue that some Republican and Tea Party candidates’ habit of signing policy pledges cripples their ability to make critical decisions they should, but have promised not to make. One of the pledges the article cites bears the noxious, misleading title “Susan B. Anthony pledge.” The anti-abortion content of the pledge coupled with the very fact that it exists show not only how conservatives misrepresent the history they’re so obsessed with, but highlight how their political strategies go against the very values Susan B. Anthony stood for.

The “Susan B. Anthony pledge” commits signers to support anti-abortion legislation; appoint only anti-abortion persons to the Supreme Court and relevant cabinets; and defund Planned Parenthood and similar organizations. (To date, Republican candidates Michelle Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Tim Pawlenty, Rick Santorum, and Thaddeus McCotter have all signed on the dotted line.) This pledge was proffered by the group titled “Susan B. Anthony List,” which purports in its mission statement that “Courageous women leaders like Susan B. Anthony [...] believed that abortion was just a tool of oppression used against women.” You’d imagine that with such a bold description of Anthony’s beliefs and a pledge in her name entirely dedicated to anti-abortion policy, she was a staunch opponent of abortion.

You’d be wrong.

It turns out that Susan B. Anthony was more or less mum on abortion generally, never mind on how public policy should relate to it. The Susan B. Anthony List website gives exactly one quote written by an anonymous “A” and published in Anthony’s magazine, The Revolution, as evidence of Anthony’s boisterous opposition to abortion. “Most logical people would agree,” the site argues, “that writings signed by “A” in a paper that Anthony funded and published were a reflection of her own opinions.” “Most logical people” would be wrong. Those most well versed in Anthony’s work believe that the article was not written by her, as she was never known for signing things “A” and that the article had other content that did not fit Anthony’s writing style or beliefs.

Perhaps most importantly, I can safely say that Anthony would oppose the pledge as undemocratic — not because it takes a pro- or anti-abortion stance, but because it locks the signer into any stance at all. The Revolution was dedicated to arguing all sides of an issue. Anthony would be appalled at these Republicans’ willingness to sign onto this and other pledges that actively halt discourse and stop politicians from weighing other viewpoints, a practice essential to the democratic process and one that Anthony went to great lengths to encourage.

So what would Susan B. Anthony say about the “Susan B. Anthony Pledge”? We don’t know if she’d support the policies it outlines, but we know she would oppose anyone signing it. If conservatives are as obsessed with the values of the brilliant, though certainly flawed leaders of our past; if they are concerned, as they constantly repeat they are, with “real” American values, they’ll oppose this and the other pledges, too. It’s exactly what Susan B. Anthony and our Founding Fathers would do.
Image from Shellthing’s babble

The Obama administration must immediately end the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy on gays serving in the armed forces, a federal appeals court said.

The Log Cabin Republicans, a group that promotes equal rights for gays and lesbians, asked a U.S. appeals court to block further enforcement of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” while the court reviews a September lower court ruling that declared the law unconstitutional. The San Francisco-based appeals court today granted the organization’s request.

“As of today, the government is prohibited from applying or enforcing ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ — the law is over and done with,” Dan Woods, a lawyer representing the Log Cabin Republicans said in an interview. “All investigations must stop, all discharge proceedings must halt immediately,” he said.

More here.

Even though the couple were legally married in Connecticut, Velandia’s expired visa targeted him for deportation because the Defense of Marriage Act prevents federal recognition of same-sex marriage. A year long struggle ensued and has finally concluded. According to NJ.com:

It was a historic victory, according to the couple and their lawyer, Lavi Soloway, who said it was the first time immigration officials had made a decision to not deport the spouse of a gay or lesbian American on the basis of their marriage.

We’re so happy for this couple and hope that their moving story foreshadows DOMA’s demise. Although the fight for federal recognition of same-sex marriage is still underway, Soloway says it best: ”This action shows that the government has not only the power but the inclination to do the right thing when it comes to protecting certain vulnerable populations from deportation.”