It may be impossible not to love Ellen Page

I've loved Ellen Page since Juno (and, then, even more after Whip It), and she just keeps getting awesomer and awesomer. An excerpt from her recent interview in The Guardian:

How did you feel about the controversy aroused by your role in Juno?

I was like, you know what? You all need to calm down. People are so black and white about this. Because she kept the baby everybody said the film was against abortion. But if she'd had an abortion everybody would have been like, "Oh my God". I am a feminist and I am totally pro-choice, but what's funny is when you say that people assume that you are pro-abortion. I don't love abortion but I want women to be able to choose and I don't want white dudes in an office being able to make laws on things like this. I mean what are we going to do – go back to clothes hangers?

What do you think of the way women are treated in the movie business?

I think it's a total drag. I've been lucky to get interesting parts but there are still not that many out there for women. And everybody is so critical of women. If there's a movie starring a man that tanks, then I don't see an article about the fact that the movie starred a man and that must be why it bombed. Then a film comes out where a woman is in the lead, or a movie comes out where a bunch of girls are roller derbying, and it doesn't make much money and you see articles about how women can't carry a film.

Love. Her.

H/T AfterEllen and Feministing

Sarah Palin Redux

Check out a great post over at the Ms. blog that's related to my response to Sarah Palin and her recent return(s) to the media spotlight (had she really ever left?).

Ms. blogger Audrey's analysis is spot-on:

At the Arizona rally, Palin trotted out the maverick label and praised McCain for his anti-Obama outsiderness. But her speech had a subversive undercurrent, working the seam of age and gender at McCain’s expense. For example, to illustrate how McCain’s “man of the people” stance hasn’t won him friends in Washington, she drew on her own expertise in beauty pageants, chuckling that “He could win the talent and debate portion of any pageant, but no one’s going to dub him Miss Congeniality.” Picturing McCain in a beauty contest is inherently incongruous (would he tap dance for talent?), and then to invoke him as Miss Congeniality? Such a title feminizes him and gives Palin a home-field advantage: She was, after all, Miss Wasilla–and Miss Congeniality.

(I meant to post this last week, but it completely slipped my mind!)

Those ridiculous tampon ads...

I'm a little late on the uptake (in other words, this video has been popping up on blogs for a few days now and I only just found the time to watch it myself a few minutes ago), but this advertisement is fantastic. Smart thinking, Kotex!

A gay version of Taylor Swift's "You Belong to Me"

Just a little thing via Feministe: the Yellowjackets, an all-male a capella group from my soon-to-be alma mater, The University of Rochester, made an adorable queer music video set to Taylor Swift's "You Belong to Me," which, in the spirit of school spirit and cuteness, I wanted to re-post here. Enjoy!

Sarah Palin Back on TV -- What's the Harm?

I have a new post up at Ms. Magazine's blog (my first!). Here's an excerpt:

Discovery Networks’ announcement of its newest acquisition, Sarah Palin’s Alaska, a documentary series hosted by the state’s former governor, left me feeling conflicted. On the one hand, any mention of John McCain’s running mate provokes involuntary full-body shudders. I spent the presidential election campaign in a state of anxious high alert, wondering what Gov. Palin would say or do next. Wondering, in other words, what further platforms she’d find to display her homophobia (I’m sorry, tolerance for gay and lesbian lifestyles) or to pontificate about being staunchly anti-choice.

On the other hand, should her appearance on something as innocuous as an 8-hour Alaskan travelogue “told by one of the state’s proudest daughters” (according to Peter Liguori, chief operating officer of Discovery Communications) really inspire angst? What’s the harm if Palin coasts on her fifteen minutes of fame a little longer? She certainly wouldn’t be the first politician to delay her inevitable (hopefully) ride into the sunset.

But here’s the root of my unease: Despite the fact that the series will likely have nothing to do with politics, the idea of Sarah Palin’s Alaska isn’t innocuous.

Read the complete post (with links and photos and videos!) over at Ms.!

By the way, Ms. only just launched its blog a few weeks ago, and they have an excellent group of bloggers posting every day on a wide variety of topics. Take an hour to peruse the entire blog and/or add it to your feeds!

Health Care Bills and Protests

The health care reform bill just passed, and there's a bunch of unhappy people all over the country.

I won't pretend to understand the issue completely (I got bored and stopped following it closely a long time ago). But if the summaries are correct, (and the CBO is accurate, which seems reasonable), we'll get a moderate reduction in the deficit, some new taxes for the rich and people who use tanning salons, some decent subsidy expansions for low-income people, and some mild tweaks to medicaid and medicare. All quite undramatic, really.

All of which makes the protests quite bewildering.

However you look at it, this is not a new health care system. It's certainly not a single-payer universal coverage system. It's not going to allow the government to regulate the industry tightly, and it's not abolishing medicare/caid.

For that matter, the bill barely even falls under the reform category. I daresay what most feminists wanted (behind expanded reproductive coverage, which we couldn't possibly have gotten) was to ensure that single mothers, children, etc. were guaranteed health care - we didn't really even get that. The improvements we did get still filtersthrough the current (read, insanely complicated) system, which is doing a mediocre job at best. Hardly a dramatic victory.

Is it better? Probably. Will it hurt anybody? Probably not. And yet, the protests continue - "the worst piece of legislation ever presented to Congress!" as one radio program I overheard recently trumpeted.

I know a young man - twenty-something years old - who is the stereotype of the teabagger. He's white, decently educated, from a middle class background, rather (if unconsciously) racist, slightly sexist (openly), and republican as they come. He hates health care reform. Thinks it's going to give medicine to all the damn illegals (what a tragedy....) And everyone else needs to earn their own health care, dammit!

Except - he doesn't have insurance worth speaking of. He doesn't make much, his employer doesn't provide a decent plan. And if his girlfriend gets pregnant, she be in the system with the rest of them. All of which seems entirely lost on the man in question.

This doesn't prove anything, of course, but I suspect that there are thousands more just like that. They're protesting, not because the health care reform will actually hurt them, or the economy, or anything else, but just to be protesting - their lack of continued dominance over society, perhaps. Or simple racism, sexism, obsession with traditional family values. Something.

I'm not sure what, exactly (general fear - probably). But it's very strange, and rather frightening.

(Crossposted at Constant Thoughts)

Ain't Nuthin' But A She Thing

So I've been a bit overwhelmed with life and teaching and the long-time-coming conclusion of my graduate school career, so I've been a neglectful blogger (what else is new these days?).

As a peace offering, will you accept Salt-n-Pepa's "Ain't Nuthin' But A She Thing" music video? I've been revisiting the music of my childhood and have become a bit obsessed: