WARNING: Only for grown-ups and non-hypocritical people, for I have called a spade, 'a spade' here.
When I began the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series, I was happy in a very liberated small woman way. Here is a hero (to call her heroine, would be to say that she was merely meant to have romance scenes with the hero) who was only 5' 3" and could inspire terror in the heart or equivalent component of vampires, zombies, were-animals and your common garden variety man (yawn).
You also had these delicious guys who are dangerous on their own, yet moony when it comes to our no-nonsense Anita, who wears her devil may care attitude like a constant pair of Nikes.
Here I digress a little, by casting actors to each of these parts (yeah we are talking multiple guys here) just to illustrate the point I will make later on:
- Jean-Claude - Smooth Talking Master Vampire - Brad Pitt (very smoldery)
- Jason - Jean-Claude's pet werewolf - Hayden Christenson (naughty/dimples)
- Richard Zeeman - King of the werewolves - matt Damon on steroids (major nice guy)
- Asher - Jean-Claude's ex-boyfriend, also Vampire - Jude Law (mysterious and beautiful)
- Micah - King of the were leopards, shortie - Tom Cruise (likeable)
Yep, so one can infer the "Yawza!!" factor here...
To have one of these around would be romance-novel fodder, but here we have all of them and just our little heroine (now she starts to be one).
Before long, our lady is embroiled in various affairs in all possible combinations with the men/monsters mentioned above and my liberated spirit retched heavily, and I stopped reading.
I have the same complaint of Ayn 'Bloody'
Why can't the modern woman be represented in a more decent way?
Belonging to the afore mentioned category I can confidently state the common profile of the members: (Refer the cartoon)
- Well Educated
- Earning salary
- Independent
- Decision making ability
- Career minded
- More of brains rather than beauty
From my perusal of literature and movies on central woman character, I have jotted down points "Top ten things about the heroine of a trashy script..."
1] The attractive new entrant into our Girl's [that is how the heroine will be referred to] life moves, smells, behaves like utter trouble.
(international terrorist, stealth assassin, vampire, werewolf, amnesiac...)
2] There is more than one major wonderful guy around, who is out to get our Girl; a sitch we know will give rise to moral dilemmas resulting in the most grossly outrageous solution.
(A vampire and his buddies, two mortal best friends, one mortal and his enemy/boss, Her childhood sweetie+highschool boyfriend+cute boss+fiancee, The guy who hates [but secretly pines for] her + her dependable boyfriend...commonly Husband vs. Ex)
3] our Girl has this best friend who has a wonderful and steady guy who just happens to be the buddy of one pouty Greek god of a male character. So, each central characters will run into the other while in the turf of the common friends.
When she has misunderstood him, the common friends enlighten her about to his "mother Teresa" side.
4] And each time our Girl "runs into" the Boy (one of the boys, atleast) she thinks "oh how my heart beats to be around this guy...I should avoid seeing him" but never gets around to doing just that.
5] When he meets our Girl, the boy has been doing one of the following activities:- flexing muscles while lifting heavy things (helping old people is a plus),
- firing some reptilian individual who we know is coming back to bite buddy boy,
- making nasty or sarcastic quips about/to her,
- reading to the blind/taking care of children/any social service work,
- Working out in the gym or fighting a giant in the dojo.
So he is mostly angry, sweaty, busy (and or) dripping in blood.
4] There is one arch nemesis girl:- who hates our Girl from high school
- is the competitor in office/Boss
- The pouty Greek god's ex...Etc.
Who is never given a good makeup person or/and wardrobe selector. This person is always in the throes of PMS and is obviously slutty (although by the end of the script the line between her sluttiness and our Girl's "giving in to her emotions" blurs considerably)
5] our Girl is never actually seen working. Only seen going to or coming from office, or the usual running into good-looking men at office.
6] Everyone loves her at office/in the neighborhood/in the family.
Our Girl has co-worker friends, neighbor friends and family that will lie down in front of traffic for her. Yet she is alone and longs for the Boy.
7] Our Girl never:- oversleeps
- overeats
- throws tantrums (only has arguments with the hero(es) ending in sparks)
- is wrong
- yawns
- dresses shabbily (looks sharp even while sleeping/after getting up)
- hits people (except the nemesis-which is an all out cat-fight)
8] No matter how little she makes, or in which crampy apartment she lives, our Girl never repeats an outfit at all and all her clothes are named after illustrious people-Gucci, Versace .etc.
9] Girl is surprised to find out that the stinky rich pouty Greek god is nuts about her. [I say, when you and he are the only super-good looking people among everyone you know, it’s quite obvious that he will secretly pine away for you.]
10] She cries when he proposes. He is only slightly less emotional. Our Girl pulls out all stops from then on.
This ladies and germs, is everything pop-culture has to offer as facets of the modern woman Pray, don't be fooled into accepting these as being based on facts.
Truth is out there,
Rain - flexing muscles while lifting heavy things (helping old people is a plus),
10 comments:
I did not read the entire post but this is a reply to this statement
"Why can't the modern woman be represented in a more decent way?"
I dont know what z the big deal with sleepin around. I think it is a personal choice one makes and there is no big deal about it. If people can accept James Bond sleepin around why not Dominique Francon?
Taking quote from the same book you mentioned, "There are no absolutes, everything is a matter of opinion".
PS: ofcourse, my statement could be invalidated by applying the same example i gave. I thought of letting it out however.
Just thought of harping more on the same...
"Denying your impulses is to deny the fact that makes us human"...so one has to first decide if he/she has to be human (by not denying impulses and sleep around) or being decent (not sleep around and deny he/she is human)
Phoenix,
Sleeping around may be a human thing, but its neither healthy (mentally and physically) nor is it an intelligent thing to do.
Its a personal choice, definitely. But its something debated over (and over) by all (before the actual sleeping around is commenced), and not taken as lightly as is shown- that was my point.
And about the comparison between dominique and james bond, I dont find either's behavior acceptible. But, in general, morality is often imposed on the female species more, on the whole. I hate that, but its true.
About denying impulses, Monogamy is a sign of commitment to a person's partner. It is the cornerstone of our society that makes us different from most animals (who mostly also do not beleive in denying impulses, does it make them human?)
Harp all ya want, I like exchange of ideas...I also believe that there are no absolutes, only opinions.
- I did not talk of marraige and commitment issues here but just addresed it from that characters perspective.
- "our society" has a lot of hypocrisy. We worship gods who dont follow monogamy and yet follow monogamy as a moral is one example of hypocrisy.
- I dont believe in right or wrong, good or bad so there is no question of morals there.
Oh Brother,
There is always a question of morals. And there is always the society to contend with, even if you think its a bunch of hypocritical people.
To be involved with someone is always a question of marriage or commitment, even from the perspective of the characters.
But you are entitled to your opinions as I am to mine, and we have our own picks on good and bad.
Gods are our invention, along with their perfect looks, devastating powers and careless polygamy. The true god is common to everyone, formless, not to be compared to any human standards- including those of relationships.
"you are entitled to your opinions as I am to mine"
Thatz like saying "Whatever!" in a conversation :)
:D
"Thatz like saying "Whatever!" in a conversation :) "
And...here I was, thinking it meant "I am not converting to your school of thought and I will not expect you to change your mind either."
good post, but don't you think you should have given some real life examples, instead of just dwelling on those hollywood bimbettes?..
Hi Bharat,
The topic being modern women of pop-culture, if I were to dwell on the likes of me (real world and boring as hell), u wud never say good post :p.
Heh...I actually understand that you want more realism...wokay.
Shall supply the same
Ho hum,
I must say, I find this discussion very amusing (yes, guilty as charged:an M C P).
First off, I must confess I am not in the habit of visiting blogsites as a means to spend my hard earned rest time, so kindly excuse any breach of Netiquette. I was referred here by one of my friends (whose identity, for ethical and fiducial reasons, shall remain unrevealed; and who shall, for this referral, find loads of animal porn in his/her mail!) who happens to be a fan of your blogsite (is that the term?). but then s/he also happens to be a fan of the Bronte sisters. Go figure.
Anyway, to come back to the main topic. Yes, the world (& I'm restricting myself solely to India here; so u might well ask why the heck did I not write "India" rather than "the world", and to that I reply: "So sue me!")judges women more harshly w.r.t. men; yes the modern woman is well aware of this fact and has been trying to establish her individuality as she seems best--by turning more career-oriented, by trying to be more "balanced" (whatever THAT means), by living alone, by adopting adoption (vis-a-vis having biological children), by changing partners faster than u can say Kallu Mama, by sleeping around (yes that too,my dear Polly Prudes!)--but is all that necessarily bad? I mean, I must agree with Rainbow (or whatever her real moniker is)when she paraphrases "to each her own". And no (yes I know it's bad form to begin a sentence with a conjunction, but what the hell, I'll let your lawyer have a field day with me. See you in court.)I don't think it is necessary that one take flak just to prove one's point, or for that matter go out on a limb trying to be jingoistic about 'morals'. I mean, heck, these things change with time/place/person...even the mood one might be in! There are no 'ethics' as far as I'm concerned, as long as no one is getting hurt (primum non nocere and all that jazz!). This hurt may be physical or emotional or financial or some other form which I'm unable to think of presently. I also don't see the logic behind holding on to one's dear life to one's own principles if they are better changed (when, how & to what degree, of course is what only the individual can/shud decide).
So if James bloody Bond chooses to spill his wild oats all over the town, one must remember that he is a fictional character, and to compare/explain a real life issue using fictional examples is, well, idiotic. James is of course not bound by The Law (and I'm sure M wud save his arse shud he be caught, after all he IS the best bloody gun in the business, naked or not!)as real men are (which IMHO, is one of the biggest deterrents in this nation for men not to go on a, er, rampage; to commit a genocide, of sorts. Slightly tangential: Has anyone seen a movie (Hindi) called Matrubhoomi?)
Anyway, where was I? Ah yes, the belittled, misunderstood Modern Woman!
As I was saying (rambling more like it -- I often have no point in particular to make, as u might have guessed if u have continued thus far) this estrangement is partly a fault of women like Aarthi (who seem to alienate ppl, maybe men more than women - and yes I know the likes of her don't care - due to their I-will-not-budge-under-any-circumstance-and you-are inferior-to-me-you-MCP attitude, by closing the lines to resoning) and partly due to a sizeable batch who'd rather take things lying down. Only a few handful are true feminists (as there are very few true patriots) who see things as shades of grey, rather than blacks or whites, and are willing for a reasonable talk or a lusty war-cry when the need arises,but who also know just when to keep their pie-holes shut.
And to that all of you can say "Whatever", as do I. :-)
Amen to the right of free speech and free thought.Viva la difference!
P.S.- Since it is very very unlikely that I'll visit this site to re-read my post, or to read the comments to this, anybody interested in throwing brickbats at me is welcome to direct them to eroticon6er@yahoo.co.in. But remember, I have a seemingly inexhaustible store of porn which might be better if directed elsewhere!
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