arts

We've seen so many people exploit their children that it's become a sort of sordid and sad norm in our culture. But really, this is ridiculous.

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have yet to show their baby daughter off in public, but eager fans were given an unusual preview with the chance to see a bronze cast depicting her first solid stool.

The scatological sculpture -- more doodoo than Dada -- is purportedly cast from 19-week old Suri's first bowel movement and will be shown at the Capla Kesting gallery in Brooklyn, New York, before being auctioned off for charity.

If you look at the picture, you can see that this is no diaper-smooshed poop. It's almost like someone was holding the babe when the movement took place. I imagine they had a crew shooting video, too. What do you think?

(Of course, this "sculpture" is by the same "artist" who depicted a birth-giving Britney Spears in a come-f*ck-me-doggy-style pose, which is even more ridiculous -- especially when it was a Caesarean birth.)

Unlike Forbes' kibbitzing scolding prediction, my guess is that Sumner Redstone is having no regrets for publicly shunning Tom Cruise. Scientology is starting to appear to be the least of his utter strangeness.

I suppose it's been pretty obvious that I've been slacking lately on my blogging duties. My posts of late have been less the result of a deliberate process and more of an impulsive, "Oh! I need to blog this!" after coming across something.

Here's one of those things: The Carnival of Science Fiction Feminism call for entries, whose deadline for entries is June 29th, with any posts from late May and all of June qualifying.

So if you're blogging about the edgy sexual and reproductive politics of Battlestar Galactica or sexism of Star Trek or attempted deconstruction of macho in Lost (ha!) or the blatant and pernicious sexism in the Dune prequels (making the original downright tame by comparison) or all the stupid sci fi trash coming out of Hollywood (where we don't really even need to mention the blatant sexism and even occasional misogyny running through those rotting fanboy fantasy blockbusters, now, do we, really?)...then send in a link. Also eligible:

* All Weblog Postings on Science Fiction and Fantasy works in all media (books, comic books, television, film, roleplaying tabletop games and video games) written from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Fan fiction written from a Feminist Perspective is eligible.
* Posts about fan fiction written from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Posts about conventions and fan gatherings of a Feminist nature are eligible.
* Posts about conventions and fan gatherings written from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Posts about any science fiction or fantasy fandom written from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Posts linking to newsand announcements are eligible, so long as they pertain specifically to the Feminist Sci-Fi Fantasy community.
* Considerations about science fiction/fantasy news from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Analysis of non-Feminist works from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Rants about any of the above written from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Posts which spell “Space” using 3 A’s and two exclamation points and are written from a Feminist Perspective are eligible.
* Posts about Green-Skinned Amazons (from Outer Spaaace!) with more than two breasts that are not written from a Feminist Perspective will not be eligible (and if they aren’t damned funny,* will be reproduced for mockery).
* Posts about Getting Your Girlfriend into [specific type of fandom] had also better be damned funny. If written from a Feminist Perspective (even tongue-in-cheek), they will be eligible.

I found this announcement via CultureCat, whose blog I confess I've not visited in months. So I'm a week late in seeing that CultureCat is now Mrs. CultureCat -- or should I say he is now Mr. CultureCat?

Congrats to Clancy (who is keeping her name, which only makes sense since she's just finishing her Ph.D. dissertation -- not a time to become someone's rib in name)!

They call it "a monument to pro-life." I don't know. It seems to me like a monument to something else. (I'm left wondering how many women give birth doggy style?)

“Monument to Pro-Life: The Birth of Sean Preston,� believed Pro-Life’s first monument to the ‘act of giving birth,’ is purportedly an idealized depiction of Britney in delivery. Natural aspects of Spears’ pregnancy, like lactiferous breasts and protruding naval, compliment a posterior view that depicts widened hips for birthing and reveals the crowning of baby Sean’s head.

The monument also acknowledges the pop-diva’s pin-up past by showing Spears seductively posed on all fours atop a bearskin rug with back arched, pelvis thrust upward, as she clutches the bear’s ears with ‘water-retentive’ hands.

“Britney provides inspiration for those struggling with the ‘right choice’,� said artist Daniel Edwards, recipient of a 2005 Bartlebooth award from London’s The Art Newspaper. “She was number one with Google last year, with good reason --- people are inspired by the beauty of a pregnant woman,� said Edwards.

Yeah, that's it. Right. Uh huh. That's why people are coming here from Google looking for "hairy armpit girl" and "girl fucks donkey."

But hey, you're not a real artist unless you can talk total bullshit, right?

Update: Is it a knife fetish?

A little birdie tells me Britney gave birth by caesarean:

Pop singer Britney Spears has given birth to a baby boy.

The baby was born Wednesday by caesarean section at the Santa Monica UCLA Medical Center in California, the magazine said.

Now go look at the oddball birthing posture in the Edwards fantasy. I have no further comment.

Media girl posted a blog topic So what's wrong with a little objectification, anyway? As science fiction writer, J. F. Rivkin once complained, the cover of the novel (and even the title) often is not under the control of the author, so I have no arguments with author Marrit Ingman, unless she disabuses me of that presumption, about the "babes" cover of her article about Blogher.

Perhaps Second Wave Feminists have no sense of humor about their political struggles and trivializing women's topics is grist for the mill.

I was a young activist and I recall the cover of Ms Magazine - we called it "M" "S" in those days - which had an article about "why we aren't laughing." Like Polack, black, Jewish, Italian, Irish, and other ethnic jokes, jokes about women are legion. In 1973, I framed this picture and hung it on my office wall as "protest" against the "Rad Libber," (Radical Female Liberation) jokes that were making the rounds. It did not stop my boss from making his own jokes about the woman in the drawing and exactly what "movement" she would be making.

About 15 years ago, Andrew Dice Clay drew jeers for his jokes that demeaned women - women as bimbos and airheads.

Women tend to laugh to hide discomfort and mask embarrassment or even anger.

Make a racist joke to a minority, and chances are the person will call you on it. Make a sexist joke about females, the woman is expected to laugh. If she gets annoyed, then it means she has no sense of humor.

I am sure no one meant any real harm in putting up that cover and were it the Onion, I might think it was trying to make a satirical point, but the cover seemed out of place given the rest of the article.

I hope that this is not part of the post-Roe world.

Like "Lois Lane," "Clark"s" jokes aren't funny any more.

I suppose it's cool that the Blogher conference has gotten such high-profile attention from the Austin Chronicle, but I can't quite get over the fact that the editors ran with this cover.
Here Blogher is about empowering women's voices, and the spin they put on it uses cheap sex appeal, while also echoing the really bad movies of the '50s, like, um, Queen of Outer Space....

Three American astronauts are on the first manned mission to Venus, and when they arrive, they find the planet to be inhabited solely by women with high heels and short dresses. Unfortunately, they are immediately imprisoned, for the queen who rules Venus hates men... Suspecting the astronauts to be spies, she now plans to destroy the Earth. So now it's up to the three men (and some friendly Venusians) to overthrow the wicked queen and save the Earth.

Yes, that's right, get a few women together and they automatically hate men and want to take over the world. Those familiar with the genre of the times know that there were many movies like this, drawing on cultural fears of women who don't live to be in the arms of their man, much like the alien invasion movies played off of the red scare.

The final plot point of most of these movies was when the evil women finally succumbed to romantic advances by their male captives, dropped their guns and presumably rushed off to happy lives spending their nights on their backs and their days in the kitchen. Silly, uppity women, they just didn't know their place!

And this is the image the Austin Chronicle decides to run with to position Blogher in the minds of its readers.

The article itself is quite complimentary, introducing the founders of Blogher and the stuff they're talking about in panels at the SXSW festival.

"Women who write about family are 'mommybloggers,' while men who write about family are 'personal bloggers,' incorporating personal elements into their blogs," Des Jardins says. "It's so easy to call someone a 'mommyblogger,' to say that they write 'just' about family."

"As though so much of our great literature and art isn't about family relationships," Camahort points out. "When Arthur Miller wrote All My Sons, nobody said, 'Oh, he's just a 'daddy playwright.' Nobody calls him a 'male playwright.' I think that's why women are rightfully apprehensive."

Fellow BlogHers Stone and Casino – who Stone describes as an "unashamed, unabashed feminist blogger" – will continue the talk about marginalization, identity, and their implications in "Public Square or Private Club: Does Exclusivity Strengthen or Dilute?"

A serious enough take, and it's presented without any snark or sarcasm.

So what's with the overtly sexist cover? I've never been to Austin, but I hear tell it's a liberal town, so maybe they will all "get it." But really, this seems like a rather cheap shot to me. Imagine an African American blogger's conference with a Sambo-like caricature on the cover, or an Anti-Defamation League conference with a caricature of an "evil Jew" with a long hook nose. This cover says that women empowered want to emasculate men (note the three women seemingly doing just that) while lounging around as objects of desire.

If that's the political climate we have in liberal areas, no wonder ERA never passed and forced pregnancy is the political fad du jour.