The Genius of “Legally Blonde”

When this film came out, I thought it was good lightweight fun – with some mildly disturbing stereotypes not worth worrying about. After rewatching it on TV the other night, I’m starting to think it’s a masterpiece of gender and class dialectics.

It actually bothered me even more this time, perhaps because my daughters are now 10 and 13, alternately trying on and resisting their emerging femininity. As my wife and I discussed why it bugged me, though, I realized that the film was uncovering and probing a lot of my own stereotypes and judgments about girlyness.

The genius of Legally Blonde is that it fully embraces the silliness of certain girly trappings while communicating their fun – and quietly observing that guy trappings just might be every bit as silly. Yes, Elle Woods spends an awful lot of obsessive energy and intelligence mastering arcane details of fashion and makeup. But is it any more “serious” to master indie rock, video games (which my daughters love, by the way), or football strategy? No one calls a young guy dumb for spending his free time on these.

Without dipping into feminist jargon or preaching in any way, Legally Blonde (directed by a man, written by two women) illustrates how the things men like are considered the norm (and important), while femininity is treated as exotic and frivolous.

Yet science demonstrates that in physical terms at least, women are the norm. The XY chromosome is not enough to create male genitalia; it just (usually) triggers male hormones that do that. With intersex conditions such as CAIS, PMDS, and 5-ARDS, the lack of hormonal effects leaves XY individuals with vaginas and clitorises. In other words, females are the real normal, and males are the variant -- a hormone-triggered mutation, you could even say.

It’s true that the film makes one deft, if statistically unlikely starting assumption: that an insanely privileged white girl from Bel Air could be totally obsessed with the most expensive designer clothes and cosmetics without harboring an ounce of superiority toward those who can’t afford or appreciate these luxuries. Even that now looks to me like a clarifying master stroke.

Elle is basically Cinderella in reverse, as my wife observed. She shows that, with a pure enough heart, a girl can overcome all the advantages of wealth, beauty, blondness and boobs to remain humble, smart and true to herself. No matter what the boys think.

Just a Cotton-Pickin' Minute Here

I liked the title of your last post, honey, BUT you were only half right in how you characterized me (and even Shirky, who goes further than I do). Specifically:

>>They claim women won't achieve the success we want without tooting our horn
Yes absolutely.

>>and cheating.
No. I didn't say or mean that.

>>We need to boast
Yes absolutely

>>and even lie about our capacities and accomplishments
I didn't say lie. Shirky did, but he means a yes to "can you handle this job?" when you're not sure. That's not really a lie in my view; more of a gamble, and a responsibility to scramble and make your bold statement true.

>>Bravado yields recognition, promotion and big bucks.
Absolutely. Do you disagree? Do you have a plan for changing this?

>>Isn't this what's known as selling one's soul?
No. It's confidence -- the same confidence women always say they want in the men they date. If you have two job applicants with equal qualifications, and one is confident they can handle it while the other isn't, which would you choose?

I don't like arrogance, self-promotion, and relentless drive to get ahead. But as Shirky says, these traits are very common among successful people. You may say that many people including you (and possibly more women than men) would rather not succeed than become that obnoxious. Fine. But then you can't complain that women don't make as much money, rise to the tops of organizations, etc.

Is that what you want?

You Were Right, Honey

Back in June 2009, Mark posted an entry encouraging women to be more like men: Women Need to be More Evil. Today I found a post on Clay Shirky's blog that maintained the same Rant About Women.

They claim women won't achieve the success we want without tooting our horn and cheating. We need to boast and even lie about our capacities and accomplishments in order to get noticed. Bravado yields recognition, promotion and big bucks.

Isn't this what's known as selling one's soul?

Seeking images to illustrate this post I found a thought-provoking engraving. The rungs of the ladder are carved with fine qualities: industry, temperance, prudence and such, framed by morality and honesty. Not everyone dares climb, only the men will even consider it, and only one man in the group is actually taking the first step. Notice the young boy encouraged to pay attention as the ladies look on.

I admire the qualities that are reflected on this ladder; I only wish there was a woman poised to take her turn. These are qualities that can be shared by all. But clearly, it's an old picture, reflecting a different social and economic reality.

What's interesting now is that women are outpacing men in college registration. What might emerge could be a South African-kind of imbalance, where the minority rules the majority, that is, a few educated men dominate in positions of authority over the greater numbers of educated women.

My hope, my practice and my recommendation is that we all climb with integrity, never stooping. It is the foundation of morality, that which yields success for society. Perhaps that's the true problem, our definition of success is based on the advancement of the individual, not the community.

In my search for images, none showed multiple ladders...

Afghan Throw

I haven't written anything on this blog in several months, but am compelled to post a link to an essay (which maybe 2 years old, I don't know, its source seems to be) on the current plight of the women of Afghanistan.

According to the Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN), a project the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs:

Every 30 minutes, an Afghan woman dies during childbirth
87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate
30 percent of girls have access to education in Afghanistan
1 in every 3 Afghan women experience physical, psychological or sexual violence
44 years is the average life expectancy rate for women in Afghanistan
70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan

What's worse is that these are considered improvements...

How do I explain this to my daughters?

Here's a fantastic (if long) comment from Metafilter about personal safety and the experience of being a woman. What do I know, but it feels very real. The question is, how do I prepare my pre-teen daughters to handle all of this, to remain safe without living in fear?

Schrodinger's Rapist

Get past the shocking title, because this essay is a great reminder for guys on what a woman is thinking when you approach her, as a stranger, in public. Curious what you think, Olga.

My only quibble is when she says (to guys): "Is preventing violent assault or murder part of your daily routine, rather than merely something you do when you venture into war zones? " She's assuming the answer is no, but she's wrong, especially for younger guys.

In the same way that it's hard for men to realize how much women (need to) worry about sexual attack, I think many women don't realize how much guys (esp. 18-30) are at risk of physical violence in day to day life. For no other reason than, some guy is trying to show how how tough he is. The recent beating death of that guy in Chicago was a wakeup call, but really not that surprising to me. It just happened to be videotaped.

Mr. Sanchez

Is it wrong if I'm not consumed with redecorating the house like some other spouses I know? I don't know if it's exhaustion from two months of preparation + taking care of stuff that I put off during those months, + a headlining gig (comedy) + a writer's conference -- but I can't really pretend to be fascinated by moving the furniture around just so.

Besides, there are still a lot of repair projects (remodeling seems a bit grandiose) to do on the house.

Mrs. Saltveit

While Mark was posting to the blog like wildfire, I was busy getting married.

Actually we both got married, to each other no less.

Yet, somehow, I became consumed with wedding prep, in a way that Mark did not ~ and the reason I write about this is that I wonder if it's a girl thing.

We agreed to create as simple yet meaningful an event as possible, and it was as DIY as could be ~ but I still found myself counting the silverware and glassware in order to calculate the number of wine glasses and forks (not to mention tables and chairs) I'd need to rent so our families and closest friends would be comfortable. I created the invitations and announcements, designed and purchased the gifts for our wedding party and guests, took care of shopping for Mark's daughters as needed, and coordinated with our bridesmaids and ushers about what to wear. I bought the bubbles instead of rice.

It thought provoking and time consuming and I enjoyed every second of it.

Mark did his share of the most important things; he rented the park site, downloaded a tons of songs for the dance party, and was in charge of all the food shopping and cooking for the reception (thank heavens!). We went ring shopping together.

It wasn't out of laziness that he didn't tend to the minutiae; he had decided he wanted to do quite a bit of remodeling before my parents arrived for the wedding, and he went at it full force. In the final week before the wedding, even after my parents arrived, he was still busy sanding and painting while I went shopping for fabric with my mother and my cousin.

My mother made my veil and my cousin made the flower girl basket and my bouquet. Together my mother and my cousin sewed the cushions for our two ring bearers. Our friends Maya & Maria helped decorate for the dance party, our friend Dañel created our cake topper, and my friend MaryHelen volunteered to decorate for the reception...

Happily.

Women need to be more evil

Looking at our last two posts, I figured out how to crack the glass ceiling: women need to be move evil.

I don't mean sneaky, snarky, stab-you-in-the-back with a smile; that happens all the time. I'm talking flat-out, yeah I'm selfish, try-and-stop-me OWNING IT. Can you think of any examples, in all of history, literature, or film? Cruella de Ville is the exception that proves the rule, and she's, well, a bit cartoony. Even Leona Helmsley saw herself as the champion of cute little doggies.

Instead, women instinctively claim the moral high ground, like Governor Granholm chastising men for having affairs (with women). And women are the harshest judges of other women. Someday, when any mom can go to divorce court and let her ex take full custody so she can focus on her career -- or even just say she's happy to get back to work because her baby is wearing her out -- without apology, we will have taken the final step to equality. Because no one blinks when men do these things. But the risk of hearing "BAD MOTHER" whispered in the background hamstrings women's choices.

It's similar with fiction. Why are more characters men? Probably many reasons, but one is that a writer never has to apologize for, or justify, male characters. A lot of women characters attract visceral anger, especially if they are bad guys. (See, my mind naturally filled in bad... guys for strong, mean characters.) Anyone who creates such a woman risks being called misogynist or unrealistic. Male characters can be angels or antichrists, and it will never occur to anyone to question the author's choices.

Men are just like that, sometimes. When women can be just like that, sometimes -- for any value of that -- then the glass ceiling will be gone.

What is with you men?

Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm, on Bloomberg TV discussing the Mark Sanford affair:

"My reaction is really about his wife and kids. I mean, they are friends of ours and I'm just -- I am floored by this. I would never -- if I were betting, I would be the first person in the pool to say that is not him. This is really -- I am just really shocked by it. And, my heart goes out to Jenny and the kids. And, I hope people can at least give them their privacy. What is with you men?"

I dunno, but most of these politicians are having their affairs with a woman. What is with you women?

Now I'm a strong advocate of monogramy, if not a bit judgmental about affairs. But the stereotype that "men are dogs" baffles me. Aside from gay liaisons and I suppose threesomes, aren't there always going to be an identical number of men and women cheating? My theory is, men get the reputation for cheating because women are better at hiding it (ie deceit). Men just get caught more.

What's holding women back? A dirty little secret...

My recent post about why fewer plays by women are produced got me thinking about standup comedy, which I've been doing for 10 years now.

There are many more male than female comics. Based on my personal experience, the reasons match the results of those theater studies pretty closely. In other words, the leading causes for fewer women comics are 1) fewer women try standup in the first place, and 2) other women are much more judgmental about women comics than male comics. (A third reason seems to be that life on the road, away from freinds and family, sleeping in your car on off nights and in grungy club condos on gig nights, bothers men less.)

Of the women who try open mics, from what I've seen, a higher percentage go on to success. But very few try. Also, when they do, I often hear comments from women in the audience like "Why does she have to be so nasty?" I rarely see men react that way to a woman comic.

The why gets complicated. Part of it is that comedy is generally transgressive, and we have no problem culturally with men being transgressive, but get confused by women who are. Notice how rebellious women are almost automatically labeled as "sluts" regardless of what their rebellion is, or who they choose to sleep with.

But certainly, the role of women in all of this is one of the reason why I think complaining about "the patriarchy" is worse than a waste of breath. It confuses the issue, and takes us further away from making progress, by implying that "the man" is keeping women down.

Gender bias in theater? Yes, but it's complicated

3 rigorous new studies looked at whether there is gender bias in theater, i.e. whether plays by women get produced less often, or are not allowed to play as long (regardless of profitably.)

The results are striking and unexpected. Theatrical artistic directors defend the fact that most produced plays are written by men, by saying that men simply write more plays. The study actually confirmed this; there are twice as many male playwrights, and they're more prolific to boot.

BUT -- when the same play was sent out, half the time under a man's name and half under a woman's, the "woman's" play was rated significantly worse overall. Here's the twist: male artistic directors and literary managers rated them exactly the same, but female ADs and LMs downgraded "Mary's" play.

The third study looked at the 329 new plays over the last decade on Broadway, where we can roughly assume that money is the main criteria. Plays by men outnumber those by women 8 to 1. The plays written by women that were produced made 15-20% more money than men's plays -- but they weren't allowed to run any longer.

Conclusion -- there's money to be made by producing more female-written plays on Broadway. And this stuff is complicated.