Two things! Very quick this week because I am busy busy busy busy *collapses in a pile on the floor*. But click through for a couple of things you should definitely check out…
The good: Analysis of gender and film roles
This is fascinating: an analysis of 2000 screenplays by gender, in response to comments that the Bechdel test isn’t a good enough measure of Hollywood’s gender bias. You can use their charts to break down by gender and age and learn that:
a) men tend to get much more screen time than women
b) older women in particular are seriously fucked over
c) it’s got better since the 70s, but it’s only improving very slowly
“We Googled our way to 8,000 screenplays and matched each character’s lines to an actor. From there, we compiled the number of words spoken by male and female characters across roughly 2,000 films, arguably the largest undertaking of script analysis, ever.”
You can see all of the film dialogue analysis here.
The bad: ConsentProject WTF
Yesterday @consentproject tweeted this:
Rape is not and will never be a “feminist issue.” We stand with survivors of ALL genders because everyone deserves a safe world.
— Project Consent (@consentproject) April 10, 2016
I don’t know where to start, but here are a few things:
- ‘Feminist issue’ does not mean ‘issue that only affects women.’
- Feminists are frequently the most vocal, supportive and enthusiastic about what consent is and why it’s vital that everyone should understand it. Why would any consent campaign want to distance themselves from a movement that’s gained so much ground in this area?
- Most importantly – male victims of sexual violence are often ignored or treated less seriously, because we live in a society which often expects men to be permanently horny and incapable of withdrawing their consent. That tells them ‘boys don’t cry’, and creates an atmosphere in which it can be incredibly difficult for men to report sexual violence. This is a really important issue, it’s also a feminist issue. Ignoring the gendered nature of sexual violence tells me you don’t understand that this is important. It tells me that you do not – and cannot – understand the complex needs of different survivors.
If you would like to talk to someone about rape or sexual violence, here’s a link to the Rape Crisis website. There are also organisations that provide dedicated help to men and boys.
Update 12 April 2016
Consent Project has deleted the tweet and issued this apology…
1 Comment
@’Why would any consent campaign want to distance themselves from a movement that’s gained so much ground in this area?’
Feminism is an inherently subversive movement – it is trying to subvert patriarchal norms, gender roles, and power structures.
As such it is a threat – the main methods for dealing with such a threat are propoganda (and we’re actually very glad that violence has been replaced by propoganda – or advertising – in most of the ‘western’ world)
Thus the reason someone would want to distance themselves from this awesome movement is a consistant campaign against the label ‘feminism’ (the flag that we follow, the movement leading the charge) over the past decades.
People (mostly men, i suspect, but not exclusively, i’d love some data to back up this feeling) are afraid of being associated with feminism. And all of the political baggage that that entails.