Failing the Bechdel Test

In 1985 my cartoonist idol, Alison Bechdel, drew the strip above. The concept that for a feminist to watch a movie it should have at least 2 women characters that talk to each other about something other than a man has become known as the Bechdel Test. Bechdel writes about it in her blog, here.

I've known about the Bechdel Test for a while, avid follower of Dykes to Watch Out For that I am. However, I didn't realise that Bechdel was influenced by Virginia Woolf. She notes that in chapter 5 of A Room of One's Own, Woolf talks about the comment "Chloe liked Olivia" in a fictitious book. I've just discovered that of the 6 Virginia Woolf books I can find on my shelves, none of them is A Room of One's Own, so I will quote Bechdel's selection from her copy of that text:

"All these relationships between women, I thought, rapidly recalling the splendid gallery of fictitious women, are too simple. So much has been left out, unattempted. And I tried to remember any case in the course of my reading where two women are represented as friends … they are now and then mothers and daughters. But almost without exception they are shown in their relation to men …

Suppose, for instance, that men were only represented in literature as the lovers of women, and were never the friends of men, soldiers, thinkers, dreamers; how few parts in the plays of Shakespeare could be allotted to them:  how literature would suffer!"

Meanwhile, I think that "12 Years a Slave" fails the Bechdel Test magnificently.

A French Perspective on the Election

Under the headline of "Présidentielles : surprise ! c'est (encore) un homme !", mes amies at Le Blog d'une Chienne de Garde demonstrate their excitement at the news that Carla Bruni is rumoured to be on a flight to Los Angeles since her husband just lost the French Presidential election.

What? A translation? Hmmmmm ... the quote is something like "I'm not born a feminist, I am becoming one". As for what the testicles are saying, the Babylon translator online suggests "with the hair to the tabs and all" but I suspect that is not quite what the artist wishes to suggest. The headline, with my A for O-level French, I can reliably tell you it says, "Presidentially:  Surprise! It's (once more) a man!"

O well. Let's reserve judgment on the new Socialist President-elect of France:  Francois Hollande!

An Orange on the Seder Plate

Taking part in this year's campaign by Nashot HaKotel aka Women of the Wall. It must be at least 25 years since the first feminists added an orange to the symbols on the Seder plate. WoW asked us to photograph ourselves with an orange upon which was written one's name and current location. So here I am (wearing the QPR Dennis the Menace shirt just after returning from the Arsenal game).

So why an orange? The story is circulating that Susannah Heschel (daughter of the great rabbi Abraham Joshua H) once asked an orthodox rabbi when he thought women would be allowed to stand on the bima and lead the community in worship. His supposed reply was that it had as much chance of happening as there was of bread being placed on a Seder plate. Turns out that this is not what actually happened. According to Heschel herself, the issue was solidarity with Jewish lesbians, and since one should not put bread on the Seder plate, she decided that an orange should be used instead. The full details may be found here.

Today, in solidarity with LGBTQ people, women, and anyone marginalised and suffering from prejudice, we maintain this custom.

Feminist Cartoonist Fights Back!

This is one of a series of Orangina ads in France. The ravaj has always thought Orangina to have the best-tasting diet orange soda. But if you know as much French as the ravaj, or more even, then after reading this (via the fascinating Blog d'une Chienne de Garde) you might have to join us in rejecting the product because of its sexist advertisements.

Ms. Chienne has also shared her perspective via the following cartoon:
If that doesn't put you off the boisson ...

An Interview with Susie Orbach

Was just reading Decca Aitkenhead's interview with Susie Orbach in the Guardian today. Orbach is probably best known for her book 'Fat is a Feminist Issue', written about 30 years ago. Nu - I'd love to fill this post with quotes from the interview, because it is having a strong impact on my thinking - today is supposed to be the beginning of my new eating regime! I shall content myself with one, and let you read the rest here if you wish.

"Her latest book, Bodies, maps the progress of our alienation, from a time when we took our bodies for granted to one where they are an endlessly perfectible work in progress. "When I was growing up," she explains, "one or two girls were beautiful, but it was not an aspiration, right? We didn't expect to be that sportsman or that beauty queen. That was OK, that was what movie stars were for. That wasn't something that was essential for all of us." Yet today, movie-star looks are not just an aspiration but an imperative, and ordinary people think nothing of starving or surgically enhancing their bodies in a tireless campaign to make them look as though they belong to somebody else altogether."

And how did that evolution come to pass? Insert rant about diet and cosmetic industries. *sigh* It so happens that losing some weight should cause a drastic improvement in my current health. I need to reach that goal first, before obsessing about the looks of forty-something movie stars and why I don't look like them. To tell you the truth, I am more likely to lust after such women. The bodies that I really admire would be those of footballers like Thierry Henry and Cristiano Ronaldo; or the physical strength of the Williams sisters, although my mind does keep slipping back into thoughts of Nigella :-)