Sexual Assault and the Culture of Hollywood

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Cinema Discusso > Sexual Assault and the Culture of Hollywood

Bolingbroke: Jan 4, 2015

got any sevens posted:

Also what kind of dummy grabs a big buff straight black man's junk?

The fact that Crews is large and black is exactly part of why Venit could get away with sexually assaulting him. If a large black man uses physical force against someone, that narrative will absolutely be spun to demonise the black man, no matter how much the other guy had it coming or if it was self defence.

This incidentally is one of many reasons why "just get buff/learn martial arts/buy a gun" is a terrible response to discouraging sexual assault. These issues are about institutional and professional power; having physical power means jack if you're going to be fired or jailed for using it.

# ¿ Dec 5, 2017 17:22

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# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 09:13

Bolingbroke: Jan 4, 2015

Very interesting (and melancholy) article on Brendan Fraser and his absence from big Hollywood films: https://www.gq.com/story/what-ever-happened-to-brendan-fraser

The HFPA claim they're investigating Fraser's assault allegations against their former president, Philip Berk: https://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/hfpa-investigating-brendan-fraser-sexual-assault-claims/

# ¿ Feb 25, 2018 09:08

Bolingbroke: Jan 4, 2015

School uniforms need to be totally revamped. Mine didn't have one, but so many of my friends who did experienced a huge amount of sexual harassment when walking to/from school in a uniform, way more than they'd get when in casual dress. There's something very hosed about forcing 12 year old girls to wear an outfit that has become one of the top porn tropes in the country. At least give them the option of trousers.

# ¿ Mar 16, 2018 10:15

Bolingbroke: Jan 4, 2015

chitoryu12 posted:

It's almost like the problem isn't that kids need to have their dress policed, but that men are raised in ways that encourage them to be creeps.

Weird.

Yeah in case it wasn't clear, I'm not arguing that it's kids' dress codes that are the problem here, but until we as a culture move past men being loving atrocious to children those children shouldn't be forced to dress in a way that so many men sexualise. I'm sure if we give them alternatives men will just start sexualising those as well but, eh, you do what you can. I suppose my complaint here is less with the nature of school uniforms and more that kids are forced to dress that way.

# ¿ Mar 16, 2018 14:07

Bolingbroke: Jan 4, 2015

Electric Bugaloo posted:

You're really putting the cart before the horse here though (or something like that) by arguing that "schoolgirl trope = sexualized image to lots of men = therefore underage girls shouldn't be made to dress that way for school." You're arguing that the uniform itself has a uniquely sexy quality that certain men appreciate, when the reality is that it's what the uniform represents that is so taboo- and the root of its appeal.

The "catholic schoolgirl" ensemble isn't really all that different from any other button shirt + skirt combo (like what many women might wear to work) aside from the fact that it's associated with students. This is treated as a sex trope by adults for reasons ranging from legit pedophilia (or at least a "preference for women on the younger side") to the fact that most adults in our sex-phobic, rear end-backward society got their first taste of sex by "breaking the rules" as students, and they fetishize those experiences and that period of their lives. Our society is also obsessed with the idea of virginity and innocence - and the idea of deflowering or corrupting that innocence, along with the implied power imbalance, is similarly fodder for many a sex trope.

To build off of Desperado Bones' post, a middle school I used to work at in a really, really poor district had (by design) the cheapest, most unappealing uniforms you could imagine: baggy, 90's-style navy sweatshirts and sweatpants. The kids all looked like giant, dark blue bags of potatoes walking around. That didn't stop the construction workers on a job site down the street from hollering at my 7th and 8th graders every afternoon as they walked home. And these kids were 11 to maybe 15 at the very oldest. Eventually the dean, a rugby playing dire bear of a dude, had to start walking out with the students at dismissal just to deathstare at these guys until everyone got safely past.

You could put teenagers in full hazmat suits, and as long as society understood that a hazmat suit was now what teenagers wore you would have some men behaving inappropriately toward them. Because to those guys it's about loving teenagers, full stop- or at minimum, it's about getting their rocks off harassing somebody they assume would be powerless to get them in real trouble.

I'm aware of all this, thanks. I literally just mean kids shouldn't be forced to wear a particular outift that's especially sexualised. I know that whatever they wear will inevitably be sexualised (I've experienced all this myself), regardless of what it looks like, and it being a symbol of the taboo is why it's sexualised. Just give them the choice of what to wear so they're not forced to wear the most sexualised tropified poo poo available.

# ¿ Mar 16, 2018 23:35

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# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 09:13

Bolingbroke: Jan 4, 2015

'Transgenderism' was briefly a term you'd see in academic work by actual trans people a few years back. Checking my notes, Jack Halberstam's work used it as recently as 2017 (Trans*: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability), although it's definitely not commonly used anymore. The preferred noun is transness. Some of the older trans crowd might still use it, but 98% of the time it's a dogwhistle that reifies trans identity into an ideology. Absolutely a red flag if it's not being used by, like, an actual trans theorist over the age of 50.

EDIT Here's a couple of really good articles about the rise of 'TERFism' in the UK: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/07/opinion/terf-trans-women-britain.html: 'the obsession with supposed �biological realities� [...] is part of a long tradition of British feminism interacting with colonialism and empire.'
https://theoutline.com/post/6536/british-feminists-media-transphobic?zd=1&zi=4usnexrm

Bolingbroke fucked around with this message at 06:38 on May 30, 2020

# ¿ May 30, 2020 06:33

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Cinema Discusso > Sexual Assault and the Culture of Hollywood