watch this doc: Il Corpo Delle Donne

Il Corpo Delle Donne (Women's Bodies) is a 24 minute short doc that explores the way that images of women are manipulated and exploited in the Italian media (and everywhere else on earth) and the consequences on a larger cultural scale.

"This project took off as a matter of urgency. It all started with the observation that women–real women–are an endangered species on television, one that is being replaced by a grotesque, vulgar and humiliating representation.

We sensed the enormity of this loss: the erasure of women’s identity is happening right before our eyes, but without a proper reaction, not even from women themselves.

This led us to select television images that share a common manipulative exploitation of the woman’s body, to let people know what is happening–not only people who never watch television, but especially those who watch it but “don’t see.”

Our aim is to ask ourselves questions, and to pose questions about the reason behind this erasure, a real “pogrom” of which all of us are silent spectators.Our project grants special attention to the erasure of adult faces on television, to the use of plastic surgery to erase any sign of the passage of time, and to the social consequences of this erasure."

I first came across this Italian short documentary on one of my favorite blogs: SexGenderBody. I really, really wish I could post this video for you here, but could not find an english version I could embed. Here is the link from the official website:

http://www.ilcorpodelledonne.net/?page_id=91

Seriously, this film is brilliant and thought provoking. Totally worth 20 minutes of your time!! 

quote of my life

"All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind"- Aristotle

What would you do in life if you didn't have to make money?

true romance

I have no words of my own tonight; I'm just weary from routine and a lack of purposefulness. I dug (literally went through all of my old boxes of books and random junk in the closet to find the little scrap of paper I had written this on in 2007) up this inspiring little number courtesy of Charles Bukowski's Henry Chinaski. This passage makes my heart flutter in the best way.

"If you're going to try, go all the way.

Otherwise don't even start.

This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, jobs and maybe your mind.

It could mean not eating for 3 or 4 days. It could mean freezing on a park bench.

It could mean jail. It could mean derision, mockery, isolation.

Isolation is the gift; all the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it.

And you'll do it.

Despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine.

If you're going try, go all the way.

There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter.

Its the only good fight there is."

yeah you are!

I just finished watching Margaret Cho's "Beautiful" (which is awesome by the way). While most of her jokes get right down and dir-taay, they are littered with seeds of truth and wisdom about sexuality and being female. And its her honesty that makes her so damn funny! When she's tellin' it like it is, she never shies away from the political roots that shape our culture. You are left with an important and empowering message after the hilariousness wears off:

"We gotta compliment ourselves because we get enough shit in the world... I think its very important to feel beautiful. I think its very political to feel beautiful. Especially if you're queer; because if you're queer you have to take on the world every single day of your life and you have to feel beautiful to survive. And you are so beautiful!!!"