In addition to Thin Mint cookies, I am addicted to reading articles that question whether or not Topic X is feminist or anti-feminist. Does Topic X get the Feminist Seal of Approval or does it go on the wall of shame? Like the Thin Mint cookies, these articles are usually devoid of nutritional value, but I read 'em anyway.
Here are two of the latest "Is it Feminist?" articles:
What's Wrong With the Hunger Games Is What No One Noticed. (Answer: Katniss is a bad feminist.)
And a whole Room for Debate about whether or not attachment parenting sets back the women's movement.
Next week, we'll debate whether or not the following subjects are feminist or anti-feminist: Jessica Simpson's never ending pregnancy, all of World War II, and a bathroom scale.
Apt. 11d 
A bathroom scale is more feminist than a living room scale.
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I chatted about this with friends after the umpteenth “Why Katniss is more Feminist Than Bella” article in the mainstream media. I predicted that we’d soon see a backlash explaining why Katniss was insufficiently feminist.
It’s like the journalists are writing to a planned schedule. Keep your eyes peeled for complaints about The Avengers’ Black Widow and Catwoman. There might be some real reaching this winter, but we might even get something along these lines for Galadriel in The Hobbit.
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They put Galadriel in The Hobbit?
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“It’s like the journalists are writing to a planned schedule. ”
Yup. It drives me nuts. I conflate it with the fact that practically everyone looks good on the red carpet these days, because everyone uses a stylist who uses the officially defined rules for what should be worn on the red carpet, and no one takes any risks.
Also baby names, where everyone is trying to be unique without being too unique and ends up doing what everyone else is doing, but with actual marketing people telling you to be unique but not too unique.
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Mayim Bialik is my hero.
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You got it sistah! They also alternate between mommy wars AND is this good for feminists articles.
What drives me crazy about the attachment debate is that the ability to choose is HUGE privilege that many if not most women do not have. You have no choice around paid work, your attachment/breast feeding decision is made for you.
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“What drives me crazy about the attachment debate is that the ability to choose is HUGE privilege that many if not most women do not have.”
Well, unless you’re hoeing beans or toiling in a rice paddy with a baby on your back. Then it’s take-your-child-to-work-day every day!
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Are Thin Mints feminist?
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I read the piece on Badinter in last year’s New Yorker and found her arguments intriguing… As a mother of a 2 and 4 year old, I def have attachment parent tendencies, what with allowing them to come to our bed in the middle of the night and choosing to have us live on a tight one-income budget as a SAHM instead of the alternatives. The lack of sleep has robbed me of full use of my cognitive abilities and the lack of full time paid work- well, I’m afraid to consider the implications in their entirety… But while I may have lost some power in the world of financial independence, I am indulging a personal goal of mine- to try to emulate the childhood I had when my mother stayed home. Isn’t that attention to my own goals despite the pulls of society, in that singular context, the definition of self-empowerment? I do hope to return to full-time work and repair all the financial weaknesses I’ve created for myself, as an independent entity of my husband, not to mention enjoy the comforts of two incomes. I think when I do, I’ll look back on this time at home as priceless.
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Are Thin Mints feminist?
The are delicious, and that’s all that really matters.
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Thin Mints aren’t feminist. Tagalongs are feminist, but they are also racist. Trefoils are feminist and anti-racist but taste horribly bland.
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Yes, but is Katniss an attachment parent? I’m going to indulge in a little transference and guess that she’s like me and most of my friends: following some some attachment parenting practices, some neutral ones, and some that are in opposition to AP ideals.
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MH, yes, Galadriel’s in The Hobbit but legitimately, I’d say, since she’s part of the Council and Gandalf meets with her in this time frame. You don’t read about it in the main story, but in the rest of Tolkien’s material it comes out.
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I wasn’t complaining about Galadriel. I guess that would explain why they split it into two parts.
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I’m actually re-reading The Hobbit to my son right now. It isn’t a very feminist book. I don’t think there is a single named, living female in the book who isn’t a spider. Maybe Lobelia at the very end, but I’m not sure.
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We need to read The Hobbit, too, before the movie comes out.
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“It’s like the journalists are writing…”
It’s called Google Insights or whatever the tool is. In my day job I weep daily because of what actually *gets* clicked, as opposed to what people say they want to have available to be clicked. (We try to do both.)
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That one about the Hunger Games is particularly silly. Many of the commenters of that post instead got it right, and not coincidentally, those are the comments that were rated the highest by the people who read that site.
In a way, Katniss sitting back and having other people do the killing is the most controlling of all. It’s kinda like a mob boss. She doesn’t have to get her hands dirty because everyone else will just do it for her. Seems like a pretty smart strategy to me (to the extent that it’s correct–as several commenters noticed, she DID in fact kill people and continues to do so in the other 2 books).
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As long as she’s killing somebody. That’s the important part.
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Remember how Gandalf disappears during the Hobbit to expel the Necromancer from the Dark Tower in the forest? They’re putting that into the movies.
Much more scope for (a) the return of famous faces and (b) crowd-pleasing massive battle sequences.
Plus, two movies.
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