[Wamvan] Fwd: Too Skinny Minnie & Gendered Halloween Costumes

Fri Oct 19 11:07:14 PDT 2012

Hi Natalie & all

Thanks for sharing the Halloween post - would love to hear other's ideas
for cool, creative costumes. I know my coworker is going as a "Binder Full
of Women" (instruction video here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YVk1hWEkj00).<http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YVk1hWEkj00>

I think the Miss Representation screening went pretty well - there were I'd
say about 100 people there and probably around half stayed for the panel,
which went pretty well. There was a good variety of questions, from issues
of agency & how you fight sexualization without discouraging healthy
sexuality, to underlying issues of power and consumption, to analysis of
particular social media platforms and how they play into the issues raised
in the film. The other panelist was Sandy Garossino.

I also mentioned WAM! Van as one local group working on issues of gender
representation and media literacy so hopefully people will check out our
website and get more info!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Jarrah

On Fri, Oct 19, 2012 at 10:25 AM, Natalie Hill <nhill10 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Thought I would share a couple things in this latest Miss Rep newsletter,
> below. I didn't even hear about the skinny Minnie Mouse thing. Of course,
> some argue the capitalist, sexist, patriarchal institution of Disney on the
> whole should be boycotted (so singling out this one example of bizarro body
> re-designing is moot) but still, interesting.
>
> Another subject here is Halloween. Jarrah Hodge at Gender Focus recently
> published a great post
> <http://www.gender-focus.com/2012/10/06/halloween-2012-not-just-sexy-costumes/>on
> the sexy Halloween costume phenomenon on Gender Focus, complete with
> alternative, very creative costume ideas.
>
> And on a related note, I know Miss Representation was recently screened at
> UBC, and the panel after included WAM! Van community members Jarrah (go
> Jarrah, busy lady!) and Beth Hong, one of the organizers of the first WAM
> van conference back in 2011.
>
> Who was there? How did it go? I couldn't make it, but would love to hear
> any highlights of the discussion :)
>
> cheers,
>
> Nat
>
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Miss Representation <Miss_Representation at mail.vresp.com>
> Date: Fri, Oct 19, 2012 at 9:09 AM
> Subject: Too Skinny Minnie & Gendered Halloween Costumes
> To: nhill10 at gmail.com
>
>
>
> <http://cts.vresp.com/fbl?93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/http%3A%2F%2Fhosted-p0.vresp.com%2F816967%2F93073e9a1a%2FARCHIVE%23like>
> <http://cts.vresp.com/ts?93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/http%3A%2F%2Fapi.addthis.com%2Foexchange%2F0.8%2Fforward%2Ftwitter%2Foffer%3Ftemplate%3D%257B%257Btitle%257D%257D%2B%257B%257Burl%257D%257D%26url%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fhosted-p0.vresp.com%252F816967%252F93073e9a1a%252FARCHIVE%26shortener%3Dbitly%26title%3DToo%2BSkinny%2BMinnie%2B%2526%2BGendered%2BHalloween%2BCostumes>
> <http://cts.vresp.com/ls?93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/http%3A%2F%2Fapi.addthis.com%2Foexchange%2F0.8%2Fforward%2Flinkedin%2Foffer%3Ftemplate%3D%257B%257Btitle%257D%257D%2B%257B%257Burl%257D%257D%26url%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fhosted-p0.vresp.com%252F816967%252F93073e9a1a%252FARCHIVE%26shortener%3Dbitly%26title%3DToo%2BSkinny%2BMinnie%2B%2526%2BGendered%2BHalloween%2BCostumes>
> **
>
> [image: actionalert]<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/ff5146500d>
>
> Dear Natalie,
>
> The recent "re-imagining" of Disney's Minnie Mouse, the iconic animated
> character beloved by children the world over, is a frightening example of
> our culture increasingly sexualizing children and perpetuating a limiting
> standard of beauty for women and girls. The new Minnie<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/d1408aea39>,
> created for retailer Barneys New York, is depicted impossibly skinny and is
> stretched beyond recognition. In its efforts to sell a product to young
> women, Disney and Barneys are reinforcing the media's already unhealthy and
> dangerous body ideals for girls.
>
> With Halloween fast approaching, the season for scary displays of sexism
> is upon us. Costume shopping for October 31st has become a disturbing
> yearly experience - an unavoidable reminder of just how much money is being
> made through the objectification, sexualization, and degradation of women.
>
> These days you can put "sexy" in front of nearly anything and make it into
> a Halloween costume for women (in fact, there's already a "Sexy Minnie
> Mouse<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/07794f1505>"
> costume); and, as a result, girls are learning at younger and younger ages
> that the* point* of Halloween is to show off their bodies.
>
> Last year we wrote<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/c402a8323f>
> :
>
>  "Halloween seems to amplify our cultural trend of women being raised to
> manipulate their bodies and boys being taught to master their environments.
> With these costumes, are we again teaching girls to value themselves only
> for their beauty and boys to glorify violence? When are we going to provide
> a wider array of opportunities for our girls to portray characters that
> aren’t easily objectified or sexualized? Where are the costumes for my
> daughter that actually represent power or authority?"
>
>  We want to counter gender stereotypes again this year by presenting
> positive Halloween alternatives for our daughters *and* sons.
>
> *This week, submit your favorite positive costume ideas on Tumblr<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/e5a35902c0>or send them to us via email!
> *
>
> You can also use #NotBuyingIt<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/5bd5954c5c>on Twitter to call out the most egregious and offensive costumes - not to
> mention companies - you find.
>
> Over the next two weeks we'll spotlight the best costume ideas from Tumblr
> and continue to keep pressure on retailers<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/426bde0269>and corporate America to give our children healthy ideas on who and what
> they can become!
>
> Warmly,
> Jennifer Siebel Newsom & The MissRepresentation.org Team
>
>
> Facebook<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/64e428e693>
>  | Twitter<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/57a2071477>
>  | Tumblr<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/797f4019da> |
> Pinterest<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/f82ed0823a>|
> YouTube<http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MissRepresentation/93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/740645022d>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>   Click to view this email in a browser<http://hosted.verticalresponse.com/816967/93073e9a1a/1661553653/1eb99f04bd/>
>
> If you no longer wish to receive these emails, please reply to this
> message with "Unsubscribe" in the subject line or simply click on the
> following link: Unsubscribe<http://cts.vresp.com/u?93073e9a1a/1eb99f04bd/mlpftw>
> ------------------------------
>   Miss Representation
> 1806 Belles St. 3A
> The Presidio
> San Francisco, California 94129
> US
>
> Read <http://www.verticalresponse.com/content/pm_policy.html> the
> VerticalResponse marketing policy.
>   [image: Try Email Marketing with VerticalResponse!]
> <http://www.verticalresponse.com/landing/ef/?mm/93073e9a1a>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wamvan mailing list
> Wamvan at lists.resist.ca
> https://lists.resist.ca/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/wamvan
>
>

-- 
--------------------
Jarrah Hodge
@jarrahpenguin
http://gender-focus.com
--------------------
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.resist.ca/pipermail/wamvan/attachments/20121019/11b8883c/attachment.html>