Another one of those freaky things that happen to me (as I keep saying, it's not the intensity of freakiness but the frequency of them): three days ago I bought The Sunday Times, opened its magazines and promptly reminded myself why I decided about half a year ago never to read the Sunday magazines. The first headline of the Style magazine put me off instantly: "More to come - The flowering of the 'Botox' and better sex after 40' brigade". The article trumpeted the story of a 44-year-old woman ("I want to tell the tale of my life") and basically how she found fulfilment ("I can honestly say that I'm the most content I've ever been") after her divorce, primarily by embarking on a wild sex life with "a rota of four or five men I see, mainly for sex".
I had a number of problems with this article, even though at the time on a warm Sunday afternoon I was too lazy to think them through, and anyway there were the World Cup matches that day to watch. My instantaneous reaction was an irrational gut insecurity - I can certainly see myself (though I fervently hope not!) at 44 as she claimed she was: "frumpy, overweight, undersexed...a mother with three careers - baby-sitter, laundress, cleaning lady - and married to a man who was married to his job." But I certainly can't see myself, at 44 (or any stage of my life, frankly) sleeping with four or five men in a rota. I don't have or see myself having "a boyfriend wish list pinned up on my kitchen bulletin board", I don't plan or see myself planning "my kids-free weekends like a military operation, scheduling a date for Friday night, another for Saturday and a third for Sunday lunch". My god, what am I going to be missing?
But that wasn't my main problem with the article. I was more disturbed by the insistent equation of wild promiscuity with happiness: sex doesn't seem to count unless you do it with dozens on the go, one after the other. Hooking up is fine even if it's easy and anything-goes: "It was easy to meet men - but then I was easy too. Post 40 and post divorce, I had to be." What I found most insidious (and which was what sucked me in in the first two seconds) was how this attitude can masquerade as sexual liberation and equality: "Men move fast; why can't a woman?"
I am trying to write this without sounding like a prude. But I sincerely echo Ariel Levy's comment: "If you happen to be a person for whom this incredibly specific form of sexual expression [the ultra-consumerist porn-star ideal] is authentic, then this is your moment, and you should enjoy it." But if it's not, and I would suspect that would include a fair number of us, then to constantly flaunt this mentality of fast sex and unthinking promicuity is actually just evil. It's sensational, it's trendy, it parades an air of debonair liberation. Sex and sexual discovery are wonderful things, yes, but like all wonderful things and subjects they should be treated and written about with care. I think of this wonderful line by Pater (all the reading on epiphany that I've been doing, right) - "I wish they would not call me a hedonist. It gives such a wrong impression to those who do not know Greek." Which really made me laugh. But on a more sobering note, these articles don't talk about how it is actually the loneliest of all after a while to be with partner after partner after partner, barely knowing any of them, trading only bodily fluids. These articles don't talk about how emotionally empty it can be after a while when all you connect with are shells of bodies and nothing else. These articles don't talk about how (conversely) you destroy your own sense of self-worth and self-respect after a while when you realise all you can trade on is your body, when you realise the only way you know how to get attention is through sex, because all that is alot less glamourous and, well, sexy. I think of a line in Roger Ebert's review of Lost In Translation (yes, it's terrible to have to turn to quoting Roger Ebert and most of you will probably stop reading at this point and, Ian, yes I know you hate the film, but, hey, occasionally Ebert does come up with something): "They [Charlotte and Bob] share something as personal as their feelings rather than something as generic as their genitals."
Which brings us to the Guardian article I came across today on Ariel Levy and her book, "Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture". I'm abit tired of writing now, so I'll just be brief: Levy's central thesis is that the rise of what she calls "raunch culture" is far from what it is trumpeted to be - women's liberation and empowerment - but instead trades on sexual stereotypes and performance meant to titillate and sensationalise, which really brings us back to the pre-feminist days. This post is not about whether Levy is right or wrong (although I'm very inclined to go with "she's right") but just that I guess I'm so glad I'm not the only one who feels that way: that there is this wholly unreasonable (yes, unreasonable) and over-emphatic equation in our culture today between rampant sex and an all-consuming sexual lifestyle and all the good things in life - happiness, fulfilment, contentment, worth, self-respect. And forgetting (unfashionable as they sound) loyalty, fidelity, and trust. And, again, that all my good ideas come too late.
Blogroll
- Blazejowski
- The Chutry Experiment
- Delirium's Library
- Dr Mabuse's Kaleido-Scope
- dsng.net
- girish
- quandmeme
- shaun wilson research blog
- Theatre of Found Sounds
- zp
Links
- Bright Lights Film Journal
- Cahiers du cinéma
- The Film Journal
- Film-Philosophy
- flicker
- Jump Cut
- PopMatters
- Rhizomes
- Rouge
- Scope
- Senses of Cinema
Previous Posts
- Sunday In The Park With George (17 June 2006, Wynd...
- On leaves
- Let the ghosts lie
- RIP
- And we think life sucks
- Private thought du jour
- Plug Wars 3 - Revenge of the blog
- I love this country
- Thinking out of the box (or not)
- Birthing pains
Search
© 2006 Jenna Ng
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Hi!! Thought I’d dash off this greeting, and concur that the post-40s raunch culture is soiling the nation – even its more dignified spots.
I live on Wentworth golf course and the peace of the sultry evenings is often savaged by a raucous pre-feminist group intruding on these environs. Clearly divorcees weakened by proposals of a lustful nature, these unruly folk fashion unnatural passion orgies on the greens out there under the moonlight with a whole rota of interchangeable lovers. Last night was no different. I shy from going into details myself on these things, but it is very often the case, according to the grounds-staff of England’s most fashionable golf circuit, that those in charge of the seducing in the first place appear to be the very grasping 44 year-old women you describe – and they are EVERYWHERE, and waving Sunday supplements no less.
But enough psychotic exaggeration. I think we’re all busy looking to answer the Big Question in life, and we bring ourselves to believe that once we arrive at that answer, our worries will be over. If there is EVER an answer, and our capacity for “love” would appear to be something to do with it, then in the meantime the True Romance magazines will try every potty thing they can – EXCEPT teach some people the meaning of self-respect and personal fulfilment – to exploit it, belittle and cripple it with stories of stupidity. (And the concept of female self-empowerment/liberation be damned, seemingly, in the process.)
Haphazardly,
Ian
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Since this post is about sex, it’ll probably be read plenty but commented upon little ;o)
But seriously, the proliferating “raunch culture” really is a fascinating subject to me. I view it as the annoying stepchild of the much needed (Kinsey-initiated) sexual revolution and women’s moment of the 20th century. I never really understand how a critique of “raunch” is viewed by some as prudish or, even more perversely, anti-women’s lib. I think there are plenty of people with healthy sex lives and in full support of women’s rights who find much “raunch” insulting.
Linda Williams studies of pornography often is the study of the “raunching” of culture -- though I don’t think she uses the term. She moved from a feminist critique to a larger social reading of the proliferation of the porn aesthetic in all things. She speaks not of pornography as “scandal,” but the “democratization” of it over the last 20 years or so. It’s the intensity of it in new public and private (internet, etc) forums that she often explores. It’s interesting stuff.
Though I always wondered how one of her pornography studies graduate seminars are at Berkeley. She claims to keep it very professional. I must admit, spending an entire semester watching pornography would be . . . to say the least . . . odd.
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
I just remembered . . . You and I watched Williams discuss Jane Fonda’s orgasms at SCMS. She spoke and then half the room filed out, not bothering to stay for three other speakers.
I guess sex sells ;o)
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Eeeps - the golf course!!?!
I wouldn't go so far as to say "exploit", "belittle" or "cripple" (though I agree about "stories of stupidity".....) but yes I do think there's something terribly insidious, almost nefarious about the whole matter. And I think that we agree on; perhaps just a question of degree.
You live on the golf course, Ian?
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Good point ref Linda Williams! I didn't think about that, but come to think of it yes you're right - raunch culture has infiltrated the field! On that note, I also think of Tanya Krzywinska's "Qualifications for Real Sex in Art Cinema" essay in Geoff King's collection, which I read recently. I won't comment on the essay now, but my point is that yes, we seem to have reached a juncture where "real sex" scenes are now so, um, "real" (or should I use "verité aesthetics") in art cinema (The Idiot, Intimacy, Piano Teacher etc) there's actually a need to have to justify it academically (at one point even drawing on Lacan's "sexual (un)relation", albeit precious little else...).
Come to think of it. I once came across a doctoral proposal at a Dutch university (no more details than that) proposing a thesis on, well, ejaculation shots in cinema. Now if you think a graduate seminar in pornography studies is odd......
I have not read much (uh, any) of Williams and her work on porn studies, though. The only work of hers I've read in detail is her book on surrealist cinema when I was reading up on Bunuel - of all things, right.
Ref Jane Fonda's orgasms... *lol*. Yes, that's true. That was funny. But remember someone turned round at the door and said she had to catch her flight, so I guess at least one of them had a good excuse. Now I feel bad about leaving myself (and taking you along!)......
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
I've always thought that funny behaviour like that would be a phase. People either engage in promiscuity when they're young, or when they're old. If you were at it when you were in your 20s, you'd probably not want to do it when you're in yr 40s, and if you missed out when you're in yr 30s, then you make up for it later. To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven.
Have read in a review of "Lie With Me" - (Yes, I watched it, I was bored, really) - that sex makes really bad cinema. And it makes sense. And that would invalidate the whole porn industry, but well... People grinding each other for 5 minutes is just not good cinema, when those 5 minutes could have been used for a more interesting succession of images. That's why it has to be justified academically. You ever tried justifying a joke academically?
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Of course - a whole essay on the humour of Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales", which I didn't even particularly find funny to begin with.
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Just a word on the specific text you’ve chosen, here, and on reading: … I might offer that the Times supplement articles, specifically the publication & tale you mentioned, exist on the one hand (and I don’t know how deeply into people’s lives this actually goes) to reveal a moral truth for its conservative readers ... Rather than being counterideological, they construct meanings for the relatively traditionalist (non-philandering) readership through the exaggeration of a specific image of absolute sexual hyper-ascendancy, so that essentially a debunking strategy is at work, here: the “permissive” values of raunch culture aren’t necessarily idealised in the end (and you’ll have to say whether or not the magazine that portrays the erosion of “women’s lib and self-empowerment” is promoting this rampant amorality and corruption semantically, or editorially, which I suspect it isn't), but seem to me to be presented in various contexts which ultimately expose the disparity (rather than concretise the relation you note) between rampant amorality/”all-consuming sexual lifestyle,” and happiness, contentment, etc.
Agreed, this proposition assumes not just the mild presence, but an overwhelming MAJORITY presence, of a relatively orthodox, homogenous bourgeois readership who look at these articles on permissive attitudes and feel subtly better about their marital/single lives in comparison, but in my experience, the readership of the Times (owned by Murdoch’s News Corp., right? And accused lately of reflecting Murdoch’s conservatism editorially) aren’t in an impressionable state to change their mentality on the basis of these articles ... Alternatively, teen-targeted publications for both sexes produce EXACTLY that sort of dilemma because they’re promoting oppositional (antiauthoritarian maybe?) values and meanings; in which case, I agree that raunch culture plays a significant role.
(As for my overall geographical placement. Shudder ... Not “on” the golf course, as I of course said. I am not a rogue vagrant. I have a cottage flat on the edge of Wentworth’s the Great Wood, which means the golf club is at the bottom of my back garden. Which also means I get to see Tiger Woods pass by my flat later this year in September, IF he agrees, like he said he would in May, to participate in the World Match Play …)
Ciao, kiddo.
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Like the rest of the room, I showed-up mainly to see Williams talk about Fonda's orgasms, to be honest. I won't lie.
I think we stayed for one more speaker to be polite and then snuck out. It was Sunday and I think we both were a little tired of panels by that point.
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
I can certainly think of worse places to live in than somewhere with a golf course at the bottom of your back garden! I live by a marina and all I've got are ducks (though very nice ducks - I'm quite fond of them).
Give me a beep next time you're at the BFI or something, and let's have a coffee, ok?
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Well, I remember I became really disinterested as I knew nothing about the topics of the other two speakers. But yeah, it was Sunday and I was pretty "panelled-out" by then.
<$BlogItemCommentCount$> Comments:
Oops - I meant "uninterested", not "disinterested". Dammit - this not the first time; for some reason I always get the two mixed up. :-)
Post a Comment
<< Back to blog