Live like the stars at the low interest rate of 20%

Once again December has descended upon us with the echos of competing songs flooding in from every direction and every shop we pass by assault us in a barrage of sound. Our other senses bombarded with greens and reds, the swirl of mint, and the promise of joy if we just engage in the ritual of spending. I don't hate Christmas, I enjoy the days off work, and I enjoy the time I get to spend with my family, but I do not enjoy the feverish pace of consumption in the guise companionship, the struggle to find the perfect trinket to express a feeling caring or thoughtfulness. A few kind words, a hug and sometime spend in conversation have no equal in the material realm.

Avengers are buff, but are no Buffy

The Avengers movie was in theatres back in May, that being so long ago this post is hardly relevant to the times, was received with much fanfare and it was a huge success, I enjoyed it a lot. I did however want to point out two every obvious things... pointed out by many before me, and I'm sure many after me. One, cast of mostly white men, two, cast of mostly white men. Hey, isn't that the same thing twice, yes but from two different angles. First I would like to talk about the lack of racialized people in the movie, we see Nick Fury played by Samuel L Jackson, as the head of S.H.I.E.L.D. he's not really a member of the team, so that leaves.... The Hulk.. he's green right... hmmm. All of the characters are "classic"

To beard or not to beard

In an effort to tackle the concept of being “masculine” I decided to take a look at the documentary film, Mansome directed by Morgan Spurlock, the director of other “gems” such as supersize me, and wherein the world is Osama bin laden,  What I was looking for was information on what we as a society see and believe to be typical gender norms for “men,” I tried to identify a hegemonic masculinity. Antonio Gramsci talks about hegemony in his Prison Notebooks, and I think looking at spontaneous consent will help identify a shift in Hegemonic masculinity. Manliness being identified as the rough and rugged working man, who loves sports, cars and beer, but shifting to include more less typically "manly" options. I would argue in part due the ability to sell products to men that have not typically been purchased, like a variety of skin care products as an example.

Boys toys, and violence or lego my lego

A few days ago, while procrastinating, I decided to watch a few youtube videos under the guise of "doing research," I decided it was time I watch the Tropes vs Women a six part vblog by Anita Sarkeesian who runs Feminist Frequency website (link in important links side bar). Lucky for me watching these videos, and many others on the channel, actually was research. The videos that struck me at the time was the two part Lego video, about the gendering of lego, which I believe she was using as an example of how toys (and other media) are gendered.