WTF?

Girl set ablaze for wearing lipstick
11:00 AEST Sun Oct 19 2008

An 11-year-old girl was set on fire by a relative in India's northern city of Jaipur for wearing lipstick and being "inappropriately dressed", media reports said.

The girl suffered burns over 90 per cent of her body. Her chances of survival were bleak, police officers told the NDTV network on Saturday.

Police arrested her great uncle, who allegedly poured kerosene on the girl and set her ablaze on Friday.

Investigators told the PTI news agency that the 55-year-old man, a conservative Muslim, had told the police he was enraged at the girl wearing lipstick and being "scantily dressed".

Among conservative Muslim communities, women are required to observe hijab, which means wearing clothing that covers the head and the body.

But relatives told news channels the man had tried to molest the girl and had set her on fire when she objected.

Neighbours came to her rescue, one of whom was also injured while trying to put out the flames, police said.

A case of attempted murder was registered against the accused.

Police are continuing investigations.

Brenvy and the city...

So I saw SATC last night (The new Sex and The City movie for the uninitiated) and I really enjoyed it – it even elicited a few genuine belly laughs (especially Charlotte’s poopy-pants incident in Mexico), but mostly it left me with brand envy (henceforth to be known as brenvy).

From the opening right up until the credits rolled it was a veritable avalanche of designer clothes and bags and shoes and lifestyles, and whilst that was exactly what I paid $13 to see, I couldn’t help but feel a bit...depressed and empty afterwards (and when I say empty I’m referring to my closet).

I came to the conclusion that I desperately wanted – nay, deserved - a wardrobe full of Vivienne Westwood and Louis Vuitton and diamond-encrusted stilettos, but unlike Carrie and the crew I’m not raking it in through my (non-existent) glamour job or (even more non-existent) millionaire boyfriend which of course means that I, along with pretty much every other woman in the theatre, will miss out on what we so lust for.

And on that bleak note, I’m off to e-window shop on E-Luxury.

Lip Gloss Etiquette

To gloss or not to gloss – that is the question.

At least that was the question flitting around in my little product-nutty mind last Monday morning as I sat on a crowded train bound for Central Station. I whipped out my fave Chanel gloss (Lèvres Scintillantes in myriad if we’re being precise) and went to apply, but I suddenly felt a collective sense of disapproval from my fellow commuters (expressed via grunts, sighs and eye rolls).

Maybe I was just being paranoid, or perhaps I was slightly delirious (quite possible seeing as I only had about four hours of sleep after all). Paranoia aside, it did get me thinking about the etiquette of lip gloss. Are there situations where one shouldn’t apply? I’d never considered my gloss habit to be impinging on anyone else’s happiness and well-being, but judging by the reaction of my train seat buddy you could have be forgiven for thinking I’d attempted to wipe my nose on his shirt sleeve.

Has anyone else encountered reactions like this? Is gloss (and makeup application of any sort) a strictly-in-your-own-bathroom thing? If so then I’ve been offending people every day for the past....never mind.

Good Girl Gone Bad?

Good or bad – it seems everyone has something to say about Miley Cyrus.

The recent release of her Vanity Fair photo shoot has landed Miley in even more hot water following the MySpace photo scandals that have plagued the 15-year-old starlet in recent weeks.

Many fans (and fan’s parents) have expressed disappointment in the Hannah Montana teen queen, saying that she’s leading her young fans astray and promoting a skanky image a la Britney.

Miley had previously dismissed the MySpace photos which included her showing her bra as “nothing bad,” but when the Vanity Fair photo of Miley draped seductively in a satin bed sheet surfaced, camp Cyrus admitted to embarrassment.

The Disney Channel has backed their young protégée, releasing a statement which brandished Vanity Fair, saying that “a situation was created to deliberately manipulate a 15-year-old in order to sell magazines.

So where does the truth (and the blame – if any) lie?

Growing up in the spotlight with a rock star dad must surely come with its pressures and temptations, but it would seem that the world is super keen to dish out the judgement on Billy Ray’s little girl.

So is Miley really guilty of committing an unforgiveable act?

All teenagers struggle to come to terms with their own identity and emerging sexuality and try on different shoes to see how they fit – that’s an accepted part of becoming an adult.

However it would seem that Miley won’t be afforded that same right because the world is watching her grow up – or perhaps we would prefer she didn’t?

Lads Mags. How do I loathe thee...

Shirt-potatoes.

There is something inherently disturbing about that term. I first stumbled across the crude expression for women’s breasts in FHM, a well-known and popular lads’ mag.

Thus began my unadulterated hatred of that entire magazine genre.

If lads’ mags were the only source of “information” available on female sexuality, then the world would be forgiven for thinking all we women really want to do is rip it off and ‘shake it’.

There are three things about lads’ mags that I find abhorrent. Firstly, they present one single stereotype of female sexuality – that being the plastic porn variety. Secondly, they insult men by telling them that this is the only sort of woman that they ought to be attracted to, and lastly they sell this disturbing and perverted view of sexuality to society without any concerns about the messages they are promoting.

If their ‘win your girlfriend a boob job’ competition wasn’t enough to make you want to stab yourself in the eye with a fork, then Zoo Weekly’s next offering might just push you over the edge. Zoo is poised to piss everyone off all over again with their upcoming ‘win a free divorce’ competition.

The editor of Zoo Weekly Paul Merrill defended the competition by saying that it would “encourage people to see the error of their ways and get out rather than put up with 40 years of misery.”

I’ll bet he’s a charming guy.

The British version of Zoo Weekly is also in hot water because they recently published pictures of a 14 year old girl’s breasts after her boyfriend sent in the photos without her permission.

One study found that lads’ mags valued women solely in terms of their looks. The researchers used an example from the lads’ mag FHM, where one section was titled “Dog or Fox?” and invited readers to praise or crucify the women featured based on their perceived level of attractiveness.

According to same study, faux-lesbianism and bi-sexuality is a theme constantly regurgitated throughout lads’ mags. The fake-lesbian trend in lads’ mags is derived from soft-core porn and is based solely on women pretending to be aroused to please the reader. Note the key operative word here is pretending – and personally I fail to understand how readers find fake arousal sexy.

The study concluded that lads’ mags focus on women solely as sexual spectacle. I’m afraid I must agree with those conclusions after reading common lads’ mag cover lines which included charming headlines such as “The girls of Big Brother – better and wetter than ever,” and “Topless models writhe around together.” Lads’ mags are as close as you can get to porn without readers having to be over 18. Perhaps they’re even designed to ween teenage boys onto porn.

So what does all this excess of boobs and booty in lads’ mags really say about our society?

I for one believe it reflects a dehumanisation of women in our society. These magazines focus on women as body pieces rather than people. The underlying messages of such publications are that women are sex objects to be consumed or utilised – much like car parts.

Authors of an academic article published in the 90s share my opinion. After analysing numerous images the researchers concluded that women were featured solely as sex objects and decorations without any real personality. This resulted in women being viewed as almost inhuman because their only implied functions and purpose are sexual. The study also found that women’s body parts were featured much more than their faces – effectively reducing women to bits and pieces rather than actual people.

The defence often cited by the lads’ mag editors is that their magazines reflect society’s sexual liberation and freedom of expression. That argument tends to fall to pieces when you look at society’s response to Islamic culture and gay marriage.

In 2006 former Prime Minister John Howard said that he found Muslim women wearing veils “confronting.” More shocking than this ignorant statement is the fact that no Australian politician has ever commented on the truly confronting content of lads’ mags.

In 2005 George W. Bush proposed an amendment to the U.S constitution that would forever ban gay marriage. The saddest part is that almost half of the United States agreed with Bush in a nationwide opinion poll.

Journalist and author Ariel Levy was shocked and saddened by Bush’s actions and the general American response. She wrote that if half the people of the most powerful nation in the world felt so threatened by two people of the same gender being in love and having sex that they turned their attention – during wartime – to blocking rights already denied to homosexuals, then all the porn, lads’ mags and pole dancing classes in the world won’t render us free or sexually liberated.

Amen to that sad fact.