LADY GODIVA: The Naked Truth

In the immortal words of Franz Kafka on following The Policy of Truth, "Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion.   Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly."   So I'm merely gonna take that advice from Kafka and be as honest here as possible in this post. Remember waaay back in ol' 1987 when the word  'Mannequin'   was a movie?   (Oh look!--it's almost like a toe tag she's got on herself there but it's like a pink price tag ankle bracelet, how cute)! And when the word "mannequin" was just for a giant plastic human figure to exhibit clothing on in a "realistic" fashion that was slightly less creepy than a Victorian Doll for the purpose of selling various attire?     (You are welcome for the nightmares). Well, now a mere mannequin means so much more. "Mannequin ah, wah-unn..." #1).  T...

This music video manages to be both riotous and poignant.  It  weaves between banal adult reality and hyperactive hedonism to such an extent, that there's really no way of telling if the main subject's fantasies are only just that - mere fantasy or reliving a tropical abandon on a recently taken holiday.  A tropical abandon that through a myriad  of miniature existential crises becomes quite clear is not an escapist life style for our subject but her actual preferred lifestyle choice. The main subject is a rather "thick girl"  who's portrayed as both conservative to the point of dour and as an eccentric sexy leopard lady: Too, too many times, especially in music videos, a woman's appearance is limited to only being sexy or beautiful (or just naked).  So it's reeeaaalllllly super refreshing to see a female portrayed as multidimensional and not just by her choice in appropria...

YingYing Shang has done something truly marvelous for her disabled little sister Melissa Shang - she started a petition for American Girl to release a disabled Girl of the Year doll. Melissa Shang's request is just as reasonable as it is honorable.  Afflicted with Charcot-Marie-Tooth , a form of muscular dystrophy, it's touching to know that through this deliberate action, she, herself, is actually setting an example of empowerment for many.  In particular, other little girls, disabled or otherwise.   American Girl dolls are a viable alternative to the-rubbish-one-growth-spurt-away-from-a-landfill dolls that young women are somehow encouraged to play with lately these days, such as: BRATZ Dolls  Monster High Dolls Barbie    With American Girls 'Historical Characters' , I was actually really disappointed to see that apparently nobody appeared to give the green light on such wonderfully inspirational historica...

The ether is all abuzz over whether or not these Japanese "Disney Princess Lingerie" items are a Dream Or Nightmare. Fairly modest lingerie visually, but intellectually, rather disconcerting.   (Yes, "Belle" has been misspelled).  Personally, I'm unwilling to answer:  dream or nightmare? -- because that's a very childish way of asking, good or bad?   Instead I'd rather ask, how did this get made and to what purpose was it made?   Are these being marketed to little girls, pre-tweens, 'tweens, teenagers, young adults, fetishistic adults, furries, fangirls - to whom for purchase?  Was there such a large demand necessitating supply?   Frisky writer Winona Dimeo-Ediger gushes over the bras and even asks, ... "any guys reading: do you dig the sexy princess look?"  I say if the dude does, keep him away from your princess crazed daughters.    There's no denying that there's some weird hypersexualization...

There's something really, really, really disturbing about this.  Something that says chump and cheap, yet is magically garish simultaneously.   I hate it.  I hate that Disney is cashing in-- yet again- -on their contrived and manipulated notions of romance even further than they've already cashed in on it and what they've already spoon fed to mold tender minds on what love is as well as on what 'true love' consists of.  It makes me vomit a little in my mouth.  I hate it almost as much as shitty overpriced white dresses with 'Disney Princesses' names on them to get touted as 'special collections' to make you into yet another walking cash cow while you embark on your fantastic suburban fantasy of heterosexual bliss in virginal white even though your hymen broke at 13 during a family reunion just so your rug-rats can nurse from the same poisonous rat posed as mouse teat as you did because you obviously turned out absolutely fine.   Truly, a...

To ring in the new year, figured it might be fun to share some amazing, yet relatively unknown, covers and or remixes of their more notorious originally released songs.   #1). "Under My Thumb"  (cover The Rolling Stones) by La Roux happens to be a wonderful female cover of "Under My Thumb", where the gender of the subject is not dependent on that of the singer's.  Typically, whenever I've heard a female cover of this song, the sex of the subject gets changed to "he" and I feel that that ultimately taints the depth of these lyrics.  It's a song being sung by an abuser in a relationship, someone who has gained control over another person that they felt they used to be controlled by.  It's not a love song.  It's the antithesis of a love song.  However the La Roux cover is really melancholy, not smug like The Rolling Stones version.  You get the sense in the La Roux rendition that there's an element of regre...