Sweet E! I Pine for You July 7, 2008

by Emmacat

 

I have accidentally become enmeshed in a locavore experiment. The experiment does not involve local food, but it does require adherence to rules of virtue and eschewal of trashy modern pleasures and is therefore in the potentially obnoxious, self-righteous mold of a locavore experiment.

 

I face: no cable all summer.

 

This was the idea of my virtuous and budget-minded (euphemism alert) boyfriend, who doesn’t watch nearly as much cable as I do. I like CNN with lunch and MSNBC in the evenings and E! and more E!! and more E!!! on the weekend nights, when the liquor ads suggest that cooler people are out partying. With my boyfriend.

 

Okay, he’s not partying. He’s out winning bread for me and the kitties. Djing. Saturday he had a particularly utilitarian gig, one at which he was forced–by a coercive requester–to play “What Is Love.” You know, Baby don’t hurt me/Don’t hurt me/No more. He was looking for a paper bag to put on his head.

 

My fate was worse: an evening home alone. Normally, when he’s djing and I can’t come, I hang out with Joel McHale and the Kardassians and those sad clown Playboy bunnies (or, if I start to feel E!-icky, the Whiskers family).

 

Dear reader, it was terrifying.

 

I began in the network region of the dial, thinking surely those channels exist for a reason. But their raison d’être appeared to be crappy reruns.

 

My next turn of logic: if I enjoy E!, a whole channel based on titillating entertainment news, maybe I should try the working man’s E!

 

I sat through a tedious half-hour about Barbara Walters’ memoir on Entertainment Tonight and decided it was made for old people, but palatable nonetheless. So I doubled down and went for TMZ.

 

That was a mistake. Apparently I like my celebrity gossip cut with the baking soda of irony. I couldn’t take the straight stuff. The rest of the night I watched nature shows on PBS, just to scrub clean. Did you know there’s a cute little critter in Patagonia that’s like a mix of a hamster and a deer? Did you know Patagonia isn’t just a type of fleece vest? (Actually I did know that last, I’m just being cute and self-deprecating.)

 

I suppose if I do this every weekend all summer, I’ll be purer and more adequately disturbed about global warming. And imagine all the charming species I won’t know about if I watch E! instead.

 

 

Read more Emmacat at Clebilicious.

Tyra-nt Watch: I Met Tyra Banks… sorta June 21, 2008

- Buffy Weill-Greenberg

One day I was wandering through the farmer’s market in Union Square when I saw a group of young people gathered and emitting a loud murmuring. “Is it a protest?” I thought. I stared reflexively.

And finally I saw an unusually tall woman staring down with a practiced, closed lip smile, a smile of embarrassment. She wore layers of make-up worthy of a drag queen. Is she an athlete? Is she a model?

No. Fucking. Way. It’s Tyra Banks. The murmuring grew louder as she walked towards me (a pure coincidence, I’m sure). And as I stared, I realized that in this over-crowded farmer’s market, there was a circle of nothing surrounding Tyra — no baby carriages, no tourists, no well, me’s. What the fuck made her so special? Why didn’t she have to deal with the same elbow-to-elbow crowd that the rest of us did? As I walked past, still staring, her over-sized bodyguard made some comment in my general direction to stay out of the way and lightly touched my shoulder.

I wanted to scream at him and her — “this is ludicrous.” I wanted to scream, “Union buster!” (Tyra refused to recognize the writers’ union at ANTM.)

And I actually considered it but fear of arrest or being roughed up won out.

I’d seen a couple celebrities before but they always did the New York thing of blending in and I always did the Jersey thing of openly staring, mouth typically agape. But this was my first brush with Celebrity. Celebrity fucking sucks.

Reality TV Saves the Poor June 20, 2008

- Buffy Weill-Greenberg

Living in squalor? Cramming four kids in a one-bedroom apartment? Well, here in America don’t look to the guv’ment to help you. Turn on your TV and get help from Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.

The premise of the Sears sponsored Extreme Makeover (oh, and by the way, the CEO of Sears Holdings earns 3.42 million, according to Forbes) is a fundamentally conservative one — we don’t need a hand-out from the government, we just need altruism (often in the form of corporate sponsors and excessive consumerism.)

Extreme Makeover takes a family living in unlivable conditions and transforms their trailer, apartment, house into that basic human right that’s so far from basic in the US — a safe, comfortable place to live. That’s not the role of TV, it’s the responsibility of our government to ensure each person has housing, a responsibility that our government shirks.

Here’s one family featured on Extreme Makeover:

Ginyard family: Veronica Ginyard and her family had a life of adversity and struggle. Having bought the first and only home she could afford, Veronica was raising her eight children — including two sets of twins — in a home that would be cramped for a family of four, let alone nine. A strong woman, she was determined to raise her children in a safe and loving home, keeping them off the streets and away from violence for good. But the house wasn’t much of a safe haven.

The extremely hazardous home had exposed wires sticking out of the drywall, mold from constant flooding in their basement, plus holes in the walls and ceilings. The kids were sleeping in makeshift bedrooms in the basement and attic. Veronica was working two jobs just to make ends meet and used public transportation to/from work. “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” came to their rescue. Also in the episode, Grammy-winning superstar Patti LaBelle performed at a candlelight vigil outside the Ginyard’s new home. Original airdate was May 28, 2006.

(Source)

Extreme Makeover personalizes the tragedy of a family’s poverty to the exclusion of all else; it’s a perfect television arc: tragedy, rebuilding, success. Why did she need to work two jobs? Why did she need to stuff a family of 9 into an “extremely hazardous home”? The outside causes (the decreasing wages of the working poor, the cuts and cuts and cuts to affordable housing programs, the Republicans’ fight to keep the minimum wage down, our profit-driven healthcare industry) are absent.

President Bush’s FY 2009 proposed budget was, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, “woefully lacking”: At at a time when the demand for low income housing assistance far outstrips the supply and when there are 2.8 million more poor families in the United States than there are homes for rent that they can afford, the FY09 low income housing budget is woefully lacking.

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, George Bush’s wife made an appearance on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition in Biloxi, MS. What a perfect photograph: the Bush administration makes thousands homeless in MS and LA and then Laura Bush appears on Extreme Makeover for a photo op, talking about the show’s decision on whose house — out of the thousands — to rebuild: “They haven’t chosen one yet. I’m trying to encourage them to maybe choose a school or a library to do, which would help everybody in the community.”

Extreme Makeover isn’t alone in its conservative, consumer philanthropy. Most celebrities and other television shows are in on the game too. Stars who make millions sign a guitar to be auctioned off, participate in telethons asking us to donate, auction off their designer clothes. The winner of The Celebrity Apprentice got to donate a check of $250,000 to a charity of their choice. $250,000. Donald Trump’s net worth is $3 billion, according to Forbes. $250,000. $3 billion.

The wealthy — the wealthy celebrities, corporations, CEOs, networks — could try to help more directly by voluntarily capping their salary at $1-4 million/year and donating the rest to charity; that could begin to redistribute the highly concentrated wealth in our country. The global affairs journal, Foreign Policy, asked for the “one solution that would make the world a better place.” Haaaar-vard based psychologist Howard Gardner suggested an income cap in the United States. Too Much explains:

The United States needs an income cap, Gardner posits in the new Foreign Policy, that limits the amount of money a single individual can annually take home to no more than “100 times as much money as the average worker in a society earns in a year.”

“If the average worker makes $40,000,” Gardner proposes, “the top compensated individual may keep $4 million a year.”

Gardner’s Foreign Policy contribution also advocates a cap on wealth, proposing that “no individual should be allowed to accumulate an estate more than 50 times the allowed annual income.”

If that allowed annual income were $4 million, then Gardner’s proposal would allow no one, at death, to bequest a fortune greater than $200 million. Any individual wealth above that would have to “be contributed to charity or donated to the government.”

A cap on income and riches, Gardner adds, would raise billions, even trillions, “to begin to solve the problems about which others are writing in this collection of solutions to save the world.”

In addition to an income cap, there are other solutions as well to redistribute wealth, like raising the income tax instead of cutting taxes for the country’s wealthiest. Jon Whiten of Media Massage sums it up well:

As Daniel Brook noted in his great book The Trap, the current tax code isn’t some given — it wasn’t always this way. Writing about Franklin Roosevelt’s actions, Brook notes

To hold down the top, he proposed, first in 1936 and again in 1942, capping annual incomes by instituting a 100 percent income tax bracket. … Congress found his proposal too radical but met him halfway, instituting a 94 percent tax on income over $200,000 (a couple million dollars in today’s money). After the war, the top rate was lowered to 91 percent.

Of course, we’ve brought that way down since then. Reagan, upon election, slashed top tax rates for millionaires from 70 to 28 percent, and we’ve only kept rolling down that hill since. It seems like the only way we can come out is to put in place radical plans like FDR’s.

Maybe if the CEO of Sears (who rakes in $3+ million) and her ilk had to pay more in taxes (instead of enjoying the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy) we wouldn’t need Sears advertorials like Extreme Makeover to give a poor family a middle class home. But where’s the television drama in that?

Take Action: Sign this petition asking the wealthy to voluntarily impose an income cap on themselves and donate the rest to an organization that works to fight poverty.

Tyra-nt Watch June 18, 2008

Five days a week and every ANTM “cycle” Tyra Banks unleashes her narcissistic self on audiences. Tyra-nt watch is a place where we and you compile her Tyra-isms.

Has she told an ANTM contestant one week to tone down her personality and the next that she’s shrinking away? Has she referenced her mother during judging? Has she compared modeling to athletics? Has she humiliated a young woman? Has she made the conversation about her the way Tyra and that really annoying guy from work only can?

Send in your sightings for Tyra-nt watch to elizabethwg@gmail.com.

Andrea Lives in Van Nuys June 18, 2008

- Buffy Weill-Greenberg

So before The Apprentice went all Brangelina and invited celebrities to compete to raise funds for corporations which would in turn raise money for charity (celebrity/corporate philanthropy is a topic for another column), Donald Trump told his contestants that he would divide them into the haves and have-nots. (For a refresher on that season, read this.)

Here is our country at a glance, according to Too Much:

Try visualizing wealth in the United States as a three-piece pie, with one piece going to the top 1 percent, one to the next richest 9 percent, and one to everyone else. In 2004, America’s top 1 percent held over $2.5 trillion more in net worth than the entire bottom 90 percent, according to Federal Reserve data supplemented by the annual Forbes 400 list.

***

In 2004, the nation’s top 1 percent raked in more income than the bottom 40 percent, Congressional Budget Office research released in December 2006 indicates.

Every year Forbes rates the top earners in entertainment. People who receive obscene amounts of money for modeling, acting, singing or just being famous for being bootylicious (my big butted sister Kim K.) I don’t care what they can do — no one deserves to earn that much money.

So in a semi-regular column I’ll go through that list and break down what their income could pay for in our country, if that person limited themselves to a $4 million/year salary. (And yes, I’ll include what the celeb pays out in charity — I’ll be fair.) In a May 2007 story Too Much published a story on an income cap:

Can our contemporary world be saved — from the problems that ail us, from climate change and oil dependency, from AIDS and religious extremism, from poverty and inequality? Foreign Policy, the world’s most prestigious global affairs journal, is tackling this weighty question head on, in a new issue that asks 21 of our earth’s most thoughtful observers to suggest the “one solution that would make the world a better place.”

That “one solution,” suggests Howard Gardner, the Harvard-based psychologist whose widely acclaimed books on human intelligence have been translated into 26 languages, ought to be a cap on the income and wealth that any one individual can accumulate.

The United States needs an income cap, Gardner posits in the new Foreign Policy, that limits the amount of money a single individual can annually take home to no more than “100 times as much money as the average worker in a society earns in a year.”

“If the average worker makes $40,000,” Gardner proposes, “the top compensated individual may keep $4 million a year.”

Why I Keep Up June 17, 2008

- EmmaCat

    

I KNOW it’s counterintuitive: Keeping Up With the Kardashians is good for my self-esteem.

The Kardashians bump is remarkably reliable. I watch the show, wondering how anyone could be so flagrantly incestuous, wondering what draws me to such trash, wondering when it will end already, and walk away thinking half an hour is squandered.

Not so! After a certain incubation period, generally between one and three hours, I feel better about myself. This is partly due to what I call the Girls Next Door Effect, the comforting realization that people living ostensibly glamorous lives are bigger losers than oneself.

But the other part has to do with a circuitous logic that seeps into my subconscious during the one- to three-hour incubation period. To wit: this is a show on television, actually a quite popular one, and there are various hazy reasons one could proffer for the show’s existence–the family is vaguely famous, hot, rich, glamorous–but these are merely derivative. The kernel is the Kard.ass.ian badonkadonk. And, of course, specifically, that of Kim. This has to be the grandest celebration of the tuchus the world has yet seen.

Thank you, Kim’s butt.
(Kim’s butt: “You’re welcome.”)

 

 

 

 

 

Once this realization seeps in, I can expect to see myself in the mirror differently for up to a week. Why, I’m no chubalub, I’m Kim without the tatas and the nose job! Serious booty is always served with a side of cellulite, as Khloe helpfully explained to the camera in the calendar-for-Reggie ep.

It wasn’t always this way. When I was wee, my mother warned that I stood to inherit the dread Miller butt. (Which only became farcical when I grew up to pack far more back than any Miller.) Mum came of age under the reign of Big Tits, Tiny Ass and has never had a Mixalot awakening.

THE RECENT Kardashians highlights special “Junk in the Trunk” really encapsulated the concept. The featured highlight? A how-is-this-on-tv shot of Kim trying to stuff her big back cheeks into little jeans, a muffin top of nekkid butt meat attesting to her failure. I have since been informed that this is a common porn trope.

Imagine my shock. Because, how many times have I faced just such a vision (albeit, with skivvies) in a dressing room mirror and fled the store drowning in a pool of shame?

Never again.

Get more EmmaCat at www.clebilicious.com.

The Akon Problem June 16, 2008

- EmmaCat

The problem is this: When I hear the mellifluous voice of Akon, I act irrationally. “Smack That” comes on the radio and basic decency — never mind political correctness — demands that I change the station. But I do not. I reach for the dial and, veering from my good intentions, I turn it up. I then proceed to roll down the car windows to air my apparent self-loathing for all the world.

Nor is the problem limited to Akon tracks. I also crank up Dr. Dre’s “The Next Episode,” in which the shorthand for woman is “somethin’ to poke on.” I join my sisters in shame singing “Got Your Money” by Ol’ Dirty Bastard. ODB exhorts us to give him his money and we, in unison and all too eagerly, acquiesce. And I can’t seem to stay off the dance floor when “Ain’t No Fun” comes on. This Death Row ditty, with its deceptively upbeat bassline, irresistibly melodic synth, and sing-along hook, is in the great “posse cut” tradition; each rapper gets one verse to elaborate on the theme of, in this case, hoes. The not-fun situation of course occurs “if the homies can’t have none” of the young lady the narrator is already enjoying.

Even way back in the eighth grade, I shuddered when my dad asked me what my favorite song was. I answered bravely and honestly, if not quite proudly.

“Rump Shaker?”

***

I think Chris Rock explained this phenomenon best. “If the beat’s alright,” he says, “she’ll dance all night.” That is, even if the lyrics we’re dancing to are, for an example courtesy of Rock’s imagination, “Put a dick in her ear/dick in her ear/fuck her in the eye/fuck her in the eye.” Sometimes the song sounds so good that my objections are overwhelmed. I can’t resist.

In that respect, Akon really messed with my mind. His voice positively rings out, seductive and rebellious. Rolling Stone called it “one part reggae rootsman, one part Muslim call to prayer, one part R. Kelly.” And he lent those Senegal-born, Jersey City-bred pipes to solid tracks like “Locked Up” and “Soul Survivor” before moving on to the trashy, misogynistic portion of the hip hop career arc. He won me over crooning, “If you’re lookin’ for me you can find me on the block disobeyin’ the law/Real G, thoroughbred from the streets, pants saggin’ with my gun in my drawers” long before I heard, “Possibly bend you over/Look back and watch me smack that.”

The distinction will seem meager to some, especially those who aren’t fans of hip-hop. Bill O’Reilly, one example among many, condemns hip-hop in general on the basis of its objectionable lyrics. During his 2002 anti-Ludacris campaign, O’Reilly accused the rapper of selling “mind poison” and “subverting the country” because his lyrics “espouse violence, degrading sex, and substance abuse.” O’Reilly even called out American Idol’s R&B cherub Fantasia for the empowerment anthem “Baby Mama,” condemning her for glorifying unwed mothers. Many rappers — Eminem is a fine example — like to slap the exonerative label “controversial” on all of their lyrics, regardless of whether they take cheap shots at gays or probe touchy but important racial issues.

Well I do make a distinction, and it’s based on artistic integrity. “Locked Up” is a serious song about prison, where Akon spent three years on auto theft charges. Its haunting refrain (“They won’t let me out”) and earnest message do justice to Akon’s dramatic voice. “Smack That” is about nothing. It’s cotton candy for the club, and after dancing to it you will feel similarly sick.

So I’m not one of those who thinks all popular artists should be role models. In fact, I often dislike songs that try too hard to be “positive.” The attempts tend to melt into a sticky goo, à la India.Arie’s “I ain’t built like a supermodel/But I learned to love myself unconditionally/Because I am a queen.” I’m for quality, honest lyrics, whatever the subject matter, like Akon’s on “Locked Up”:

I’m steady tryna find the motive
Why do what I do?
Freedom ain’t getting’ no closer
No matter how far I go.

Quality lyrics can go on club bangers, too. Dancing to “Hey Ya” is surely as fun as dancing to “Smack That,” without the feminist guilt hangover. But you don’t even have to go innocent. I like a good down-and-dirty track like “Magic Stick,” too. Because as Nigel Tufnel of Spinal Tap learned, there is a difference between sexy and sexist. (“Well what’s wrong with being sexy?” asks Tufnel. “Sex-IST, -IST,” his bandmates reply.)

***

On his sophomore album, Konvicted, Akon is following the standard formula. It goes like this: First, put out a song or two utterly degrading women. This will somehow prove your street cred with the guys. (Eminem did misogyny extra credit, going so far as to rap about stuffing his wife in the trunk — presumably in an attempt to compensate for his lack of melanin.) Then, step two, put out what XXL blogger Tara Henley dubs the “for the ladies” track, the sappy musical equivalent of a philandering husband coming home with flowers.

The first singles off Konvicted were “Smack That” and “I Want To Fuck You.” Now Akon is trotting out lyrics like “Nobody wanna see us together/But it don’t matter, no/Cause I got you,” on his latest single “Don’t Matter.”

I’m not so easily duped, Akon. I just heard you saying, “Women just hoin’/Big booty rollin’/Soon I be all in them an’ throwin D/Hittin’ no less than three.” (D=dick.) This two-pronged approach of appealing to the guys with lewdness and the ladies with corniness insults all parties. And we all listen to the same radio stations, FYI. They’re not gender-coded.

***

If I catch myself singing the utterly degrading chorus on “Ain’t No Fun,” it’s because Dr. Dre and friends put a lot of effort into making a beat catchy enough to overwhelm my objections, and because Nate Dogg’s voice is almost as swoon-inducing as Akon’s. And if I can’t help loving a song like Snoop’s “Gin and Juice” — whose lyrics include, “When I bust my nut, I’m raisin up off the cot/Don’t get upset girl, that’s just how it goes/I don’t love you hoes, I’m out the door” — it’s because those lyrics are coming from the mouth of a very talented rapper, one whose silky flow and clever rhymes are wasted on the same old raps about bitches, bitches and more bitches.

It’s a shame to pour so much effort and talent into making great music, only to tack on lame, predictable lyrics. Because that’s exactly what misogyny has become: the predictable, default subject matter. In a bizarre twist, lyrics that should be shocking for their degradation of women have become mundane and formulaic. “Smack That” isn’t edgy. It’s pseudo-edgy — a calculated, cynical bid for radio play and in many ways as uncontroversial a song as you could put out nowadays.

Even hip-hop superstars have real lives. They can’t live entirely in music videos, surrounded at every moment by slow-mo gyrations and spinner rims.

You know what I’d be interested in hearing about? Polygamy.

You know who could tell me? Akon. His father had four wives back in Senegal and in an interview with Angie Martinez on Hot 97, Akon let slip that he’d like to have many wives himself. Now that would make for some “controversial” lyrics.

***

Hip-hop misogyny is a long story and I can’t do it justice here. But I would be remiss if I didn’t mention this fascinating new trend: some rappers are turning on the very subjects of their braggadocio, the groupies. I blame Kanye West for this. After all, he started it with “Gold Digger.” And now Game has followed suit with “Wouldn’t Get Far.” (”Wouldn’t get far/Fuckin’ them rap stars/You know who you are/Put your hands up, ladies/If you kept your legs closed/It would be just a waste of time.“) Appropriately, Kanye shows up for a verse, asking some captivating rhetorical questions:

Would you be with Jay-Z if he wasn’t CEO?
Would you be with F-A-B-O if he drove a Neo?

Poor rappers. These innocents are being hustled by wily women with eyes on their bank accounts. The obvious fact that this is a use-use relationship they apparently have not noticed. I ask them:

Would you be with Superhead if she didn’t have double-D-Os?

And don’t think these conscientious objectors are coming home with naught to poke on. Kanye finishes his verse with, “But since they all fall in my palm, I’ll take a trio.” They’re mad at groupies for using them and disgusted by their whorishness — but they’re not going to stop fucking them! Gracious, no!

I do credit Game with raising the issue in a less whiny, self-pitying way than Kanye has. (I also credit him with having gorgeous biceps — haha, I counter-objectified!) Whether he succeeds is questionable, but I think Game intends, at least in part, to expose the shrouded exploitation behind the video bootyshake. Maybe rappers will realize that hollow sexual relationships can get old and try for something real, the way Nas is so proudly doing with Kelis.

So if you feel used, rappers, I urge you: Boycott those groupies! Maybe you’ll make better music. Nas sure has:

Tired of hoppin’ from honey to honey
HIV spreadin’, everybody bump the same bunnies…
I want a son to greet every mornin’
Daughters and more sons tickle my feet
Wife smilin’, tellin’ me it’s time to eat
I’m gettin’ married

Check out Emma’s blog at www.clebilicious.com.

Welcome to The Peach Pit June 16, 2008

This is a place to discuss that great love of ours — pop culture (teevee, sitcoms, hippity hop music, etc.)!!!!! We’re starting up with a group of writers, journalists, non-profit types and actors. You could call it a left wing Entertainment Weekly, without the staff, pretension, budget or celebrity access. Or, uh, you could just call it The Peach Pit.

If you’d like to contribute to the blog with your own observations, insights, loves, annoyances, please e-mail Buffy at elizabethwg@gmail.com.