Don't Believe The Hype

Christmas Reading...

Right now I'm plowing through the very excellent "Pledged: The Secret Life of Sororities" by Alexandra Robbins.

Very smart
Very balanced

And very interesting to read a well-researched, journalistic, documented account of many myths about sorority life.

It's not hearsay or exaggeration when Robbins reports talking to a west coast sorority sister who says:

"My house was king of eating disorders" and then goes on to describe how at least once a month the plumber was called to her sorority house to clean out the pipes which were clogged with vomit.

Similarly, at one of the schools at which Robbins went undercover, she reports that at a Panhellenic Council meeting, representatives from all eighteen sororities on campus said that their houses has problems with eating disorders.

The portrait of sorority life that's emerging in the book is one of a complicated subculture that's killer to get right. From getting in (people hire expensive Rush Consultants--like beauty pageant coaches!-- to help them get their presentation right) to fitting in (not gaining weight and making the house look bad) to forming friendhsips/relationships ("friends" tattle on each other and broadcast personal secrets told in confidence "for the good of the house" and sisters who are date raped by frat boys keep silent so as not to jeopardize the relation between their houses and the 'right' fraternities...)

The book is leaving me with more questions than answers, but in a good way. Stuff like:

What does it mean when you join a 'sisterhood' (something that seems positive to me) at the expense of excluding other women who don't fit in (not so positive)?

What happens when young women spend so much time bonding that it takes precedence over their education. (In the book, many sisters maintain average to high GPAs, but they cut classes at a moment's notice in order to preen, prep and organize social events. Now, I understand college is about more than just academics, but I can't help thinking about the old hokey adage that these girls are cheating themselves by missing so much school...)

What about sisters who pressure their sisters to drop female friends from outside the sorority?

More on this when I finish the book and have some time to reflect!

Get Ready to Get "All Made Up" !

Barnes and Noble will have it nationwide.....

Amazon's selling is it as of April 18th 2006....

Borders and others are currently placing orders with my publishers Walker & Company....

So get ready to get your copy of "All Made Up: A Girl's Guide to Seeing Through Celebrity Hype and Celebrating Real Beauty" in paperback or hardcover...

Come this spring, there'll be press! There'll be reviews! There'll be a radio tour!

Stay tuned....

Move Over Tara Reid

Anyone see the article in the NY Times a week ago about teens and chastity rings? ("A Ring That Says No, Not Yet," Thursday December 8, 2005 G1-G2)

It talked about how more and more teens are choosing to wear them and make their beliefs (re: sex, virginity etc) public.

In my opinion, the good part is that it seems some teens are taking a stand against the Girls Gone Wild vibe that is currently prevading so much of pop and youth culture. Yay!

The bad part--although not shocking--is how this trend, too, is being exploited as a marketing opportunity. The Times reported that many chastity rings sell for as much as $300...

So I'm torn. I'm pleased that girls have strong convictions on such an important issue and are acting on it (whether or not I agree with their actions)...but am troubled that one of the motivating factors seems to be to wait around for Prince Charming....and to spend lots of money on a sort of status symbol in the meantime. All this also sets up a "pure" "impure" dynamic among girls...and that smacks a little too much of the age old "Madonna/Whore" situation (ie, women have historically been portrayed as one or the other in pop culture)...and that ain't progress....

Um...no.

There's some construction going on on the main floor of my house these days... so there are lots of workers and tradespeople around....

The other day on my way down to the office, I passed one of the tradesmen--a nice, talented 30something guy who knows everything about restoring walls that haven't been plastered since 1912--and he's like, "OH! I thought you were downstairs... but you're not."

So I replied with a friendly, "I know! I'm up, I'm down.. there's so much going on, I'm sort of all over the place."

And he was like "Yeahhhhh, jest like a woman."

HA HA HA HA HA. Wasn't that funny to make my comment about geographical location within a house all about gender myths?

Gee, what a laff riot that guy.

Guess I shoulda known that talk about what floor I might have been on was just an open invitation to derogatory cracks about women. I mean, it's like wearing a "kick me!" sign...

Overreacting? Mebbe.... but hey, I no like jokes like that in my own house.

Period.

A little vocab lesson from the Queen

Just read this some place.....

"Bodacious is a great word.
Curvaceous is my favorite.
Plus size is my least favorite..."

--Queen Latifah

Tell it!

Soda Wars

Soda in school vending machines: a significant source of empty calories that contributes to the rising rates of youth obesity.... or a harmless "treat"--or even staple in teen diets?

An article in today's New York Times (registration might be required to view it) goes into the whole situation, which is fascinating. But here's the part I like best:

The beverage industry, which is dominated by Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, rakes in $92 billion a year. But American Beverage Association, a lobbying group for the beverage industry, has just released a study concluding that school vending machine sales of non-diet soda declined by 24 percent from 2002 to 2004 and that the average high school student consumes just one 12-ounce nondiet soda a week from school vending machines.

Soooo, basically, the ABA is saying "Look, we don't even sell that much in schools! It's not our fault that kids are getting fat."

And maybe they're right.... so here's an idea: Since shcool sales are such a miniscule part of the $92 billion earned a year, how 'bout they just pull out of schools and agree to take a hit in sales there?

Hell, it might help a few teens who haven't yet gotten enough nutrition education to know that they can't drink tons of soda every day if their school doesn't offer PE and all they do after school is sit around and IM instead of being active.

To me, at least, that seems to make perfect sense. And I'd be happy to explain said position to any member of Team Coke or Pepsi....

Yay! (I think...)

A few weeks ago there was an article on MTV.com titled "Can't Squeeze Into a Size 2? Neither Can Teen Mags' Newest Models". Accompanying it was the now-famous photo of the Dove girls, in all their plus-sized splendor and sassy white undies.

The articles says "Real girls with real hips are giving the waifs of runways past a run for their money?"

Really?

Cause I've been reading a lot of hate (misdirected and erroneous hate, in my opinion, but hate nonetheless) about how gross it is to see "real" women like the Dove girls in ads. Crap like "If I wanted to see fat people, I wouldn't look in magazines etc."

I'm from the school of thought that every little bit is progress (I love ya Dove for what yer doin'). And if the teen mags think that images of REAL girls sell, and change their content so they can sell more mags and keep making money... wellll, I'd call that the power of the people and their pocketbooks.

And given who's in currently charge at some of the teen mags (the very cool Atoosa Rubenstein at Seventeen, Christina Kelly at Elle Girl and Susan Schulz at Cosmo Girl) , I'm optimistic things will keep improving.

What do you think?

All Sex All the Time?

A new study is out by the venerable Kaiser Family Foundation about the amount of scenes depicting sex on shows that are broadcast during hours watched by young adults.

1,100 shows were surveyed (equal to about a week's worth of programming) on ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, WB, PBS, Lifetime, TNT, USA Network and HBO. Sexual content was defined as anything from discussions about sex to scenes involving everything from kissing to intercourse.

A whopping 70% of all shows were found to include some sexual content.... averaging about five sex scenes per hour. That's up from three scenes per hour in 1998.

Now don't get me wrong... I'm no prude. Sex is fine and all that.... but hellllooo, we've got a government touting the need for abstinence, teen pregnancy and birth rates that are out of control (although they are declining somewhat), teens allegedly involved in "Rainbow Parties" (ahem, where girls "service" guys, each leaving a ring on lipstick on the guy.. forming, uh, a demented "rainbow"), 9 year olds who dress like they're sexy 25 year olds because that's what's marketed to them and all sorts of other problems.

So here's my question: Do Hollywood TV writers (plenty of whom are super well educated, worldly folk) not know there are cultural crises go on around sex? (Of course they do!) Do they not care? (I really don't know. But to me, it seems like they don't) Do producers and studios not feel some sort of responsibility to their audiences? (I really need to know the answer to that one) Don't they ever think of just doing the right thing, instead of the thing that sells? (A girl can dream... can't she?)

YES. There IS sex all around us and it's a wonderful, joyous thing that should be celebrated. But NO, that doesn't make it the best thematic content all the time--espeically for shows for younger people in a culture that doesn't know WHAT to make it. It's reductionist (I think that's another word I used a lot back in grad school). It makes it seem like our interests, our experiences are all about sex--or should be--and that's just not the case!

Secret Agents Everywhere

Picture this:

Your best friend can't stop talking about how much she loves! loves! loves! a particular new cosmetic/cell phone/movie/brand of clothing...

Hunh, you think, note to self to check out what all the fuss is about.

But did you ever think that all the fuss is actually buzz marketing?

As more and more people tire of being bombarded with ads everywhere they look, and TiVo lets ads be skipped altogether... manufacturers and media are coming up with creative ways to get the word out about their products. (Read more about this whole trend in Chapter Three: The Media of my forthcoming book, All Made Up: A Girl's Guide to Seeing Through Celebrity Hype and Celebrating Real Beauty (Walker & Co, April 2006) ).

Well, an article in the Indianapolis Star reports that Proctor and Gamble (makers of Pantene shampoo, Oil of Olay skin products, Tide laundry detergent and Crest toothpaste) have signed up over 250,000 (!!!!) of the country's coolest teens to slip positive mentions of their products into their daily conversations with friends and family. Manufacturers know that we trust word of mouth more than any ads... so now they're turning word of mouth INTO ads...

Now, I'm not saying that everyone who can't shut up about some great new product is actually a secret agent out to advertise to you without your knowledge... but it is happening. In fact one top advertising exective estimates that more than 85% of the country's top 1,000 marketing campaigns are now using some form of buzz marketing.

So just don't believe everything you hear, alright?

That's What I'm Sayin'!

Actually... this should be filed under "Random Acts of Smartness"...

The editors of Bust magazine have dedicated their Dec/Jan 2006 Editor's Letter to pointing out the hypocrisy and cultural mystery that IS Adam Corolla. They say it better than I ever could, so let me quote a bit:

(Just to give you a little context, the eds are complaining about how there are enormous billboards of his smug, ugly mug right outside their offices...)

"Adam Corolla, who based his career on being a sexist jerk on The Man Show (hey, but it was ironic!) and whose pairing with Dr. Drew on the sex advice talk show, Loveline, is one of the worst possible castings in the world--like walking into your gynecologist's office to find out it's been turned into a frat house.

Adam Corolla, with his perpetual show-me-your-tits-sneer, giant Pez-like teeth, and dude-fro that make him ressemble a Brady brother missing link. Adam Corolla, so much of whose schtick involves discussing what does or does not make a women sexually attractive...

If there was a woman as unattractive as Adam Corolla on television, she'd probably be the first on his list of people to ridicule. But of course, there would never be a woman as unattractive as Adam Corolla on telelvision, because unattractive women aren't allowed on TV. And if, by some miracle, there was an unattractive woman on telelvision, she'd be playing the role of "the unattractive woman." She certainly wouldn't be given her own late night talk show, let alone two TV shows at the same time.

Did you know that there were actually people who complained about that Dove ad campaign? Turns out they found images of less-than-model-perfect women in white underwear to be offensive...."

Too bad no one gets as upset over the double standard that is embodied by Adam Corolla.....