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The Big Phallus Theory: The Big Bang Theory, Nerd Culture, and Women
(While I tried to avoid them, you may find some SPOILERS for The Big Bang Theory in this post.)
One of my favorite sitcoms is The Big Bang Theory. While the show is not always strong on plot and rarely portrays life in academia accurately, its likeable characters and nearly unending stream of insider gags for nerds make it an entertaining means of spending half an hour. I love Leonard, the everyman. I enjoy Sheldon’s elevated dialogue. And I can both sympathize with and laugh at Howard and Raj’s awkwardness. I also appreciate that it features a smart, sensible heroine, Penny, who isn’t afraid to assert herself and can talk back to the guys.
What I can’t stand is that, like most of nerd culture and the wider culture, the show often reeks of sexism. Some of it, like Howard’s frequent lewd comments that reduce women to sex objects, I can ignore. Indeed, if I restricted myself only to popular culture that presents women as nothing less than fully realized human beings, I’d probably never be able to watch another movie or television show again. I’ve become so used to explicit sexism, in the form of derogatory comments about women, in my media diet that, I confess, I often recognize it and then choose to ignore it. It’s one of the patriarchal bargains I make as a feminist and a woman living in a culture that recognizes my gender’s worth only in so far as it meets certain standards of sexiness, attractiveness, and compliance. What does bother me about the show that I haven’t been able to ignore so easily is the implicit sexism in the lack of female nerd characters.
Seriously, where are the women nerds? I see them everywhere in real life. They attend conventions, they go to the movies, they cosplay, they talk about Star Wars and Star Trek and play Skyrim and Dungeons & Dragons. They consist of the majority of people that I know and I’d say nearly all of my female friends are nerds. I know women who can code websites, quote Lord of the Rings, act out scenes from Doctor Who, recite the noble gases and their atomic weights, and kick your ass in Call of Duty. Why are these women not represented, or even acknowledged, in The Big Bang Theory? I’m not even asking why they aren’t main characters–though a show about four female nerdy friends would be awesome and so much more entertaining than Sex and the City–so much as I’m wondering why, in the show’s universe, they don’t even seem to exist.
Well, one might point out, what about Amy and Bernadette? Perhaps, in the strictest sense of the term “nerd,” someone who is brilliantly smart and obsessives over even the tiniest minutiae of something, Amy and Bernadette are nerds. They’re both smart, they’re both biologists, and they both have Ph.D.s. To give credit where credit is due, just a few decades ago it would have been unthinkable to have not one, but two women characters in the S.T.E.M. fields on a television show. However, Amy and Bernadette are still ultimately defined in the show by their relationships with their male significant others. They are judged, and often found wanting, by their ability or inability to meet cultural standards of attractiveness, and they do no participate in what has come to be the domains of nerd culture–things like comic books, science fiction shows and movies, and video games. There are no women regularly featured in the show who enjoy these pursuits, even though such women exist in real life.
In real life, however, nerd culture often has just as much, if not more, of a problem with sexism than The Big Bang Theory does. While The Big Bang Theory ignores nerd women and pretends that they don’t exist, real life nerd culture can be downright hostile toward women attempting to claim the identity of “nerd.” Whether its people accusing women of only pretending to be nerds in order to hook up with guys or creating the “Idiot Nerd Girl” meme that I’ve attempted to reclaim in this post, a lot of guys seem to want women out of their conventions, their role playing games, and their Internet spaces. But why? The most obvious answer is sexism, but it would be too simple to leave it at that, so I’m going to dig a little deeper.
Though the cultural perception of nerds is changing, it is still largely a negative one, as evidenced by the male main characters on The Big Bang Theory. All of them, in some way, have failed to live up to to our culture’s unrealistic and burdensome ideals of masculinity. None of them are physically strong. Neither are they particularly attractive. They know little of sports. They aren’t charismatic or suave or charming. They aren’t physically or emotionally tough. They prefer the comforts of their apartments to the outdoors. Nerdy men are, as the show and the wider culture seem to suggest, not masculine. The show has frequently paired short, wimpy Leonard with Penny’s tall, dark and handsome beaus to make this point. Leonard, Sheldon, Howard, and Raj could often be better described as “feminine” than masculine. There is, however, one group that is lower than nerds on the social hierarchy: women. Whatever male nerds are, they are still more masculine (and thus higher on the hierarchy of patriarchal culture) than women. But when women start entering nerd spaces–and demanding an equal right to be there and be recognized as nerds–they challenge the modicum of masculinity that nerd culture has been able to salvage for itself. They also challenge the perception of women, within both nerd culture and the wider culture, as nothing more than accessories that convey masculinity, and thus worth, on a man. (Think about how, when Howard was first dating Bernadette, he worried that she wasn’t good-looking enough. An attractive girl conveys to society that there is something “manly” or “masculine” about the man she is dating, thus increasing his worth in the eyes of patriarchal culture.)
I think there is a place for women in nerd culture, and I’m sure that women will continue to attend cons, play video games, and go to special screenings of Star Wars. Just as women have fought, and are still fighting, for their right to inhabit the biology labs and physics departments where Bernadette and Amy have managed to reside, I suspect that women will continue to exist in nerd spaces and gradually gain acceptance there. I also suspect that, as nerd culture continues to grow within the mainstream, the stereotype of nerd men as less than masculine will diminish.
However, just because the stereotype of nerds as feminine may disappear does not mean that sexism within nerd culture will necessarily end. Though I would be very glad to see our culture expand its definitions of masculinity beyond its currently narrow confines, I suspect that this will do very little to challenge the standards of beauty to which women, even nerdy women, are held, both inside and outside of nerd culture. Maleness, I still sadly suspect, will still be privileged within nerd culture, in part because nerd culture is inherently exclusionary. To be a nerd, it helps to be male. It also helps to be white, cisgender, and educated. I suspect being able-bodied helps too, though I have seen a broader spectrum of ability represented in nerd culture than I have in mainstream culture. It is required that one be at least middle class, as I doubt the working class has the time and money that are necessary to indulge in nerdy pursuits. Gaming systems can be incredibly expensive, as are books, DVDs, and high-speed Internet connections. One must also have the leisure time to master the games and fantasy worlds present in nerd media. Sadly, in many ways, nerds are often primarily defined by what they consume.
I would like to think that nerd culture is smart enough to look at its own privilege and try to include a wider range of people. After all, many of us nerds define ourselves by our inability to fit in, our difference from mainstream society, and our stories of bullying and rejection. Perhaps we could use those experiences to sympathize with those whom society bullies and rejects. Until more nerds are willing to make this effort and look beyond their own privilege, however, I suspect that nerd culture will largely remain another old boys club.
Uncanny Clowns for Fallen Angels: Darren Lynn Bousman and Terrance Zdunich’s The Devil’s Carnival: Episode 1
(Because I’d rather be safe than sorry with TRIGGER WARNINGS, this post contains a brief mention of suicide and some discussion of intimate partner violence. Also, while I tried to keep them to a minimum, there are some SPOILERS for The Devil’s Carnival: Episode 1.)
Yesterday, as a present to their loyal sinners (aka fans), Darren Lynn Bousman and Terrance Zdunich released a trailer for their second episode of The Devil’s Carnival, an independent film series based around devilishly delicious retellings of Aesop’s fables that inverts our common conceptions of Hell and Heaven.
You probably already know of Darren Lynn Bousman—he’s a director of the popular Saw franchise. Terrance Zdunich has done a little bit of everything, not limited to illustrating, writing, and acting. The two previously worked together on a rock opera, Repo!: The Genetic Opera, an excellent movie that didn’t receive nearly as much publicity as it deserves but that has found a cult following, anyway. (Seriously, Repo! is my favorite movie. I can probably recite the entire thing: Erherm. “The not-too-distance future. An epidemic of organ failures… Chaos! Out of the tragedy…”—Wait! I’m writing a blog post. Sorry.) This past year, to the delight of fans like myself, Bousman and Zdunich released their second collaboration, The Devil’s Carnival: Episode 1, which they publicized themselves by doing a road tour of the movie, shown in small theaters across the country. At the Q & A with Bousman and Zdunich in my city, they said that they wanted to make going to the movies fun again. They certainly did. The event featured not only the movie but also local performing acts, audience participation, and a costume contest. (And, you know, a chance to meet and shake hands with Bousman and Zdunich themselves! In person! A friend and I left the theater squee-ing. I’m sure we weren’t the only ones.) The experience was not unlike going to a shadowcast of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, except for the fact that Repo! and The Devil’s Carnival are genuinely good movies that can be enjoyed in a non-ironic way.
Of course, when I say that The Devil’s Carnival is a good movie, I think it’s a good movie that requires a certain peculiar disposition. It’s for the freaks, the geeks, the weird, and the imperfect. (Or, at least, those who proudly self-identify as any one of those things.) I’ve seen the film classified as horror, but I don’t know if I would call it that, exactly. It’s macabre. It’s dark. There’s blood. And suicide. It’s creepy. It’s morbid. It’s uncanny. It’s a little confusing. And there’s singing. Lots of singing. But it’s not the upbeat, catchy singing of popular musicals. It’s completely unlike anything I’ve ever seen, and with Hollywood recycling the same old franchises and plot lines in order to create blockbusters, the sheer novelty of The Devil’s Carnival can be, in itself, arresting. I find it disarming. The eeriness of the film followed me for a long time after I’d left the theater. What I mean is, this is a movie that, like Repo!, challenges its audience to think, to mull over the story. It unsettles more than it satisfies, partly because it is the first in a series and so must leave its viewers wanting more. But its different-ness, its newness also demands contemplation. It turns familiar conventions on their heads and mashes together the whimsical and child-like with gore and the grotesque. Also, Lucifer, the devil, is the good guy. But he doesn’t exactly inspire the warm fuzzies that we tend to associate with “the good guys.” He’s harsh and he’s fair. I think he’s brilliant, but then, I’m a fan of devil-centric stories. Why? Because I’m a freak and a geek. I’m weird and I’m imperfect.
Despite its refreshing unusualness, The Devil’s Carnival is also very traditional. Its plotlines follow retellings of Aesop’s Fables, updated to apply to contemporary situations. For all of its inversions, the film is essentially a morality tale. Don’t be greedy and selfish. Don’t trust others naively. Grieve, but then move on. I agree with these proverbs, but it’s the film’s portrayal of the second one that I find a bit unsettling, as the moral is applied to a teenager, Tamara, who, the audience is lead to believe, dies at the hands of her abusive boyfriend. On the one hand, the film could be read as blaming the victim—faulting Tamara for getting into a bad relationship in the first place, even though, at the start of the film, she appears to be trying to leave her abuser.
On the other hand, however, the film does treat the problem of intimate partner violence as serious, literally an issue of life and death, when it is too often dismissed not only by popular culture but also by policy makers. The Scorpion, Hell’s shadow of Tamara’s earthly amore, is not left blameless, though he also does not suffer nearly as much as Tamara does, at least not in the first episode of the series, anyway. The film also explores our culture’s perception of True Love, ultimately concluding that our ideals about love are just as dangerous and deceptive as they are sweet and coddling. I, personally, do believe that, to some extent, our culture’s perceptions of True Love probably contribute to the pressure that women feel to stay in abusive relationships, in addition to other social and psychological factors. Women are taught that we are not worthy unless we are loved, or appear to be loved, by someone else. We are also taught that a good and loving woman stands by her man, no matter what he does, even if he manipulates and hits her. We are taught that anything, even abuse, is worth True Love. None of this is true, of course, but it is perpetuated by our culture’s depictions of True Love. By challenging the concept of True Love, the film does, at least to some extent, grapple with a cultural element of intimate partner violence.
Ultimately, while the three human main characters, including Tamara, are punished for their flaws, at least part of the responsibility is thrown at the feet of God, who in the movie’s universe, is an unrealistic perfectionist, creating imperfect humans and then blaming them for their failings and barring them from Heaven. Were his creations always happy and care-free, the film suggests, God might approve of humans, but he can’t abide them as they are—flawed and surrounded by the troubles of the world. Lucifer, as the film portrays him, may be strict about his six hundred sixty-six rules, but at least he gives humans a chance to learn from their failings. He has “grace for cheap,” while Heaven offers nothing but indifference.
As I said, this is a film for the imperfect, for those who don’t fit in, and who have strange and macabre tastes in movies. In part, this cult appeal is due to the aesthetics of the movie, but I also think it has to do with the film’s depiction of Hell. In The Devil’s Carnival, Hell is for the flawed, the monstrous, and the imperfect. It’s a place where strange people—people who wouldn’t fit in Heaven and probably wouldn’t want to go there anyway—have a hope of finding their place. When I, dressed in a black corset, black gloves, and knee-high boots, went to the local showing of The Devil’s Carnival¸ I hardly stood out. There were people wearing all kinds of bizarre costumes and clothes, accented with outlandish make-up and multiple piercings and tattoos. We all looked awesome, but anywhere else, we would’ve looked freakish and probably received stares and disapproving looks. United by our love of Repo! and the work of Bousman and Zdunich, we fit right in with each other. Our difference became something to celebrate. What I like about The Devil’s Carnival, more than its delightful creepiness, is that, like a few other cult movies such as The Nightmare Before Christmas, it gives people like me a chance to get together and revel in our strangeness. Bousman and Zdunich didn’t just create a film—they’ve made an event, an experience, and a community of fans.
I have no predictions for the next episode in the series. I expect it will treat viewers to a more in-depth look at the universe that the first film established. I suspect there will be more fables. I’m quite sure that there will be more haunting songs. Whatever it brings, I’m very much looking forward to it.
Why We Want the World to End (Or Don’t)
(I’m not completely happy with this post, since I seem to be writing it from a very Western, very humanistic perspective. Usually I try to write in such a way as to challenge Western-centric views, and I ultimately tend to prefer Donna Haraway’s posthumanism to humanism. However, like the rest of the nation, I’m still reeling from the tragedy of the Sandy Hook shooting and I’m not really sure how to process it. So I’m falling back on old worldviews that I’ve been surrounded by all my life and that are Western-centric and humanist.)
December 21, 2012, has come and gone, and yet we and the world are still here. (For my fellow Whovians: the Doctor saved us! Again!) But why all the hype and build-up? Why are people so attracted to the idea of the end of the world?
A fascination with the apocalypse is nothing new, of course. Perhaps as long as there have been people, we’ve been contemplating our own demise. Many different religions have stories about the world ending or nearly ending or predicting the end of the world. We have movies about the end of civilization brought about by global warming or a zombie virus or another species. Why are we so fascinated with this stuff?
In some sense, I think it’s cathartic. When bad things happen, especially really, really bad things, I think a part of us believes that the world just can’t get better. This weekend, after being bombared by news of the tragic shooting in Sandy Hook, when I was searching for something to read, I didn’t reach for the comforting essays of David Sedaris or the wisdom of Greg Epstein or the motivation of Eve Ensler. No, I cracked open World War Z by Max Brooks, a faux historical account of the zombie apocalypse, set in our own near-future. It was a morbid mix of media—Sandy Hook on the television and a book of grisly zombie attacks in my lap. Yet the combination seemed fitting. The shooting and the book both spoke of the darker sides of humanity, the destructive parts of our nature, our callousness. It’s easy to look at all of the violence in the world, the poverty, the inequality, the injustices, and (worst of all) the indifference, and think that we really are, as a global society, devouring ourselves. Sometimes we seem like the snake that eats its own tail—we’re causing our own demise and yet we keep cannibalizing ourselves.
Of course, this is only one perspective. While Sandy Hook showed us humanity’s low points, it also showed us how noble and courageous we can be. There was the teacher who, after hiding her students in a closet, bravely defended them from the attacker at the cost of her life. There was another teacher who barricaded herself and her class in a bathroom until the police came. We can’t bring back the 26 people who died, but we are finally having serious, national conversations about gun control and about better care and access to care for the mentally ill and support for their caretakers. For every sensationalistic reporter who’s blamed mental illness for the shooting, I’ve heard at least two people point out that those suffering from mental illness are more likely to be victims of violence than its prepetrators, so we’re also having conversations about the stigma surrounding mental illness. Yes, much of the talk surrounding the shooting is unproductive, but at the same time, we’re also bringing up topics that need to be discussed and dealt with.
And that is, ultimately, why the apocalyptic genre has never really appealed to me. Yes, it has its place. It warns us of our faults and failings and shows us the sides of ourselves that we’d rather not see. But it rarely goes beyond that. It cuts out all of the hard work that needs to be done to truly make this world a better place. It’s lazy. Why worry about greenhouse gases or pollution when we could all be raptured tomorrow? Why advocate for legislation that grants women and people of color and those in the LGBT community equality when the world could end in a week? Why promote a living wage or workers’ rights when the zombie virus is going to infect us any day now? If the aliens are coming next year, do we really need to worry about finding a cure for HIV/AIDS or preventing world hunger? If we are, as a species, inherently destructive, then why should we try to fight our nature and make the world a more equal and just place? Creating change is hard. Waiting for the world to end is easy. I think a part of us is so drawn to stories about the apocalypse simply because ending it all would be so much easier than working slowly and diligently, day by day, to fix what we’ve got.
Yet, every day, so many people are doing just that. From individual random acts of kindness to large-scale social movements, people all over the globe are working to make the world a better place. And change happens. It’s incrimental, of course. It’s not nearly as dramatic as the apocalypse. Instead of basking in the glory of being the lone survivor of the end of the world, it’s building networks and teams of people, putting aside our own desires for the good of those around us. It’s engaging in the daily drugery of community organizing or volunteering or taking the time to listen to a friend’s problems or even just being polite to someone when we’d rather snap at them. It often doesn’t feel like we’re making headway, but we are. Violent crime rates are actually dropping in the U.S., despite what we see on the news. We’ve found cures to diseases that once would’ve been deadly. The idea that women should have the right to the same educational and career opportunities as men was once unheard of. Gays and lesbians can now openly serve in the U.S. military. This is not to say that the world is perfect—far from it—but to point out that change does happen! Society can get better. It happens slowly, but it does happen. And it will continue to happen because of the dedication of ordinary people to doing what they can to improve the world.
At the beginning of this post, I made a little in-joke for other Doctor Who fans. For those not in the know, the Doctor is the humanoid main character from a British television series, Doctor Who, a story about time travel, space travel, and the better nature of humanity. I doubt that we will ever see zombies in Doctor Who. Yes, the show has featured antagonists that are zombie-like, but they tend to be comical and easily defeated. I don’t think that we will ever see the Doctor facing down an unstoppable zombie horde like the mass of Zacks in World War Z because zombies simply cannot exist in the same universe that contains the Doctor.
Here’s what I mean: zombie stories, like other apocalyptic stories, rest on the assumption that humanity and this world that we’ve created for ourselves is ultimately ruined. Humanity is corrupt, we’ve devastated the world, and there’s nothing left to do but end it all. But there are other stories, stories like Doctor Who (and The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter and Star Wars and Star Trek and so many others from countless time periods and cultures), that believe in the better nature of humanity. These stories tell us that we are brave and strong and smart and that we can ultimately progress toward building a better world. They tell us that ordinary people can create change, that we can perservere and make the world a more equal and just place, and that over time, even the smallest gestures and efforts can build into something significant. Out of tragedy, they tell us, we can rally together and, through our hard work and better nature, we can create change. Even in the wake of something as terrible as a shooting at an elementary school, we can believe that people really are good. We can create a world that brings out the best in humanity and where troubled young people get the help that they need instead of resorting to violence and where everyone feels safe enough and supported by the social system that surrounds them so they don’t feel the need to own guns.
We can sit around and dismiss humanity and the world as not worth bettering. We can give and wait for an apocalypse to wipe us all out and do nothing. We can look at all of the problems in the world and say that there’s nothing we can do and nothing is worth fixing. Or we can say with the Doctor, “The human race just keeps on going—keeps on changing. Life will out!” But we have to act. We have to make that change happen. It isn’t easy, but it’s ultimately worth the work.
Some Silly Search Terms
I was looking at my site stats today and was quite amused by some of the search terms that have brought people to this blog. Some of the more ridiculous ones include:
1.) Impenetrable Pussies–Sounds like the title of a bad porno movie. Or an edgy, sex positive, radical feminist blog. But probably a bad porno.
2.) Homosocial Premise–Makes me think of a band name.
3.) Poststructuralism Fog–Also makes me think of a band name, possibly a band started by a group of English department professors.
4.) Jack Halberstam Sucks–No. No, she does not.
5.) Fog Stereotype–Also sounds like a band name
And, my favorite:
6.) Purple Jack Skellington Christmas Tree–I want one!
Seriously, though, it looks like most of the search terms that lead people here involve the name of a television show or pop culture icon with “critical theory” added to it. Either I’m attracting a lot of geeks like myself who want to read critical analyses of pop culture or a bunch of confused college freshmen. Either way, I’ll take it. 🙂
For Whose Entertainment?: Images of BDSM in Pop Music, Part 3
(I would rather be safe than sorry about TRIGGER WARNINGS. So, just so the reader is aware, the following series will contain discussions of the bondage/discipline/domination/submission/sadism/masochism (BDSM) subculture and sex positive feminism. While the series contains no descriptions of graphic or violent sex, if any of these topics might disturb you, please refrain from reading it.)
Part 1 discusses BDSM generally. Part 2 looks at common depictions of BDSM in popular music videos and why these depictions are problematic.
For YOUR Entertainment: A Positive Pop Depiction of BDSM
The video and lyrics of Adam Lambert’s “For Your Entertainment” begin innocuously enough. We are first presented with a typical city street, and then the camera moves below the concrete, where we find ourselves in a basement club. Lambert, weilding a wicked black cane and dressed in a black leather trenchcoat, is entering the club with an entourage. In the background, the bass beat is emphasized with a sound like the cracking of a whip. These are the accessories of BDSM, but pop has borrowed them so often that they are hardly worth noticing. As he enters the club, Lambert sings, “So hot! Out the box!/Can we pick up the pace?/Turn it up! Heat it up!/I need to be entertained.” We are, so we believe, in a typical pop video. It might have a dark and shady atmosphere, but we expect that we will be subjected to nothing more than images of singing and dancing while we hear lyrics about having a good time.
The song and video both take a sudden turn, however, when Lambert glares at the camer and declares, “I’mma hurt ya real good, baby!” This is unexpected. The declaration has a rawness, an honesty, that is rare in pop depictions of BDSM. Even Rhianna’s “S&M” is more light and flirty, presenting Rhianna as a naughty girl who’s up for anything. Lambert, however, lays bare the message of the song and the video. The line contains the contradiction of BDSM play. Yes, it can hurt, but it is also a good kind of pain, a pain that the bottom wishes to experience and the top wishes to give. This is the good kind of pain, not the pain of mental illness or bad press, which are not consensual.
The lyrics continue with the sort of lines one would associate with a top. “Let’s go! It’s my show! Baby, do what I say,” he commands, establishing his control. But the control is not just for his own pleasure. “I’mma hold you down until you’re amazed,” he sings. The amazement that he references his bottom feeling suggests that his actions are not purely for the sake of inflicting pain (or shock value) so much as they are to please his bottom. Later in the song he adds, “I’mma work you ‘til you totally blow!” reinforcing the idea that the play is ultimately about what that the bottom recieves and the top gives. The second verse reinforces this idea, when he sings, “It’s all right. You’ll be fine. Baby, I’m in control.” For many bottoms, the appeal of being dominated is not necessarily pain itself but the sensation of being controlled completely by another person. In fact, plenty of forms of BDSM play do not involve pain. The line and its reassurences also underly the trust that must exist between a top and a bottom. To place himself in a top’s control, the bottom must trust that ultimately, he will be all right, that the top will respect his limits and stop when they are reached. Whatever actions are inflicted, a top will ultimately be concerned for the welfare of the bottom, as the lyrics reflect.
The song continues to reinforce the idea that BDSM play is not about mindlessly inflicting pain in the chorus, which repeats, “I’m here for your entertainment.” This simple line expresses the complex relationship of power that exists between the top and the bottom. On the surface and in the context of the play, the top holds all of the power and control. The top may inflict pain, bind or gag the bottom, or command the bottom to obey him. However, at the heart of the play, the bottom holds his own power. After all, the top must respect the bottom’s limits, and with one word, the bottom can bring an end to the whole scene. Nothing happens in the scene without the bottom’s consent. In a way, the top is in service to the bottom as much as the bottom is in service to the top. The top, after all, is there for the bottom’s entertainment, just as the bottom is there for the top’s entertainment. Despite all of his words about control, Lambert, in the chorus, ultimately recognizes that as a top, he does not hold all of the power and another power is held by the one he controls.
In this picture of BDSM, fulfillment, pleasure, and satisfaction are mutual. The bottom desires to be controlled and the top desires to control. The play is not that of a superior overpowering an inferior but of two collaboraters in a game of mutual desire and satisfaction. (This is perhaps what we would all like to have in our relationships and sex, be they vanilla or BDSM.) The BDSM play is just that—play. It is based on mutual understandings of consent and of the acts that will take place. Each partner takes his or her role, based on his or her desires and not on society’s dictums of their gender. (Traditionally, women are expected to be submissive in their relationships with men while men are expected to take control, even if these roles do not fit the individuals who are expected to play them out.) At the end of BDSM what has just taken place is a play, a scene. It has been acted out and no one has really been harmed without their consent.
The dancing in the music video “For Your Entertainment” reinforce this idea of play and mutual consent.. No violence is actually shown, and the control that Lambert as a top exercises is visualized through dance. He controls the other dancers with the movements of his cane, almost like a director conducting a band. They are working together to create something, and while Lambert might be in control, each member of the scene is equally important in its creation. There is no devaluing or debasing of his female bottoms. In another scene, the backup dances cling to him, supporting themselves on him, until he pushes them away. Before they fall, he catches them by their throats, and then rights them in a matter of seconds. The image is something like a trust fall, in which one person holds her body still and falls backward while her partner catches her. The control that Lambert exercises indicates that he is capable of preventing his bottoms from coming to real harm. He will simulate dangerous situations—part of what a top does for his bottoms—but will not let them undergo pain that they do not want. The action is also stylized in the form of a dance. It is a collaboration between the top and his bottoms. They are creating something together that they could not create alone, reinforcing the idea of mutual satisfaction in BDSM play.
The images of the video also emphasize the idea of play. In between the dancing, there are shots of people in the underground club. They smile and laugh at each other, even when they are wearing blinders and other BDSM gear. Everything happening here is all happening as play, they seem to say. This is not something serious. This is a scene we’re acting out. When it’s all over, we’ll walk away unharmed. The music video is an inversion of everything that pop music usually presents BDSM to be, and in presenting that inversion, it shows BDSM to be what it ideally is. The club, underground and filled with snakes and palms, suggests a kind of Eden, but an Eden in which Lambert, on his throne and dressed in his black corset, rules as a sort of Satanic king. The apple of knowledge, however, in this Eden, does not bring death but instead an understanding of what BDSM and consent really are—a kind of play, a kind of trust that people in both the BDSM and vanilla communities can support.
“Let Me Entertain You ‘Til You Scream!”: BDSM as Performer-Audience Power Plays
Not only does the “For Your Entertainment” video present BDSM in a more accurate light than other pop music videos, it also uses BDSM to illustrate the complex power relations between the performer and the audience. After all, the song is titled “For Your Entertainment,” and as a pop singer, Lambert is an entertainer. His job is to sing in front of thousands of people and entertain them with his music. The video ends with him not as a dancing top or a master on a throne but as a singer on a stage, performing for everyone in the club.
Just as a top in a BDSM relationship or scene appears to have total control but control is also in the hands of the bottom, so a pop singer on a stage appears to have control over his audience. He can tell them to put their hands in the air, and they will. He can command them to jump and dance, and they will do so. He can ask them to sing along with him or he can initiate calls-and-responses. The audience seems ready to follow his every command. They scream their love and adoration for him. Their applause after each song is thunderous. He appears to have great power, for he can envoke almost fearfully strong emotions in his fans and make them obey his commands.
However, in the pop singer-fan relationship, the fans have a subtle power that is not immediately recognized, much like the power of the bottom. Yes, they might appear to be under the control of the singer, but he is just as much under their control as they are under his. They are, after all, the ones who allow him to continue being a pop singer. They buy albums, download his singles, and pay for concert tickets. They view his televion appearances and buy magazines that feature interviews with him. Their money and their attention allow him to continue being a pop sensation. As such, they have power in this relationship too, and the singer is just as beholden to them as they are to him. They consent to listen to his songs and buy his music. If they were to lose interest and stop buying, the pop game, as it were, would stop. Like the bottom, they have the power to initiate the play and the power to stop it. While power may seem to lie with the performer, ultimately, the fans are in control.
One could be cynical about the pop singer-fan relationship (It’s reliance on capitalism and a music industry that is often more interested in maintaining the status quo to make money instead of using its music to promote social change are particularly suspect.), but the video does not take this view. Just as the top-bottom relationship is a kind of play, a collaboration, so too is the pop singer-fan relationship. They come together to create an event, the performance, the spectacle of pop. Pop, with all its glamour, is nothing without people to pay attention to it. The music is meaningless if no one will hear it. The singer and the fan each have their power, annd each use it to contribute to the play. At the end of the video, the concert that takes place would be impossible without Lambert and it would be impossible without the fans. He wants to sing, to perform, and they want to hear him sing, to watch his performance. Both get the satisfaction of experiencing what they want and in doing so, they come togethr to create a concert.
But I’m Still Not Satisfied: Some Problems and Conclusions
While “For Your Entertainment” is a better depiction of BDSM than is usually found in pop, it is not perfect. Someone who understands the underlying ideas of BDSM or an astute viewer of the video would probably see it as a positive depiction of BDSM or at least as a message of mutual collaboration. An ignorant or less-than-observant viewer, however, could easily mistake the lyrics and miss the message that the play is, ultimately, about mutual satisfaction between the top and bottom. The lyrics could be interpreted as someone insisting that his partner will enjoy his control eventually, despite the partner’s protests. While I think a close inspection of the lyrics resists that interpretation, most audiences of pop music will probably not listen too closely and could easily miss the point. As I have shown, BDSM culture is full of paradoxes and contradictions—the bottom is not in control yet also has control—that are not easily or intuitively grasped. Many viewers could easily miss this message.
My other source of discontent in the video comes from the queer nature of BDSM. BDSM, even when it is between a heterosexual man and woman, is ultimately queer because it is not the normal and largely accepted sexual script that society presents. Instead of fitting individuals into roles of submissive and dominant based on their gender, BDSM allows individuals to be themselves and decide for themselves if they want to be dominant, submissive, or a mixture of both. Because it is outside of mainstream sexuality and because it rejects traditional gender roles, BDSM is queer.
Adam Lambert is also queer. Despite the strides that have been made in acceptance of homosexuality—he is, at least, openly gay. Elton John had to hide in the closet.—Lambert shows us just how far we still are from the ideals of acceptance and equality. To date, (I admit, I’ve yet to watch any of his new music videos. This may have changed.) none of his music videos have shown him kissing, caressing, or longing for another man. In “Whaddya Want From Me” and “Time for Miracles” he sings exclusively to the camera, to some unnamed and genderless “you” that is left to the imagination of the audience. The video for “If I Had You” employs a similar technique, in which Lambert, surrounded by a forest of dancers, ultimately dances alone. In a television performance, when he kissed another man, there was a large conservative outcry. Such behavior, between a man and a woman, would be considered tame compared to what is shown on many sit coms, but when such behavior is between two men, society still sees it as deviant.
Even in a song and video about sexuality that exists outside the mainstream, “For Your Entertainment,” Lambert’s sexuality is referenced only on the periphery. He is primarily shown being stroked and caressed by women. There are a few men who adore him as well, but the camera does not focus on them and they are portrayed as almost androgynous. He sings mostly to the camera, to genderless “you” that the audience can construct to suit its own politics. In a song and video celebrating queer sexual practices—“queer” as in “outside the mainstream.” I am not suggesting that all homosexuals practice BDSM.—Lambert ought to be able to express his own sexual preferences more openly. Unfortunately he must cover up his “deviant” sexuality in order to appear acceptable.
Despite its flaws, “For Your Entertainment” is perhaps one of most accurate depiction of BDSM in pop music. It reveals the important values of BDSM subculture—consent, trust, and mutual play. These are values that those in the vanilla community can certainly agree with, and by presenting BDSM as it is and not merely for shock value, the video paves the way for other accurate depictions of BDSM that could lead to a larger conversation about consent, open discussion about sex, and power relations in both BDSM and vanilla relationships. By opening up these conversations, we can perhaps build a more sex-positive society in which all sexualities and preferences and respected and adult, informed consent is paramount to all relationships.
For Whose Entertainment?: Images of BDSM in Pop Music, Part 2
(TRIGGER WARNING: The following series will contain discussions of the bondage/discipline/domination/submission/sadism/masochism (BDSM) subculture and sex positive feminism. While the series contains no descriptions of graphic or violent sex, if any of these topics might disturb you, please refrain from reading it.)
I began the first part of this series a while back, and even though I’d finished it, I never got around to publishing it. This isn’t to say that I didn’t do anything with it. The ideas in the drafts of the blog posts actually turned into an academic paper, which I wrote in a pop culture class. However, I hate it when bloggers start a series and never conclude it, so I figured I’d post what I’ve got, just to round out the series.
Pain Without Pleasure: Typical Presentations of BDSM in Popular Culture
Certain accoutrements of BDSM have become so commonplace within pop culture that they are hardly noticeable. Corsets, fishnets, combat boots, and leather jewelry may be worn by pop artists, and while they look “bad ass” or “edgy,” viewers will probably not associate them with BDSM. Occasionally, however, pop artists will bring more explicit images of BDSM into their music videos. While I think that these images are somewhat problematic, I think they can also be used to comment on the music industry itself, which is full of dominants and submissives of its own, though these relationships are often based on money and not mutual consent. BDSM in pop music videos can be a way to comment on power—who has it and who wants it? Unfortunately, in these images, the importance of consent in the BDSM community can easily be lost.
Perhaps when thinking of BDSM in pop music, the first song that comes to mind is Rihanna’s “S&M.” After all, the title itself contains a reference to sadism/masochism. However, Rihanna has an earlier song, “Disturbia,” which also uses images of BDSM, though the song itself does not specifically refer to BDSM in any way. Most interpretations of the song, in fact, reference it to being about mental illness, specifically panic attacks or depression. In the song, Rihanna sings about feeling as though she’s going insane. She is oppressed by emotions that she cannot control, so much so that she believes she is in another world, a disturbing and frightening world in which she has no power.
The video situates these feelings of helplessness in the context of BDSM. The video shows Rihanna bound, trapped in a cage, and wearing clothing and makeup that are traditionally coded as part of the BDSM community—dark, heavy eyeliner, black corsets, and thick black boots. The dark make up and macabre imagery also bring to mind the goth subculture, an important feature of the video, as African-Americans are rarely portrayed as part of the goth subculture (or the BDSM subculture, for that matter), and even those African-Americans who do take part in those subcultures can feel alienated and estranged because they do not see people who look like them traditionally represented as being in those subcultures.
The BDSM suggestions of the video might be there for shock value, but I believe their purpose is larger than mere sensationalism. If the song is indeed about mental illness, then it is, on some level, a song about power and control. Someone suffering from mental illness may very well feel that her life is spinning out of control, that she is prisoner in her own mind. She has no other choice than to submit to the dominance of the mental illness. While this is certainly an interesting observation about the difficulties of suffering from mental illness, it is still an inaccurate representation of BDSM. One does not consent to mental illness. Mental illness recognizes no safe words or limits. It is a situation that happens, regrettably, to an individual. As such, while the BDSM imagery may make an interesting commentary about the powerlessness felt by those who suffer from mental illness, nothing is added to the cultural understanding of BDSM.
Rihanna’s second song, “S&M,” explicitly mentions BDSM in its lyrics. In them, Rihanna claims “now the pain is my pleasure.” She extolls her enjoyment of naughty sex—“I may be bad, but I’m perfectly good at it.” The video, however, is not so much about BDSM culture as it is about the turbulent relationships that pop stars have with the media, which is certainly its own kind of power play.
In the video, Rihanna acts as a kind of switch, first being bound in plastic by reporters and then later binding them in duct tape and whipping them. It is certainly an insightful commentary about the relationship between celebrities and the press. The press have the power to reveal information about celebrities or spin situations involving them in unflattering ways, which can leave celebrities feeling powerless. At the same time, however, celebrities have the power to create news, leaving the media at their mercy and waiting for their next outrageous stunt. However, in both forms of these relationships, the relationships of power and control are certainly not consensual and are more the result of our capitalist news market and entertainment industry than personal preference and desire for fulfillment. While the video does much to bring to light the power plays between celebrities and the media, it misrepresents the BDSM community.
Another video that features BDSM play is Christina Aguilera’s “Not Myself Tonight.” The video features images of Aguilera bound and gagged, as well as dressed in rubber and dancing with a crop. She also kisses a woman whose hands are tied above her head, and crawls on all fours, catlike, toward a bowl of milk.
In many ways, the video performs the chorus: “I’m not myself tonight.”, Aguilera borrows costumes and dance moves from other pop singers, including Madonna, Britney Spears, and Lady Gaga. I would also like to add that there is nothing inherently wrong with the BDSM images presented in the video. There is little real violence or harm displayed in them, and they are probably there for shock value more than anything. From the perspective of someone who understood the underlying ideas of BDSM—informed consent by willing adults—they would be harmless, more or less. However, most viewers probably do not have a background understanding of BDSM, and so the images of rough sex, group sex (perhaps even the playing out of a rape fantasy?), and bondage are not seen in their proper context. The video presents the message that rough sex, scary sex, perhaps even nonconsensual sex, is sexy. This is, unfortunately, not the message of BDSM.
With all the pop videos misrepresenting BDSM, even those that do so to make a comment about power and control, are there any that do BDSM right? Positive, accurate depictions of BDSM are few and far between; almost nonexistent in popular culture. However, there is one song and its accompanying music video that give a relatively accurate and even positive depiction of the BDSM subculture. Adam Lambert’s “For Your Entertainment” presents both lyrics and a video that capture the nuances of BDSM more accurately than “Disturbia,” “S&M” and “Not Myself Tonight.” At the same time, the song also uses the ideas of power and control in BDSM to comment on the complex relationship between pop performer and audience.
Part 3, the final installment, does a close reading of Adam Lambert’s music video for the song “For Your Entertainment” and gives some concluding thoughts about how BDSM is presented in popular culture.
Women Warriors Alone: Kill Bill vol. 1, Lady Gaga, Hyper-Irony, and Feminism
The desert air hangs heavy and hot over the highway asphalt. An enormous, bright yellow truck roars toward the horizon. In the blur of its speed, its only identification comes from two words, painted in pink, on the back of the truck: “Pussy Wagon.”
This description could easily fit either Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill film or Lady Gaga’s music video for the song “Telephone,” which references the film. Put the two together and you have a delightful mess of hyper-irony, a meta-pop culture. Gaga is referencing Tarantino, and Tarantino references, well, a little bit of everything.
In a way, when I watched Kill Bill, I felt as though I was seeing it backwards, and not just because the plot is non-linear. My first introduction to the movie had come through watching the “Telephone” music video, in which Lady Gaga and Beyoncé escape prison, a(n) (presumably) abusive lover, a murder scene in which they are the perpetrators, and the police, all from the cab of a yellow truck with “Pussy Wagon” painted on the back. The critical readings of the “Telephone” video were all quick to point out that the video was referencing Kill Bill, not only with its Pussy Wagon but also with its jumpy narrative about vengeful, powerful women.
So, when I finally watched Kill Bill, I knew, obviously, that the movie had come first. Still, in the chronology of my own life, “Telephone” had come first, so while watching Kill Bill, I’d see something—a yellow truck, subtitles, unusual camera angles—and think, “That’s just like in ‘Telephone’!” Such is the state of our popular culture, which builds reference upon reference to itself. I’d seen the reference before I’d seen the original. Then again, if Walter Benjamin and the postmodern critics are to be believed, we now live in a culture in which the original is so easily copied that it no longer has any meaning, and we are constantly surrounded by references that do not really refer back to an original. Gaga referenced Tarantino, who references classic cinema, comic books, and anime, among a whole host of other media, within Kill Bill. These forms of media regularly reference novels, myths, and plays. To trace their origins back might be interesting but isn’t the purpose of this post.
Having viewed Kill Bill backwards from the lens of “Telephone,” however, I wonder if the music video served, in some way, as a rewrite of the movie. While I can certainly find feminist undertones in Kill Bill—a strong, independent female protagonist who is not overly sexualized; an emphasis on the sexualized nature of the violence women are, regrettably, all too often subjected to; a cast of female characters who exert their own agency and skills to obtain power instead of relying on men or their sexual allure—I don’t feel confident declaring it a feminist film. (Though I think it does pass the Bechdel test.)
I found several aspects of Kill Bill problematic, but my greatest source of discomfort with the movie came from its presentation of women as natural enemies and especially how the conflict between the female characters was racialized. I also want to point out that I’ve only seen volume one of the series so far, and I realize that many of my current problems with the film may be addressed in subsequent volumes. My biggest problem with volume one was that the female characters, while all strong and independent, were set against each other as adversaries. Within the movie itself this isn’t a problem, but the movie exists within the entire cannon of popular culture (and, in fact, frequently makes clear through its references that it exists within popular culture), and within much of that popular culture exists a stereotype that women are naturally catty and suspicious of each other. The movie does nothing to challenge this stereotype.
The struggles between the women are also racialized, as Uma Thurman’s character’s two adversaries are African-American and Asian. Well, I didn’t find the conflict between Thurman’s character and Copperhead too problematic. While race is present in the scene in which they dual, it isn’t a central part of their conflict, and I found their recognition of their shared identity as mothers interesting. However, in Thurman’s character’s dual with O-Ren Ishii, ethnicity is centralized. O-Ren Ishii mocks Thurman’s character as a white girl with a samurai sword, only to be bested by her in the end. The dual perpetuates the tired trope, found in films like Dances with Wolves and Avatar, of white people taking on an exotic, foreign culture and mastering it better than its own natives. Again, within the context of the film itself, this might not be problematic, but the film exists within the wider scope of popular culture and it does little to challenge the racial/ethnic stereotypes of that popular culture.
I found the animosity between the women almost surprising, in a way, because I could have easily seen them all coming to realize that they’d been manipulated by the mysterious Bill and joining together to take him down. In fact, I almost expected Thurman’s character and Copperhead to team up, bonded together by their motherhood. The film easily could have presented a sisterhood of women fighting together against their shared manipulation. Instead, they fight each other. The Pussy Wagon could have lived up to its reclaimed title as a vehicle full of women out to take back what’s theirs.
In the “Telephone” music video, however, the Pussy Wagon lives up to its reclaimed name. Of course, the “Telephone” video doesn’t just reference Kill Bill. It also pays homage to Thelma and Louise, a film I confess I have not seen. (I know, I know! For someone who loves analyzing pop culture, I’m so far behind!) However, I have seen the classic scene where Thelma and Louise drive their truck off the edge of the cliff, and though I hadn’t seen the entire film, at the end of the “Telephone” video, when Gaga and Beyoncé drive the Pussy Wagon off the cliff, I knew enough to think of Thelma and Louise.
By referencing both Kill Bill and Thelma and Louise, the “Telephone” video blends the independence of both movies’ heroines, the cinematography of Tarantino, and the sisterhood of Thelma and Louise. It presents Gaga and Beyoncé as partners in crime who help each other achieve their goal of revenge against the men who’ve hurt them and then help each other escape. It also presents Gaga and Beyoncé as equals, irregardless of their races. It is, in a sense, what Kill Bill might have been.
I’m not trying to say that Kill Bill isn’t a good movie. I loved finally seeing Tarantino’s renowned cinematography for myself and I very much want more. As an action film, it was excellent. Its protagonist was also a refreshing break from the usual role of women in action films, in which they are usually toys or temptations for the male characters. However, the film exists within the larger field of popular culture, a field to which it itself makes frequent references. The film places itself within pop culture as a whole, and so I, as a view, must do the same. While I found its heroine to be strong, independent and compelling, it did little to challenge stereotypes about women’s relationships with each other and racial tropes about white people being better at non-Western cultures than the non-Westerners. However, the beauty of a referential pop culture is that it invites rewrites and critiques from other forms of pop culture. By combining the strength of Kill Bill with the sisterhood of Thelma and Louise, the “Telephone” music video provides such a corrective while tipping its cap to Tarantino’s signature style.
A Cuban…Something: Race and Gender in I Love Lucy
(Not my best post ever, but I made a commitment to blog more regularly, so I figured I should try to come up with something.)
Recently, I’ve been watching a lot of I Love Lucy reruns on TVLand’s website. The last time I watched I Love Lucy, I was a young child, so I think I was more amused by the slapstick than anything else. The show’s stance on gender roles and race went right over my head. Now, while I find myself amused by the show, I also feel a little…guilty for enjoying it.
I could write extensively on the show’s portrayal of women. On the one hand, it’s extremely sexist. However, there is certainly an element of subversion in Lucy and Ethel’s pranks. The show panders to patriarchal stereotypes about women while also knowingly winking at them. At the same time, Lucille Ball is an outstanding comedian, and in an age where we still have male comedians and other personalities claiming that women just aren’t funny, Ball is resounding proof that women can and do have a sense of humor. However, the sexism and subversion of sexism in I Love Lucy is a topic that, if I recall correctly, Susan Douglas deals with in her excellent book Where the Girls Are, an examination of the popular culture surrounding Second Wave Feminism. Suffice to say, the show is by and large very sexist, but this didn’t surprise me.
What did surprise me was the racism. As a child watching I Love Lucy, I don’t think I ever realized that Ricky was Cuban. Watching the show now, I can’t forget. In nearly every episode, Ricky is referred to as a Cuban at least once, and it’s usually in a remark about his faults. If he won’t buy Lucy something she wants, he’s a “stingy Cuban.” If he’s angry about something, he’s a “hot-tempered Cuban.” If he holds his ground or won’t change his mind, he’s a “stubborn Cuban.” If he’s doing something that Lucy and the rest of the cast like, he’s Ricky. If he’s displeased one of them in some way, it’s because he’s Cuban. He is heavily marked by his ethnicity throughout the show.
Much like the ambiguity of the sexism in the show, however, Ricky’s “Cuban-ness” isn’t entirely negative. Seeing the show in 2012, I’m struck by just how much Ricky is portrayed as a (more or less) complete human being and not a Latino stereotype. Granted, in the 1950s, when the show was made, the ethnic stereotypes were probably different. Today, however, Latinos are often (regrettably) portrayed as poor and/or lazy, a view that, I would argue, has more to do with unfairly scapegoating them for a lot of the U.S.’s labor and immigration problems than it has to do with Latinos themselves. Ricky, though he might complain about how much money Lucy spends, is not poor. Nor is he lazy. In fact, his character is something of a workaholic.
Some of this portrayal might have to do with the fact that he is portrayed as thoroughly assimilated into American culure. He might slip into Spanish every once in a while and speak English with a slight accent, but he espouses the same values expressed by American television patriarchs such as Andy Griffith and Ward Cleaver—work hard and earnestly, don’t be frivolous or wasteful, and people get what they deserve. In some sense, he is an example of the “good” or “deserving” immigrant—the immigrant who accepts American culture and knows (or learns) the language. He finds success through his assimilation. I find this dichotomy of “good” versus “bad” immigrants problematic in many ways, as it allows us to blame individuals and not social inequalities for the failures of many people who come to this country. However, assimilation is something that many immigrants experience and many might not see it as an inherently bad thing.
Ultimately, watching I Love Lucy has made me aware of just how little I know about Cuba’s history between Spanish colonization and Castro’s rise to power. I also know almost nothing about U.S.-Cuban relations before the Cold War. It’s also made me realize that I don’t know a lot about the history of the portrayal of Latin Americans in U.S. popular culture. Clearly, there is something of a gaping hole in my knowledge that needs to be filled. If nothing else, watching I Love Lucy has made me realize how much I don’t know, which is a great way to start learning new things.
With the Slightest Little Effort of His Ghost-Like Charms: Identity and the Appeal of Jack Skellington and The Nightmare before Christmas
The Florida sun shone off the pale yellow and pink pastels of the hotel walls. Samantha, Joe, [not their real names] and I sat on the curb while leaning against our luggage and instrument cases. Despite the brilliant, white sunshine and the heavy humidity, we were all dressed head to toe in black. The last hold-outs of the Goth craze of the early 2000s, we each sported thick, black eyeliner, black t-shirts, black jeans, and black boots. Samantha was also wearing a lacey, black tutu over her pants, which must have been warm but looked fetching on her petite frame.
Joe yawned. “When is the bus supposed to get here?”
I glanced at my watch. “About fifteen minutes ago.” We were on our way back to that conformist institution called high school from a marching band trip to Disney World. There we were misfits and band geeks, weird in our penchant for black nail polish and obscure music. But here on the curb, even in the brightness of the Florida sun, we fit in with each other, a black murder of crows amongst gaggles of white swans.
Samantha yawned too and pulled a pillow out of her backpack. It was white and round and covered in fleece, thick black yarn stitches slashed through the middle and two large black, familiar eyes stared up at us.
“Oooo! That’s awesome!” I squealed with delight.
“Jack! Jack! Give me Jack!” Joe shouted as soon as he saw the pillow. He snatched it from Samantha and hugged the plush face of Jack Skellington, Tim Burton’s anti-hero of The Nightmare before Christmas, that icon of angsty, Goth high schoolers and Hot Topic posers.
“Give it back!” Samantha whined. She reached for the pillow and then playfully slapped Joe when he held it out of her reach.
“Hey!” he barked and then grudgingly returned the cushion.
“My Jack!” Samantha said, holding it against her chest, over her heart.
* * *
What is it about Jack Skellington, about Nightmare before Christmas, that so appeals to teenagers, especially those who take to wearing black and listening to heavy metal or alternative rock music alone in their rooms? It’s been almost twenty years since the movie came out, and yet I still see that cartoon skeleton face nearly everywhere—usually in malls and usually around Halloween and Christmas. Many children’s movies have not been nearly as resilient and many of them certainly haven’t appealed so heavily to the teen market. Even more haven’t stuck with me personally, but Nightmare before Christmas has. Even in my twenties, I have a Jack Skellington poster in my apartment. I own a Jack Skellington tote bag. I even decorate my Christmas tree with Nightmare decorations and two of my favorite t-shirts feature screen-prints of Jack and Sally. What about this quirky movie keeps it coming back every Christmas? Why are teenagers, some probably born after the movie came out, still drawn to Jack’s eerie smile? And why can’t I, even after I’ve long left Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny behind, give up on Jack Skellington?
For those of you who missed out on Tim Burton’s dark fairy tale, I’ll give you a summary: The premise of The Nightmare before Christmas is that each major holiday—Halloween, Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving—is created in a magical town. Halloween, naturally, is created in Halloween Town, a village made up of twisted castles and crumbing walls and inhabited by vampires, an evil scientist, werewolves, and a whole host of other ghouls and goblins. Despite their macabre appearance, the inhabitants of Halloween Town are friendly, helpful folk. They just have an aesthetic that inverts our own. Skulls and rotting hands are beautiful while snowflakes and Christmas trees are ugly. While Halloween Town is officially run by a mayor, the real boss in town is the local celebrity, Jack Skellington the Pumpkin King, the scariest monster in the world. Jack, seemingly, has it all—a castle home, good friends, and adoring fans. But he’s bored. He feels stuck in a rut, doing the same thing year after year. So one night, after the town’s usual Halloween festivities, he takes a walk through an enchanted forest and finds the magic doors to the other holiday towns. He stumbles into Christmas Town, inhabited by efficient and ever-smiling elves and, of course, Santa Claus, and is amazed. He decides to bring the joy of Christmas to Halloween Town, but the fiends and phantoms just can’t wrap their heads around the concept of Christmas. So Jack modifies the holiday into a morbid parody of Yuletide. The well-meaning but misguided residents of Halloween Town decide to bring their version of Christmas to the world, so they kidnap Santa Claus and Jack takes off in a coffin-shaped sleigh pulled by eight skeleton reindeer to deliver presents of dead rats and giant snakes (all wrapped in black paper and topped with festive black bows) to terrified little girls and boys. The National Guard eventually shoots down Jack’s sleigh, and he realizes that he’s made a terrible mistake. He isn’t meant to be Santa Claus—he’s the Pumpkin King, destined to give people a good scare on Halloween! He rushes back to Halloween Town and sets Santa Claus free. Christmas is restored to its usual cheeriness, and Jack has a renewed sense of who he’s meant to be and what his purpose is. He goes back to his patch of jack-o’-lanterns and his town full of ghosts, knowing that that is where he belongs.
To really understand the appeal of this movie to a certain subset of people, especially teenaged people, I think it’s worth comparing Halloween and Christmas in our culture. Halloween is a dark holiday, a holiday to playfully face our fears and find out that they maybe aren’t that scary. It’s also a holiday to explore our identities. We try on new clothes, new costumes, and new personas. It’s a time when it’s socially acceptable for “good girls” to look promiscuous, normally polite and well-mannered children can indulge their love of sweets, and teenagers and college students can pull pranks across the neighborhood. Halloween is about celebrating the Others of our culture, whether those others are the scary misfits, creepy monsters, or our own secret fears and identities. Christmas, conversely, is a holiday that invokes and virtues of generosity and good will. It’s about spending time with family, eating good food, giving and receiving presents, and basking in the warmth of companionship in the depths of winter. It’s a holiday upon which we’re supposed to be jolly. If Halloween is about facing the parts of ourselves we usually keep hidden, Christmas is about putting on a front of our happiest, most idealized selves.
But what if your idealized self isn’t what your family or your culture tell you you’re supposed to idealize? Or what if you just can’t stand pretending to be cheerful when you really feel anxious and sad? Or what if you just want to be honest about those dark, hidden parts of yourself that you’re told you’re supposed to keep secret? As a teenager, I felt like that, and I know I’m not the only one. In high school, I watched the popular girls cake on the newest eye shadows and mascaras featured in Vogue. I overheard them talk about the latest diets and weight loss regimes mentioned in Cosmo. I saw them sashay into class wearing designer jeans sported by major actresses. And they were smiling, always smiling! They told the teachers what they wanted to hear and they told their boyfriends what they wanted to hear. To me, it all seemed so fake, like they were wearing a mask, a costume.
With my black clothes and eyeliner, I was wearing a costume too, but at least I felt that my costume was of my own making. I wore it to please myself and no one else. I was, in my own eyes, a rebel. Instead of designer clothes, I wore thrifted outfits. Instead of memorizing the lyrics to the latest pop songs, I memorized the poetry of Emily Dickinson and Edgar Allan Poe. My friends and I flaunted our difference. We felt sad inside, so we wore our sadness outside. We felt like the world of popular, pretty people had rejected us, so we rejected the world of the popular, pretty people. What they thought was ugly was beautiful to us, and we found beauty in the dark, secret places that everyone told us were ugly.
Of course, a great deal of this rebellion was, at least on my part, based in jealousy. I’d be willing to bet that a lot of other teenagers also harbor a similar resentment to the popular people, the pretty people, the people-pleasing people. For whatever reason, they seemed to have what we didn’t, whether it was in conventionally attractive looks, better social skills, or just the stamina to repress what they were really thinking and mold themselves into whatever they needed to be in a given situation. Other people liked them. Looking back now, I realize that these popular kids probably felt as sad and lost as I did. They were just better at throwing up a front of confidence. They faked it till they made it. I, for a variety of reasons—depression, anxiety, and probably just plain stubbornness—couldn’t do that. So I proudly wore my difference in fishnets and Converse while a tiny part of me wished that I could be pretty and popular. Like Jack Skellington, I fit well in ghastly, gruesome settings, but sometimes I grew weary of being a misfit, an outsider, a monster.
As I mentioned, I’m sure I wasn’t the only teenager to feel this way. High school is indeed a strange period in life. You have a child’s impulsiveness but you’re morphing into an adult’s body. You’re being given adult responsibilities—driving, getting your first job, considering college or trade school or the military—but you still live with your parents and are expected to obey their rules. You’re starting to form your own opinions about important topics like politics and religion but you still giggle when somebody accidentally farts or burps in class. You’re told that these are the best years of your life, but you spend a lot of time feeling stressed out about classes and directionless when you think of your future. If I may over-simplify: in a sense, high school is full of a bunch of people who haven’t quite figured out yet who they are. So some of them learn to pretend that they’ve figured it all out, while others learn to revel in their awkwardness. The pretenders are like Christmas. They seem cheerful and virtuous and get their validation from pleasing the people around them and fitting in. The revelers are like Halloween. They try on a bunch of different personas, usually personas that invert cultural norms and values. They get their validation from shocking people, from defining themselves as outsiders.
And this brings me back to the appeal of The Nightmare before Christmas and its protagonist, Jack Skellington. Jack, like so many teenagers, including my friends and me, is a monster, an outsider, a misfit. He’s a celebrity on Halloween and in Halloween Town, but to the rest of the world, and certainly in a cheery place like Christmas Town, he’s a creepy skeleton, a symbol of death and darkness. Also like my friends and I, and many other teenagers, Jack enjoys his difference. It makes him special. And while it might scare normal people, his difference is what makes his friends adore him. But difference can still be lonely and tiring, and like Jack, sometimes a lot of us outsiders just want to be normal and happy, like everyone else. So Jack does, for a little while, become like everyone else. In a place where Halloween is normal, Christmas becomes like Halloween—a chance for Jack to try out other, hidden parts of his identity. Instead of being macabre, he gets to be jolly. But instead of transforming Jack from a beast to a prince, as so many fairy tales do, The Nightmare before Christmas affirms Jack’s difference. It makes him realize that he is a monster and that being a monster is, for him, a good thing. Watching Jack’s transformation into Santa Claus and then back into the Pumpkin King allowed me, and I suspect still allows a lot of teenagers, to feel affirmed in our own weirdness. We might want to be like the always happy elves or always happy popular people, but we, like Jack, knew that that wasn’t who we really were.
Of course, we’re all different from everyone else in some way, but high school is a time when many people feel pressured to put on a front of happiness and conformity. And a lot of people, like my teenage self, feel uncomfortable with that front. While we’re often told that we’re just going through a phase or we’ll grow out of our discomfort, some of us build out identities on our rebellion, our difference. We don’t want to give it up. We don’t want to be told that we’ll blossom into princes or princesses, even though we might be frogs now. The Nightmare before Christmas is a fairy tale that says otherwise. It tells us that even if we try to be what everyone else wants and expects, that’s not who we are and we probably won’t succeed in our façade. Like Jack, we’re outsiders and monsters. But also like Jack, we can enjoy our difference. We can use it to find a sense of purpose and meaningfulness. We might be monsters, but that’s okay.
* * *
In many ways, I’ve come a long way from that girl draped in black and sitting on a curb in Florida. Eventually in college I learned how to put on an act of confidence, and I’ve played that part long enough now that most of the time I can convince myself it’s not just a role. I’ve figured out how to balance my black humor and sarcasm, which make me happy, with a smiling disposition and cheerful demeanor, which make other people happy and usually make me happy too. I’ve mostly moved past my anxiety and depression and stubbornness, though they still haunt me from time to time. Though most of my wardrobe still consists of black clothes, I’ve also branched out into blue and red and green and even orange and purple. I’ve cut back on the eyeliner considerably, and I only bring out the fishnets and boots on special occasions (like Halloween!). A lot of people would tell me that I’ve grown up.
In other ways, however, I’m still not so different from that high school girl I used to be. As a newly minted graduate in a poor economy, I often look at my up-and-coming friends and feel plagued with self-doubt. In their photos on Facebook, they’re all smiling, and their status updates chronicle their successes in jobs and relationships. Of course, I rejoice at their victories in finding jobs and starting careers when the economic climate is so set against them. In one sense, their success gives me hope. But another part of me, unemployed and single, feels as though I’m stuck in a rut in my hometown. My twenties, I’m finding, are still an awful lot like my teenage years, especially in regards to being faced with new adult responsibilities while still feeling childish. I’m finding that a direction and a purpose in life do not come along with a diploma and a degree.
So, much like my teenage self, I still squeal with delight when I see the softball-like face of Jack Skellington grinning at me from the window of The Disney Store or Hot Topic. He reminds me that feeling like an outsider doesn’t have to be lonely or isolating. I can enjoy my monstrosity and play with my identity. Every day can be Halloween, in which I try on different personas, different aspects of myself, until I find one that I like and that fits. In fact, being different can lead me to a renewed sense of purpose of help me find my own meaning in life. I may not know what that is yet, but like Jack, after comparing myself to the conventionally attractive and happy people, I might just decide that it’s better to be a monster after all.
An Intimidating and Impenetrable Fog 