Models, Women, and Marketing

According to AdRants, a survey of 194 female college students, aged 18-24, found women feel uglier after seeing thin models. Well, duh.

But the thing I find curious and a little infuriating is that those same women are also more likely to buy products promoted by waifish models than from ads with "regular-size models."

If people want to start changing the pressure on women to be thin and create an environment that invites healthy body image, the place to start isn't by protesting Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue but to stop buying the damn products promoted by suicide-thin models!

Summer Webisodes

If you're missing your favorite shows, take heart--the summer webisode season has begun.

The Office offers a series of two-minute episodes about Kevin's money troubles and his plan to get out of debt.




It seems as if Heroes hasn't been on for ages, but you can enjoy some new short episodes online.



Truthfully, neither webisode series is very good--you might find better stuff to watch on YouTube--but both series may get better as they go along. Watch for new episodes to be posted in future weeks.

Is this the kind of leadership we want in the White House?

John McCain has positioned himself as some sort of "new" Republican, a maverick who will go his own way. Perhaps that is why I am so bitterly disappointed with the typically Republican way he is running his campaign.

Is this the kind of integrity, honesty, commitment to telling the whole story, and leadership we want in the White House?

• Fidel's Comments about Obama: McCain has been running a Web ad that shows photos of Fidel Castro and Barack Obama, and says, "Fidel Castro thinks he is 'the most advanced candidate.' "
  
  First of all, I don't appreciate the kind of campaigning this represents--should Americans choose their president by voting against the candidate endorsed by a hated foreign leader? Doesn't McCain have something positive to say about his own campaign rather than trying to link Obama to Castro, a link that simply doesn't exist?
  
  But if you're going to campaign this way, at least tell the complete truth. The "advanced candidate" quote comes from an article by Castro that was largely critical of Obama. Castro complained that Obama views the Cuban revolution as "anti-democratic" and that Obama makes the "exact same" arguments used by U.S. administrations "to justify their crimes against our country."
  
  
• Obama caused high gas prices? A new McCain ad places the blame for high gas prices not on the oil man in the White House but on the junior senator from Illinois. That's patently absurd, of course.
  
  The ad starts with this voice over: "Gas prices - $4, $5, no end in sight, because some in Washington are still saying no to drilling in America. No to independence from foreign oil. Who can you thank for rising prices at the pump?" At his point, the ad plays an audience chanting Obama's name.
  
  Does the McCain campaign have problems with reality? John McCain may not have noticed, but gas prices are falling. Where does this talk of $5 and "no end in sight" come from? From the same GOP ad machine that always tries to scare voters rather than inform them. Whether its Willie Horton or 9/11, no subject is too taboo that it can't be callously played like a trump card for the benefit of the Republicans party.
  
  So, what's the truth? Obama has voted against new drilling in the waters of the Outer Continental Shelf, but so have many others. More importantly, there is no relation between this drilling prohibition and current gas prices; the Energy Information Administration estimates that if the go-ahead were given right now for such drilling, it would be 2030 before there would be enough oil flowing to have a "significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices." The entire basis for this ad is nothing but a lie--and yes, McCain himself "approved" the message.
  
  
• Obama Supports the Troops: Yet another ad claims, "Barack Obama... voted against funding our troops." It's true that Barack once voted against funding the troops, but he did so because the bill funded the war in Iraq without containing a timetable for withdrawal, a stand on which many Americans agree. Moreover--and you can rest assured McCain knows this--Barack has voted to support the troops ten times in five separate measures.
  
  The same ad claims, "Barack Obama never held a single Senate hearing on Afghanistan." This is true, but perhaps McCain needs a geography lesson; Obama is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's subcommittee on European Affairs. Last time I check Afghanistan isn't in Europe, but it seems McCain doesn't know this.
  
  Here is what McCain knows: The full Senate Foreign Relations Committee has held three hearings on Afghanistan during the past two years, and Obama attended one of them. If that sounds like a poor record, take a look at McCain's record for Afghanistan: He's the highest ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee and has missed all seven of the hearings that his panel held on Afghanistan during the same two years.

This sort of"politics as usual" is disheartening to see from McCain. His drift to the right and toward the sadly predictable way of GOP campaigning is disappointing. This is not the kind of leadership I want to see in the White House (because it is the kind of leadership we've had in the White House now for almost eight years.)

By the way, the information for this post came from the bipartisan FactCheck.org. You can subscribe to their email, which reports on the truth contained in candidates advertising and speeches.

Star Wars Flashdance

I'm enough of a Star Wars geek and a stop-motion animation lover to post this, despite the obvious ridicule I may endure:

Mandalorian Dance @ Yahoo! Video

Me Starring in Jib Jab's Latest Campaign Toon

Send a JibJab Sendables® eCard Today!

Watchmen Trailer

Considering two of the best movies I saw this year were superhero movies based on comics (Iron Man and Hellboy II), I guess I'll look forward to Watchmen next year. Nice trailer...

Homemade Roller Coaster

A guy loves roller coasters but gets tired of waiting in line, so he makes his own--complete with a 360-degree loop.

I'm actually relatively impressed! The homemade Blue Flash Coaster...

RIP: Jesse Helms

When a politician dies, it's become fashionable to laud him, no matter how offensive or wrong-headed his or her policies and actions. When Nixon passed, those who read his many obituaries and tributes would've have had a hard time telling he was the man responsible for shaming the Office of the President with clandestine, domestic spying against Democrats, that he cost the country billions of dollars in lost productivity and Federal spending to address his crimes, or that he ushered in a period of distrust of those in Washington, D.C.

So, while others are praising Jesse Helms for the way he stuck to his ideals and values, I think we ought to instead be pointing out how those "values" and "ideals" were hate and intolerance. The irony is that this man, who worked most of his life to deny equal rights to so many, died on Independence Day while so many Americans were celebrating that all men are created equal.

Some may feel this is unfair--that Helms was a product of his times, so we should ignore the bigoted and hateful things he said. I might actually agree with this if so many people don't still believe the same things. The fact these words were uttered by a man who influenced the thinking of so many others is why they deserve to be seen for what they are today, the day after his death.

• "White people, wake up before it is too late. Do you want Negroes working beside you, your wife and your daughters, in your mills and factories?" (1950) (Source)
  
• "Crime rates and irresponsibility among Negroes are a fact of life which must be faced." (1981) (Source)
  
• "The University of North Carolina (UNC)... the University of Negroes and Communists..." (1995) (Source)
  
• "All Latins are volatile people." (1986) (Source)
  
• "The government should spend less money on people with AIDS because they got sick as a result of deliberate, disgusting, revolting conduct." (1995) (Source)
  
• "Mr. Clinton better watch out if he comes down here [Fort Bragg]. He'd better have a bodyguard. " (1994) (Source)
  
• "Because she's a damn lesbian. I am not going to put a lesbian in a position like that."--Senator Jesse Helms after failing to block the confirmation of Roberta Achtenberg as assistant secretary for the House and Urban Development Department, May 1993 (Source)
  
• "The Negro cannot count forever on the kind restraint that has thus far left him free to clog the streets, disrupt traffic and commerce, and interfere with other men's rights."--Helms on "the Negro problem," 1963 (Source)
  
• "We've got to have some common sense about a disease transmitted by people deliberately engaging in unnatural acts."-- Helms on why he opposed approval of AIDS research. (Source)
  
• "I'm a conservative progressive, and that means I think all men are equal, be they slants, beaners, or niggers."-- Helms, 1985, quoted from the Democratic Alliance (Source)
  
• "Your tax dollars are being used to pay for grade school classes that teach our children that Cannabilism, wife-swapping, and the murder of infants and the elderly are acceptable behavior."--Helms from a fundraising mailer sent out by his campaign (Source)
  
• "The subject matter is so obscene, so revolting, it's difficult for me to stand here and talk about it. I may throw up." 1987, commenting on an HIV prevention comic book (Source)
  
• "There is not one single case of Aids reported in this country that cannot be traced in origin to sodomy." 1988 (Source)
  
• "Think about it. Homosexuals and lesbians, disgusting people, marching in our streets, demanding all sorts of things, including the right to marry each other. How do you like them apples?" 1990, during his re-election campaign (Source)
  
• On Larry King Live, Helms took a call from Tilk, Alabama. "I just think that you should get a Nobel Peace Prize for everything you've done to help keep down the niggers," the caller said. "Thank you, I think," Helms replied. (Source)
  
• "You were the best qualified for that job, but they had to give it to a minority." Helms' 1990 campaign ad (Source)

I will not rejoice in the passing of another human being, but I will not allow a person's death to turn him from ignorant bigot to saint. Helms' words speak for themselves. It's a shame a man in a position of power for as long as Helms was couldn't use his pulpit to enlighten rather than to reinforce false stereotypes and to deny other humans the right to equal protection under the law.

Cutest. Video. Evar!

Animal Friendship Between Different Species.

This video is presented to make your Independence Day a little more warm and fuzzy.

How Pathetic Has the American Male Become?

I understand it's just a movie, but I went into Wanted expecting a fun Summer movie ride and I walked out depressed at the state of the American male.

Warning, there are spoilers below, so if you want to see two hours of slow-mo bullets piercing heads and the laws of physics being violated, then you may not wish to read further.

Wanted is Matrix without Matrix's heart and soul. There's lots of slow-mo action, some of it quite good but most of it simply ridiculous. In one scene, a car slides sideways, hits a small lateral crack in the pavement, vaults 20 feet over a phalanx of police cars, hits the side of a bus with its wheels, pushes the bus over on its side, and drives off the bus to safety. In another scene, a single bullet pierces the heads of six different people consecutively. Some movies this season are about super heroes, but this one is about super bullets!

I'm not going to complain about the ridiculously unbelievable action sequences in Wanted; instead, I'll complain about what it says about my gender. The movie's about a feckless office worker named Wesley Gibson who lives a miserable life ruled by shrew-like women--his obese boss is a bully and his girlfriend is an unfaithful witch. The flick is one of the most misogynistic movies I can recall in quite some time. (Of course, his one and only buddy is no better--he's screwing Wesley's girlfriend and actually borrows money from our protagonist to buy the condoms to do so.)

Wesley comes to learn that he has special powers and is the son of the world's greatest assassin, which is pretty lucky for the guy since the movie makes clear that working in an office is the equivalent of modern slavery. Stripped of his dignity in the most crude and cartoonish of ways, Wanted makes sure the audience cannot miss how unmanly it is for Wesley to work in a cubicle. As a result, his conversion to an assassin's way of life has less to do with family honor and almost everything to do with the fact the modern male is a wimpy, downtrodden, sterile, powerless being who can really only realize his potential by causing mayhem and death.

I have nothing against fantasies where people escape a burdensome existence for something more exciting (see Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, etc.), but I do object when the exciting way of life is nothing more than an adrenalin rush from killing others. The writers, sensing they needed to give Wesley some semblance of a conscience, paste a fraudulent and brief scene where he hesitates on his first assassination assignment. Luckily, he quickly learns it's all right to kill other people, and his momentary lapse gives him script license to smile lustily as he mows people down from that point forward.

The men in the audience at my showing seemed to eat it up, and that is what I found depressing. How sad have we males become that we empathize with the powerlessness of an office employee and cheer as the character graduates from puberty to manhood by sending bullets into people.

Maybe I just take things too seriously, but I found Wanted to be more disturbing than entertaining. Perhaps the misogynistic, misanthropic ideas are just in the heads of the film makers, but heaven help us if they've tapped into the psyche of the modern man.