[In case it needs to be said: I don't agree with every word of everything I link to. --L.]
- Guess What? Women Buy More Movie Tickets Than Men | Women & Hollywood
- You know that whole conversation about how women don’t go to the movies and are not a film market? You know that conversation that we hear over and over as the big reason why we are inundated with crappy boy films week in and week out.
Well thanks to the statistics that we released by the MPAA with barely a blip yesterday, (thanks David Poland for the heads up) the news is that not only do women go to movies, we go more than men. Yes, folks — women go to the movies more than men do.
This news should rock each and every executive in Hollywood more than the Bigelow Oscar win. Cause this is something they understand. This is money and women are delivering the money. Big time. [...]
I know exactly why the 2009 numbers increased. If you follow the business it’s not too hard to figure it out. The reasons are New Moon and The Blind Side with a side of The Proposal [...]. Maybe folks are going to try and say that it is a fluke because there were two female centric successes and we don’t have those frequently. Friends, that is the whole fucking point. It’s like that line from Field of Dreams – “if you build it they will come.” It is only looked at as a fluke because of the shortsightedness of people who won’t believe that women will continue to go to the movies. There is nothing in any of the data that I have looked at the gives me any indication that women won’t go to the movies in the future. In fact, I would venture to say that if they continue to make movies that attract women we will continue to be there.
- A Work in Progress
- …I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the Courage Campaign Equality Teams that are doing some great work doing their best to change hearts and minds. You can join your local equality team and really get down to some of the nitty-gritty hard work that our community can do to speed the process along. If you aren’t in California and want to help out here, consider supporting the Courage Campaign’s work on marriage equality in the real world, and through this blog.
- Quote of the Day
- "I am as strong as a man. I am as smart as a man. I demand the absolute respect of a man. If you understand this, we will get along well."—Peggielene Bartels, a secretary at the Embassy of Ghana in Silver Spring, Maryland, also known as Nana Amuah Afenyi VI, the lady king of Otuam. Bartels inherited the kingship after her uncle died and the elders determined she would be his successor. She suspects the corrupt elders thought they would find her easily manageable because she's a woman. Ahem.
- The Rehabilitation of Mike Tyson
- To be clear, I'm all for giving people another chance. And being let out of prison is a second chance, which is why we don't impose a life sentence on everyone convicted of any crime. Tyson faced as many as 60 years in prison, actually got sentenced to 10, and only served 3. That's second chance enough, in my opinion.
I don't believe that people who have "paid their debts" are necessarily owed the same opportunities they had before. Giving Tyson a second chance doesn't axiomatically mean he deserves to be made rich and famous again—although that's certainly what our culture appears to believe.
If you're rich and famous, it appears you can be wicked enough to be sent to prison, but not so wicked as to be sent to the working class. I have a problem with that.
- Proposed
- I would like to put forth the radical notion that, if a fat person is fat by choice, it's okay.
I'll give you a moment to sit with that idea—that it's okay for someone to choose to be fat. Because it really is a radical notion, and, like other radical notions, it is both has the capacity and is likely to evoke visceral reactions of protest. Like: "But being fat is (potentially) unhealthy! And that's not okay!" But, if you give yourself a moment or two, you'll probably realize there are other potentially unhealthy things that people do, which you would probably argue in favor of allowing them to continue doing.
It's more dangerous to ride in a car than be a pedestrian. But if a person capable of walking to the store wanted instead to hop in their car to pick up milk a mile away, you'd probably think that's okay. Because, hey, maybe they have a good reason for preferring to drive.
More people get hurt jumping out of airplanes for fun than get hurt gardening for fun. But if someone prefers the adrenaline rush of skydiving to the relaxation of gardening, you'd probably think that's okay. Because everyone's different, right?
Sometimes, doctors tell patients that a surgery, or an experimental treatment, or a new drug, might actually be more likely to kill them than cure them. But if someone decided to opt for the risky cure, you'd probably think that's okay. Because it's that person's body, not yours.
So maybe it's all right for you to think it's okay, if someone chooses to be fat, rather than thin.
The Link(s): Wed, Mar 17th, 11am by Lee Salazar, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Terms and conditions beyond the scope of this license may be available at leesalazar.com.