Monthly Archives: September 2011
Harry Potter’s Hermione: Less Brainy, Brave. More Sexy
As Harry Potter’s Hermione grew up, her brainy, brave persona turned more sexy, less threatening and less magical, says Sarah Jane Stratford in The Guardian. She continues:
Did Hermione Granger really say “I can’t” during the climactic battle in the final chapter of the Harry Potter film saga? Presented with her chance to destroy one of the horcruxes she had put her life on the line to hunt, she backs away and needs her almost-boyfriend Ron to insist that of course she can.
The transformation of a brave, adventurous girl into a young woman who becomes weakened by, or defined by, her sexuality, has a long literary tradition. The next step, it seems, is to become a mom who is sick or dead.
I discovered this pattern one year when I let fiction take over my usual nonfiction reading habit.
In The Sound and the Fury we meet adventurous, determined and nurturing little
Caddy Compson who is busy exploring the local countryside, climbing trees and sometimes bossing her brothers. Later, she becomes a promiscuous woman, shamed and rejected by her family. And the mother in this story? She’s a neurotic hypochondriac.
Faulkner introduces us to a mother who is dying, and later dead, in the appropriately titled, As I Lay Dying. Her daughter is upset and fixated on her out-of-wedlock pregnancy (instead of her dying/dead mom).
In Atonement creative young Briony Tallis has an over-active imagination that leads to serious trouble. Her older cousin gets raped, and her older sister is overcome by romance. Mom is constantly bedridden with headaches.
Plain Song revolves around a shy 17-year-old whose mother kicked her out after learning she was pregnant. Two young boys have a mom who spends her days locked away, depressed.
I could go on, but you get the point.
If strong, adventurous girls grew up to become strong, adventurous young women, who were also sexual, that would be fine. But too often, sexuality diminishes them or becomes all they’re about.
Maybe that explains why older women (moms) end up sick or dead. Upon reaching womanhood the grown girl leaves behind everything that had empowered and engaged her to become defined by her sexuality. When her allure fades, there’s nothing left.
Which suggests a lesson for real live women. Best to avoid a one-dimensional focus on sexuality that rests on narrow beauty notions. Instead, stay strong and develop many facets of yourself, including an ageless and radiant beauty and sexuality (a la Susan Sarandon, Meryl Streep, Isabella Rossellini, and Hellen Mirren) to enjoy over a lifetime.
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Should You Ask Why Your Lover Loves You?
We often ask our lovers why they love us.
That may not be such a good idea.
When people become analytical – making lists of pros and cons, what they like and don’t – they can end up misleading themselves.
Social psychologists, Tim Wilson and his colleagues, found that analyzing our feelings can actually make matters worse.
Unfortunately, we don’t always know why we feel the way we do. So we might latch onto reasons that are easily identifiable, and easier to verbalize, than what’s really in our hearts. Our reasons sound reasonable, but they aren’t necessarily correct.
Now comes the bigger problem: After looking at our list, we may change the way we feel, at least temporarily, to match what we wrote. Maybe the list doesn’t seem too spectacular and we reassess our feelings.
Wilson gives a couple of examples. Suppose you enjoy dating someone, and you wonder why: What is it about this person? As you think about it, you start to notice that you and your partner don’t have much in common. With so little in common, you can’t have much of a future! So you change your mind about the relationship.
Then there’s that episode from Friends when Ross makes a list to sort out his feelings toward Rachel and Julie. He loves Rachel but can’t figure out why, so he writes down whatever comes to mind: “She’s just a waitress… She’s a little ditzy.” In real life, Ross may have concluded that he did not love Rachel as much as he thought, because all he could think of were negative traits. (But when he thought about Julie, all he could think was, “She’s not Rachel, she’s not Rachel.” Perhaps fiction is more forgiving.)
If you ever do choose to list the reasons why you love your lover, consider that you may not know, or may not be able to articulate, your real reasons.
Fortunately, the effects of “reasons-generated attitude change” are temporary. So at least don’t do anything rash based on your new perspective.
I once asked my husband why he loved me. He said he didn’t know. I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t push the matter.
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Taking Mom to Court for Bad Birthday Card, No $$$
Two children, now in their early 20s, have taken their mother to court charging damages for:
- Sending a bad birthday card – and no money
- Neglecting to take one child to a car show
- Telling the other child, at age 7, that she would call the police if he didn’t buckle his seatbelt
- Failing to buy enough toys
- Haggling over the amount she would spend on a party dress
- Calling her daughter at midnight to insist she return from a homecoming party
The Chicago Tribune itemizes the complaints, saying that last week the court record stood about a foot tall with the children seeking $50,000 for “emotional distress.”
Come on, isn’t all of the above called “typical parenting”?
Steve Schmadeke, of the Tribune filled in details on the card:
On the front of the American Greetings card is a picture of tomatoes spread across the table that are indistinguishable except for one in the middle with craft-store googly eyes attached. “Son I got you this Birthday card because it’s just like you… different from all the rest!” the card reads. On the inside (his mother) wrote “Have a great day! Love and Hugs, Mom xoxoxo.”
I can see why her son felt this was “inappropriate” and sued.
An appeals court dismissed the case saying that ruling in favor of the children could open the floodgates to excessive judicial scrutiny and interference of families. Really? The court was tempted to rule in favor of the children? How this case managed to get as far as an appeals court is beyond me.
I’m not sure whether the children, who were raised in a $1.5 million home, are just spoiled or whether their father is manipulative and abusive.
Turns out the whole thing was dad’s idea. He not only came up with the scheme, but volunteered to represent the kids in court. Luckily, he’s a lawyer.
Mom and dad are divorced. This could be revenge.
But how did dad rope the kids into his evil web?
I don’t know the details of their family life, but the whole thing reminds me of something I read from Kathleen Krenek, Executive Director of Next Door Solutions to Domestic Violence. In an op-ed piece for the San Jose Mercury News she says, “Father’s often use their own children as pawns to abuse their victims, creating family rifts that position the mother as inferior and the father as the good guy.” She continues:
An abuser hits his wife when the children aren’t around, then turns into the “fun” parent when the children are around. The victim, their mother, is frazzled, anxious and stressed out. The children see their father in a good mood, then see their mother: stressed out, annoyed and scared. Then their father says, “Hey let’s go to the movies.” The mother doesn’t want to go, spoiling their family fun. In the eyes of the kids, the father is the good guy.
Who knows whether dad found a way to make himself seem like the “fun” parent and turn the kids against a sullen mom. Regardless, dad, daughter and son should all be embarrassed for, at the least, being such spoiled brats.
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