"Female Chauvinist Pigs," out in 2005, wondered just how liberated the heroines of "raunch" culture actually were.
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" Ariel Levy is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the author of "Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture.
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Oprah dedicated an entire episode to the topic of Stupid Girls, inviting smart women like Pink, journalist Naomi Wolf, and Female Chauvinist Pigs author Ariel Levy on as guests.
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Some might know her better for her famous 2005 book, Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture, which was a look at how a sex-positive brand of female empowerment can become a slippery slope to misogyny.
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As current Refinery29 editor Yael Kohen pointed out in her 2012 book, We Killed: The Rise of Women in American Comedy, Elaine May and Phyllis Diller, along with Lucille Ball, consistently pushed the boundaries of what was "acceptable" women's behavior, a topic Ariel Levy tackled in 2005's Female Chauvinist Pigs as well.
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Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, Judith Butler (333) The Beauty Myth, Naomi Woolf (1990) "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color," Kimberlé Crenshaw (21990) "The Riot GRRRL Manifesto," Kathleen Hanna (22000) Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women, Susan Faludi (1991) The Bust Guide to the New Girl Order, edited by Marcelle Karp and Debbie Stoller (1999) Feminism Is for Everybody: Passionate Politics, bell hooks (2000) Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture, Ariel Levy (2005) Feminists have been anticipating the arrival of a fourth wave since at least 1986, when a letter writer to the Wilson Quarterly opined that the fourth wave was already building.
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She appeared in two off-Broadway productions.Ariel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs (2005), chapter 2.
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Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch CultureAriel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture, Free Press, 2005, is a 2005 book by Ariel Levy which critiques the highly sexualized American culture in which women are objectified, objectify one another, and are encouraged to objectify themselves. Levy refers to this as "raunch culture".
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Ariel Levy (born 1974) is an American staff writer at The New Yorker magazineLevy bio, New Yorker website. Accessed Sept. 25, 2013. and the author of the books The Rules do Not Apply and Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture.
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School dancing, sexual and other stereotypes, senseless violence, lovesick carelessness causing blond drunkenness, hippie hypocrisy and the type of comedy of errors reminiscent of Oscar Wilde are also parodied. Pick-pockets, male and female chauvinist pigs, obstructive false eyelashes, mistaken murder and misplaced false boobs are additional spoofed elements.
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According to Levy, there are two strategies a Female Chauvinist Pig (FCP) employs to "deal with her femaleness."Levy 2005, p. 107. In the first strategy, an FCP distinguishes herself from women whom she deems excessively feminine ("girly-girls"), while simultaneously objectifying such women (e.g., going to strip clubs, reading Playboy, and talking about porn stars).
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Others, such as Susan Brownmiller, a well-known American feminist, journalist, author, and activist, share this opinion. Although raunch originated in the male domain, Levy claims that it "no longer makes sense to blame men." Central to Levy's analysis of raunch culture is the concept of "Female Chauvinist Pigs": women who sexually objectify other women and themselves.Levy 2005, p. 93.
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Lilli and her fashions were sold as children's toys in several European countries, including Italy and Scandinavian countries; outside Germany she is usually remembered as a children's doll. In the United States, she was just called "Lilli". Some Lillis have been seen in original 1950s packaging for an English-speaking market labelled "Lili Marleen", after the song. Decades later, American author Ariel Levy referred to Bild-Lilli as a "sex doll" in Female Chauvinist Pigs and in interviews about the Lilli-inspired Barbie doll, Eve Ensler referred to Lilli (without elaboration) as a "sex toy".
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Levy discusses this phenomenon in Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture. Levy followed the camera crew from the Girls Gone Wild video series, and argues that contemporary America's sexualized culture not only objectifies women, it encourages women to objectify themselves. In today's culture, Levy writes, the idea of a woman participating in a wet T-shirt contest or being comfortable watching explicit pornography has become a symbol of feminist strength. Jordan Peterson has asked why women need to wear make-up or high-heels in the workplace, that a double standard exists for sexual harassment and females who self-objectify themselves in society.
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Ted Kessler of The Observer noted that the song "may be slightly kooky pop-rock, but it's sung by someone with the range of an operatic diva." Alex Henderson of AllMusic picked the song as a highlight from the album, while Robert Christgau wrote that its lyrics have an "awkward, carnal, unhesitatingly female chauvinist." Matt Cibula of PopMatters said that "it could have been a great little thing, [...] simple, graceful, light, but now it’s a damned mess," citing the "tell-tale touches" at the start, the Bangles’ “Eternal Flame” influence and “Penny Lane” trumpets by the end" as examples. Cibula called it "a potentially cool song [that] has been studioed out of existence.
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Levy criticized the pornographic video series Girls Gone Wild after she followed its camera crew for three days, interviewed both the makers of the series and the women who appeared on the videos, and commented on the series' concept and the debauchery she was witnessing. Many of the young women Levy spoke with believed that bawdy and liberated were synonymous. Levy's experiences amid Girls Gone Wild appear again in Female Chauvinist Pigs, in which she attempts to explain "why young women today are embracing raunchy aspects of our culture that would likely have caused their feminist foremothers to vomit." In today's culture, Levy writes, the idea of a woman participating in a wet T-shirt contest or being comfortable watching explicit pornography has become a symbol of strength; she says that she was surprised at how many people, both men and women, working for programs such as Girls Gone Wild told her that this new "raunch" culture marked not the downfall of feminism but its triumph, but Levy was unconvinced.
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