Tag Archive for "Girls"

Posts Tagged Girls

Quick Hit: What did you think of “Girls”?

Last night, the much-anticipated new series Girls premiered on HBO. I got into a lively debated with one of my colleagues at Mother Jones, who found the show to be “unwatchable.” After getting a sneak peak at the first few episodes, here are some of the exciting things about Girls that I think he overlooked:

The sex? Plenty of ink has already been spilled over the show’s explicit and often painfully awkward sex. The aggressively un-glamorous hook-ups in Girls are far more realistic than anything else on television. And such a frank and funny portrayal of young sexuality—at least when it’s through women’s eyes—is noteworthy enough to warrant props, as well as plenty of hand-wringing

By Samhita • 12 years ago

Gender essentialist marketing hurts young girls

A really amazing video went viral over the last week featuring a young girl frustrated that all girl’s toys are marketed as pink–going as far as making the connection between companies wanting boys and girls to play with different things.

It’s amazing.

Along with this, Peggy Orenstein has a must-read op-ed in the NY Times taking on some of the nature vs nurture arguments made in support of the idea that girls just like pink (in response to LEGO putting out a new set for girls in pink), weighing both sides of the argument. She writes,

As any developmental psychologist will tell you, those observations are, to a degree, correct. Toy choice among young children is the Big Kahuna of sex differences, ...

By Samhita • 12 years ago

Gender essentialist marketing hurts young girls

It’s amazing.

As any developmental psychologist will tell you, those observations are, to a degree, correct. Toy choice among young children is the Big Kahuna of sex differences, ...

By Maya Dusenbery • 12 years ago

Quick Hit: Check out “Rookie”!

“Rookie,” Tavi Gevinson’s new website for teenage girls, has officially launched. With a classy, simple layout and three posts per day by a roster of very cool contributors (including our very own Lori!), it kinda makes me want to go back and do high school again–with better style this time.

I especially loved Tavi’s first post offering tips for getting over “girl hate.” It is spot-on and comes with this lovely flowchart explaining the origins of girl-on-girl competition and jealousy.

Go read the rest and explore the site!

By Samhita • 12 years ago

JC Penny’s back to school catalog tries to get “girly”

Back to back, two t-shirts from JC Penny today that send exactly the message girls need when heading back to school: we don’t need to learn, we’re pretty and boy crazy (teehee).

via JC Penny.

JC Penny has already taken one of the shirts down stating,

We agree that the “Too pretty” t-shirt does not deliver an appropriate message, and we have immediately discontinued its sale. Our merchandise is intended to appeal to a broad customer base, not to offend them. We would like to apologize for any concern we may have caused and assure you that we are taking action to ensure that we continue to uphold the integrity of our merchandise that [our customers] ...

Back to back, two t-shirts from JC Penny today that send exactly the message girls need when heading back to school: we don’t need to learn, we’re pretty and boy crazy (teehee).

via JC Penny.

...

By Courtney • 12 years ago

A summer camp of one’s own

Who among us hasn’t heard the oft repeated quotation from Mahatma Gandi: “Be the change you wish to see in the world”?

Well, as I was sitting in front of 80 high school aged-girls last week talking about body image, media activism, gender, feminism, and so much more, it occurred to me that a spin off that deserves popularizing is, “Be the culture you wish to be a part of in the world.” It’s happening at the Girls Leadership Institute (GLI)–a training institute and summer camp fostering authentic leadership in girls. It’s happening at Feministing. It’s happening in all kinds of feminist organizations and friend circles–formal and informal. We make change by creating subcultures where our values–about equality and ...

Who among us hasn’t heard the oft repeated quotation from Mahatma Gandi: “Be the change you wish to see in the world”?

Well, as I was sitting in front of 80 high school aged-girls last week talking ...

By Courtney • 12 years ago

You go (shy) girl!

“I think it’s important for shy girls to be able to be seen as leaders too,” said the, no doubt, shy girl sitting among a circle of 20 or so middle schoolers at a girls’ leadership summer camp. We were brainstorming a list of leadership qualities that we–not the media, not parents, not teachers, not even friends–deemed critical.

I thought this point was not only brave, but very astute. As I make the rounds of girls’ leadership development programs and camps this summer (I’m thrilled to be headed to The Girls Leadership Institute next month, co founded by one of my favorite human beings, Rachel Simmons), I’ve been thinking a lot about the kind of leadership model we are ...

“I think it’s important for shy girls to be able to be seen as leaders too,” said the, no doubt, shy girl sitting among a circle of 20 or so middle schoolers at a girls’ leadership summer ...

By Chloe Angyal • 12 years ago

Little girls and big systemic cultural problems

Good Morning America recently ran a segment on what I would term early-onset body image issues – girls as young as 5 and 6 are picking up on the cultural imperative for thinness, and the result is that girls are worrying about their weight before they’re out of the third grade. We’ve known for some time that little girls worry about this stuff, and that girls are starting to diet at younger and younger ages. GMA put together a panel of girls between the ages of 5 and 8 to ask them about diet, exercise, and how they felt about their bodies.

The adult women in these girls’ lives are seemingly all on diets – their mothers, their teacher – ...