Afbeelding van de auteur.

Susie Orbach

Auteur van Mooi dik is niet lelijk

23+ Werken 1,697 Leden 20 Besprekingen Favoriet van 1 leden

Over de Auteur

Susie Orbach is a cofounder of the Women's Therapy Centre in London and a visiting professor at the London School of Economics. She is also a cofounder of the Women's Therapy Centre Institute in New York. Orbach lives in London with her partner and two children

Bevat de naam: Susie Orbach

Fotografie: Photo by walnut whippet

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Werken van Susie Orbach

Mooi dik is niet lelijk (1978) 401 exemplaren
Bodies (2009) 231 exemplaren
Fat is a Feminist Issue, I & II (1998) 213 exemplaren
Wat willen vrouwen eigenlijk? (1983) — Auteur — 116 exemplaren
Fat is a Feminist Issue II (1982) 107 exemplaren
Fifty Shades of Feminism (1800) — Redacteur — 76 exemplaren
Hoe zijn vrouwen eigenlijk? (1983) 76 exemplaren
Het vrouwelijk mijnenveld (1994) 24 exemplaren
Towards Emotional Literacy (1999) 22 exemplaren

Gerelateerde werken

Christmas Days: 12 Stories and 12 Feasts for 12 Days (2016) — Medewerker — 359 exemplaren
"Spare Tyre" Song Book (2000) — Illustrator — 1 exemplaar
Feast : Magic dust (2018) — Medewerker — 1 exemplaar

Tagged

Algemene kennis

Geboortedatum
1946
Geslacht
female
Nationaliteit
UK

Leden

Besprekingen

While I struggled with some of the ideas in this book, overall I thought it was well written with worthy content. I thought the exercises given for journalling and talking it out were especially good.
 
Gemarkeerd
thewestwing | 2 andere besprekingen | Aug 12, 2022 |
I think a certain group of radical feminists are being very selective and cherry picking examples of media where women are apparently "objectified".

I mean for instance, batwoman isn't just a lesbian but also an intelligent, political feminist (she was expelled in the United States Military Academy because of the "don't ask, don't tell" rule). Catwoman, on the other hand is meant to emulate a femme fatale with a dominatrix-like bitchy personality. Her "style" has nothing to do with deliberate attempts to "objectify" women but is meant represent a common comic character "motif" for narrative purposes.
You have to realize that video game / comic characters are meant to be "larger than life" to keep reader interest. How can a graphic novel convey information if the words used are considerably shorter than a book? It does this through hyperbole, exaggerated action shots / poses / emotions and character dramatization.

These companies are well aware of keeping up with diversity. Many comic book publishers including mainstream ones have superheroes of different races, different sexualities and different ways of life. Some longstanding stories do feature powerful, sexy and seductive heroines, but these heroines also kick major arse and are not "merely wank fodder". It's incredibly disrespectful to the artist to criticize their choice of making their characters look aesthetically pleasing.

It's also victimless (digital girls are not exploited) and nothing more than printed ink. I am fed up of gungho, clueless radical feminists who think us "males" just love oppressing women in the media for the sake of it. If you want freedom you must also treat those whom you disagree with respect and dignity and not just call us simple minded idiots for daring to call bull**** on this ideologically-driven moral panic. By all means attack Nuts / Zoo, I couldn't give a s*** about those wank mags, but please the leave video games and the SF genre alone!

I can see through the attack on "video games" as nothing more than a "strawman" attempt to discredit a subculture which has made massive progress to be as diverse as possible and have welcomed women with open arms. The only problem is purely that of a historical one (less women have historically taken up "computer sciences" hence there is under-representation). There is no patriarchal cyber-boogeyman!

Respecting artistic freedom and freedom of expression is qualitatively more important than pandering to dogmatic, moral imperialism. I too am tired of the same old tropes being trotted out by so many writers (of both sexes), such rape as the go-to trigger for "character development" or as the principal (or only) threat to female characters. I'm fortunate not to have suffered any such event in real life, but it's never far from women's minds - is it too much to ask that we get some wish-fulfilment too?

The internet is full of hilarious critiques of this double standard, Men vs. Women on book covers - maybe you should read some:

http://www.jimchines.com/2012/01/striking-a-pose/

I don't really get a lot of the criticism leveled at the T&A comic poses? Is it any different to the improbably handsome bare-chested hunks that adorn the cover of romance/erotica novels? Both are aiming at a particular target demographic.

It's not the same thing at all:

1. Bodies - Men get to look like incredible athletes. Women get to look like pneumatic blow up dolls;
2. Clothing - male superheroes are generally in all over outfits. Female superheroes have to wear skimpy outfits with it all on display;
3. General depiction - the men get to do heroic poses. The women get to do frankly ridiculous poses to show off boobs, bum or both.

Comics are pretty horribly sexist (at least your mainstream DC and Marvel are). This is now being highlighted more and more - hopefully pressure will bring changes. Specifically on the body subject. Comic book heroes reflect the social ideal body image of their time for both men and women, though definitely filtered from the male perspective. So yes, the guy look like seasoned athletes because that's the image of "What you should look like" that's pounded into guys from the moment they start watching television, and one the female side, the women are extremely physically attractive, though not as nearly as muscled because that's the social ideal that men get for women.

And that's not exclusive to men, though it'll look different with women since while the women will look more realistically athletic, the guys usually end up somewhere between Robert Pattinson and Ryan Gosling.

And frankly, that's how superheros will almost always be. They're supposed to projections of our ideal selves, especially physically. So unless you can reform society so there is no ideal body image for any gender (which is both probably impossible, and may not even be beneficial since we hopefully want people to strive towards *some* physical goal, though it shouldn't the brick shape men are expected to be now, or the ultra-skinny, but conspicuously large-breasted ideal we have for women) you're always going to get Superheroes that just don't look like real people, because that's kinda the *point*.

Ah so politics is fine so long as it reflect debates in 'the real world' except of course feminism is a well-established political narrative and clearly generates a lot of debates so wouldn't such a political message reflect 'the real world'? You can't demand that politics and political messages in games follow a well-worn path of cultural norms as dictated as acceptable and then expect games to be innovative. The only way for games to progress as a medium is to smash socially conservative boundaries they are currently hidden behind and to be able to engage as all art forms on topics that those producing the work wish to cover.

Feminists are getting a bit desperate if they're going after fantasy novels, comic books and games. “Game of Thrones” does have a lot of sex and nudity, but it is hardly the first HBO series to be like that. As for Charlaine Harris, my guess is that the majority of her fans our women. Hers is a welcome antidote to the asexual blandness of the Twilight saga (yes I know the Harris's books were written first). After all, women like sex too.

As for fantasy genre in general, yes you can critise, as long as it doesn't turn into some kind of feminist witch-hunt. At the end of the day it is fiction and escapism. If you don't like a game, a book or comic, then don't buy it.

A story that reflects the values of the reader is relaxing and comforting. A story that challenges the values of the reader is more stressful and, well, challenging to read. Also, material that fits with existing stereotypes just slots in quietly and lets you concentrate on the plot. Material that goes against your stereotypes hogs the attention and distracts from the plot. And that is without considering people who object to having their stories mixed with what they consider hostile political propaganda.

Bottom-line: Are there any women who have read Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel series? The heroine is not only a holy prostitute but also a masochist (an “anguissette” in the book, one who gets sexual pleasure from pain), yet Carey, to my mind, makes her believable, sympathetic, and even admirable. I'd be interested in hearing a woman's opinion of her. Carey seems to have been a little unfortunate to have been too early for the recent vogue for women's S/M porn, with all the sex and sadism going on in her book she should rename the series 50 Shades of Red. Carey’s writing is much more my alley than the essays in “Appignanesi’s collection (and they’re so frigging boring and naïve too)!
… (meer)
 
Gemarkeerd
antao | 2 andere besprekingen | Nov 19, 2019 |
This was very good. I'm a mailman with two eyes for detail, so looking at the neverending stream of photoshopped Lifestyle and Fitness magazines keeps me considering parts of this book.

This series is great so far. I rec both this & the Kostenbaum.
 
Gemarkeerd
Adammmmm | 4 andere besprekingen | Sep 10, 2019 |
In this short book, renowned psychologist Susie Orbach discusses how our bodies have become a commodity, something to be altered by surgery, weight loss, make up, etc. Social media has reinforced ideas of the perfect body, and anyone who doesn’t have one (i.e., most of us) is made to feel that it is our fault and that we need to change it to be accepted. Our body is no longer somewhere to live from, but a commodity to prove our worth in the world. In Scandinavia, women who think they are too tall are having their femur broken and reset to make them shorter; in China, people who think they are too short can have a metal rod inserted to make them taller; women are having plastic surgery to shrink their waist and enlarge their breasts, while men are having surgery to increase the length and girth of their penis. Something has gone very askew in the way we view our own bodies.

Orbach also examines extreme cases such as Andrew, a physically healthy man who felt that he could only be happy if he had his legs amputated, and she looks at the psychology behind such stories.

It’s a short book at 145 pages and is something of an introduction to the ideas contained within, rather than a full scale investigation, but it makes for fascinating reading, talking about how the dieting industry is based on failure and plays on people’s insecurities. This is a book to make you think, it’s a book to make you angry, and it’s a book that everyone should read. Fascinating and highly recommended.
… (meer)
 
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Ruth72 | 4 andere besprekingen | Jun 6, 2019 |

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Statistieken

Werken
23
Ook door
3
Leden
1,697
Populariteit
#15,123
Waardering
3.8
Besprekingen
20
ISBNs
125
Talen
8
Favoriet
1

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