Playing Chicken
When I'm not having deep thoughts about a support group made up of Tiger Woods, Itzhak Perlman, Kim Peek, and myself, I'm having deep thoughts about the Pussycat Dolls, specifically their wretched reality show, of which I have been in unfortunate audience twice now.
Here's the thing: The girl they kicked off most recently (she had to ceremoniously relinquish her pink feather boa and douse her makeup-mirror lights) was booted because she was just darn too sexy. Too sexy? Wha? According to the judges (among them jailbird L'il Kim), "The Pussycat Dolls are all about being sexy and classy. You're just not right for us. Too strippery," they told Brittany or Melissa or whatever her name was. Mind you, this was at the conclusion of the episode where the weekly "challenge" was dragging the contestants to a public nightclub, dressing them in lingerie, and then having them gyrate suggestively on boudoir furniture in glass cages behind the bar. Some of these girls are baaaaarely legal, i.e., not even old enough to be in a bar in which alcohol is being served, i.e., probably out past their bedtimes.
My complaints on this topic are many, and the least of them is that I don't understand how one can be sexy and classy while wearing white velour shorts cut like a man's underpants. That's demanding the impossible, as far as I'm concerned, and that's not to mention the air-humping that, when syncronized and put to music, is called "dancing" and considered a "talent." If anyone can take tighty-whitey air-humping and make it classy, that person is Her Serene Highness Princess Grace Kelly, and rest assured even she can't do it beause I've pictured it in my mind and it is AWKWARD. (Especially considering she's been dead for twenty-five years.)
Putting aside the overall contradictory demands of the show (sexy! but not slutty! but while wearing a mesh thong! and singing about unsafe intercourse!), my biggest complaint is the gross misdirection of the whole Doll organization's "mission." Those people need a reality check in the form of a slap upside the head from someone who can articulate in terms they understand that there is a time and a place and an audience for certain things: Strippers, burlesque dancers, and their ilk are all fine and good when reserved for men and women over the age of consent but not otherwise. Similarly, strippers, etc., should not promote themselves to children aged 6 to 16 in the form of glittery logo T-shirts with overtly sexual slogans. Miniskirts so small they reveal buttcheek should not appear on primetime network television, I don't care who's president. Don't get me wrong--I love naked and half-naked people, especially when I don't have to pay to see them, but WON'T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN?
Most of all, it's the hypocrisy that drives me mad. The "creator" of the group (unfortunate plastic surgery!) is keen to go on about female empowerment and "girl power" and how the ultimate goal of the Dolls is projecting feminine strength and confidence. If that's true, though, how do they explain the lyrics to their top hit, "Don't Cha"?
I know you like me
I know you do
That's why whenever I come around
She's all over you
I know you want it
It's easy to see
And in the back of your mind
I know you should be fucking me
Don't cha wish your girlfriend was hot like me?
Don't cha wish your girlfriend was a freak like me?
Don't cha wish your girlfriend was raw like me?
Don't cha wish your girlfriend was fun like me?
Um, unless I'm misunderstanding something, isn't that a song about stealing someone's man? Is that what kids these days are calling female empowerment? Is this the new code of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood? And where in the world is Tipper Gore?
The truth is, I care about this but not a lot. The truth is that ever since the weather changed, I've been a bucket of smiles. A big red-and-white-striped bucket filled with smiles and original-recipe chicken and biscuits. (I'd been obsessing over KFC for a week, so last night Simon surprised me with a Bucket o' Cluck of my very own, whether to make me happy or make me shut up is beside the point.) Aside from street harrassment, I can barely force myself to complain about anything (shock), and the fact that I have used my site as a platform from which to rant about the Pussycat Dolls means only that I think someone out there should take up the cause and actually care, instead of just fake care because her PMS needs some outlet, feeble thought it may be (not that I'm implying anything about myself). See, there's a time and a place and an audience for certain things. There's a time to save the children and save the world on a website, but there's also a time to turn off the computer and turn off the brain machine and sprawl on the grass with a meaty drumstick. Guess which one I'm doing this weekend?
Yup, "Pussycat Dolls" and "Genuine Class" just go hand-in-hand...
I'm vaguely interested by Emily's favorite reality show, "Top Model," but if anyone tried to watch the Pussycat Dolls show in my immediate vicinity, I might have to change the channel Elvis Presley style.
I have not seen THAT reality show, nor do I want to! ANTM is my smut tv of choice. And now I want me some KFC! Hope yours was fantastic :)
I'm still wondering about the type of woman who grows up to say "I want to be a quasi-stripper when I grow up." I just really don't get it.
Worse, the girls who say "I've wanted to be a Pussycat Doll all my life." That doesn't even obey the laws of the space-time continuum.
Sexy AND classy? I haven't even been able to read the rest of your post yet because I am sitting here completely flabbergasted by the idea that the Pussycat Dolls consider themselves classy. I'm all for delusions but, wow. My poor beer-addled mind is turning somersaults. (Going back to read the rest now.)
Two things:
1. There's a quote that I can't be bothered to find where the creator of the Dolls says something like "every girl, whether she admits it or not, want to be a Pussycat Doll." Um, no.
2. I've been working toward creating entertainment for girls from 6-16, seeing as how that's my job and all, about how it's okay to be a dork and not everyone aspires to be a cheerleader. I have been told over and over again that "kids want to watch shows about popular people." Mind you that these same networks don't have any uberpopular shows on now. /headdesk.
*Sigh*
Against all that is reasonable and adult I kind of enjoy the Pussycat Dolls. That's not saying though that I think there is an ounce of class amongst them.
These girls will not be wearing my traveling pants anytime.
I kind of equate the Pussycat Dolls with those awful Bratz dolls who look like weirdly big-headed, alien hookers. (And they say BARBIE was a bad roll model for kids and caused eating disorders? The only person I've seen who comes close to Bratz ideal is Nicole Ritchie, who is so skinny she looks like a bobble head. How is THAT better than BARBIE? At least Barbie had a career(s), fer gosh sakes.)
Anyway, the way I feel about them is that if college girls want to prance around in hot pants and emulate people who try to steal other girls' boyfriends, whatever. But the marketing campaign directed at the 6-16 set really gets under my skin. IT IS NOT APPROPRIATE! Get your little one an American Girl doll. Fun AND educational! And not slutty! Because they lived on the prairie and in Victorian England and were runaway slaves.
But yeah, I'm not fighting the good fight, either. I just rant about them every now and again.
Newgy--I get what you're saying, and in different circumstances, I might be a fan of the show. I love watching talented people do their thing, and who doesn't love outrageous costumes and makeup and hair? It's just that 1. they're marketing themselves to kids who are too young to be any kind of sexy--even "classy sexy," whatever that means--and 2. they're either completely deluded about their own image or they're just trying to convince people that they actually believe they're projecting the image of strong female role models. I've seen an episode or two of the Bunny Ranch show, for instance, but what makes that okay is that those girls know full well what they are and what they're doing, and they don't pretend like they should have their own line of posters so they can be hung on walls next to the Disney princesses. I just think the Pussycat Dolls should be moved to late night on a cable station and they should just come out and admit that they make their way by being trashy to the max. An' I'm through.
Oh, I agree that they are deluded and are guilty of false...advertising/targetting? It kind of reminds me of the early days when Britney Spears kept insisting that she's a strong girl, and she's the one who controls her image and projects etc. And, well, we all see now how well that turned out.
It's more of a guilty pleasure than a genuine one.
The Pussycat Dolls actually makes me pine for the Spice Girls, something I thought I'd never say sober. Other than Posh (aka Mrs. Beckham), where are they?