Why can't a WOMAN...be more like a MAN??

[MADem]

To quote the song....


http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Entertainment/story?id=1526982

Click on the link inside the story to see the video (edited to fix link)


Video about a woman who went "undercover" as a man for a year and wrote a book about her experiences.

The makeup was incredible!!!!!! Quite an interesting study, this....

[AllieB]

1. Given the current climate on DU these days

:popcorn:

Pass the butter please.

:popcorn:

[rkc3]

2. If that's the case, I'll leave out Carlos Mencia's comments on

equality.

[MADem]

12. Watch the report--it's fascinating.

The woman who wrote the book goes into "preconceived notions" and shines an interesting light on them. A review, here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0670034665/103-7451825-1007822?v=glance&n=283155

The disguise that former Los Angeles Times op-ed columnist Vincent employed to trick dozens of people into believing her a man was carefully thought out: a new, shorter haircut; a pair of rectangular eyeglasses; a fake five o'clock shadow; a prosthetic penis; some preppy clothes. It was more than she needed. "s I became more confident in my disguise... the props I had used... became less and less important, until sometimes I didn't need them at all," Vincent writes. Gender marking, she found, is more about attitude than appearance. Vincent's account of the year and a half she spent posing as a man is peppered with such predictable observations. To readers of gender studies literature, none of them will be especially illuminating, but Vincent's descriptions of how she learned, and tested, such chestnuts firsthand make them awfully fun to read. As "Ned," Vincent joined an all-male bowling league, dated women, worked for a door-to-door sales force, spent three weeks in a monastery, hung out in strip clubs and, most dangerous of all, went on a Robert Bly–style men's retreat. She creates rich portraits of the men she met in these places and the ways they behaved—as a lesbian, she's particularly good at separating the issues of sexuality from those of gender. But the most fascinating part of the story lies within Vincent herself—and the way that censoring her emotions to pass as a man provoked a psychological breakdown. For fans of Nickel and Dimed–style immersion reporting, this book is a sure bet. (Jan. 23)

Edited extract of the book, here: http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,,1733547,00.html
A taste:

Now I had to find some male company. Bowling was an obvious choice. It's the ultimate social sport, and as such would be a perfect way for Ned to make friends with guys as a guy. Better yet, I wouldn't have to expose any suspicious body parts or break a heavy sweat and risk smearing my beard.

It was still a daunting prospect. Any woman who has ever run the gauntlet of construction workers on lunch break will understand how it felt to walk into that bowling alley for the first time on men's league night. Those guys may not have known that I was a woman, but the minute I opened the door and felt the air of that place waft over me, every part of me did. It felt as if every pair of eyes in the place had landed on me and stuck. After standing there frozen for several minutes, I had just about worked up the gumption to retreat and call off the whole thing when the league manager saw me.

"Are you Ned?" he asked, rushing up to me. "We've been waiting for you. C'mon and get yourself some shoes and a ball."

There was no getting out of it now. It was when I began watching the men bowling that I could see this was going to be laughable. They were all throwing curve balls that they'd been perfecting for 20 years. I couldn't even remember how to hold a bowling ball, much less wing it with any precision. I was dressed as down and dirty as Ned got in a plaid shirt, jeans and a baseball cap pulled low over the most proletarian glasses I could find. But despite my best efforts, I was still far too scrubbed and tweedy amid these genuine articles to pass for one of them. Even at my burliest, next to them I felt like a petunia strapped to a Popsicle stick. Looking at them I thought, it's at times like these when the term "real man" really hits home with you....

If people get exorcised about this topic, they're likely in the wrong forum....

[redqueen]

14. I can't believe the first thing she talks about is who asks whom out.

:mad:

This better get better... FAST!



edit: And of course, it didn't.

:eyes:

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

17. You make it sound like that's not a big deal!

It sure is for us!! :scared:

[redqueen]

18. The problem is you all assume it's so different for every woman.

For whatever reason, I've hardly ever been approached.

Each and every boyfriend I had, I asked out. Most dates as well.

It's not such a big freakin deal. FFS... compare that with the shit WE complain about.

[mondo joe]

30. As a gay man I'm often mystified at the dynamics of hetero men

and women, and how many traditional roles are still carried out.

I work with a lot of progressive people, and mostly women. But I still hear stories about "I think he might propose this weekend - I hope he does!" and things of that nature.

The whole idea that it's your role to propose or be proposed to seems so weird to me.

[redqueen]

32. It is weird.

I'm SURE not one to be defined by gender roles... baffles me why so many still love them so much...

I do not understand why it's acceptable for a girl to play with trucks and action figures... but if a boy wants dolls or pretty ponies, people get in a snit.

Until we correct this, we will not progress at all on these issues. We have to stop forcing our kids to conform.

[One_Life_To_Give]

44. Snit puts it mildly

See what parents do when their son says "I want to be a Princess"
Or would you let your son be a Princess for Haloween?
And don't forget about men working in Daycare. (They are all Pedophiles, you know)

[redqueen]

45. And it's not ideologically-based, either.

Sadly, many liberals seem to be unable to let that crap go. :(

[Up2Late]

3. I think that question was clearly answered in the musical "My Fair Lady"

But, sorry, I didn't memorize the words, but do remember that song.

[Marie26]

16. I like the answer, too.

Why can't a woman be more like a man?
Men are so decent, such regular chaps.
Ready to help you through any mishaps.
Ready to buck you up whenever you are glum.
Why can't a woman be a chum?
Why is thinking something women never do?
Why is logic never even tried?
Straight'ning up their hair is all they ever do.
Why don't they straighten up the mess that's inside?
Why can't a woman behave like a man?
If I was a woman who'd been to a ball,
Been hailed as a princess by one and by all;
Would I start weeping like a bathtub overflowing?
And carry on as if my home were in a tree?
Would I run off and never tell me where I'm going?
Why can't a woman be like me?

I love My Fair Lady. :)

[knitter4democracy]

54. "I'm accustomed to her face."

I love that musical, too. :D

[ClintonTyree]

4. That's not the video I got from the link........

I got Ridge's homeland security junket in Hawaii.

[redqueen]

8. Yup...

trying to find the other story now...

edit: you have to select 20/20 and scroll down a bit... the URL stays the same as above

[MADem]

13. Sorry, let me see if I can pull it back up and do a fix nt

[MADem]

15. Repaired, sorry

http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Entertainment/story?id=1526982

[redqueen]

5. Heh.

hehehehe

Perhaps we should fight other battles first... since this problem is much more deeply ingrained in too many people.

[MADem]

20. Well, I wasn't looking for battle fighting, just a bit of general

discussion. I thought the construct of the woman's experiment was sort of interesting.

[redqueen]

26. It's a battle waiting to happen...

yeah, the way that she did it was interesting. She seemed to focus on dating, at least that's the impression I got from this interview.

There's SO MUCH more significant conflict... this dating stuff bores me to tears.

[MADem]

36. I think that was only a piece of it--there is alot in the reviews about

the male bonding business as well. She also did a retreat at a monestery, and joined a men's self-help/therapy group, in addition to the men's bowling league.

[redqueen]

42. *sigh*

Interesting, but not what I'm interested in. :)

[devilgrrl]

6. You mean Norah "I wanna be Camile Paglia" Vincent?

She doesn't need to dress like a man - she already is one.

[Misunderestimator]

28. I met her, and she is THE most conservative republican lesbian I

have ever met. :puke:

(On edit... I suppose she calls herself a liberatarian, but she is definitely conservative, and anti-democratic.)

[MADem]

40. Watch the Colbert interview linked elsewhere on this thread

She is not a BUSH FAN (no pun, mind you)....he mentions him, and she makes a sharp comment back at him.

[Misunderestimator]

46. Her opinion may have changed, but from what I remember...

she supported him the first go 'round, and was of the same mindset as the log cabin republicans. I also saw her once on Politically Incorrect... on the conservative side.

Also.... look at this tripe she wrote a few years ago...

"We're sorry they didn't tell you to arrest or shoot looters on sight until after the locals had carted away irreplaceable ancient artifacts from the Iraq Museum, pillaged hospitals and palaces and swiped everything of value from under your noses while you were left to watch, impotent and idle atop your idling tanks."

from here:
http://www.letstalksense.com/articles/vincent230503.htm

Yeah... maybe she's not a fan of his, but I'm definitely no fan of hers.

Here's an article she wrote in 1999 rather on the side of Log Cabiners and in support of Rudy Giuliani (as well as George Bush):
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/9935,vincent,8026,1.html

"But the Republican stance on gays has softened remarkably in the last month, what with George W. Bush declaring in early August that he would have no qualms about hiring homosexuals. In the same vein, Elizabeth Dole— whose husband curtly rejected a Log Cabin contribution to his presidential campaign in 1996— said that she would gladly accept money from a gay Republican group. The staid senator John McCain even went so far as to say that he could imagine there being a gay president someday."

What-the-fuck-ever. As far as I'm concerned, she helped elect the bastard.

[MADem]

47. If I sounded like I disbelieved you, that wasn't my intent, really!!!

And I apologize if that's how I came off. I really didn't know a thing about her politics, but live and learn. I'm certain you're right--she's evidently in the Andrew "they LIKE me...they really like MEEEEEE!" crowd. Just be a good little soldier, and they won't shove you back in the big, dark closet!

I was just stunned at the transformation she made. The makeup was astounding, and she really managed to 'pass' as a guy.

And based on the Colbert interview, perhaps she'll do a little atoning. Hey, David Brock managed it, maybe she can too. We'll just have to see.

[Misunderestimator]

48. I guess I laugh about it, because when I met her...

she was a major butch lesbian who already dressed and cut her hair like a man. Hell, she was wearing a man's suit and tie when I met her for drinks with her and her girlfriend. Nothing wrong with that, but there's a lot wrong with her politics, and the whole dressing like a guy thing being a big deal for someone who portrays herself that way anyway... just seemed a bit disingenuous and gimicky. She pisses me off... if you couldn't tell. :)

(And no need for apology, she just pisses me off. :D)

Oh, and funny you should mention David Brock... here's what she wrote about him:

" Brock, like Jeffords, appeals to principle to explain his turn of coat. He professes a solemn change of heart, a sudden crisis of conscience that has led him out of dextral Sodom and sent him scampering toward Bethlehem to be reborn. Or some such. But is this the stuff of reformation or just more of the same?

Jeffords' move is promising if it portends the eventual rise of a viable third party. But that's about as likely as Brock's conversion being, at heart, anything more than a publicity stunt. Welcome to Washington. The ninth circle. The hub of the republic in all its labyrinthine deceit.

As unsavory a character as he may seem, Brock is a child of the Beltway snake pit, both journalistic and governmental--if the two can even be meaningfully separated on the Hill. He's the quintessential maladaptive chameleon of a brittle two-party system that is locked forever in the petty stasis of incremental gain and loss, tit and tat, quid and quo. We deserve him."

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0601/vincent060601.asp

[MADem]

51. Well, I like David Brock, and her assessment of him is off the mark, to be

charitable. If he is all she says, what does that make her, then? The gay Sally Fields of the literati??? Brock woke up and smelled the coffee, and apologized, and continues to atone. She hasn't, yet.

These apologists don't seem to realize that they don't have a real seat at the table. They're there for the photo op, and their ears would burn if they heard what was said after they left the room.

She'll figure it out, eventually, if she's halfway able to use her brain. But likely she'll figure it out only after the right is out of power, and she is in desperate search of an audience. That's probably what this book is all about--she sees the handwriting on the wall, and is trying to branch out.

It's real cowardice to go with the strength, rather than one's core beliefs. Ya gotta wonder how people can live with themselves...

[Misunderestimator]

52. You got that exactly right!

:thumbsup:

[Cleita]

7. I used to do it all the time on my resume. Allow them to think I

was a man because my name could be either male or female. When they met me and saw I was a woman, many jobs offers were rescinded.

I did it for the laugh. :rofl:

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

10. How did you get job offers without being interviewed?

:shrug:

[Cleita]

24. Oh I meant I was called in for an interview meaning they were

interested until they saw I was a woman.

[mondo joe]

27. I think you confused being interested enough to interview with

wanting to give you the job. HUGE assumption there.

And did anyone phone you to schedule the appointment? Did they hear your voice?

Do you know who got those jobs? Were they men?

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

33. How in the world do you determine that?

Do you have any idea how many interviews I've had where I didn't get the job?

[mondo joe]

23. You mean they made job offers without ever meeting you?

How did THAT happen?

[Ksec]

9. No thanks.

I like femininity, and when Im around a lady with it, I feel more like a man. Not that I dont feel manly when a lady isnt around but nothing floats my boat like a lady who knows how to use that charm .

[walldude]

11. While it may be interesting,

Going as a man in disguise isn't going to tell a woman what it's like to be a man. Without the plumbing it's pointless.

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

19. Reminds me of that great line by Larry Miller

"If women knew what men were really thinking, they'd never stop slapping us."

Or words to that effect.

:rofl:

[Up2Late]

21. She was on The Colbert Report a few weeks ago...

...here's the link to the video: <http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=50036>

[MADem]

25. Great interview!!!

The remark about him spending two years as a stripper was amusing, too...!

[porphyrian]

22. Personal choice? - n/t

[Misunderestimator]

29. Too bad she's a conservative and a sell-out.

[redqueen]

34. Oh is she?

That explains the focus on dating, of all things.

*disgusted*


edit: oh and also the info in post 31... self-hating women... all the rage in repukeland.

My repuke sis-in-law echoed shitforbrains' comment that there's nothing worse than a WOMAN know it all.

:puke:

[MADem]

37. Gee, she must be in the rare "Lesbians for Bush" subset!!!

I suppose since the Monkey is losing the Latino demographic, he's going to have to pick up other constituencies...

The eye roll she did when Colbert, in his interview with her, mentioned Bush suggests, rather strongly, to me, anyway, that she is NOT a fan....

[redqueen]

43. We can hope.

:)

The short bit that someone mentioned about men bottling up thier emotions and how harmful it is to the psyche is encouraging, that's for sure.

[One_Life_To_Give]

31. Look forward to reading

As a man it will be interesting to see what she finds different.

Note: I had also seen her interview on CNN.

It's interesting that her opinion of women in general was lowered by her experience.
Also apparently men have much more non verbal communication than women realize.

[Misunderestimator]

35. Amazing how her opinion of women could be lowered...

since she had such a low opinion in the first place. As for dressing like a man, I met her six years ago, and she was dressing like a man then too. :eyes:

She's a lesbian uncle tom.

[One_Life_To_Give]

38. The presumption of Male Guilt is False? n/t

[LostinVA]

39. Very interesting...

[mondo joe]

49. My recollection of her in interview is that she said she greatly

preferred being a woman.

I don't know how the jibes with her thinking less of women.

[Misunderestimator]

50. I dunno, I didn't hear it. I was just responging to One_Life_To_Give's

saying that. :shrug:

[One_Life_To_Give]

55. From her CNN Interview

Her opinion of women was lowered because
She thought women were more evolved, prior to this experiment.
But seeing women assume all men were Cads until proven otherwise
She decided they (women) were no better than men.

Not an exact quote. But words to that effect.

[tammywammy]

41. I saw an interview with her

and I remember just this one remark. She was saying how it's a lot of little things that are different, especially body language. And she was talking about how when women put perfume on their wrist, they always then rub them together. She was around a group and putting on cologne (maybe at a store, I don't remember exactly) and she went to put her wrist together and got strange looks.

[debbierlus]

53. That seem incredibly unethical.

And, the insights she discovered sound pretty damn obvious.

Weird!