Just a Girl by Tammie Adele

  You can buy your hair if it won't grow You can fix your nose if he says so You can buy all the make-up That M.A.C. can make But if you can't look inside you Find out who am I To be in the position that make me feel So damn unpretty   Okay, so today’s post is a bit of a contrast the last post , which discussed the unbelievably pretty Victoria’s Secret angels. Today we’re discussing the very unpretty body image issues a lot of women are faced with, whether the issues are real or perceived.             I have a cousin that is known for her good looks. She and her eventual husband met while they were both young and good looking, but after marriage and about five kids I guess the passion was starting to wane. He started fooling around on her. I’m not saying that my cousin wouldn’t have cheated on him – I don’t know if she would have or not – just that with five kids to care for, she didn’t have much of an opportu...

  I feel pretty Oh so pretty I feel pretty and witty and gay And I pity Any girl who isn't me today   So, . . . Victoria’s Secret has retired the angel wings. The reason given for retiring the iconic wings was that the whole concept was too far removed from what women want and too fixated on men’s fantasies . The idea of supermodels strutting along catwalks wearing nothing but scanty underwear and ‘wings’ was conceived in the 70s. The world is very different in the 2020s to what it was in the 1970s, but does that make the angel wings redundant? Yes, the idea was conceived and perpetuated by male executives, and I’ve never heard of a male disrespecting the angels, but does that mean that women don’t like it? I mean, isn’t the whole idea that the angels represent the fantasy – women want to be them, men want to be with them? That said, I think the direction Victoria’s Secret is going in is admirable. They now employ an ethnically diverse crew of over-achieving ‘ ...

    To those of us who knew the pain Of valentines that never came And those whose names were never called When choosing sides for basketball   Many moons ago when I was seventeen my favourite subject at school was media studies. I loved learning about how the media can be used to communicate broader stories, how the media boils down these stories and, more generally, how it is a lens to society and culture. That said, at one stage I found myself watching a group of my female classmates presenting on the portrayal of women in the media. Supermodel @NaomiCampbell ’s appearance in the film clip for @michaeljackson ’s In the Closet was held up as their great example of the objectification of women in the media and the unrealistic images that girls have to aspire to. To try to drive their message home, the group had plastered the walls of our media room with pages, mainly advertisements, ripped out of women’s magazines featuring, apparently, unrealistic images of ...

  I am just a red brassiere To all the boys in town Put this bus in top gear Get me out of here   Soooo, the other day a bunch of privileged old white males decided that they were too important to mix with ‘ Oh my God! Women! ’. That’s right, I’m talking about the Sydney Australian Club’s two thirds vote against allow women membership. My first thought was along the lines of How dare they! Then I checked out their website and moved along to Who cares? Finally I watched some of the copious amount of media commentary on the issue and finally got it. I guess my point is that a club that provides its members with, I quote,  ". . .excellent dining facilities, en-suite bedrooms and apartments, a fully equipped gym, and . . . first rate business facilities . . ." really isn’t offering that much. Sydney is full of excellent dining establishments, accommodation, gyms, and even business facilities. However, it is the exclusive networking opportunities and associated prestige...

  You know, sometimes I want to rip out your throat, Daddy For all those things you said that were mean Gonna make you just as vulnerable as I was, Daddy What’s that say about me?   Dads love their daughters. There’s generally no debating that. However, they also objectify women. This may explain why they are so protective of their daughters (see Post 14 and Post 17 ), because they know what they themselves are capable of, never mind other men. Worse still. Maybe they remember what they did to girls when they were boys. As stated in reference to our illustrious leader, @ScomoAnnounces , in Post 21 , it’s time for men to stop thinking of the women they care about as being separate or different to those they don’t care about. Of course they care about their women, or at least should care about them, but that doesn’t make their women different to the other 49.6% of the world population that is female , or the 50.2% of the Australian population that is female . After all,...

    I realized quickly when I knew I should That the world was made up of this brotherhood of man For whatever that means     When I was 25 I was still trying to prove my independence and figure out what my identity was. By the time I turned 35 I was happily settled into a relationship and was earning more cash than my man, but not feeling as though he had to lift his game and earn as much as me (compare to Post 3 ). This got me thinking that, maybe, the mad drive a fair proportion of women have to prove themselves is all self-inflicted. Additionally, maybe this pursuit of proving themselves is counter productive when it comes to relationships, because at some stage you have to cease looking out for just yourself and start looking out for others in order to have a healthy relationship. Then, as a gender, we further confuse sex relations when it comes to etiquette. We live in an era when males don’t know if they’re expected to open doors for us or not. ...

  Can't knock 'em out, can't walk away Try desperately to think of the politest way to say ('Er, sorry, yeah, but nah') "Just get out my face, just leave me alone And, no, you can't have my number (why?), 'cause I lost my phone"       Don’t get me wrong, I love my dad, however . . . However, my dad has been an old man for a very long time. He’s also managed to simultaneously be a perpetual adolescent. Of course I’m talking metaphorically here. Throughout my life I’ve witnessed my dad’s frustration at not being able to control situations or feeling like someone wasn’t taking his advice. Examples include him trying to talk my niece (who he and my mum raised as their own - see Post 12 ) and I into moving to Queensland because he’d decided to move to Queensland. I’d allowed my dad to think that he’d talked me into moving to Canberra a few years before this, but really I just wanted to move home regardless of his views on the matter. Howe...