Jezebel: bette davis

Bette Davis Gets Stamp'd • Rwanda Women Dominate The Parliament

Maria — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 17:30:00 EDT

• A 42-cent commemorative stamp will be released tomorrow in Boston featuring a portrait of real-life and fictional Jezebel, Bette Davis. Think the mail her stamps are on will have a bumpy ride? • According the preliminary election results, Rwanda will be the first country where women outnumber men in parliament; females have taken 44 of the 80 seats. • The lesbian romantic comedy, I Can't Think Straight, which is written and directed by Shamim Sarif, has been picked up for North American distribution by Here! films. • A survey of 422 Midwestern gay and bisexual men revealed the internalized homonegativity (or negative attitudes towards homosexuality) predicted poorer mental and sexual health in men. •

• Despite attempts by residents in Austin, Texas to get billboards depicting aborted fetuses taken down, the city government says they can't do anything about them because they aren't breaking any laws. • The manager of Image Hotel on the Mediterranean coast of Turkey claims to have fired all of his male staff after he caught them having affairs with foreign female tourists. • According to collected tax data, women "out-gave" men in gifts by $5 billion in 2005. • A Pakistani newspaper claims that there are 100 rapes occurring in Karachi per day, but, of course, that number may be higher that due to rape victims' fear and silence. • A study of hospital discharge records in California revealed a decreased number of complications as a result of a hysterectomy over the past 15 years. • A study of Lipitor, a drug prescribed to men and women to reduce the risk of a heart attack and lower cholesterol, has revealed that the drug is mismarketed towards women and makes unfounded claims about the effectiveness of the drug for them. •

Bette Davis Eyes

maria — Mon, 05 May 2008 12:45:00 EDT

Do you have big eyes? Apparently monkeys are really into them. A recent study at the University of Bremen, Germany has found that macaque monkeys have the most brain cell attention focused on the size of the iris of different faces. The more extreme the iris size, the bigger the reaction of the brain cells. There were also 19 other features of the face that different brain cells responded to, but the cells dedicated to eye size were the most numerous. I guess this explains MRirian's huge macaque monkey following on YouTube. [Scientific American]

Where The Hell Are The Strong Women?

Dodai — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 16:00:00 EDT

In The Independent today, Johann Hari writes, "Where have all the strong women gone?" Hari gets all nostalgic for Bette Davis: "She was not only a woman; she was an electrical storm with skin. She never pretended to be dumb, or a little girl. She didn't do soft, or simpering. She had a voice like sour cream, and eyes like a raven." But, Hari argues, women on film — and on TV — have weakened. "If the symbol of 1930s Hollywood was Bette Davis in Jezebel, defiantly wearing red to her virgin-white ball, today it is Cameron Diaz in There's Something About Mary, rubbing semen into her hair because she is too dumb to realize it's not hair gel."

But what about Buffy? You may ask (I definitely ask!) Hari answers:

The few strong women in Hollywood movies and TV are safely located in an unreal world: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Xena: Warrior Princess. The closest to an unapologetic feminist is Lisa Simpson - and she is eight years old, and a cartoon. This isn't because Hollywood is especially sexist. Hollywood largely gives us what we want - and we don't want to idolize strong, powerful women today.

I tried taking a look at my DVD collection to see if there were any movies with strong women in it. Whale Rider was the only "modern" movie. And the lead is — in the words of Ms. Britney Spears — not a girl, not yet a woman. Maybe Flirting? Or Blue Crush. I don't own Death Proof but I plan to. Other than that, all of the other films with strong women (The Women, His Girl Friday, The Wizard Of Oz?) are from a bygone era. (The rest, stuff like Midnight Cowboy, Nowhere, Shampoo, Adaptation, Pirates Of The Caribbean, Velvet Goldmine, Harold & Kumar... male-oriented.

Hari notes that today, a majority of college graduates are female. We have a woman running for president. We live in a time where women are in business, in government, in outer space. Why aren't they in entertainment?

Johann Hari: Where Have All The Strong Women Gone? [Independent]

Gays with letters to mail, rejoice! Bette ...

Jennifer — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 10:45:00 EST

Gays with letters to mail, rejoice! Bette Davis, star of the film Jezebel (holla!) and, most famously, All About Eve and Whatever Happened To Baby Jane? is the latest American icon to be honored with a first-class postage stamp. The late actress' visage will be available for your bill-posting pleasure in 2008. [Yahoo]