Jezebel
the untouchables
Posts Tagged “
India
”
the untouchables
Lakshmi: Now A Normal Girl, Still a Goddess
We have always had kind of an obsession with Lakshmi, the Indian girl born with a parasitic twin that gave her four arms and four legs. Well, Lakshmi and her family (who, you might recall, rightly refused to sell her to a circus) are the subjects of a National Geographic documentary this weekend and a 20/20 story tonight. After the surgery, her family had to move away from the town they lived in to avoid people that were angry at the surgery and thought they profited from it (they didn't), but Lakshmi's attending a school for disabled children and her parents still consider her a goddess. [ABC News]
Big Deals
Mayawati is a 5-foot tall chief minister of the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. She had a 12 foot bronze statue of herself replaced with a larger one because it was 3 feet shorter than nearby statues of other leaders. She didn't want to get short changed, okay? But! The cost of two statues? $950,000. As CBS News reports, that's "no small fee in a region of India notorious for its bad roads, spotty electricity and endemic poverty." Still, Mayawati is a heroine to dalits, "the so-called untouchables" on the bottom of the caste system, who have faced centuries of often violent discrimination. So she'd better be represented properly! [CBS News]
Dangerous Cocktail
The Hindustan Times reports that drinking is on the rise amongst India's single women. Addiction centers report dramatic jumps in the number of women seeking treatment, and AA opened its first women's group in Pune last year. As more and more women move to urban centers to pursue independent careers, they're falling prey to demons that were previously more the purview of Indian men. "The loneliness of living as a paying guest in a new city got to me." says one 19-year-old. "People seem to hang out with you only when you are drinking, and I started shaping my social life entirely around alcohol." The number of ever-younger girls falling prey to alcoholism, however - some as young as 15 - and the rise in rural alcohism numbers, hint at a potentially larger problem. Awesome, however, that there's no culture of shame surrounding recovery? I don't know many 19-year-olds who'd voluntarily dry out... [Hindustan Times]
leftovers
Puppy + Weddings= Bad Idea, WEtv • Indian Widow Throws Totally Bangin' End-Of-Life Bash
• WEtv uses sad-sack female stereotypes to try to push "Puppy Weddings" TV show. We love puppies, but we don't think puppies love weddings. • NYRA says Hooter's waitresses will have to dress appropriately if they want to play with their pretty new race horse, Big Brown.• A Canadian waitress was fired after shaving off her hair for a charity fundraiser.• A suspect has been indicted in the disappearance and murder of a Nashville Girl Scout in 1975. • A new book, This Is Who I Am: Our Beauty In All Shapes And Sizes has women pose nude and talk honestly about their body image. • McCain goes after disgruntled Clinton supporters, saying that Hillary was inspiring to his daughters. McCain: a true friend of wymyn everywhere. • Philly newspapers make fake ads for "Derrie-Air" airlines to test their advertising's effectiveness. • US military says Iraqi insurgents are exploiting women's grief and using them as suicide bombers. • Want a daring weekend To Do? The World NAKED Bike Ride takes place tomorrow—clothing optional, duh. • A climate bill to cut greenhouse gases and address global warming was defeated in the Senate today. Maybe you should take that bike ride. • After commencement speech, some whiny Harvard grads are mad because insanely popular author, J.K. Rowling, wasn't a big enough name.• The unemployment rate rose .5% last month, the biggest jump since 1986. But we're still not in a recession, right? • An Indian widow throws a totally awesome two-day mega-party in hopes of getting into heaven. • Gossip Girl author to write first series of "adult" novels, focusing on a group of gal pals who meet at a college in Maine.
leftovers
More British Boys Are Growing Man Boobs • Indian Men Go Under The Knife To Get Beautiful
Rising obesity rates among British boys are behind the growing number of surgeries to reduce male breasts. • Nevada-based company creates toilet paper-alternative Biffy, or, as it is more commonly known, a bidet. • An international group of female ski jumpers sue the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Winter Olympics for excluding women's ski jumping. • As more and more families struggle financially, extravagant proms are going out of style. • Women are largely underrepresented in clinical trials for depression and lung cancer. • British pet-owners hope to prove their dog, Bella, is oldest in the world (at least 25!). • Roman Catholic nun who pushed to expose sex abuse in Boston churches, died Saturday at 73. • India's economic boom is making some middle-class men consider plastic surgery. • Dating websites for the mentally disabled and those with diseases are gaining in popularity. • A new documentary explores the lives of Muslim gays and lesbians. • Elisabeth Fritzl may sue her father for therapy costs and emotional damages. • Some people never learn: a woman from Truckee, CA is arrested for drunk driving in same spot where she crashed while intoxicated five months earlier.
The state of women in science in the Western world may be less than encouraging, but there's cause for a little celebration elsewhere: 45-year-old rocket scientist Tessy Thomas has just been named project director for an "advanced version" of a medium-range missile defense system in India's Defence Research and Development Organisation, the first for a female in the country. The married mother of one says that when she joined the organization, there were only four to five women. "Now there are about 20-30 women in a lab of 250 scientists. It is a good improvement." [Times of India, UPI]
rag trade
We Couldn't Have Put It Better Ourselves, Agent Provocateur
- Prestige magazine has the "world exclusive" of the new Agent Provocateur campaign starring Kate Moss. Note the black models featured also in the shoot! They are slightly less prominent, but no worse fed. [Prestige HK]
- And look her! The notoriously tight-lipped Kate Moss granted an actual interview to the Guardian! Does she have anything to say for herself? "After a long pause," the story reveals..."Not really." [Guardian]
- More "authenticity" from the trailers of the upcoming Sex & The City movie: It was like being in [NY department stores] Bergdorf Goodman and Saks combined. There was an overwhelming amount of branded product...The characters were defined via their wardrobes and the products they used: Carrie, for example, was a creative, fashion-obsessed writer type, so she used an Apple Mac because of its design value and wore all these crazy clothes.... [FT]
- "China is about brand, brand, brand." [NYT]
- India "is a fast growing economy and with consumption so robust and with incomes rising, it's a fertile ground for the print media." And all the crap Vogue and GQ would like to sell to them! [Reuters]
chit chat
Race Relations: What's So Wrong About A Rich White Woman Interested In "Africa"?
A few weeks ago, Latoya Peterson, editor of the blog Racialicious, emailed me to proffer compliments over the success of the site and talk about Jezebel's coverage of racial issues, which, she explained, she wasn't particularly thrilled with. After a few email exchanges, I called her, and we talked for what seemed like hours. We did the same the following day. And, (if I remember correctly) a few days later. Although I didn't always agree with her assessment of our content and the intentions behind it, I found her and her commentary to be intelligent, charming, sensitive and, of course enlightening... so much so that I decided to recreate part of our conversation over email so that commenters could weigh in. After the jump, Latoya and I discuss reader complaints, accusations of colonialism, coverage of Third World countries, and how to deal with issues of "the patriarchy" abroad without being patronizing. More »
crappy hour
Barack Obama Doesn't Look Too Psyched About That Beer
Fifty thousand people are dead or close to it in Burma, and Barack Obama can state unequivocally that he does not drink designer beer. Seventy five percent of American adults will at some point be impoverished. The average American car owner really must save $30 this summer. Chris Hitchens believes Barack Obama may be pussy-whipped. Ellen Page believes Burmese dictator Than Shwe is a modern Hitler. And when tomorrow comes, Terry McAuliffe believes everyone will be saying that Hillary Clinton did better than they thought she was going to do in both the North Carolina and Indiana primaries tonight. Now there's a statement Glamocracy Megan and I can get behind! After the jump, an unusually hip-hop laden edition of Crappy Hour. More »
skin deep
In India, Fair Is Handsome & Dark Is Doomed
Loathing your dark skin isn't just for women. A new product in India, Fair and Handsome, is just one of the many skin-lightening creams that are, according to the Washington Post, "exploding in popularity." In fact, though these products are nothing new for the ladies, the mens' market has grown 150%. India has a long history of colonialism and caste-systems, and darker skin is often openly reviled. Nikki Duggal, a New Delhi-based graphic artist says, "It's something we have internalized, and it's propagated by everyone since we still have this colonial hang-up that white is better, white is wealth, white is someone rich enough to never toil in the sun. It's so prevalent in India that fair equates to more success in life. There is a very sad message that if you are dark, you are doomed." Oh, and by the by: The lightening creams which will save you from certain doom? They cost about $1. Which is half a day's wages for many Indians.More »
leftovers
"Untouchable" Girl Thrown On Fire • Low Weight And Education-Levels Linked
• A 6-year-old Indian girl was thrown into a fire by a man for being an untouchable. • People of Lesbos insulted by term 'lesbian', sue a gay rights group. • A 94-year old woman becomes Britain's oldest bride. • Sixty-nine percent of mothers ages 18 to 34 incur medical debt. • Afghanistan holds the world's highest maternal mortality rates. • Afghans also jail raped and abused women. • Another reason to switch to lipstick: lip gloss invites skin cancer. • Baby boomers complain that hearing loss puts strain on marriages. • Obesity prevention programs can reduce eating disorders as well as obesity. • Is there a link between a healthy weight and education? • Bare-bottomed prom invites get suspended. • Low birth-weight can lead to greater weight gain in adulthood. • 18th-century opera singers were the original celebrity bad-girls. • Breast-feeding is up: 3 in 4 moms breast-feed their infants.
bring it on
What's The Point Of Cheerleaders For Cricket In India? (Or Cheerleaders Anywhere?)
Everything I know about cricket, which isn't much, I learned from my Black World Literature professor in college, a tiny Indian woman and cricket fanatic who would devote the first 10 minutes of every class to updating us lame American kids on the sport that was like a religion to her. I quickly learned that cricket is steeped in the kind of tradition and mythology that makes the Boston Red Sox look like a manufactured boy band. The relationship between Indian cricket lovers and their teams is other-worldly, and this kind of devout obsession is clearly in play with the controversy surrounding the sport and the "importing" of Westernized cheerleading onto the sidelines of matches throughout India, to the great chagrin and horror of many Indians. "What the cheerleaders are doing during cricket matches is ten times more vulgar than what used to happen in dance bars of Mumbai... How can we allow such vulgar dance in a cricket field?" asks Nitin Gadkari, leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Maharashtra state. More »
leftovers
Barbie Goes Green; Berlin Sets Up Stalker Center
• From Anya Hindmarch to Barbie, the trend of "Green" handbags has officially run its course. • Prep author naturally turns to Laura Bush for new book. • Juno is on top of the DVD-sales charts, those Hills ads work! • Did you know that we ascribe gender stereotypes to women and men? Groundbreaking! • Norman Mailer's former mistress dishes on sex life for 50 pages. • Lovers too poor to wed cozy up on bridge in Cairo. • India to increase penalties in aborting female fetuses. • Berlin set up a walk-in clinic to help stalkers. • Saudis are slow to accept working women. • Reflecting on meals can curb overeating. • Two fatal accidents at Indian weddings leave 43 dead.
leftovers
Florida Outlaws Truck Nuts? • Congo Arrests Cock Snatchers
• Being a tool just got harder: Florida may fine drivers with truck nuts. • EHarmony ditches one-night stand advice after super-prudes protest. • Pervy dude peeps on roommate using teddy bear camera. • Superstitious Congolese police arrest suspected "penis snatchers"; men must find new excuse for small dicks. • Pasha Grishuk, a former Olympic figure skater, was slipped GHB in hotel bar. • Is schoolyard sexual harassment is more harmful than bullying? • Yet another teenage girl commits suicide after being bullied. • Domestic violence is associated with chronic malnutrition in India. • Indian-Americans use email to get to know future spouses in arranged marriages. • Duh: TMZ uses exciting headlines to get hits on banal videos. • Earth Day = Forced Abortion and Sterilization Day? • Women nurse pain after a break-up by selling jewelry from ex-boyfriends for cash. • Fliering an ex's town accusing her of giving you herpes is a-ok in Florida, as long as the allegations are true.
leftovers
Pussycat Doll Sells Out For Soap; Women's Basketball In Iraq Scores Big With Kurds
Pussycat Doll takes shilling to high extreme, sings song for Caress body wash. • An Indian man beheaded a woman he believed was a witch. • 18-year-old girl genius makes the natural transition into academia. • "Whether or not we're in a recession, it doesn't matter. That day is the most important day of your life and a memory for a lifetime." —bride-to-be on expensive weddings. • Men undergoing treatment for sleep apnea sleep better when sleeping with their wives. • The U.S. Marine Corps is attempting to recruit women through advertisements in women's fitness mags. • Only 35% of Afghan schoolchildren are female, despite advances in getting Afgani children educated. • A woman sells eggs to fund her Everest climb. • They may be short, but Iraq's female basketball team has dreams as high as mountains! • Fast fashion is out, sewing machines are in! • Don't you know? Asshole male drivers are just getting in touch with their caveman roots. • Awesome 55-year old grandma runs marathons to come to the aid of meth addicts.
Nita, far left, is 13 years old, and is readying herself to lose her virginity to a stranger and become a prostitute. The man who will eventually have sex with her for the first time could — her family hopes — pay as much as $1,200 for the "right" to her virginity, and, according to this article, "can have access to the girl for as long as he likes - several hours, days, or even weeks." Nita, explains the story, "has signed up for a life in which she will deal with 20 to 30 clients per day, until she reaches her forties. After that, when she is no longer considered desirable, she will depend on any children she may have for support." [Telegraph]
leftovers
