Why Sarah Palin won't be our Vice President

"I have a question for the women in the audience," the Alaska governor began, "Are you willing to break the highest, hardest glass ceiling in America?"
What a cruel joke for a woman who is against everything I believe in – environmental reform, animal rights, a woman’s right to choose, the importance of education, peace, and freedom from persecution – to surround herself with feminists and ask me to help her break the glass ceiling.

It took women 50 years to get the right to vote after freed slaves did. Fifty years! These were women married to politicians, raising their children and running their homes and yet it was easier for white men to view a black man – whom only a few years was considered property – as a citizen than the women they shared a bed with. I bring this up because it’s vital to understand the deep-seated fear and resentment men had for women wanting the vote (and by proxy, full citizenship). They must have viewed us as children, demanding something that we could neither understand nor be trusted with. But in 1917, Montana (who had given women the right to vote) elected the first woman into Congress, three years before the Constitution was amended.

Nearly a hundred years later, there are still far too few women in Congress. Out of 535 members, only 90 are women: 16 of 100 senators are women (two of them are from California, Senators Feinstein and Boxer, both of whom I’ve met!) and 74 of 435 representatives are women. So it really irks me when I read about "Palinmania" in The New York Times, describing how popular Sarah is with the "dudes." They paint their chests and shout Maverick and "marry me" at her rallies. They say they prefer Palin over both Obama and McCain as if she’s running for president! A few are quoted as saying men have screwed things up enough, maybe it’s time to let a woman run the country for a while. While I couldn't agree more, I find it difficult to believe that these dudes felt this way when Hilary was running or that they’ve ever spent a minute in their lives thinking about the gender inequality in politics. No, because the Joe Six-Packs say Sarah's different, she's "their kind of woman."

The feminists have always said that in order to be regarded by men, a woman has to be sexually appealing, non-threatening and assume, in some way, the role model of wife and mother. But if she wants to be taken seriously, she can't be seen as using her sexuality. Maybe that explains the glasses? They say "I know I'm hot but I want you to take me seriously, okay? [wink, wink].” She certainly has that over Clinton who, as formidable as any man, didn't advertise her role as mother and was more concerned about being seen as qualified instead of sexually appealing. Many of these men said they came to the rally just to look at Palin, because she's so beautiful. I'd like to point out that this is not sexism by the other candidates or by the media, this is pure unadulterated sexism from the American public. What could be more dismissive than supporting a candidate because she's a VPILF?

The strategists that picked Palin specifically wanted a good-looking woman because they intended to play the gender card. People tend to be more sympathetic to an attractive woman and they're less likely to rip her apart (or expose her flimsy credentials). Despite what her supporters think, the reaction to her has been quite kind compared to the way Hilary Clinton was treated or even the way Nancy Pelosi is talked about these days. Women are crucified for being tough and attacked for being soft, but less so if they're pretty. I'm so tired of reading the public's comments about how Palin is being "picked on," a phrase that is decidedly sexist in its assumption that she can't take it. The charge that the media has unfairly focused on her appearance and clothing is completely unfounded. No one cared about her wardrobe until they discovered how much it cost and her attractiveness has been made an issue because the more we learn about her, the more we believe it's the reason she's a candidate. She thinks her family life has been delved into more because she's a woman. Really? We haven't heard about Obama's interracial parents, his mother leaving him with his grandparents, getting food stamps while going to medical school? We haven't heard about McCain's affair and leaving his crippled wife for another woman who just happens to be filthy rich?

A female supporter remarked at the same rally that she trusts Palin because she’s a mom. In any corporation in the country, the fact that she has five kids including a disabled newborn, would subject her to possible discrimination over a fear that she wouldn't have enough time for her job. When most women take six months to a year getting their full energy back after having a baby, Palin's running all over the country like Superwoman. No one's afraid she might exhaust herself or neglect her baby or her husband or her job? Such a curious exception to what is practically a rule in the working world. I met a woman who, while presenting her thesis for business school, was asked how she planned to start a business with a baby (she was pregnant at the time). If Palin were truly getting the sexist treatment, questions like this would be asked without impunity. While I have the utmost respect for the job of mother - and most of my girlfriends are mothers - I hardly think it is an automatic qualification. Andrea Yates, Deanna Laney and Dena Schlosser, all God-fearing Christian mothers, killed their children. I'm just saying, think before you speak people.

What bothers me most though is simply that Palin is the first female nominee on a presidential ticket. How utterly unfair that after all these years (the first serious female contender for president was in 1964) we should get a woman like her. Hilary Clinton was a serious candidate – smart, savvy, experienced, well spoken – and she deserved it as much as anyone. I would have been proud to call her my president but not this woman. She sounds like a third grade teacher who hasn’t spent a lot of time speaking to adults and if she doesn't have an answer to a question, she blames the question! She’s either as dumb as she appears or she’s feigning it in that “math is haaaaard” way that girls do when they first discover that boys are threatened by girls that are smarter than they are. Either way, it’s behavior unbecoming a woman promising to break the glass ceiling for all women. Men are threatened by women who are smarter than them which means the only woman capable of breaking the ceiling is as smart as the men around her and isn’t afraid to show it.

When I watched John McCain announce her as his running mate during the Republican convention, I thought it was a stroke of genius. I imagined all of his advisers in a room after the Democratic convention thinking that they didn’t have a chance in hell. How could McCain possibly compete against the youth, optimism, intelligence and charisma of Obama? We all heard that sucking sound when Hilary was pulled out of the race, though, and in that vacuum they decided to bring in a woman of their own. But unlike Hilary, this woman would be pretty and approachable in a fifties housewife kind of way and she’d be a real woman with a lot of kids and strong views against abortion. They also imagined, I’m sure, that if she literally had never been to Washington, she wouldn’t have any enemies there or anyone who really knew her background. Plus, they thought she’d be easy to manipulate.

The Republicans don’t give a shit about women. Oh sure, they’re happy to use the fire of pro-life conservative women to get elected but once in office, they don’t do a damn thing about it. The irony is, Roe v. Wade would probably have a better chance of being overturned if there were more women in office, or in the courts, because women care about this issue. Pro or against, it affects us profoundly. Out of 110 Supreme Court Justices that have sat on the bench in our history, only two have been women. Plus, since 1990, the number of female Republican representatives has been dropping. While women in state and U.S. congresses were split evenly then, now Democrats make up 69% of the women in state legislatures and 70% of the women in the U.S. Congress. When the Democrats had a black man and white woman as their top contenders for President this year, the Republicans had a bunch of white men. They weren’t looking for the candidate that would make the best Vice President; they were looking for someone that could help them win. They’re using Sarah Palin, exploiting her "aw shucks" ignorance and her bald-faced ambition, to try to win an election as if what happens after that is meaningless.

The flip-flopping that Palin's doing right now on whether or not she's a feminist further demonstrates that the strategy isn't working. The Republicans don't know how to position her and because of it we haven't a clue who she really is. At a rally a few days ago, Palin appeared onstage with a number of high-powered feminists who previously supported Clinton. The fact that NOW (National Organization of Women) has already endorsed Obama hasn’t stopped these women from aligning themselves with a candidate whose most fervent supporters want to take us back into the dark ages. So they too prove to be sexist by backing a candidate simply because of her gender and basically reversing their support on every major issue. During her Katie Couric interview, she answered the question about whether she's a feminist with a decisive "yes" but now she doesn't want to be labeled. The public thinks she's being asked the question only because she's a female and isn't that sexist?

Yes, she's absolutely being asked the question because she's a woman, but no, it's not sexist. Let's not pretend that gender neutrality is possible in this highly critical and personal arena. Equality is being treated with the same respect and being offered the same opportunities without rewards or punishment based on race, gender, etc. I think it's a perfectly legitimate question. We women are being asked to consider her despite her shortcomings, which can only mean that she intends to represent us in a way that a man can't. Besides, if she were really an intelligent leader, she would jump at the opportunity to educate us on what being a feminist means to her. She could say that being a feminist does not mean subscribing to a single political doctrine because that would be saying that all women are the same. (Clearly, we are not.)

She could say that being a feminist means taking the women's role as creator very seriously and that is why she cannot condone abortion. I would respect her if she could articulate a position, any position, even if I didn't agree with it. She could outline for us how she has promoted and stood up for women's rights – in the same way that she exposed corruption in the government and negotiated a pipeline in her state, which I also haven't heard her speak cohesively about. She wants to break the glass ceiling, so what's wrong with asking her how she's going to help me do it too? One editorial suggests that we haven't heard anything intelligent from Palin because the Democrats haven't asked her any real questions and suggests that they're being sexist by not engaging her. I say bullshit. I say she's had plenty of opportunities to say something worth listening to and has failed miserably. While sexism definitely contributes to the gender gap in political representation, it isn't the reason Sarah Palin won't be our Vice President.

That isn't to say this has been easy for me. I'm a dyed in the wool feminist who would probably draw blood to defend Palin if I saw some of the crap she's putting up with in person, but I also cringe at everything that comes out of her mouth. Clearly, we need more women in politics to choose from for these roles. One theory for the inequality is a lack of candidates. If nothing else, Sarah Palin has shown us that being a gutsy and attractive woman and mother are enough to run for office. So perhaps she will inspire women all over the country to get their names on the ballot. I'm planning for a woman president in 2016 but let me make one final note. People forget that we've already had quite a few women in the White House, the First Ladies. Many of these women have worked just as tirelessly for our country as their husbands and some have made enormous contributions. While it's not an elected position and they don't get paid, they also get very little credit for their efforts so I'd like to thank them now.

Raging at the dying of the light

I am very excited. A friend of mine in L.A. has finally started a blog. One of the most interesting, informed and opinionated people I know, he writes as he speaks and his blog is eloquent, witty and a delight to read. The reason I'm so excited, however, is because his passion is for politics and he has started his blog just in time to cover, blow by delicious blow, the 2008 Presidential Election. I am also opinionated and interested but don't seem to have the inclination to follow politics in quite the same way.

Now, I can read a well-spoken and summarized rally cry without the misery of slugging through The Economist or watching television. Topics covered in his impressive first week: The excitement of having Obama as the Democratic nominee, why Clinton did not lose because of sexism, how Obama's camp is using the Internet to squelch rumors and who should be his V.P. It's great stuff and I recommend that you check out Free Radical.

Don't you think it's funny...?

That people use "it" to refer to babies but not to any other human. We don't call seniors or disabled people or teens or pregnant women, "it," and yet you hear parents refer to their own babies as "it." Overheard at the bus stop this morning, a guy was talking about how his daughter was reacting to the new baby. "She was really excited at first about having a little sister, and then she started kicking it." I thought it quite interesting in light of the abortion debate. We basically refer to humans all through pregnancy and up until (when?) about a year old as a THING. The fetus, the infant, the baby, "it."

I think it's because without the mother, this thing can't possibly live so in essence it isn't it's own creature yet. It is attached to and depends on the mother until the age when it starts walking, talking and eating solid food. At which point we refer to IT as daughter, son, niece, nephew, child, kid, him, her, she, he or their name but never it. It reminds me of my women's studies days in college where we spoke of lexicon a lot and how it's shaped by cultural attitudes and yet can also actually shape our views. This is the argument behind why waitress became waitperson, stewardess became flight attendant and mailman became mail carrier. While when those names were invented it may have been appropriate because those were gender specific job, they no longer reflected our culture and needed to be changed so as to avoid reinforcing outdated ideas.

So is it that we used to think of babies as objects, not people, and we are perpetuating an outmoded societal view in our language? Or is that that we still view babies as objects which is why the majority of Americans, while not in FAVOR of abortion, support a woman's right to choose? Because this thing doesn't have it's own life until it's no longer a baby and it's right to life doesn't start at conception?

Why women should rule the world

Sometimes these blog posts come together through a seemingly endless trickle of related thoughts and topics. I line up ideas and draw correlations as if when I stand back, I'll see the secret to the universe. In order to not get overwhelmed, I'll occasionally table a draft until I figure out what it's about.

One of those posts was Why Women Should Rule the World. I chose that title because it's provocative. When I mentioned it to a friend, she was horrified. "Are you REALLY suggesting that only women should be in charge?" It kind of tickled me, provocation successful. I suppose the title should be: Competition, Make Way For Cooperation. It started out like this:

As our world becomes increasingly interdependent, wealthier countries will have to spend more resources helping less fortunate nations. Their problems are our problems and we can no longer shut them out. We may find ourselves depending more on cooperation, not competition,to get us what we want. To bring about this change, we might consider more women in politics and positions of power.

Only 16% of our federally elected representatives are women. Nancy Pelosi, during her trip to Syria, asked for cooperation from the Middle East. Men compete, women cooperate, it's how we're made. Without women, without a balance in government, we just may destroy our world and ourselves.

A while back, Matthew Dowd, the strategist that helped get President Bush elected, defected from the Bush camp after six years in part because of his opposition to the war. In an interview with the New York Times, a deeply disillusioned Dowd called for a withdrawal of troops from Iraq.

Not knowing what he'll do next, Dowd said “I wouldn’t be surprised if I wasn’t walking around in Africa or South America doing something that was like mission work.” He added, “I do feel a calling of trying to re-establish a level of gentleness in the world.” I thought this was pretty powerful, a (male) political strategist calling for gentleness in the world and wondering why aren't taking care of each other. Especially since it's been proven that altruism makes us happier than selfishness!

The problem with my argument is that it makes the presumption that women would behave like women in politics and business. And obviously there are also men who can bring this kind of balance to our leadership. What I was fingering my way towards was the idea that we have been living in a masculine society for a long time now: a society based on domination, crushing the competition, winning at the expense of another's loss, taking what we want because we can. This is the economic model that I keep referring to, that has to change.

It used to be that competition drove innovation but in the last several decades, competition has suppressed innovation of a certain sort. We have the ability to reduce our dependence on oil, but we don't. We have the ability to insulate our houses with natural materials to reduce our dependence on natural gas for heat and electricity for cooling, but, for the most part, we don't. Why? Because it's not in the best interests of the companies selling those products. Why, people always ask, isn't there a high-speed commuter train between LA and San Francisco, a very well-traveled corridor? Because the airlines are making a bundle ferrying people back and forth even though the flights dump tons of CO2 into the atmosphere.

The earth is like the bank account of a very rich uncle that died and bequeathed everything to us. We don't know why we're so lucky but we never really stopped to wonder. We just got to spending! Everything we "make" is made of the earth. Humans don't MAKE anything (except babies), who are we kidding? We just TAKE and then sometimes do some stuff to what we've taken and say we made it.

We've been taking for a long time now, withdrawing large sums from the bank account, but we haven't put anything back (and what we do put back makes us poorer). Given the laws of economics, what are the chances that the bank account is unlimited? The environmentalists are saying the account isn't dry, but it's getting there. How about curbing our spending now? In fact, with so little dough left, we have to get pretty innovative to make it last or INVEST IT WISELY so that it can grow to make us rich again.

A while back I was puttering around on the web looking for the digital version of a National Geographic article about the Jamestown settlers who intentionally and inadvertently changed the landscape of the future United States dramatically. They esentially created a new ecosystem in a few decades. I was going to use it to illustrate the point that the reason we're in such hot water is because we can change our environment so easily and rapidly, which means we can also change it for the better in the same way.

But I found that it had already been described in a thought-provoking theology blog and I discovered something. There's a term for and a whole study of what I was trying to describe! It's called eco-feminism. It basically describes a "feminine" way of relating to the environment. If we think about little girls and boys, it's easy to see what this means. Boys want to smash hills and break branches and destroy things to make other things. Girls want to smell flowers and make pretty things from twigs already on the ground and relish in the beauty of nature. One looks at something and sees what they can do with it, another looks to admire and is inspired to preserve. (The Wikipedia description is really quite fascinating - and much better than mine - you should read it.)

I guess the reason it took me so long to publish this is that I couldn't figure out exactly what my point was. I think it's this. When I was in college, majoring in Women's Studies, it was pretty radical to say that sexism was the same as racism, or any kind of discrimination, marginalization or subordination based on a person's race, gender, socioeconomic status, etc. And now I find my world rocked by the idea that it's even bigger and broader that that. The subordination of nature - plants, animals, mountains, oceans, air - also stems from the same need for domination.

While we've seen huge shifts in our attitudes towards people of color and women in this country in the last century, but we've also seen how quickly our "enemy" can change from fascist to communist to terrorist. Why, we haven't been concerned about human rights violations in China for a long time now. Not since we became their biggest client. Last I time I checked, they were still communist. And a recent eye-opening article written by an female reporter working in Saudi Arabia illustrates that while we may claim to fight oppression in one area of the world, we're quite comfortable allowing it to continue in another as long as it serves our needs. Women not only are covered from head to toe in public, they must also be kept out of sight of men at all times because even completely covered, they are a distraction and a source of unmitigated agitation and temptation.

Obviously, turning the world away from a model of domination is a big move. A change that will not tolerate such inconsistency and hypocracy. In order to truly view mother nature as something to love, protect and live in harmony with, we will have to also do that for our fellow creatures - animals and humans alike.

Let Cam do your breast exam

This Breast Cancer Society of Canada commercial, from 2000, was created to encourage young women to self-examine. It's freakin' hilarious. I love it.



Some good reasons from The National Breast Cancer Foundation to do regular self-examinations:
* Every two minutes a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer.
* Breast cancer is the leading cause of death in women between the ages of 40 and 55.
* Seventy percent of all breast cancers are found through breast self-exams.
* Eight out of ten breast lumps are not cancerous.

Do the math. Do the exam.

Nancy Pelosi is a rockstar!

The New York Times reports that she visited Syria "with a high-level group of lawmakers including Henry Waxman [of California]" (who also rocks, by the way - I've been sending him letters for years and always get a response back about his efforts in that area). They met with President Bashar al-Assad of Syria.

It's exciting enough to have a female Speaker of the House, the third-ranking elected official in the United States after the president and the vice president, but now she's basically advocating a different approach to diplomacy in the Middle East. She's showing the world that we are a complex government and President Bush doesn't speak for all Americans.

A side-by-side comparison of their views from the article:
PELOSI “expressed concern about Syria’s support for Hezbollah and Hamas,” to Assad and “expressed our interest in using our good offices in promoting peace between Israel and Syria.”

BUSH said the visit sent mixed signals to the Middle East and to President Assad’s government.

PELOSI and many other Democrats, as well as some Republicans, have spoken often in recent months about the value of increasing dialogue with Syria as a way to improve stability in the region.

BUSH told reporters that he saw little point in talking to Syria now. “Sending delegations hasn’t worked,” he said. “It’s just simply been counterproductive.”

A bureau chief for a leftist Damascus newspaper said "Pelosi’s approach represents a more practical policy; the administration’s policy over the last few years has been based on demands and ideology."

A shopkeeper in downtown Damascus summed it up perfectly: "She views the world through a different perspective than Bush. She’s more open-minded.”

See? Rockstar.

The power of images

I've been reading Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. I loved The Tipping Point, a great marketing book, and a friend said I should read Blink. In it, he talks about how powerful words and images are, even in small doses on a short term basis. Someone reading angry words will become angry, a person seeing images of a minority group committing crimes will become disposed to distrusting that minority group, etc.

I live in Los Angeles and while I've often known that the entertainment industry is by far the most sexist industry in the country - only 7% of working directors are women (for reference, approximately 16% of federally elected seats are held by women - not exactly a bragging point to begin with).

Even so, I'm constantly amazed by the movie posters that I'm subjected to on my way to work. I won't even get into the "Black Snake Moan" poster that is just beyond bizarre, or the "Captivity" poster that basically showed Elisha Cuthbert being MURDERED (it was taken off of buses after protest).

I'll just mention the three movies being advertised now on every billboard and bus stop on my eight mile commute. See if you can spot the theme:

"Perfect Stranger" - Halle Berry looks terrified at a menacing Bruce Willis.

"Disturbia" - The tagline is "Every killer lives next door to someone" while a terrified female is both menaced by the shadow of a man AND watched by another man through binoculars.

"Fracture" - Anthony Hopkins looks menacing and the headline is "I shot my wife."

I know. It's not something we normally think about but what do you think the unconscious reaction to this kind of messaging is?

Milk Gone Wild!

OMG, this is fantastic! Only PETA could make a health statement, protest the mistreatment of animals, satire sexism, and be totally hip and kind of sexy at the same time. I agree with the user who posted that it's demented. It is, but in the best kind of way.

A girl who knows how to handle herself

I went out for drinks last night, close to my house, so I walked. Since it was night time, I walked quickly and with purpose. A young woman came out of a restaurant and walked in front of me for a while. She was thin and had on very high heels that made her whole body wobble a little. She was walking very quickly too, almost running, and her long dreadlocks seemed to be weighing her tiny body down. I heard hooting and hollering from a bunch of guys from across the street. The more they cheered, the faster she walked, stumbling and almost falling at one point before ducking into a parking garage. The moment she did, hoots of disappointment came from across the street and then silence. A foot behind, I was invisible.

I told this story to my dad and he said something about how some women walk in a very feminine way while others don't. What does that mean, feminine? Does it mean delicate or in a more vicious way, weak? Fragile? Instinctively, are men drawn to the "weaker sex," when they're easy to catch?

This scenario played out like a pack of hyenas chasing an injured antelope, struggling with a sprained ankle to keep up with the herd.

The more she hurried and stumbled, the louder their hollering. Yet they paid me no attention. True, I was marketing myself as a woman who's capable and not a victim (I didn't have a car to stumble into) but it has never had anything to do with attractiveness. From the distance they were at, she could have been a transvestite! All they saw were heels and wobble. Raaaaaowr.

Horrific horrifying horror

I was at the video store with my dad, looking for a film to rent. Every third film, it seemed, was a horror flick. And I don't have to tell you that most of them are about pretty young women being victimized. I picked up one called Rest Stop and made the mistake of reading the back. It's, as I guessed, about a woman tortured by a sicko after stopping at a rest stop...something about a box of tools and a saw (!)

I guess what makes it so SCARY and, I shudder to say, APPEALING, is that it actually happens and women are really afraid of that. Hmmm, I wonder how often it happens. Or are women disproportionately afraid because of movies like this? Why is a woman's fear so appealing?

A few minutes later, my dad picks up the movie The Virgins of Juarez. "This is a good movie," he says, "YOU should see this." I figure that he's making reference to the fact that I'm a feminist, something he hasn't always been too supportive of. He explains that it's a true story of women (young, I imagine, since they're VIRGINS) who are abducted in Juarez, Mexico, raped repeatedly and then KILLED. Disposable sex toys?! I feel myself getting physical ill in the video store as he goes on. "Minnie Driver plays a reporter who goes down there to get the story and this girl," he says, pointing to someone on the cover, "was buried alive but manages to escape."

I'm so horrified, I don't even know what to say. Why should I see this movie? God, how sick. How awful! My brain is spinning. Who are these people? WHO abducts little girls and rapes and kills them? WHO?! Normal men just walking around decide to do this? How can a society have such a low value on the life of a woman? How can a society care so little about women living in fear?

My mom had mentioned an article in the paper that morning (it was a weekend with the parents) about a 15 year old girl who met a guy online. She agreed to meet him somewhere and was kidnapped. He and HIS FATHER kept her in their apartment for a week and raped her. FOR A WEEK! She managed to escape, apparently, and they got caught.

That night, I had a nightmare about a serial killer, a duffel bag full of warm bloody body parts in Ziploc bags, and a series of films the killer had made while killing each victim. This was a nightmare because I was in charge of solving these crimes and had to watch the movies. I couldn't sleep for two nights afterwards.

So, the other day I was at the beach, on the walking path. Every time I heard someone behind me I jumped a little, startled. I notice that other women do it too, when they're approached. I saw a couple of guys laughing at a woman who was startled by them. Does a man even know what it's like to feel like a potential victim walking around? Sure, sure, it's a state of mind. BULLSHIT. With so much real violence against women, why do we need fictional violence?

Let me ask a question. Why is it that fictional terror is entertainment while the real terror is a challenging think piece? For example, Blood Diamond featured little boys getting body parts hacked off. COOL! Last King of Scotland is about a dictator who was a mass murderer...way better than Zodiac. That guy wasn't even REALLY a serial killer. Or what about The Virgins of Juarez? I mean, isn't that right up horror alley? Can someone explain this to me?

Billboards of naked women

I moved recently and my new work commute is mostly freeway. It's a much nicer commute, even when there's traffic because everyone on the freeway is doing the same thing, more or less, going straight ahead. But one thing I just realized that I don't encounter anymore are the billboards of naked women (and bad TV shows). There was a period of time when I was outraged, every morning, by a barrage of skin and bones Mischa Barton, giant breasts in a guys face for Two and a Half Men (they're raising a kid, get it? it's HILARIOUS!), an extreme closeup on a models pouting lips (selling a car of course) - well, you get the picture.

But then today I saw this billboard:

Whose genius idea is this movie? I don't even know where to start. We've got two actors known for choosing bizarre/bad/downright tacky roles, a white girl on a chain held by a much older black man, the follow-up film from the white director of "Hustle & Flow" (also a depressing movie with degrading female roles) and the name "Black Snake Moan." I presume that is supposed to sound as sexual as possible with the black snake of course being his penis and the moan is what happens when he uses it? Am I the only disturbed by this? I don't know, I guess I'm one of those people who wants a film to be uplifting, liberating or jeez, at least a meaningful commentary on something. Maybe this is but I will probably never see it.