We have a special guest today: my social media manager, research consultant, and sister, Katie Marinello. She has some thoughts to share. Read on...
When the Oscars were announced on Tuesday, I hopped on Facebook to register my thoughts about the nominations for Barbie: The Movie.
They nominated Ryan Gosling and not Margot Robbie.
They nominated Ken and not Barbie.
In a movie about the patriarchy.
That’s too on the nose even for a movie about a children’s toy.
I was not alone in this. There was a wave of Think Pieces about the snub, followed by a wave of Think Pieces about how this conflict was essentially White Feminist Outrage (TM). I myself got some flack for not mentioning the more egregious oversight of Greta Gerwig not getting a Best Director nod. And Barbie was, after all, nominated for eight Academy Awards, with Greta getting one for writing and Margot for producing.
The ultimate irony is, I don’t even care about the Oscars. I ignore them entirely most years, or watch an hour or two and am reminded of how few movies I see annually.
So why is this still on my mind a week later? Let’s get into it.
No, of course not. My heart breaks for the estimated 16,000 women and children who have been killed in Palestine, the 65,000 people with uteruses who have become pregnant as a result of rape in states where abortion has been banned since Roe was overturned, and the fact that we’re all going to die due to global climate change. Greta and Margot will ultimately be fine without the Oscars.
But as Claire frequently says, pop culture is the real world. The way we treat women in the micro affects how we treat everyone, everywhere, all the time. (Different Oscars, sorry.)
We'll never know, because it would never happen. According to the Inclusion List, in the first 95 years of The Academy Awards, women made up only 17% of the 13,253 nominees, and only 16% of all winners. That’s…sobering.
We certainly get more than our fair share. I’m thrilled for America Ferrera, one of only eight Hispanic/Latino nominees for Best Supporting Actress in the history of the Academy. Only1.7% of all nominees were Hispanic/Latino as of last year. There's certainly an argument to be made that white women are not hurting for representation.
As this blog shows time and time again, women of all shapes, sizes, and identities are hurting for GOOD representation. As the movie points out, that is something Ruth Handler recognized when she invented Barbie, and it’s something that no one movie, law, or hashtag can fix all at once.
No. I refer to it as “bubble gum feminism,” a light, frothy package that feels subversive because most movies don’t use the word patriarchy.
But also…most movies don’t use the word patriarchy. And this one, which was essentially about a plastic doll, let us live out our fantasies of tearing down the patriarchy while wearing pretty shoes and having our own convertible.
Not to mention introducing the basics of feminism to those who may not get it elsewhere, including little girls, their mothers, and Ben Shapiro.
Absolutely. Who can say this better than Sasha (Ariana Greenblatt), whose conflict with her mother brings Robbie’s Barbie to the Real World?
Sasha: You set the feminist movement back 50 years. You destroy girls' innate sense of worth and you are killing the planet with your glorification of rampant consumerism.
Absolutely not. And isn’t that what movies are for?
So chances are, by the time we publish this blog, our outrage will shift to another slight or snub for another woman or group of women. We’ll be back to advocating for Palestine, reproductive rights, and sustainability. But that doesn’t mean that this doesn’t matter. Each little piece of this feminist puzzle leads to the ultimate conclusion that women–their art, their accomplishments, their hopes, their lives–matter in the Real World.
For more from Katie, follow her on TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook. As always, keep your sexy lamps burning.