09 April 2009

"Thin. Hairless. Nipped and Tucked. Plastic Fantastic. Is this all right? Or is it all white?"

Brought to my attention by Beet, and positively fucking wonderful

Meet the Muffia


"Frustrated by a lack of feminist debate, Sinead King and Katie O'Brien have been out on the streets flashing their merkins as the Muffia – the latest in a long line of outspoken female performance artists..."

"Under the guise of the Muffia, they started asking questions of their own. Why don't we resent the way the media portrays women? Does no one care that women are mutilating themselves with cosmetic surgery? Why do so few young women know what feminism is?"

"O'Brien explains that their aim is "to use our bodies on the street to generate ideas and engage with people.""

Check out the whole article, it's a good read and has a nice, quick history of feminist performance art.

4 comments:

  1. http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=feminazi

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  2. I for one salute them for their courage in pushing their objectified, tattered, collectively brutalized & broken young bodies out there for society to pay attention and WAKE UP finally. Even after their supple pertness has long since been grafted viciously away by the rampant, perverted 'Lolita' phantasy-indulgements of our society's Patriarchal capitalist power-pigs; stripped of their inner beauty, these sistahs dare to courageously bare their legs & upper thigh skin (symbolically, that erogenous zone-skin being so delicate, but also their first AND last line of defense, having the sole protection of frail cellulite) obviously well cared for--I'd even say almost 'regally' milky-white, referring to their prim voluptuous thighs--in spite of ALL that worn mileage from decades of male-Gazing abuse and soul-Rape, robbing them of their youthful attractiveness, they still have the guts to put themselves out there, even reappropriating (albeit it symbolically) their own. They beat the odds, and truly are SuperNINJAs

    Considering myself an enlightened reformed-male feminist, I finally feel cathartically comfortable speaking of their exposed body parts, trusting it obviously won't be taken wrongly as S-X-ST! If I understand correctly, that's precisely the point they're making: ‘Why,’ they challenge us to consider, ‘are wymin so utterly brainwashed & compelled to define their own beauty and brains by how others (read: the racist/sexist/homophobic WASP power superstructure) judge them?’ I guess some people don't get that, and insist on having no life except to put others down.

    So nice to have zero shame and have this out in the open to discuss frankly, especially in this prudish male-dominated (aka violent & anal-retentive) society. Considering myself a feminist and one of the more enlightened reformed-male, (I also follow Buddhist doctrine --Tibet 4ever!!), I feel cathartically comfortable speaking about their exposed body parts like mature adults, trusting it obviously won't be taken wrongly as S-X-ST! If I understand correctly, that's precisely the point they're making:

    ‘Why,’ they're asking, ‘are our wymin so brainwashed & compelled to define their own beauty and brains by how others (read: the racist / sexist / GLBT-phobic WASP power superstructure) judge them?’ I totally know where these womyns are coming from, because it's the same with men, just from the other side of the coin of suffering and diametrically opposed pressures. For instance: From an early age I (and most other males I'm sure) have been taught that it's always bad to expose ourselves in public we shouldn't ever think with our crotches -- that it's vulgar or disrespectful to let it 'all hang out' so to speak. Well, EXCUSE ME? Disrespectful to WHOM?? To the endless herds of stupid sheeple walking by, getting offended by an *Inconvenient Truth* they have to ignore so that they can keep buying makeup & razors & deodorant, so all the chauvinist pigs will line up to defile them, like some metaphorical version of those porno Japanese bukakke gang bangs -- which probably all started in the first place because our sick misogynist AmeriKKKan GIs treated Japanese wymynn like the objectified dark-skinned Other, who only exists to them as hypersubmssive geisha-like oral-vacuums looking to ingest as much sperm as humanly possible??? Is it any wonder the Japanese culture is so obsessed with virgin schoolgirl manga & pubescent panties in vending machines -- when that's exactly the poison WE injected into them!!!

    We males have had it pounded into our heads for so long that it's somehow BAD to think with our genitalia -- YEAH RIGHT, maybe BAD for the greedy "logic-obsessed" (read: rich old male) asshole Nazis who want to keep all wimynz subservient to their sick Gaze, & those typical consumerist idiots so moronic that they can't even realize we know what's best for them to think, better than they do because they bought into the LIES that perpetuates an unequal society. And that's why I feel such a swelling in my pride to see these 'Buff Muffs' showing the world that it doesn't matter who you are on the inside -- it's baring it all on the *outside* that counts, and that has probably historically been the biggest catalyst for positive change.

    After all, "Well-behaved women rarely make HIS-tory." And the same holds true for men too -- that's why I'm gonna start tomorrow -- protesting with my pants off -- Samurai/ Assassin/ Cosmonaut/ KurtCobain stylee... If any the zombified sheeple (or their hot young & impressionable daughters) dare get offended or try to escape en masse from the sight of my (admittedly) monstrous ‘circumfrential evidence,’ well hopefully it'll wake some of them out of the postmodern Matrix of false consciousness that keeps them enslaved. SOLIDARITY MY NINJETTES!!! BTW when are them perky little nano-titties venturing out for another ... *ahem* ... political statement for change??

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  3. 1. I'm even more impressed with this website for not deleting Crom's post despite the fact that you disagree with him about as much as I do, I'm sure.

    2. It's a shame that there is so little out there on male liberation but even MORE sad that what little there is, is either sexist/misogynist or at the very least, deaf and blind to the validity of most of the core of feminism and the need for women's liberation.

    3. Some day a pro-women pro-men movement for liberation of all. Or at least a pro-women's-liberation/pro-feminist website on men's liberation, maybe some of us can at least do that.

    4. If his eyes were not so closed he would see that while there are some valid criticism on his "feminazi" website (or maybe only one, I only found one, having only read as much as I could take, near the end) namely the valid criticism of the over-simplification of some feminist writing that overlooks, for example, many under-paid men...if his eyes were open he'd see this show the need for class and other analysis to be added TO gender analysis. And yes we shouldn't pretend ALL women make less than ALL men. Maybe once the fact that men have it crappy in many ways is acknowledged, this guy (or maybe some are unreachable, but maybe other men) would be less defensive and see the need for working to liberate women from gender bias AND also work to make society less crappy for men in the ways that is it (because the man is lower-income, or non-white, or...) OR because the man is male, because men are oppressed by their socially-constructed gender so yes enlightened feminism would see that.

    5. In particular when he claims "oh yeah? I'll bet the female chemical engineers make as much money as the male ones!" he forgets that in addition to outright gender bias (which he admits indirectly, exists in at least some cases) he'd realize that maybe some of the ways in which society f's men over is behind some of why men, on average, make more than women. Yes, outright sexist anti-female bias is there sometimes, but other ingredients? Other ingredients include the social conditioning for CERTAIN attributes is strong for men than women, attributes including: over-work, over-stress, neglect your family life, neglect your own health, compete, compete, compete, hyper-competitive workaholic etc...all of which modern society inflicts on women, too, but on average, more on men, so at least one ingredient in the average being higher salsries for me is itself a way society screws men over.

    This is just one example of pro-womens-liberation (or pro-feminist) analysis towards mens liberation as well. Someday, a website on this. Meanwhile I hope some of the anti-feminists (male or female) would think about that type of analysis instead of hating on feminism as if that's the enemy. All sides need "and" rather than "versus" thinking, since we need liberation from this...AND from that, not fighting over who has it worse.

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