Tonight I will be one among the (hopefully) millions of people oggling at Zooey Deschanel as she makes her network television debut in Fox’s 20-somethings comedy NEW GIRL.
It will be the second time I watch this exact episode of television. The first was when the pilot was passed around the TV biz earlier this year (L.A. plus column item #43: advance screeners).
I liked 85% of it then, and I expect to like 75-79% of it tonight (my second impression opinion generally experiences a 8-10% dropoff from my first. Sorry UP ALL NIGHT). I this the premise (dumped girl moves in with three rando bros) is promising. I think the writing (Liz Meriwether of NO STRING ATTACHED fame) is strong. And I think Deschanel’s portrayal of Jess (extra points for perfect naming!) is wonderfully, quirkily charming (stop trying to make “adorkable” happen, Fox).
But apparently it will be in that final category where I differ from some female bloggers out there. Apparently there is a contingent that finds Zooey Deschanel uniquely damning to the progress of modern women. No, it’s true. New York mag wrote included it in an article. There’s a chapter heading called “Deschanel’s polarizing effect on women.”
I fancy myself fairly in touch with today’s woman, but this one caught me off guard. Is it a pro/con bangs debate? A group of angry brown-eye-girls lamenting territory lost? Women Against Actresses Who Insist Upon Being Indie Singers (go back to your day job Johansson!!)?
No. Apparently it’s this:
“…they resent her for seemingly playing into the male fantasy that women are only attractive when they act like girls. Plenty of blog posts have used Deschanel as a launchpad for this very debate. Then there’s grumbling that while alt-heroines of the past (Winona Ryder, Parker Posey) had a kind of edge to them, Deschanel is all sweetness and light: not enough kohl on the lens.”
Right now you’re either going, “Yeah!! Bleep that sugar sweet minx!” or “I’m sorry, what??” But it’s true. I did my Internet searching. People really do think she’s harming the progress of “real” women. Case in point: kittengate.
“On June 4, Deschanel sent out the following tweet: “I wish everyone looked like a kitten.” It got retweeted “100+” times, and then was cited in a post that comedian Julie Klausner wrote, picked up by Jezebel.com, decrying the trend of grown women who play ukulele, like crafts, and tweet about kittens. Klausner’s gist was that women who act girlie are “in it for the peen” and shamelessly trying to “broadcast to men that we won’t bite their dicks off,” and that their behavior is making it harder for the rest of us to get taken seriously. “The larger issue is that it is a lot easier for men—or even guys or bros—to demean us if we’re girls,” she wrote. “It’s much harder to bring down a woman, or to call her a moron, when she’s not in pigtails.””
It was somewhere around, “women who act girlie are ‘in it for the peen,'” that I decided to write this blog post.
I don’t know if Zooey Deschanel is “in it for the peen” or subconsciously portraying a character who is…I can’t type that phrase again. She seems happily married to a man who is quoted in this article saying, “I don’t really think there’s a whole lot of mystery about Zooey…Who she is in private is a very similar person to the one you see in public.” Her public life and private life do seem extremely consistent leading me to believe that she actually is the kitten-loving, sugar sweet, sing-song extrovert she portrays in real and Internet life.
But I don’t think the “People Against Zooey” are upset about her integrity; I think they’re upset about her person. I think they think that in being who she is she’s tearing up the pavers laid by liberated women who don’t want to wear Mad Men dresses or bake cupcakes to get a man. I think they think her throw-back tendencies (knitting, folk singing, hew-hawing) are so aligned with a 1950s housewife that she’ll permit men to behave like 1950’s husbands.
In the words of one among the anti-ZD set: “It’s much harder to bring down a woman, or to call her a moron, when she’s not in pigtails.”
Is it?
Listen. I get it. I don’t (didn’t…) want to have to play a part to hook a man. It bothers me to think that men are looking for an archetype of a woman and not a real woman.
But isn’t the whole point of feminism that it’s the person underneath the dress slash pants suit that matters? Aren’t we supposed to be able to wear short skirts if we like our legs but still demand respect in the bed/boardroom? Can’t Zooey Deschanel be bake cookies for her boyfriend every single day and still maintain equal footing in their relationship? Why does being sweet automatically equal being submissive? And isn’t it the projection of that idea that’s ultimately most damaging to women – the idea that looking like one things means you are automatically another?
I actually think Liz Meriwether – the real Jess from NEW GIRL – responds best:
“If you feel upset with how cute someone is, maybe you should go outside and run around a little. Get some air.” Deschanel agrees. “That people equate being girlie with being nonthreatening … I mean, I can’t think of a more blatant example of playing into exactly the thing that we’re trying to fight against. I can’t be girlie? I think the fact that people are associating being girlie with weakness, that needs to be examined. I don’t think that it undermines my power at all.”
What say you(s)? Do you hate ZD because her cuteness is undermining your feminism? Or do you just hate her because of her seemingly innate ability to match her dresses with her eyes?
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I love Zooey Deschanel, but I thought the pilot was terrible. She was great, but I didn’t believe the male characters at all, and the whole “oh my god, she put on a black dress and now she’s hot! No way!” thing was way overplayed already back in 1999 when Zack Siler and Laney Boggs did it in She’s All That.
I’ll try the second ep, but I really didn’t enjoy the first one.
I don’t hate Zooey for any political reasons. I’m just mad because she won’t have sex with me.
I absolutley love her!! She dares to be different 🙂 Although, I was disapointed by the show.
I think women being overly sexy damages the progress of modern women more than women being cute.
I love Zooey Deschanel, and have no problem with her femininity. I’m a pretty feminine girl as well and I would be very offended if someone accused me of dressing the way I do/engaging in the interests I like because I want to score some guy. Everything about myself is a decision made because I want to do it, end of story. And do project other motives just proves how systemic sexism still is.
This topic gets me really riled up, especially when it’s women judging other women based on how the project themselves to the world. I think if feminism had really come as far as we all talk about, or if sexism had really died as much as we think it has, then we wouldn’t fall into this trap of shaming other people based on what we think they’re doing.
I could go on forever on this topic. Basically all I stopped by to say is that I agree with you, Jessie, and it bothers me a lot when women judge other women for their femininity.
The unfortunate thing is, I believe a lot of men ARE looking for a gal who does embrace the old school ‘ideal’ female gender role-embracing.
I dress (overly) feminine, bake, cook, sew, etc. and gentlemen LOVE it. Problem for them is, I’m a GODDAMN LESBIAN. I hate all of the male attention these frivolous characteristics garner. I’ve tried more ‘traditional’ lesbian garb/lifestyle but it is just not who I am… which is problematic for meeting girls and avoiding men, but I keep trying.
Love the blog –
Cass
I had ZERO clue there was such a debate around her! I like the last paragraph best. People need to go outside more.
Re: Zooey, herself. I don’t think she’s doing damaging to feminism or anything ridiculous like that, but I do find her persona annoying becuase it seems very manufactured.
Re: New Girl. I’m not into very sitcommmy-sitcoms. I don’t like the neat and cheesy resolution. Also, too much singing! I didn’t laugh at the pilot, but I’ll give it one more episode before I’m out. I don’t think there’s anything original or interesting about this premise or style of sitcoms. I know a majority of America enjoys these types of shows, but I just can’t get into them.
I like Zoey Deschanel just the way she is. I thought one of the points of feminism was that women should be able to be who they really are and men (and women) should respect them for being who they really are. So what if Zoey is girly? She also seems to be an assertive, self-confident and capable woman who is kicking a lot of ass in a highly competitive, highly lucrative industry right now. Everyone needs to calm down and let the girl wear bows in her hair and ruffles on her dresses, bake pink cupcakes and cuddle with kittens all she wants.
A woman being herself is the POINT. Some women are overtly adorable, some are overtly sexy, some are “one of the guys,” and most are some of all of the above. It kills me when feminists try to force themselves into a box in the name of “progress.” What will change men’s and society’s minds is education and tolerance, not women acting one way or another.
I don’t think that cuteness or tweeting about kittens is particularly related to feminism (or its opposite). As somehow more enlightened women, we can’t criticize these people for presenting a fluffy personality and liking “meaningless” things, and then come back and attach all this meaning to them.
I agree with Erin – it’s pretty manufactured, cheesy, and geared toward middle America. It’s the product of focus groups, not a strong political movement.
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Call me easily amused but I actually liked the pilot. I definitely think there’s a lot of potential for it to be something comforting and entertaining and filled with potentially well-needed laughs. And who better to give all that but Zooey in all her aimless-in-life but absolutely charming, cuteness. If anything she’s actually easy to relate to. So personally, I think all those claims on her being “damaging to the progress of modern women” is actually some kind of attempt to say modern women aren’t allowed to have moments of weakness where they’re not sure where their lives are headed or what to do next after they hit a major speed bump in the road. If it was me, I’d move in with 4 guys and sing dirty dancing songs too.
I like her shows and think that it’s cute, but I understand where people are coming from. Not necessarily that she’s doing anything for attention, but she can be a little off-putting. I don’t know what it is, just that she might rub people the wrong ways. Occasionally I feel that way about her, despite thinking she seems nice. It’s like she’s queen of the hipsters, liking vintage things, indie stuff,etc. That is the way she is, and I don’t resent that, it’s just it can be polarizing. It feels like she’s aimed at a certain demographic, though she isn’t a product. Irrational as it sounds, it just feels like I can’t enjoy her acting fully like there’s just some ningling feeling at the back of my neck
It seems that the problem isn’t that she is “cutesy” but that she is non-confrontational. In many of the movies, she fails to criticize her male counter-parts, because to do so would require her character to let down the happy-go-lucky persona. I think this is why so many people believe that she is doing more harm than good.
Anyone who tells somebody they should not be what they choose to be is an idiot.
If you want to talk about progress, that’s ridiculous because you’re going back to fascism here.