Overseen in Pandemonium, and XKCD #386

[jere7my]

Dan Simmons, whose Terror was one of my favorite books of 2008, has just come out with a book called Drood, all about the curious conclusion of Charles Dickens's life. Please, sir, may I have some more?

Unrelatedly: how can anyone watch Dollhouse and not notice that the Dollhouse people are, at best, swimming in morally murky waters, and, at worst, the outright Bad Guys of the series? Sheesh. I have problems with the execution of the show, but to judge by 85% of the online criticism you'd think Joss Whedon was personally endorsing semiconsensual Dushku farming. Next week is supposed to flip over the tables a bit, so perhaps this blindingly obvious subtext will rapidly become, ah, text. (I am hoping for little devil horns, mustache-twirling, and cackling maniacal laughter.)

Comments

[jere7my.livejournal.com]

Keep in mind that I don't actually have a problem with gleaming bikini-clad women, and attractive half-naked people in general (there are plenty of gleaming half-naked men in those showers) — I am of the porn-positive school of feminism. But I lay most of the blame for that aspect of the show at the feet of Fox, since I think Whedon actually agrees with you more than me on that point. The show as we're seeing it is (I've been told) a fairly corrupt version of the original concept. It's my hope that, as it progresses (and if it's not cancelled), it will hew closer.

But the criticisms I'm referring to aren't as nuanced as yours. I'm talking about those that say, for instance, "we all get so very upset when [...] Dollhouse makes rape so neat and pretty," as Cat Valente's did. I can see an argument for pretty, but it's built into the fundamentals of the show that the situation is anything but neat. We've already seen fallout from the Dollhouse's exploitative practices, and the two most sympathetic characters on the show (the FBI agent and Echo's handler — Echo is not a character at this point) both have explicit qualms with the setup.

[(Anonymous)]

i am of the feminist-porn-positive school of feminism.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_swallow/]

logged out by accident.

[jere7my.livejournal.com]

Well, I am too — I'm pro-feminist-porn. As with anything else, porn that isn't produced exploitatively is more appealing than porn that is. And I think things like Maxim and Axe Body Spray commercials are ridiculously offensive, though more for the frat-boy view of masculinity and sex than for any particular cheesecake content. (Insofar as Dollhouse veers into Maxim territory, I blame Fox Corporate.) But there's a big middle ground of porn that's neither exploitative nor specifically feminist (or for-women-by-women).