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Here is what I wrote in response to Alvin Tan's review of
Iron Ladies II:
Comment posted before this one...
Good discussion, but where's the meat?
It's kind of great to hear from a lot of people on their opinion on Alvin
Tan's review (hopefully that is what everyone is reacting from). I see that
there is a diverse range of comments coming from many different people...
...but where's the meat? I don't think we have really gotten to the heart of
this controversy. I think that a lot of people are correct and that their
ideas and opinions are very valid. However, we still have not tackled that
over-arching issue though. We all agree that Iron Ladies II's portrayal of
gay men as being femme is offensive in its seemingly stereotypical overtones
of gay nuances. I think folks have not addressed the greater problem, which
is society's negative attitudes towards femininity and most definitely
towards effeminate (gay) men. If we work as a society, and as a larger
community, to change everyone's attitudes about this, would it still be a
problem?
In the heterosexual/larger world, the media portrays straight men as typical
macho types who are patriarchal, paternalistic, chauvinistic, etc. Moreover,
the media portray them with many negative stereotypes that play on men's
basic insensibility to women. There is no large outcry about that, because
it is a heterosexual man's world; they are the leaders and they are on top.
However, there are (straight) men out there consistently proving those
stereotypes wrong by treating women equally and other positive things.
Granted, it is not the same as with the gay, lesbian, and transgender
community. We are almost always negatively stereotyped by the (straight)
media...I hear that from all of you. That is why I suggest that we go beyond
the context of "Those characters don't reflect me, I am not a femme, they
are just making fun of us." In the short run, we can challenge films such as
Iron Ladies II. As a long term perspective and as for a larger societal
change and better world, we should try and change how society negatively
view femininity and effeminate men.
If we do that, then Iron Ladies will just be another movie that focuses on a
specific group of characters and not a general reflection of our entire
community.
Does this make sense?
Back to "interesting"
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