Hollywood-ization

Just a short post. I hate Saturday Night Live. I have hated it since sitting through a five minute sketch consisting of Phil Hartman trying to convince Woody Harrelson to sit on his lap (any amusement you might have received from that mental image is funnier than the sketch in question.

However, I have to say that their send-up of Sarah Palin was quite funny. And got to another point which I failed to mention in my previous discussion of Franzen and Meyer's airbrushed pictures. (Sorry, Mom, I still think Franzen's cover picture was heavily airbrushed to make him look more like Guy Pearce - your depth is indicated by the fact that you find him attractive based on his literary appeal, I think).

Sarah Palin is everything feminists don't want, which has been rehashed constantly around the web. She's pretty without substance, powerful, but just subservient enough for patriarchal men to accept her - since they know that at the end of the night she goes home, makes dinner for her family, and probably gives her man a footrub (in both the literal and biblical sense). This was totally characterized when Republicans think that giving up a seat to a woman is somehow supporting women's rights rather than a stupid piece of paternalistic BS.

And this is what I think SNL got spot on with that parody - Hilary is the smart, credible, and (dare I say it?) experienced politician, but she is maligned and disliked. Palin is (dare I say it?) stupid and vacuous, but people love her because she fits our Hollywood conception of a woman. Or to be more precise, our just outside Hollywood concept of what a woman should be.

And I think SNL made up FLRG/Flurge/FLIRG/etc.