The Offensive Remark comes a little early this week, courtesy of John Travolta. And he certainly earned it. In talking about playing his female character in Hairspray, he didn’t stop at griping about the “risks” and potential embarrassment of playing a woman, or at talking about the struggle to not look “grotesque” as an overweight woman. Oh no, that wasn’t offensive enough. He had to keep going until he go to this shocking bit of ignorance:
“I’m happy to be a man, but I miss being groped,” he says, laughing. “Everybody tried to grope me all day. Suddenly having breasts and a big bottom gained me so much attention. Men and women wanted to feel my breasts and feel my bum. I must be a slut because I didn’t care. Men were flirting with me and I was being given power I never had before. I found it fascinating. Women have power I didn’t know they had.”
Oh yeah. You know what the coolest part of being a woman is? Being stared at and objectified for my body! It’s great, not having to be a real person because I have tits. The ass is just a bonus. Gee, I can’t imagine what life would be like if I was taken seriously!
And you know what’s even better than being stared at? Being assaulted.
Unfortunately, I can say that I have been randomly groped without any solicitation by someone I hardly knew. It was a long time ago, back in junior high. Another kid walked up to me and grabbed my boob, just because it was there. And you know what I felt? Because it sure as hell wasn’t power, Danny Zuko. In fact, it was quite the opposite. It was powerlessness. It was shame over having a body.
I’m so fucking sick of people (men) acting like women’s sexuality is a form of power. Yes, women can use their sexuality to be manipulative. But that is also objectification. On the spectrum of power, women’s bodies rank extremely low. They have historically been used against us in every way possible, and they still are. Abortion debate, anyone? Breast implants? Women’s bodies are, sad as it may be, a fucking battleground. And though I love, love, love for women to have confidence in their bodies, to be unashamed of them and to walk with their heads held high– as they should– that is never achieved through objectifying and assaulting them.
Groping a woman simply because her body is there is a way of asserting power over her. And it smacks of astonishing privilege to suggest otherwise, just because you spent some time wearing fake breasts that were in no way an actual part of your body. Seriously, Travolta, fuck you.
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He was in a costume, surrounded by foam and rubber. My bet is that people were grabbing him for a joke, not to get off or belittle him as a person. No man was REALLY flirting with him…he’s John Travolta in drag and anyone in person could see that. Maybe he as talking about the experience of being John Travolta in a fat lady costume and not the experience of being an actual woman. Cuz, you know, he wasn’t one.
“Women have a power I didn’t know they had.”
That sounds like he’s talking about the experience of being an actual woman to me. The fact that he doesn’t see the difference is precisely the problem.
The problem for me is that you cannot seem to see that he is a man dressed like a woman. And not in that sneaky Tyra “I’m fat and shopping on the streets” way. It’s more of a “to see me is to know I am John Travolta in a fat suit and pancake makeup” way.
To comment on what it’s like to be a woman in that context is silly. To give creedance to his comments by bothering to be outraged is sillier.
Like me saying “I dressed up as an asian and instantly became a terrible driver”. Sounds too stupid to comment on, doesn’t it?
No, it’s like saying “I dressed up like an Asian, and now I know what it’s like to be Asian! Wow, they’re so polite and smart!” And if I said that, I would certainly expect someone who is actually Asian to call me on my bullshit and say that no, I really don’t have any idea what it’s like to be Asian, and that actually, I’m quite racist.
Eh, our analogies suck…he was commenting on external reactions and we are talking about internal ones. Stepping back, my only contention is that he was not being treated as a woman would in those circumstances…so I can’t help but think he was being a little tongue in cheek. Even so, his ass wasn’t being grabbed, his costume was being poked. I say let someone give his furry bits a squeeze and we’ll see how powerful he feels then.
And that’s precisely what I was saying throughout this post.
How is it powerful to not be able to control the groping? It was not as if he is saying people asked him could they grope and he had the power to say yes or no. People groped without permission. That demonstrates a lack of power.
My god, lighten up.. it’s painful to see people getting offended at such benign comments…
I think that it’s painful to see women defending these types of comments. What exactly could possibly be considered benign about a man suggesting that women are empowered when men randomly grope them?
I just wish Travolta was never cast in this role. He totally doesn’t deserve it.
And yeah. That WAS the most offensive comment of the week. Of course the fake-ness of it all was why he was being groped, but to comment that body-attention gives women power is ridiculous.
wow. these comments remind me of something leonard pitts said about white people’s resistance to acknowledging blatantly racist comments…if people can’t recongnize it when it’s that blatant, how the hell are they gonna recognize it when it’s even more insidious, which it usually is. (i’m paraphrasing big time)
Mmmm – quite a debate. While no doubt John T. meant no offense (perhaps benignly clueless?), his comments are certainly enough to make one wince – as you correctly point out, Cara. And the “grotesque” comment could be interpreted as offensive to both men and women who are overweight.
You know, I often find that the most offensive things are said when one thinks they are being completely unoffensive. When one’s guard is down, all kinds of interesting things slip out. I don’t think that he was laughing “haha, take that women” to himself at all. But I do think that he’s completely unaware of his privilege and of the struggles that women go through, and said something highly insensitive and inappropriate.
I, too, have said things that were offensive when I wasn’t thinking or wasn’t aware of something. It’s bound to happen again. And when I get called on it, I think about what I said, why I said it, and why it was offensive. I take a lesson from it, and I genuinely apologize, I try to educate myself and I do my best to correct my actions in the future. Not a bullshit “I didn’t mean it like that, I’m sorry if anyone was offended” apology, but a real “I was unaware, I was wrong, I shouldn’t have said that and I apologize for being hurtful” apology. And that’s all I ask of anyone else.
“Yes, women can use their sexuality to be manipulative.” So can men. It really confuses me when I hear people talking about the “power” of women’s sexuality, because men have sexuality too.
yes, but men have other powers as well that women don’t. women can “use” their sexuality to gain approval and recognition from men, and that is interpreted as “power,” which i guess is supposed to pacify us.
Mary is right. Women may use their beauty and sexuality as a “power,” but in the end, the men are the ones who choose whether or not to allow our sexuality to influence them at all.
Men’s power is actual power. They don’t need to use sexuality to make things happen, as they like to cause us to attempt.
I agree with Cara. You couldn’t have said it better than your last line: Seriously, Travolta. Fuck you.
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