The Lack of Cheer in Cheerleading

There's no doubt that US cultural influences formed the bulk of my childhood entertainment. My family rarely watched Australian public broadcaster ABC, with its mix of documentaries, British dramas and newscasts that were delivered in what we (being a family in which no one had yet completed high school) perceived as "snobby" accents, but which I now recognise as the mark of education and travel. Heaven forbid someone had actually lived in another country for a year or two: we never even travelled interstate!

What I could access through our small-screen television became a cultural junk food diet of sitcoms, teen films and "dramas" such as Beverly Hills 90210. With a predominantly American intake of films and television, the figure of the cheerleader was an easily digestible sign of successful femininity. She stood in contrast to bookish and unattractive girls. Not only was the cheerleader good looking, she was athletic, popular and considered successful, but in a way that supported men, rather than overshadowing their sporting "achievements". Recent films such as Bring it On emphasise the backstabbing and bitchiness inherent in any all-female competition, and also its sexualised nature as one tag-line proves: "A Comedy About The Crazy Things Girls Do To Be On Top."

I remember an older high-school girl who travelled on my school bus. She had become a cheerleader for a new Australian Rules football team that had been established on the Gold Coast. I stared at her spiral-permed hair, heavy Cover Girl pancake makeup (masking a reasonable dose of acne) and the pom poms that she once carried on the bus in awe. She was the living embodiment of everything that I had seen via American culture. She was the peak of what a girl could achieve within that realm of thinking. Several years later, I saw her at a fleamarket stall with her friends, clearing out belongings they no longer wanted or needed, and the pom-poms were among the items for sale. I knew that I could not simply buy them and transmogrify into a cheerleader. It would take a certain type and look of girl to become one, and even possession of the coveted bunches of plastic were not going to make it happen.

These reflections were sparked by the suggestion that the National Rugby League should ban cheerleaders from its games due to numerous recent controversies relating to a sexual assault and the omnipresent objectification of women. How could football players be asked to treat women respectfully- to not abuse their position and status as the ultimate Australian male- when the very system of football itself placed women on the sidelines as entertainment based on their physical attractiveness for the enjoyment of male spectators? General opinion on discussion forums did not seem to locate a connection between women treated as entertainment (it's just for fun!) and situations that spiral out of control like the 19-year-old woman who consented to sex with two football players and wound up in a room with five times more men masturbating and rubbing their genitals in her face.

Researcher Catherine Lumby said that the problem did not lie with the cheerleaders: "I take a strong view that how women are dressed has nothing to do with it. I refuse to condemn women for cheerleading or for dancing as ballerinas in skimpy tutus for that matter." Of course, she is right that the mere presence of a scantily clad woman does not authorise sexual assault (witness a Brisbane man this week claiming he raped his 14-year-old stepdaughter because she wore shirt skirts) or even Neanderthal attitudes to women in general. The Minister for the Status of Women, Tanya Plibersek, put her suggestion for the NRL to change to alternative forms of pre-match entertainment (such as drummers) in terms of needing to please mothers to ensure that the the NRL appealed to "the next generation of football fans". So, in short, the only reason you might want to remove the barely-clad women from the football field on a winter's evening is because mothers might be upset and not want to encourage their sons to participate further in the sport. We wouldn't want to try something else for the simple reason that many women might not like or enjoy it, full stop.

The only serious calls I have seen for the banning of cheerleading are in India, where its recently developed IPL cricket series has brought Americanised cheerleading to a different cultural context. There are other faint murmurs about overly-sexualised routines in other parts of the world needing to be toned down. I'd like to hear more about how women could be recognised publicly as more than than celebrators of male achievement. It's not simply about sexualisation, but creating heroes of men and ornaments of women. So long as a school girl on a bus like my eight-year-old self might see a cheerleader as a successful woman, there is a problem with all-female cheerleaders at football matches. And the masculine terrain of football is just the place that needs to break down stereotypes about women as mere accessories to successful men.

16-year-old girl to sail around the world

There are not many firsts left in this world. We've had men climb Everest. Women climb Everest. Blind men climb Everest. Blind women climb Everest. Father and son climb Everest. Mother and daughter climb Everest. If you're hankering to be the first "something" to climb Everest, your options are now rather narrow, as people of almost every background, including some who have overcome substantial physical challenges, have now forked out the dough to risk death in order to say that they "made it".

While almost anyone who can walk, abandon work for months and pay for the substantial expenses can set out to climb the world's largest mountain, not as many are able to circumnavigate the globe unassisted in a sailboat. Australian Kay Cottee became the first woman to do so in 1988. Ten years later, Jesse Martin set sail at seventeen years of age and completed his journey by the age of eighteen to become the youngest person to do so. His adventures prompted a book entitled "Lionheart", no doubt with reference to the courage and mental strength required to survive in isolation for almost a year on the sea, as well as being the name of his craft (well, minus the sponsors, Mistral who he also had to name the boat after).

With women and boys having achieved this feat, it only remains for a girl to take on the unforgiving seas. The girl who is very likely to be the one to have her name entered in the Guinness Book of Records is called Jessica Watson, and she's recently announced her intention to work towards her attempt to sail around the world non-stop without any help. Jessica has her own blog and website. As a sign of how series this attempt will be, her parents have quit their jobs in order to prepare for it. Jessica plans to begin the attempt in September, shortly after her sixteenth birthday which she celebrated this month and which finally rendered her eligible to obtain a boat license. If she completes her journey as scheduled, she'll shave a year off Jesse Martin's record and will have circled the globe by the age of seventeen.

According to a newspaper article, some have criticised Jessica's planned journey because she is too young and the trip will be dangerous. Jesse Martin was only seventeen when he began his journey, but I don't recall public concerns about him being too immature to deal with the risks. In fact, Martin has gone on to be championed as an exemplary human being by everyone from the United Nations Director to the Prime Minister and even musician Ben Harper. Bill Clinton remarked that Jesse's "courage and determination are an inspirational example".

Clearly we're not looking for these same attributes in girls, as they must be protected rather than courting danger at sea. Good luck to Jessica! I'm sure they'll be grooming a boy in utero to break her record the moment it's set.

"Up-Ageing" Girls Ditch their Dolls

For a start, I feel old because I did not know there even was a "Generation Z" until I read the newspaper today. I'm also supposed to feel old because an article in it describes the way that women of my generation packed their dolls away aged about 10 or 11, while girls are now tiring of brushing knots out of polyester hair at an average age of 6 or 7. The study cited in the article suggests girls are moving on to technological play a lot earlier, preferring to spend their leisure time on gaming systems, iPods and PCs.

The researcher, Mark McCrindle, argues that "they're [girls] moving into a technological world much earlier and it's partly coming from their peers … but it's also partly coming from parents who are pushing their children towards more structured educational toys," he said. This all sounds feasible, but why is this specifically problematic for girls? It is discussed here as a sign of childhood being "eroded" and as a follow-on effect of the premature sexualisation of girls.

Strangely it seems like it's a problem for girls to move on to gaming and electronic gadgets (even an iPod is mentioned, which hardly seems gendered in that surely boys and girls enjoy music). Did the study consider at what age boys are giving up action figures and cars? Might it not be that they are similarly developing a penchant for electronic goods at an early age? And perhaps if there has been a time-lag for girls up until now it has been part of the gendering of toys and computers. Would it have been sufficiently "girly" for an eight-year-old to be into gaming ten or twenty years ago? (Not to deny any exceptions, as I was particularly enamoured of my Commodore 64 in 1987.) How is the context different now when almost every Australian home has a computer (or two), internet, and a substantial majority have a gaming console as well?

Play with dolls fulfils a kind of preparatory function for mothering. Girls toys include ovens and irons because these are jobs it is imagined that they will one day perform. For boys we manufacture imitation power tools and lawnmowers because these tough jobs are male. Mums and Dads are probably not sticking to these gendered norms as represented in the toy aisle as firmly as in the past. Maybe girls ditch dolls earlier because they see Mum taking her laptop to work and want to emulate her in the same way that girls of previous generations wanted a replica kitchen to model Mum's daily routine?

And if dolls are waning in popularity then someone better tell the people behind the new Australian Girl doll. These dolls are meant to resemble their girl owners in age and are presented as thoroughly Australian in their netball uniforms and beachwear. The creator of the doll, Helen Schofield, was also motivated by the sexualisation of girls and wanted to counter "the negative impact of popular culture on young children". I'm interested to know whether a range of non-violent boys' toys are being developed at the moment to stem the negative impact of popular culture on them. Or is that less exciting than stemming the tide of pre-teen g-strings?

Girl Scout Cookie Controversy

The controversy in question is one of those not particularly controversial "controversies". It's the kind that only exists within the space of the morning talk show. The Today Show in the US has featured an enterprising young Girl Scout, Wild Freeborn, who sought to sell 12,000 boxes of cookies by channeling the power of YouTube. There are two small amusements to be taken from this before we arrive at the reason why Wild was thwarted. First, the headline on MSNBC is "Her Girl Scout Cookie-Selling Scheme Crumbled" (boom tish). Second, the child's name is among the most unusual I've ever heard. Not only is she "freeborn", she's "wild" into the bargain. Perhaps there is some etymology for this name that I'm not familiar with, but how refreshing in any case that parents would wish to name their girl "wild". It's not an attribute that has ever been desirable in a daughter. Late-Victorian stories like "Wild Kathleen" were about girls who needed to be tamed.


Now the controversy is far from one because the girl's appearance on Today came complete with a representative from the Girl Scouts of America and some artfully positioned boxes of cookies on the coffee table on-set. Wild's father assisted her in producing a video to promote her cookie sales in her home town, which she personally delivered to each customer. Selling cookies online is against Girl Scout policy and thus after hundreds of sales, poor Wild was dobbed in for her rule violation. While technically Wild was not selling online, it was nonetheless close enough for the video to be pulled. Let's not tell Girl Scouts of America that I see cookies for sale on eBay all the time! I would have bought some already if not for wondering how they'd fare on the journey half way around the world.


It was a little disappointing to hear the reasoning for the cookie promotion ban from Girl Scouts of America. Their website strikes me as heavily rule-oriented, with more sub-sections on correct use of the official logo than points in the US constitution. There's no such marketing overkill evident in the British Guides. First, the spokeswoman suggested that it was necessary for the actions of the Girl Scout to fit with her programme. Lumbering cookies around door to door: builds fitness, increases risk of abduction, gets girls out in the community. Advertising cookie sales online: frightening use of internet, potential paedophiles worldwide set to converge, not part of the programme. The spokesperson claimed all girls selling door-to-door were accompanied by adults, but although Wild was protected by her father in her online activities, she could not guarantee all parents would do this, so online selling and promotion had to be forbidden.


Strangely enough, a YouTube search reveals some TV ads from Girl Scouts Nebraska encouraging cookie sales. There are a few shorter, more positive variations, but this one lays on the guilt by showing a crying little girl who fails to sell a box of cookies to an uncaring clod. I'm guessing Wild Freeborn's approach may have been more subtle and possibly more effective at motivating sales. Perhaps they could put her on the Girl Scout marketing payroll?

Church Condemns Abortion for Nine-year-old Girl

The nine-year-old Brazilian girl I last wrote about (was about to say "blogged" and didn't feel happy about "verbing" it- yes, I just "verbed" verb) has now had her twin embryos aborted. It is perhaps no surprise to hear that the Catholic church did not support the abortion. What is astounding is that the Brazilian regional archbishop, Jose Cardoso Sobrinho, has announced that the mother of the girl and the doctors who performed the procedure would be excommunicated from the church.

There are a couple of ironic aspects to this antiquated response. First, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, a Vatican cleric, has defended the Brazilian archbishop's decision with a statement affirming that "Life must always be protected." Does this mean, then, that the girl's life is irrelevant? Somehow worth less than the potential lives of the two embryos? Doctors warned that it was unlikely that the girl's small body could withstand the pregnancy. I suppose it only reflects the usual religious stance on abortion, even in cases of rape, but when the victim is a child, it makes the trivialising of the woman's/girl's life pointedly obvious.

The second is that the perpetrator of the rapes will not be excommunicated from the Catholic church. His acts of child rape are less heinous than that of the girl's mother and doctors (attempting to preserve the life of a girl who has been abused) in the church's eyes.

On International Women's Day, stories like this one are a timely reminder that the actions of men, such as those with authority in this major church, continue to have an extremely negative affect on women in developing countries. While there is a very real gender divide in countries like Australia, it is a sad thing to write that it would be something of an achievement if we could proclaim that all the women of the world were only subject to the kinds of discrimination and oppression that we are.

Nine-year-old Pregnant with Twins

Today's news brings a sobering reminder that the evils of unrealistically buxom dolls and bras for the breastless are not the worst that could be inflicted upon girls. A nine-year-old Brazilian girl is reportedly now four-months pregnant with twins, the disturbing result of sexual abuse by her stepfather. The abuse began when the girls was only six, and the cretin saw fit to give her less than one Australian dollar (a Brazilian Real) each time he sexually assaulted her.

The major problem, apart from the psychological horror of a child raising children born as a result of sexual abuse, is that the girl's small body is likely to be unable to carry two embryos to full-term. One doctor commented: "We don't know if she will develop the pregnancy up to the end because of the structure of her body. It is a big risk for her."

Now, I understand that abortion is not commonly practiced in Brazil except for instances of rape or danger to the mother's health, but surely this case is one where both rules should come into swift effect. The tone of the responses of some of the doctors involved does not rule out that the girl might be expected to try to carry the twins to term, even though it would be an extreme risk to her survival. Surely the girl, a decided victim, too young to find any way out of her abusive family life, should be the first priority and the abortion conducted immediately before the pregnancy progresses any further?

American Girl Takes on the Aw-Sees

I am totally fascinated by the idea of the American Girl dolls. Not only does the range include contemporary and historical American Girl dolls, but there also accompanying books that tell the stories of each "girl" in her relevant time period. I'm sure these books do not contain literary gold, but I'm interested to see how this large and profitable company thinks historical girls should be presented to contemporary ones. I'm also guessing that real girls are more interested in the modern dolls and that it's adult crackpots like me who are interested in the likes of "Kirsten", the Minnesota frontier settler from 1854. Then again, the recent American Girl film, Kit Kittredge (starring Abigail Breslin), was set in the Great Depression in 1934.

When playing on the American Girls site (it took me several times to get a perfect score on the pop quiz, humiliatingly), I discovered it was possible to travel (virtually, and perhaps not even necessarily since I'm already here) to Australia. I loved the facts about Australia section. I had to laugh as some slang was given a pronunciation key that would have the speaker come out with the most American-sounding accent for supposedly ocker terms like "aw-see" for Aussie (more likely "oz-ee" from Strine mouths). Others replicated the British sounds that were adopted in that bizarre Simpsons-come-to-Australia episode, such as "gid-dye mite" (g'day mate). "Lolly water" was listed as the equivalent for "soda pop". I can't say I have ever heard anyone call it anything other than "soft drink" in my life. "Lolly water" has only ever arisen in the context of someone drinking a sweet alcoholic drink (in contrast to a "man's drink", like VB!), but that may reveal some now uncommon, earlier use for sweetened carbonated drinks.

The one that surprised me most was the phrase "See you in the soup!", which apparently means "See you around!" Again, I must not be getting out enough, and I'd have thought having a father who is the embodiment of the Bruce Ruxton skit from Fast Forward and Alf Stewart from Home and Away would have qualified me to know these things. I had to do a Google search to see where I was going wrong, and most of the results for the phrase were links to travel dictionaries, explaining to poor holidaymakers what funny (both ha-ha and strange) language they might encounter on their journey to the land where the water swirled down the plug-hole the "wrong" way. What has Hugh Jackman been telling them all?