Getting Catty, by Elayne Riggs
Humans have been fascinated by felines both big and small since the beginnings of recorded history. At times we’ve both worshipped them (as did the ancient Egyptians) and reviled them (as did medieval Europeans, thus opening themselves up to the spread of the Black Plague when the witchcraft-associated kitties weren’t around in sufficient numbers to keep the rats at bay). And they’ve probably always been a big part of our mythology and folklore, including making multiple appearances in comics, from superheroes like Catman and Kitten to adult stuff like Fritz the Cat to funny animal and anthropomorphic fare.
But lately two big-cat names have infiltrated our culture to the extent that we’re all probably sick of them by now. I’m secretly hoping for Matt Groening to include them in his Forbidden Words list for 2009 so we never have to deal with them again, because they — like a number of other catty terms (such as, um, “catty”) — are used to impart negative attitudes towards women. And being one of those women-types, I tend not to like negative things directed at me simply because of my internal plumbing.
The first is “cougar,” a slang term used to refer to women over 40 who take an interest (most often sexual in nature) in younger men. Is there an equivalent for men who date younger women, other than “dirty old man” or, more accurately, “human being”? I don’t think so. Cougar denotes something predatory and possibly dangerous, but tameable in the right hands which can cause her to purr. It’s male-gaze sexual, through and through. The Daily Show recently mocked this ridiculous term:
Nowadays as more baby boomer icons age gracefully, one might expect the stereotypes about post-menopausal women to dissipate. But men are still Oedipally ambiguous about this. Colleen Doran passed along a post from a San Diego con attendee who was absolutely livid at one type of con-goer he encountered. He confessed, “there was one type of person who scared the bejeesus out of me at the con: the middle-aged woman.” He then proceeded to spew forth his reasoning — that we are “reproductively useless” and “unattractive.” While he’s a self-confessed misanthrope, I can think of a few much choicer words for this attitude.
Reducing women to nothing more than their biological components is dehumanizing enough, but then to conclude that they’re useless if those components don’t operate? Well gee, thanks a whole bunch from all us childless infertile women out there who happen to like comics and generally have a heck of a lot better reputation than the stereotypical fanboy. Mother issues much?
The other cat-related term making the rounds, particularly last week, is PUMA, which either stands for People United Means Action or “Party Unity My Ass,” the response of a number of Hillary Clinton supporters to the pervasive sexism visited upon their candidate of choice in 2008. Of course, in trying to shape the narrative of millions of disgruntled cougars other easily dismissible “special interests” preparing to make gender and race war upon The Chosen One, the mainstream media exaggerated the whole PUMA thing all to heck during the Democratic National Convention. As the eminent blogger Digby puts it, “The only story that interests them is the story they tell each other about themselves.” But among the liberal blogosphere, PUMAs seemed to have little support or credibility. As Jesse Taylor noted, “at this point, you can be a feminist or you can be a PUMA, but chances are you’re not both… as anyone who’s had the misfortune to run afoul of the PUMA brigade has learned, the litany of reasons why Hillary Clinton should be the nominee keeps waning and waning in light of the far more important story here: the hurt feelings of the people who supported her and lost.”
And the official PAC’s grievances would seem to bear this out. They express frustration with the Democratic National Committee, but this frustration didn’t seem to be borne out by last week’s very successful and progressive-leaning convention. Even cynics like David Sirota acknowledge the rise of what the late great Paul Wellstone termed “The Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party.” And it does seem suspect that the PAC was formed the day after Clinton dropped out of the race, lending a lot of credence to the idea that the whole thing was little more than a front, possibly engineered by Republicans.
After Hillary’s masterful speech at the convention, Huffington Post blogger Chris Weigant referred to the PUMA contingent as an “endangered species,” but it doesn’t seem like the Republicans wanted to believe the truth — that the two candidates always have agreed on just about everything, they’re about equally centrist and pragmatic, and their policy differences were a matter of degree, so why wouldn’t there have been party unity pretty much all along? The “battle” was pretty much that there were two really good finalists and people came out in droves to vote for their American idol. Neither of the idols ever had any animosity for each other or for the voters.
So what happens to the party that doesn’t do too well with facts (which, as we know, have a well-known liberal bias)? They let their standard-bearer choose as his “soul mate” (yes, he really used those words) someone who would seem a godsend for disaffected PUMAs. A cougar for the PUMAs, you might call it. Although if you do, I’ll probably slug you.
Sarah Palin is the VPILF. And by “I” I mean the usual sexist contingent that feels almost a compulsive need to reduce any woman to the most easily dismissed stereotypes. Just as Hillary is a “whiny bitch with a grating voice who’s probably a secret lesbian” (and my goodness, but just hearing about her life story and then listening to her speech last week I got goosebumps; I was right in choosing her as one of my role models all the way back in ’92), Sarah Palin is the “former beauty queen who looks like the sexy librarian” type.
Now look, I’m the last person to want Sarah Palin anywhere near the White House, the same as I wish Condoleezza Rice (“angry black woman, never smiles, dresses like she’s in the SS, probably gay”) had never been near the White House. But I have plenty of good reasons for that. In Rice’s case, they range from her demonstrated incompetence to her oil industry ties (surely she’s the only Secretary of State to ever have an oil tanker named for her) to her Bush worship; in the case of what relatively little I know about Palin, she’s a fundamentalist wacko whose family doesn’t practice what she preaches and who’s already under investigation for all sorts of fun little corruptions. In other words, she’s an Alaskan — ba dum BUM! Thanks ladies and gentlemen, I’ll be here all week, enjoy the veal…
But seriously, if you don’t care for someone’s politics, that’s your right — but criticize them on those grounds, not on superficial traits like gender or age or weight. Even the speculation about what kind of weird thing McCain has for beauty pageant contestants (both wives, running mate, goodness knows who else) is rather beside the point, although talk about the inexperienced lightweight Palin being “a heartbeat away” when the top of the ticket is a 72-year-old with a history of cancer trouble is probably a legitimate concern. And goodness knows even people who liked Clinton had problems with many of her stances on certain issues (like the Iraq war).
When you have that kind of ammunition, it’s ridiculous to break out a cougar tranquilizing dart.
But perhaps I’m hoping for too much. The media seems to need these sorts of narratives, maybe they think they won’t get an audience without them. This inability to think outside the narrow confines of Beltway “wisdom” reminds me of another big cat, the one who can’t change its spots.
I’m looking forward to spreading the meme of… the Leopard-Men!
Elayne Riggs blogs at Pen-Elayne on the Web and confesses she’s beginning to like Safari more than Firefox, at least when posting to ComicMix. But then she’s bound to, Apple’s the one that gives its operating systems big-cat names…
I don't think "Cougar" is a dehumanizing pejorative foisted upon women by a patriarchal society in an effort to dehumanize them and steal or limit their power. It's a metaphor. It's a word that suggests a great, prowling, feline (thus feminine) strength, power and yes, sexual appeal. Like Catwoman. And I'm talking about the Julie Newmar/Ertha Kitt, comic book type Catwoman. Not that sad socialite, Jocelyn Wildenstein, addicted to plastic surgery catwoman. It is no more or less dehumanizing than the terms "Stallion" or "Stud" to describe sexually available men. Frankly, I find "Stud" a little more degrading. But I'm a guy.Even the insensitive blogger who commented on women at the SDCC concluded, "The woman erupted into a fit of rage, berating the security folks and launching into a bullshit tirade that you usually only hear from dinks in supermarkets or department stores." [The boldface is mine.]Why is the term he chose for ignorant and rude people "DINKS?" This is synonymous with "DORKS," "DICKS," "PRICKS," "TOOLS," "COCKS" and "KNOBS." All these insults stem from the perception that the male genitalia is rude, stupid, ignorant, selfish, laughable and without consideration for anything but it's own base self-gratification. Sure there are insults based on female genitalia too. But those generally imply a sense of cowardice or calculated evil, not laughable stupidity, buffoonery or oafishness!Frankly, I do find Penises more laughable than Vaginas. They are so exposed. Vulnerable. There are only two states for a penis, comic or pornographic. Like a silly sock puppet or a vaguely threatening meat-bat. Vaginas are far more mysterious and yes, aestheticly pleasing. But, I have to admit, I have a male-gaze. OK, maybe these pudenda-based put-downs are metaphors too. The penis is either comic or threatening, and yes, I find mine to be occasionally selfish and stupid. Vaginas are hidden (thus cowardly?) and mysterious (hence calculating?). I'm not saying that makes these insults acceptable. Pigeon-holing people with put-downs is patently preposterous, improper and impolite. I'm just trying to understand the logic (if there is any) behind these insults."Cougar" may be a stupid word, a silly concept. It might even be a slur, even if I don't see it that way. I'm a guy, with the male-gaze. Let the people who are being categorized determine if something is offensive or insulting. Hey, I wasn't offended by the Frito Bandito. But I'm not Mexican … and I was seven years old. But "Cougar" is a meme that has caught on. It will be hard to shake. It's pounced upon our society like a mountain lion attacking a horse. Personally, I find the term, "Cougar," less offensive than "MILF" or "VPILF." But somebody can already see a term that has some traction. <a href="http://www.VPILF.com” target=”_blank”>www.VPILF.com is already up and running web site!And, all in all, I would rather be a Cougar than a Chicken-hawk (in either sense of that word).
Sir, a "DINK" (quotes mine) is "double income no kids" – the people who feel that shopping is a hobby. Not necessarily synonymous with "DORKS," "DICKS," "PRICKS," "TOOLS," "COCKS" and "KNOBS." Granted, my knowledge may have slipped a bit, but I believe you went off the deep there about DINK… Ms. Riggs happens to be a DINK, not by choice, BTW, so you better watch it…
Although D.I.N.K. is a clever acronym, Double Income No Kids, it's also only recently coined. And I don't think that's the context the blogger used the word "dink". Especially since earlier in his offensive, misogynist tirade (and you'll have to look it up. He's not worth quoting here again) he claimed that the women he found most annoying were too unattractive to be married or even in relationships.I point you to the Online Dictionary of Playground Slang:dink n. Synonym for penis or prick; common derogatory comment about someone such as "He's a dink", circa. 1960's Note: California said to have used "dick" at that time and apparently still does. USA (Minn.)I will say that the Dictionary of Playground Slang puts "dink" as 1960s slang from Minnesota, which is my era and location. Maybe "dink," meaning "dork" or "prick," is local slang and isn't in common parlance as I assume.
As a rule, terms comparing a person to the male special purpose is to say the person is stupid. All of the terms Russ mentions (and not to forget the glorious list the Yiddish language have given us) mean idiot or buffoon. Of the only two terms for the female Holy Temple of the Yoni that I can think of that are used to address people, one means "weakling" and the other is a far coarser term for "unpleasant person". I find the disparity interesting. I consider "cougar" to be a perjorative (implying that since one must GO hunting for what is desired, there are no sources ready to provide it), but I don't consider MILF to be one, thought it could easily be considered rude. A MILF is someone who wouldn't HAVE to hunt for companionship, while a cougar needs to. Heck, technically, I'm married to a MILF. I imagine several of us are.The big difference is that while ladies are grouped into "yes" and "no" piles when they reach the famous "A Certain Age", men are not. Men, in short, are allowed to age. Cary Grant remained a vital leading man, ever cast against progressively younger than he women. That's a topic that could carry a discussion.
"Holy Temple of the Yoni."Damn, that's good…
Ah, thank you (I think) I stand, old and corrected.
I just thought that "cougar" was the female version of "hound dog." Noted in passing — That's a rather silly song when Elvis sings it.
MUCH better song in its original version, as written by Lieber and Stoller and performed by the always awesome Big Mama Thornton. I was fired from a Chicago radio station for playing it. Check it out and then tell me why I was fired. I've never been able to figure that out. (BTW, I was rehired within 24 hours; perhaps they remembered I also wrote for a 50,000 circulation alt-weekly.)
Look at a picture of the person who sang it. There' y'are. That's Chicago for you.
Right the first time.Of course, by that point in time it was more a matter of the program director than the city. He still thought rock'n'roll was a fad, and no doubt thought I was playing "race music."
Yeah, it's interesting – most of the animal refs used for supposedly virile men – stud, stallion, hound – are not really feral creatures, are they?I think both Kathy and Russ are right – the misogynist hated seeing these older women at conventions, and considered many of them useless because (in part) he assumed they were childless, so in that context Double Income No Kids becomes an insult. And Vinnie provides the only context I can think of wherein I would consider MILF to be a compliment.
I'm not sure it's derogatory OR a compliment — depends on the context. I think the phrase is more "stupid," "easy," "trendy," and "shallow." Then again, as Vinnie points out, the concept does promote the alluring viability of middle-aged woman, something long denied in our culture.
I was trying to point out the irony of a misogynist tirade ending where the ultimate insult is being compared to the male sex organ. The bogus blogger couldn't have been using the word "dink" to mean Double Income No Kids, because his complaint with middle-aged women at comic conventions stemmed not only from their infertility but their apparent lack of any romantic relationships. His BOGUS notion that women without men are not only useless, but lack any incentive toward maintaining social skills. I find this also ironic because a lack of social skills has been a stereotype of the male Con-geek for years. It's a stereotype that's confirmed recently, at least anecdotally, by such things as the Open Source Boob Project and the Free Hugs/Harassment debacles.
This just in: Sarah Haskins and Current.TV add to the big-cat debate by talking about Panther Power!
WOW! To say I am insulted by this cartoon would be a gross understatement. I come here to ComicMix to read COMIC BOOKS, and about COMIC BOOKS and all I have read over the last few weeks are political swipes…Most of them being dominated by the "Pro-Obama" crowd.There is a reason that most celebrities, writers, and artists should focus on their craft, rather than wax political science philosophy. Especially considering that most of them, don't even know from which they speak, and in the process, lose 50% of their audience. If I wanted to read about the latest presidential race, I would turn to the newspaper, or cable news. I WANT TO READ ABOUT THE INDUSTRY THAT I LOVE…COMIC BOOKS!!!I beg and implore all of you contributors here at ComicMix…Please, please, please stop confusing this site with a place like "MoveOn.org".