Dolls Clad in Feminism, And Hardly Anything Else

Edward Wyatt
The New York Times
Monday, March 5, 2007
Page B3
The Story
The Summary: The Pussycat Dolls are searching for a new member via a reality tv show to air on the CW.

[the show]...may look like just another reality show with attractive, slinkily dressed women preening for the camera in the hope of a shot at stardom. But “Pussycat Dolls Present” is about female empowerment, the show’s producers explained to a group of television writers and critics...

I might have to agree. The article's tone is somewhat sarcastic. While one doesn't normally think of scantily clad women as role models, these girls may be on to something. Their song "Buttons" was VH1's #1 song of 2006. (The song is about a woman taking sexual initiative.) They might not be the type of women you want your daughters to grow up to be exactly, but they do have a quality of empowerment about them.

There's no doubt about it, these chicks are hot. They have amazing bodies and are just plain gorgeous. I don't see anything wrong with realistically aspiring to have that body. Meaning that it's not a bad thing to have girls looking up to people with athletic bodies. Their music is catchy (and awesome to work out to, I might add) It's not Mozart, so what. Mozart wasn't the greatest role model either.

When one reporter said his 17-year-old daughter looked at the group and their antics as a giant step backward for women, the Pussycat Dolls’ founder, Robin Antin, became defensive, invoking female role models who follow the Dolls.

“There’s a reason why people like Scarlett Johansson, Gwen Stefani, Cameron Diaz have all been so interested in what Pussycat Dolls is all about,” she said. “They feel that it is empowering to get up there and dress up like a Doll. It’s fun, and it’s something that every girl in the world — she may think one thing, but I think inside every girl in the world wants to do it.”

She has a point. It's fun to be free... to be a sex kitten. Everyday I wear conservative clothing. I love to get a little dressed up and be skanky from time to time. Leave the normal stuff for the day to day.

The female empowerment The Pussycat Dolls bring is sexual in nature, but that's necessarily not a bad thing. Sex is the last frontier that women have to conquer. The "sexual revolution" was 40 years ago, and just now are women allowed to be vocal about sex. Our schools preach abstinence only, but in countries where their public schools host open discussion in their sexual education classes the teen pregnancy rates are low, much lower than the US. If overtly sexual public figures can draw the ype of conversations that should be standard in our schools, it can only be good.

As for grown women, we need to be more comfortable in our skin. If that means eating right and exercising to wear a cute little costume for our significant others, so be it. I don't see a problem.

The Pussycat Dolls may not be the best roll models for little girls, but they aren't the worst, either. They are excellent roll models for career driven women, and those that just need to "loosen up" a bit.

When another male writer asked what kind of women truly aspire to the Dolls’ aesthetic, McG responded: “You must understand the fundamental paradox of a gentleman of your age asking that very question.”

He added: “Being a step backwards for women suggests it’s in the service of men. Under no circumstances is this in the service of men.”

On the contrary, he said: “There’s even a position to take if this is, frankly, third-wave feminism.”