Reading through the Guardian today, re- celebrating the fact that America finally has a decent President, a guy who happens to be intelligence and have a social conscience I was struck by something. And that something was the absolute absence of commentary on women’s role in the Obama victory. In all the coverage I read there were TWO mentions of Michelle Obama and ONE mention of the Obama girls- the bulk of the commentary about Michelle was about how journalists couldn’t decide what colour her dress was. The one sentence regarding Sasha and Malia commented again on the colours of the dresses that they and their mother were wearing.

I watched the inauguration on the BBC. I wept a little, listening to the address, booed at Rick Warren and practically danced for joy watching Bush fly off out of public life. But, I noticed something. Of all the commentary on the BBC, there was only one female presenter and she was assigned to the route of the procession and largely redundant in the coverage. None of the guests were female- they were all men, and none of the commentary mentioned any of Michelle’s accomplishments or any of the sacrifices she would be making as her husband became president. Renee wrote a few days ago about the unpaid labour a First Lady performs and yet none of this was mentioned in any of the coverage I’ve seen. The one mention of Michelle’s role in her husbands presidency, was that she would be at the school gates each afternoon to collect Sasha and Malia. Her husbands role as a father was totally written out. It would seem, that, in the eyes of the world now, the Obama children have one active parent and that is their mother. Their father is just, obviously, going to be far too busy doing important manly things to be worrying about the trivialities of raising children. This portrayal annoys the hell out of me, because I’m damned sure that isn’t what the Obama’s think.

This total erasing of the women who are key in Barack’s life astounds me. The world really hasn’t changed that much. Michelle, a talented, intelligent successful woman, with her own career, her own achievements, her own dreams has been wiped out in effect, and reduced to being unpaid housekeeper to the worlds most ppowerful man. Or at least that is what has happened in the eyes of the media. She has ceased to be a dignified human being in her own right and become merely an extension of him.

I was bitterly disappointed. But, the fight for recognition goes on. Maybe one day, POTUS will have a wife who continues her own career, who employs ( at a decent and reasonable wage, let’s not perpetuate the exploitation here people)  someone to carry out the Housekeeping at the White House , and whose achievements are recognised, giving her a public identity of her own in the eyes of the media. Maybe the position of First Lady will change into a meaningful position of political power and social change, instead of being one of sacrifice and expectation. Maybe one day we’ll have a First Gentleman, or a female POTUS and First Lady. I live in hope.

For now, the fight goes on. The war isn’t won, even if the battle was.

right before the dawn.

Moving away from all things gender and sexuality based for a moment, I just want to post a big HELL YEAH!!! post regarding The Dark Knight.

It is THE BEST DAMN MOVIE I HAVE EVER SEEN. Srsly, it really is. I don’t want to do spoilers or lament a lack of decent female characters (Rachael Dawes annoys me, I thought it was Katie Holmes but no even St Maggie playing her and she’s still fricking annoying) or lament the rather tragic death of Heath (who incidentally really does deserve that Oscar), I just want to have a moment of comic book geek relief that for once a movie based on a comic character didn’t get completely and utterly fucked up, and that the movie was every bit as dark and twisted and I hoped it would be and then some more. It really should NOT have a 12A rating. There might not be any sex, no visible particular violence and so on but my god the implied violence and sheer fear in places are something no child should be watching IMO.

If you don’t mind spoilers then a very good review of the movie, which includes an excellent analysis of The Joker’s character and how he is the dark twin of Batman can be found here .

You can probably imagine my shock therefore when I came home to discover that over at the Wall Street Journal no less, someone wrote an article comparing Bush to Batman. Because obviously a traumatised man who becomes a vigilante/total anti hero saving his beloved city is just EXACTLY the same as a misogynistic cretin who took his country into an illegal war and who is spearheading legislation proclaiming hormonal contraception as abortion, that allows members of the far right to gain jobs, refuse to do them and consequently endanger the lives of those people who are most vulnerable in society. Totally heroic behaviour going on there!!

Anyway, that’s my movie recommendation of the year. Go see Dark Knight. And go and witness Heath Ledger in what was tragically his best role ever.