Thanks to the awesome Susie Cagle for loaning me this comic.
.
I’m taking a little umbrage at Rachel Maddow’s recent comment about her looks.
She was quoted by the New York Daily News blogger Gatecrasher as saying “I’m not very pretty. I sorta look like a dude, and I have short hair…”
MSNBC’s Dr. Maddow was drawing a comparison between herself and other female television anchors, specifically the ones on Fox News.
While I agree with Rachel that her personal style is a departure from the industry’s “beauty pagent” (her words), I don’t think she looks like “a dude”. I think she looks like a dyke.
There are painfully few images of lesbians in the media. The ones that make it to prime time – the L Word castmembers, etc. are usually straight actresses, painfully feminized, to make their lesbian roles palatable to middle American television markets. Producers seem determined to make television lesbians look like someone a straight girl could imagine accidentally making out with at a slumber party (“She was so pretty and so soft… I guess I just slipped!”). Or, like someone they think a straight guy would want to do.
Rarely do they look like someone I would want to do.
Rachel does.
Or at least I suspect she does when she isn’t all tarted up in network drag to go on the air. Who can forget those vacation pictures of her fishing, looking like the dyke next door?
On air, she looks smart, neutral, unaffected and (despite the drag) gay.
Finally, a face on television any PFLAG parent could love.
Of course I realize there are plenty of butch and transmasculine lesbians who take pride in the fact they’re often mistaken for men.
But I don’t think that was what Rachel was saying about herself. I think she just made a flippant remark, expressing that she feels pretty low maintenance in comparison to the overblown looks that are the television industry’s standard.
And, I’m not going to try and guess how Rachel identifies. Butch, femme, top, bottom, sassy switch… I think that’s her business. But I will say that every time I see her on television, my heart swells a little because she looks like the women I know and love.
She looks like she’s on our team.
Go team.
**********************
I’ve never really given much thought to how she looks. No, she doesn’t appear ultra-feminine, but then I don’t watch TV news or commentary for the looks of the anchors.
Go team indeed. She looks smart and she looks like a dyke. That’s what I thought when I heard that. Right on.
I don’t watch TV anymore. I have been hearing about this Maddow from NPR. A bit polarizing, not unlike that Palin person. As a male working in a female dominated profession, I have noticed that the majority of those women are of the lesbian persuasion. Odd that the hetero male & female clients so often prefer a female therapist. Would the therapist’s sexual orientation impact their preference? Just wondering…
P.S. Jolly good post.
Lesbian visibility in all media (or rather the lack of it) is an undeniable problem. But when it comes to presenting women in a one dimensional way: young and beautiful, isn’t that a problem across the board – straight and gay?
P.S. I totally agree with you: Watching Rachel every day on TV is like coming home.
Lately, Rachel looks as though she needs a haircut. I hope they haven’t convinced her to “grow her hair out” as has been the case with so many lesbians on TV. I am also uncomfortable with the “suits” they have her wearing… the low cut “tops” she is wearing underneath her suitcoats have an uncomfortable “straight girl” feeling to them… odd and uncomfortable. This is the best photo I have seen of her to date. I went out and bought 2 new pair of suspenders after I saw this photo. LOVE IT!