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PlaceholderPigeon
Dec 31, 2012
Speaking as a person who is a bit on the gender-uncertain side and born male, this thread has been pretty interesting in its explorations on how the marketing demarcates whats for girls and guys. I like dresses and such clothing a lot and I'm a quiet sensitive person, both things that really don't jive with the traditional 'manly' definition. As a person who hates the strict enforcement of gender roles by shame and mockery for both men and women, this strikes a bit of a chord with me. The whole 'be a man, don't be a girl' poo poo especially, and society's casual use of the female gender and its trappings as a handy insult for men who don't abide to their gender role.

The worst message I have found from these games is the Selena and Justin one. What really bothered me about it was the whole shame thing and the way the game's fail condition really served to highlight the pressure to be perfect. One can get a lot from looking at how the game decides

We see in a lot of these games the themes of making over or removing blemishes and becoming perfect looking, even at the cost of one's own individuality. But whats worse about the Selena one is how there's the added shame of being 'caught' (As the commentary pointed out jokingly, 'oh no, Justin has found out that she's a real human being'!). But on top of the fact that one is expected to toil to remove one's imperfections, one must also not show that one is even doing so. Failure is punished by shame an mockery, which is what society uses most of the time to keep people abiding by the gender rules - when it doesn't resort to violence that is. The Hollywood makeover game did this too, to some degree, by suggesting that not abiding by their definition of 'cool' would lead to a disaster, and have one laughed or shamed off the red carpet.

The 'dream girl' game where the girl had to make her appearance match the boy's desires in order to keep him was bad too, but it didn't seem to have that hint of shame that bothered me so.

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Wind God Sety
Sep 2, 2011

"I think you really should be in the ocean..."

So that's what I been doing wrong!

Antistar01 posted:

It got me thinking: what are some cartoons aimed at young(er?) people that are entertaining and have not-too-terribly-hosed-up messages?

Gravity Falls is a kids' cartoon that actually has some really good messages in general, and even has an episode where the male lead learns that changing yourself to conform to traditional masculinity is dumb.

Wanamingo
Feb 22, 2008

by FactsAreUseless

Anoia posted:

Chris Rock did a documentary called "Good Hair" that focuses on the evolution of the pressure to either have straightened hair, or the best weave money can buy. It's pretty interesting, and at times sobering, particularly when you see a toddler getting her hair straightened for the first time.

When people talk about the high standards of beauty women are held to, they don't often think about that. I know girls that hate getting their hair straightened, but have it done anyway for fear of people judging them if they leave it natural.

I'm going to second this post. Everybody in this thread go watch Good Hair.

tlarn posted:

When it came to having dudes understanding what it's like to be frustrated with how your sex/gender is portrayed, a recent example I like to use for others is to point to Disney's Brave and ask that they pay close attention to how the men are portrayed.

It's pretty much like this with all Disney films, really. A good question to ask is if they can name any of their princes, save for Aladdin.

Midnight Voyager
Jul 2, 2008

Lipstick Apathy

Wanamingo posted:

I'm going to second this post. Everybody in this thread go watch Good Hair.


It's pretty much like this with all Disney films, really. A good question to ask is if they can name any of their princes, save for Aladdin.

Prince Phillip and his horse were pretty great. And there's Prince Eric!

The men in most of the movies are comic relief or... utter nonentities. I guess they have to make the prince look good somehow.

Senerio
Oct 19, 2009

Roëmænce is ælive!

Wanamingo posted:

It's pretty much like this with all Disney films, really. A good question to ask is if they can name any of their princes, save for Aladdin.

Charming, Phillip, Eric, Adam, Flynn, Hans, Kristoff, Naveen, and that's it off the top of my head, but I see your point. Links added after I made the list.

If I ever get around to it, I figure I'll try to get a video up showing off some Cartoon Network flash games because they're actually a lot better than I remember them being (read: they're competent, and some are actually fun!)

BlazeEmblem
Jun 8, 2013

Uh oh. Do I use Ariadne thread or Goho-M?

Speaking as a guy, I tend to get really annoyed when someone, whether it is advertisers or parents, tries to enforce a distinction between boys and girls during early childhood. The kids don't care what toys they get as long as they can use up energy playing with them. It's the culture telling them to play with dolls or action figures, not the kids themselves.

I used to work at a gas station, about the time the Kinder Surprise came out with its pink version - for "girls", because the years of kids of both sexes enjoying the toys were apparently not a real thing, at least according to the ones who made the decision. However, whenever we sold one, it was only because the parent would take the blue one away from the kid and give them the pink one. Almost every girl that got a pink Kinder Surprise wanted the blue one at first. I don't know if it was because the kids were used to them, or because they toys advertised looked cooler than the girls toys, or just that they grabbed the blue one without realizing that there was another one, or whatever. The point is, we barely sold any, because the girls wanted the blue ones.

KataraniSword
Apr 22, 2008

but at least I don't have
a MLP or MSPA avatar.
I am my own man.

BlazeEmblem posted:

I don't know if it was because the kids were used to them, or because they toys advertised looked cooler than the girls toys, or just that they grabbed the blue one without realizing that there was another one, or whatever. The point is, we barely sold any, because the girls wanted the blue ones.

Part of it may actually go even more subtle than that: the blue that the normal Kinder Surprise designs use is designed specifically to complement and contrast the red and whites on the normal packaging, whereas the pink kind of bleeds into the other two colors. The "for boys" version is specifically designed to be eye-catching, and the "for girls" one is just thrown together because :j::hf::effort:.

It's actually a depressingly common trend, I'm finding - some rear end in a top hat complains to a marketing executive that they can't find any <product> appropriate for girls, and so they go and make a gendered version with the minimal effort necessary, thus furthering an unconscious belief that objects intended for women and girls - who obviously "need" the gendering - should be watered down and half-assed.

KirbyKhan
Mar 20, 2009



Soiled Meat

Wanamingo posted:

It's pretty much like this with all Disney films, really. A good question to ask is if they can name any of their princes, save for Aladdin.

Prince Naveen was a brilliant balancing act. He couldn't be a white prince because that would be racist in the "Only good man is white man" sorta way. He couldn't be a black dude because that would be racist in the "Only black girls should have the black boys in the end". So they made him indeterminately brown in a The Rock style. Obviously foreign, but approachable and affable.

Related to video: White Tiana made me crack the gently caress up.

Zoe
Jan 19, 2007
Hair Elf
Flynn Rider was a great character. (not as great as the horse though :colbert:)

And before you say he's not a prince, he married a princess okay, that totally counts.

Gensuki
Sep 2, 2011
.

Gensuki fucked around with this message at 17:28 on Feb 23, 2014

Zoe
Jan 19, 2007
Hair Elf
Okay, I know this is not going to be a popular opinion but I'm going to just come right out and say it: Utterly toxic community aside, the My Little Pony cartoon has good lessons for girls sometimes. I said before I watch it on weekends with my nieces...one of the characters owns their own business and one of the morals was that real friends should understand your entire life can't loving revolve around them 24/7 and sometimes you have to put your responsibilities first...I was absolutely blown away since I'd expected the exact opposite from a children's cartoon about the magic of friendship or whatever. There's also been a couple of plots about a character overcoming crippling shyness and learning not to be a doormat all the time, which I wish I'd had the opportunity to watch when I was 11 or 12 or so.

All of the characters are actually pretty great at avoiding the typical stereotypes...yes it's a 'girly' cartoon, but they're portrayed more like young adults with jobs and responsibilities. And I always thought it was interesting that my youngest niece (just turned 6) spent such a long time insisting Rainbow Dash must be a boy because she was aggressive and athletic and colored blue.

megane
Jun 20, 2008




Man this forest is greeeat :2bong:

Oh god I can't breathe

megane fucked around with this message at 05:18 on Jan 31, 2014

Miijhal
Jul 10, 2011

I am so tired... I am so tired all the time...
I'm a trans* woman I actually realized fairly recently that I was internalizing some of the kinds of things these game push. I try to be pretty well informed about feminist issues and do my best not perceive others as being valuable only in appearance, but the whole time I was overlooking the fact that I was still holding myself to those standards. I spent a lot of time being miserable because I felt like I could never add up to other women since I can't fit into the traditional standards of beauty.

Much as I laugh at how terrible these games are, they're still pretty uncomfortable to watch and play, knowing how insidious that kind of messaging can be.

Miijhal fucked around with this message at 05:20 on Jan 31, 2014

Tiggum
Oct 24, 2007

Your life and your quest end here.


Antistar01 posted:

It got me thinking: what are some cartoons aimed at young(er?) people that are entertaining and have not-too-terribly-hosed-up messages? Well there may be a lot, I dunno; my brain went straight to Daria and got stuck there. drat I loved that show.

In the 90s I was a teenager growing up in a small country town in Australia. It's easy to forget how isolating that can be if you don't really fit in, considering for example that the Internet wasn't really much of a thing yet. So the first time that intro came on, it was like a revelation. "That's me! (Only female.) I'm not the only one like this!"

I remember it being really good overall at promoting individuality and whatnot. It's been years since I've watched it, though. I wonder how well it holds up today.

Daria is an excellent show. I think the only criticism I'd have of it was that as a teenager who didn't fit in I had this belief in my own superiority, and Daria does kind of reinforce that. She does grow as a person as the series progresses, but it can feel like the show is saying "Yes, you are better than other people, just as you've always thought." I'm not sure you could really get rid of that aspect of it without making the character less realistic and relateable though.

The biggest sign of how good the show was though is the fact that it didn't just appeal to people like you and me, everyone watched it. I think everyone could relate to the characters, and it was really funny. For anyone who hasn't seen it, the first and last episodes of season one (Esteemsters and The Misery Chick) are probably the best to watch to get an overall impression of the show and are well worth your time.

Since I'm looking at the episode listing now, season two's Monster and See Jane Run are also great, and Daria! - The Musical from season three is one of my favourite bits of TV ever, though it's one of the lighter, more comical episodes.

Yapping Eevee
Nov 12, 2011

STAND TOGETHER.
FIGHT WITH HONOR.
RESTORE BALANCE.

Eevees play for free.

Zoe posted:

Okay, I know this is not going to be a popular opinion but I'm going to just come right out and say it: Utterly toxic community aside, the My Little Pony cartoon has good lessons for girls sometimes.

:golfclap: It takes guts to actually say that in this sub-forum. Mind you, one would hope that the 'GIRLS GAMES MEGATHREAD <3' won't tear into you too badly for having that opinion.

Daria is also pretty great. :)

chocolatekake
Jul 31, 2013

Cake? Chocolate.
Transgendered girl here, and one of the main problems I have with other people on the subject isn't so much with standards of beauty (though I do have my fair share of personal problems about that), it's when people categorize you based on your sex. Since I haven't come out to anyone in real life, if I say something or do something sort of weird, people say "oh, that's just because you're a boy," or something along those lines. I don't get why certain things have to be based on your sex. I'm about as feminine as my sister in some regards and I'm not entirely socially adept, why can't it just be because of your personality? That sort of thing is like attaching genders to toys like trucks or dolls. They're just toys, I'm just a girl.

I haven't really thought too much about cartoons that promote good messages, but I second Adventure Time and My Little Pony. And I'm adding Amethyst: Princess of Gemworld to the online shorts category.

Veloxyll
May 3, 2011

Fuck you say?!

Antistar01 posted:

I cracked up at the stoned fairy. That'd make another great avatar, I think.
Given how much the Bloodbowl chat insists I'm a girl sometimes I may have to steal this one later.


Devious Vacuum posted:

The other day I got a very important message on Ask.fm, and that person convinced me to make a clarification for this thread:



The message I got was related to Girl Games and trans women. I want to clarify that while the games we're making fun of are blatantly exclusionary on many levels, in this thread, we are all girls. These games want to define "girls" strictly and narrowly, so in this thread, I want to do the opposite. The bad messages in these games effect everyone, so therefore everyone is girls. Including everyone who identifies as female, which includes trans women, or, as I like to call them, women.

When I react to and analyze these games, I am going to start with what offends me personally, but of course that is not going to always be the same for the rest of you. People with different experiences and backgrounds will have additional things to say about why these games are dumb and bad. I have no authority to speak on behalf of a trans woman, a queer woman, a woman of color, A MAN, and so on, about how these games affect them except on a very superficial level. But that's why I made this thread!

I want you to tell me, and I am eager to hear your opinons and experiences. Ultimately, I want to increase my own awareness of all these issues and the awareness of the entire thread as well! It's no good to go around tearing down only some problematic aspects of these games. If you are reading the thread, if you are experiencing these games, then your opinions are valid and you will be heard here.

Okay, now go back to making silly .gifs, thank you everyone.

From my personal life outside the internet, I get the occasional person who thinks I'm a girl because I have long hair pony tailed up. Strangely, it put a bee under my bonnet more when it was 3 separate groups of kids in one day, than the two older gentlemen who have gotten my gender wrong.

I've also noticed, with my brother's children, that his daughters told his son that he can't play with some of the toys, they're for girls (they were like 5-8 at the time). It gets very temping to o into a feminist rage when that happens.

Which also bugs me with lady outfits in even non-girl games. I had to stop playing Loren: Amazon Princess because every time I saw the outfits I could not help but scream WHYYYYYYY.

And then of course there's my 17 y/o co-worker who, while being at what I'd call "healthily thin to average" build and weight, described herself as curvy. And bemoans 'having' to shave her legs. And has other patterns of thinking that summon parts of my feminist rage muscles twitch in agitation. And there's always the niggling feeling of "Should I say something. Or is that jerkish and judgemental and controlling. Just like the status quo."

That said, I still want to wear a skirt to work one Saturday. Just to see how long it takes for someone to say something if nothing else.

For maximum confusion and disjunction posted:

In the 90s I was a teenager growing up in a small country town in Australia. It's easy to forget how isolating that can be if you don't really fit in, considering for example that the Internet wasn't really much of a thing yet. So the first time that intro came on, it was like a revelation. "That's me! (Only female.) I'm not the only one like this!"

I remember it being really good overall at promoting individuality and whatnot. It's been years since I've watched it, though. I wonder how well it holds up today.

It took me a while to figure out that you meant Daria is a female version of you. Not that you were a female Daria.


I should really get to work on making an update for this thread. With actual game content, I mean.

Antistar01
Oct 20, 2013

Tiggum posted:

Daria is an excellent show. I think the only criticism I'd have of it was that as a teenager who didn't fit in I had this belief in my own superiority, and Daria does kind of reinforce that. She does grow as a person as the series progresses, but it can feel like the show is saying "Yes, you are better than other people, just as you've always thought." I'm not sure you could really get rid of that aspect of it without making the character less realistic and relateable though.

That's a good point. No danger of me specifically at the time feeling superior, though. Ha ha haaaah. :gbsmith:



Veloxyll posted:

It took me a while to figure out that you meant Daria is a female version of you. Not that you were a female Daria.

Hmm; according to the 'makeup and beauty' girl-games seen in this thread, I guess a 'female Daria' would be Daria in that episode where she puts makeup on and ends up looking just like her fashion-obsessed sister.

Devious Vacuum
Oct 24, 2009

Girl Games!

You guys are gonna be mad at me:


Source

Tulip
Jun 3, 2008

yeah thats pretty good


Yapping Eevee posted:

:golfclap: It takes guts to actually say that in this sub-forum. Mind you, one would hope that the 'GIRLS GAMES MEGATHREAD <3' won't tear into you too badly for having that opinion.

Daria is also pretty great. :)

"Through A Lens Darkly" s some loving amazing television.

Devious Vacuum posted:

The message is more insidious than that. It's more like "be (sexually) forward with boys, but don't let your parents find out." It reminds girls to maintain a facade of sexual purity at all times, while also telling them not to seek out any sort of guidance that might help them actually be prepared for an intimate relationship. Kissing games are the worst. Burn down kissing games.

Don't let ANYONE find out. It tells girls that the shaming of women for being sexual is justified, and something that they should perpetuate as well, because if they were worthy of not being harassed, they wouldn't have gotten caught like a dummy.

MiracleFlare
Mar 27, 2012
I feel left out: I didn't even watch Daria as a kid. I'm not sure what I watched, really, much less what kinds of messages they had about women. To be honest, up until I left high school, I sort of lived in my own bubble of ignorance. "I've never been told I can't do X because I'm a girl, therefore sexism is over! Gender? I don't even see gender." Whatever subtle sexism there was just sort of went right over my head back then, which is probably why I can't think of anything specific to bring up.

I did remember one other thing from middle school, though. It's not directly related to the games themselves, but does point out how influential the little things are. I was listening to a girl joke around while on the bus ride home. At some point, she began singing a parody of "Say My Name":

Shave my legs, shave my legs
They're getting kinda hairy, maybe even scary


Looking back, I doubt she was trying to send a message to me, but something about those words really struck me. Did she somehow know I had never shaved my legs before? I always wore long jean pants, but what about in P.E., when I had to wear gym shorts? Would people be able to see the hairs on my legs?

That night I began shaving my legs. Up until then it didn't really bother me that I had hair there, but something about the joke made me think that maybe I was just supposed to have silky smooth legs. Alas, I was kind of embarrassed about the whole thing (since having hairy legs was apparently a dark secret) and didn't ask my family for advice, so the first few times I ended up scraping some skin off because I had no idea what I was doing.

Going to a previous topic, the whole "kiss a lot, but don't get caught!" idea got really boggling for me when I found one game that actually takes place on the characters' wedding day. You'd think that'd give them free reign to kiss as much as they want, but no, their priest, their photographer, and their guests will absolutely flip their poo poo if they catch so much as a peck on the cheek.

Because of scenes like that, I interpreted the message of the kissing games a bit differently, though with the same basic idea: It's super important for you to have a boyfriend you can't spend a moment away from, but if people find out that you enjoy intimacy then you deserve to be shamed. (Tulip just beat me to this while I was typing the post up!)

So basically, yes, burn them all down. On that note, if I had any sort of gif-making skills, I'd make avatars of some of the scandalized faces from the kissing games.

Oh, and I just looked up the "Shave My Legs" thing, and I believe I found the full lyrics to the parody. I only found one site with them, so I don't know if they're even popular, but the "getting kinda hairy" thing is so close to what my friend said that I don't think it's a coincidence. It also contains lines like "Could it be that you cheat on me cause I'm so manly?" and "I know I'm hairy but I aint no man". :sigh:

EDIT: aaand I found a site that somehow snuck in that "Cooking Mama kills animals!" game that PETA did in between all the cutesy, nonviolent games in its gallery. There's nothing else of note on that site, but what the gently caress.

MiracleFlare fucked around with this message at 15:31 on Jan 31, 2014

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Gensuki posted:

Adventure Time has great morals for anyone of any age.
For kids you have "follow your dreams" and "friends are more important than items".
For teens you have "treat your girlfriend/boyfriend with love and respect" and "Don't be a jerk to people who are trying to help you"
For adults you have a lot of child rearing advice. Seriously, a lot. Kinda weird...
Boys have role models in Finn and Jake, Girls have role models in Bubblegum and Marceline.

I don't have a whole lot that's insightful to add to the discussion as a whole, but I wanted to mention that Adventure Time had an episode (Princess Cookie) that strongly reads as a metaphor for being transgender and the difficulties thereof.

Endorph
Jul 22, 2009

Zoe posted:

Okay, I know this is not going to be a popular opinion but I'm going to just come right out and say it: Utterly toxic community aside, the My Little Pony cartoon has good lessons for girls sometimes.
I sadly lost the link but I remember this incredible moment in the show where the ponies were going around singing a song about how great friendship is or something like that and hugging everyone they saw, and then they saw a dude pony with a fedora.

They stared at him for a second, awkwardly shuffled to the side, and moved on without hugging him.

The greatest lesson that's ever been taught to young girls. I really hope this actually happened, and wasn't just an amazing fake.

The_White_Crane
May 10, 2008

Veloxyll posted:

From my personal life outside the internet, I get the occasional person who thinks I'm a girl because I have long hair pony tailed up. Strangely, it put a bee under my bonnet more when it was 3 separate groups of kids in one day, than the two older gentlemen who have gotten my gender wrong.

Hah! That happens to me occasionally. The very best incident was when I was camping: I was just brushing my hair after having had a shower in the big communal shower blocks, and they were empty aside from me. Some guy comes in, catches half a glance of this betoweled, hair-shrouded figure and goes "Oh! Sorry!" and starts to back out.

To this day, I wish I'd been quick enough on the uptake not to correct him, because it would have been wonderful if he'd then walked into the actual women's bathroom and been completely flummoxed.

Quovak
Feb 2, 2009

See, the problem with online communication is that you can't feel my beard through the HTML.
Idea Channel did an episode about feminism in Adventure Time a few months back. The meme-y and overeager presentation style doesn't work for everyone, but it's worth checking out if you can get past that.

In decent girl media chat, the direct-to-DVD Tinkerbell film is surprisingly good, albeit for a much younger audience than, say, Gravity Falls. It takes a pretty unlikable oversexualized fairy from a racist 50's film and makes her a "tinker fairy" (i.e. engineer). The moral is basically to be proud of who you are, filtered through the more specific moral that, despite the challenges of STEM fields and pressure to be more "feminine", Tinkerbell will be infinitely happier sticking to what she loves and is good at rather than reinventing herself to satisfy others' expectations and avoid frustration in the short term.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUVGZiPN0hM

It's not worth watching on your own the way a Pixar film is, but I watched it with a friend's daughter and was pretty impressed. From my sample size of one 4-year-old, kids think it's great.

And there's a game!

Jenner
Jun 5, 2011
Lowtax banned me because he thought I was trolling by acting really stupid. I wasn't acting.

tlarn posted:

Ghoulia is the best of the Monster High bunch and I'll hear nothing else on the subject. :colbert:

I'm glad Monster High is trying to be forward but I look at it as someone who's semi-artsy and all I see is how disproportionately thin these girls are and how every last one of them is drawn the exact same way just with different hair/clothes/accessories.

Maybe asking for a unique look for each character is too much because Animation Costs but feh at that unrealistic thinness.

100Dachshunds
Oct 11, 2009

GOCHARMSPRINGS

Jenner posted:

I'm glad Monster High is trying to be forward but I look at it as someone who's semi-artsy and all I see is how disproportionately thin these girls are and how every last one of them is drawn the exact same way just with different hair/clothes/accessories.

Maybe asking for a unique look for each character is too much because Animation Costs but feh at that unrealistic thinness.

It's less 'animation costs' and more 'we want all clothes and accessories to fit on all dolls.' Kind of like how all 12" G.I.Joe figures (for boys!!) have the same body so their clothes and accessories are universal. This particular problem is not a gender one-- it's just a consideration of the toy making process. As nice as it'd be for different body types to be included in a set, it would be a lot less fun (and stifling, in its own way) If the fat girl had to wear the fat girl clothes and the tall boy had to wear the tall boy clothes, you know?

The thing to pick on in toy production is the sculpt of the master body...

As a 33 year old straight female who has been a severe tomboy her entire life (seriously, I dress not unlike a butch lesbian). I've never felt much pressure to conform to beauty standards. This, I'm sure, is thanks to extremely supportive parents who just wanted me to experience all life had to offer and to follow my dreams no matter where they took me. I didn't even get much pressure in school... Though I'm not sure if that was because the pressure didn't exist where I grew up (rural Maine) or if I was just not keyed to perceive it.

Devious Vacuum
Oct 24, 2009

Girl Games!

Like, oh my god! Did you guys see that Dys and FutureFriend's new Barbie LP Thread just launched? They are officially our Little Sister Thread, the Skipper to our Barbie, if you will.

Jinxie Monroe
Apr 9, 2007

No really.
Thank you.
I feel like this image is the only way I can express how strange and disturbing I find these beauty games where you repeatedly rub lotions on non-people and wash them off again and again to make them better, beautiful non-people.

Midnight Voyager
Jul 2, 2008

Lipstick Apathy

Jinxie Monroe posted:

I feel like this image is the only way I can express how strange and disturbing I find these beauty games where you repeatedly rub lotions on non-people and wash them off again and again to make them better, beautiful non-people.



It's also blatant lies, because it doesn't matter how much poo poo you put on some peoples' legs, they will never feel better after shaving.

Zoe
Jan 19, 2007
Hair Elf

100Dachshunds posted:

As a 33 year old straight female who has been a severe tomboy her entire life (seriously, I dress not unlike a butch lesbian). I've never felt much pressure to conform to beauty standards. This, I'm sure, is thanks to extremely supportive parents who just wanted me to experience all life had to offer and to follow my dreams no matter where they took me. I didn't even get much pressure in school... Though I'm not sure if that was because the pressure didn't exist where I grew up (rural Maine) or if I was just not keyed to perceive it.

This is pretty much me, except just turned 30 and from rural Texas. With one big exception though--going back to MiracleFlare's post about leg shaving, yeah I started in the 6th grade too after getting shamed hard in gym class...and in regular class, and on the bus, and basically everywhere after that even though I became obsessive about making sure to always shave, and the gym was literally the only place I ever wore shorts in the first place. I was the really shy kid who read a lot and probably too much of a doormat but junior high was a nightmare for me all around. I'm not sure how much of it was about beauty standards and how much of it was about children between the ages of 12-14 being just naturally irredeemably evil monsters who instinctively tear apart anything perceived as weak or different from them, but while I've mostly put it all behind me, to this day I still feel really uncomfortable wearing shorts in public.

Also I get unreasonably annoyed every time I see a woman in a movie who supposed to be from hundreds of years ago and has just been fighting pirates or on the run for her life or whatever and she still apparently has access to a razor and a shampoo and a manicure set and a magical portable shower and plenty of time to use it off camera. Guys are at least allowed to look scruffy sometimes.

your evil twin
Aug 23, 2010

"What we're dealing with...
is us! Those things look just like us!"

"Speak for yourself, I couldn't look that bad on a bet."
So someone linked me to a fun puzzle game that requires fast reactions and keyboard skills... and it's on a bright pink website named "Dressup Pink" that unsurprisingly is all about dress up games. The player character is female, so I guess kudos to them for figuring girls may like to play fast-paced tomb raiding puzzle games rather than do dressup.

http://www.dressuppink.com/quick-sand.html

dijon du jour
Mar 27, 2013

I'm shy
Ugh. I'm currently trapped inside as a snowstorm blows outside. What I could use is a tropical vacation. Perhaps even a Tropical Spa Day?



Oh wow, what a coincidence.



Our spa day is already off to a bad start as we rub Smooze all over our face. Or maybe it's supposed to be grape jelly? I'm not sure which option is worse, honestly.



Now goes on the banana mush. Have you noticed the theme of this game yet?



Next comes green... pineapple? Okay. and kiwi slices.
Nothing like highly acidic kiwi juice in your eyes. It'll keep 'em nice and tender.



Of course we then have to jelly up the eyebrows. This is obviously very important.



Also important is the ceremonial plucking of the eyebrows.



Next we turn her over and liberally rub with blueberry compote. Leave to soak in for 15 minutes then wipe off any excess.



Cover in watermelon juice and let soak for another 10 minutes. Not only will this impart a subtle flavor of watermelon to the meat it will also help prevent the meat from drying out during cooking.





Now cover with orange slices so zat they can impart zeir own flavor upon ze meat and wrap ze whole thing in parchment paper.



Place on a baking sheet and cook in a 400 degree oven for about ten minute.



Ten Minutes Later



Eet eez finally cooked and it smells wonderful. Now we just have to remove eet from ze parchment.





Aah magnifique. Notice how ze parchment created a steam chamber keeping ze meat meat moist and tender troo cooking and ze hair has maintained eets body and bounce. Not even ze makeup has run in ze high heat.



Bon appétit and happy cooking!



*theme song*

Regy Rusty
Apr 26, 2010

That was magnificent.

Dyslexiactic
Mar 1, 2011

I'm angry and I want to express it somehow.
:sun:
Holy poo poo I'm crying that was amazing :golfclap:.

thedaian
Dec 11, 2005

Blistering idiots.
That was truly wonderful.

Also, in addition to being a monster in an old My Little Pony movie, Smooze is apparently also an actual drink

Nihilarian
Oct 2, 2013


Truly the response that game deserves.

:golfclap:

MiracleFlare
Mar 27, 2012
And here I was, worried that I didn't have a recipe for this weekend. That was very enlightening.

Clayren
Jun 4, 2008

grandma plz don't folow me on twiter its embarassing, if u want to know what animes im watching jsut read the family newsletter like normal
Between this and fruit prom the message I am getting is that girls like fruit. Which makes a lot of sense because women love smoothies and fruit baskets and I've had to spray my apple trees 3 times this Summer to keep them away.

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Devious Vacuum
Oct 24, 2009

Girl Games!

Hey folks! In a little while I'm going to stream some girl games for funsies:



Join in and INTERACT LIVE without having to turn off your AdBlock!

EDIT: All done for now! Thanks for watching and I'll post the recording later.

Devious Vacuum fucked around with this message at 02:56 on Feb 1, 2014

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