Let’s say you happened to be next to me in the passenger seat. And some other car ran a red light, missing us by inches. You’d hear a swear word or two.
From the back seat, you’d hear, “Mo-om, you said …” as my son, seeing a chance to get away with it, gleefully repeats my offending word.
I can’t say I never curse. Sure I do, probably more than I did 20 years ago. I could blame it on not being as nice as I used to be. But it’s more that manners in general aren’t as nice as they used to be.
Words once shocking are now common. When Vice President Dick Cheney lobbed a vitriolic “F” word at a Democratic lawmaker on the Senate floor, it caused less controversy than when former Vice President Dan Quayle told a schoolboy the word potato needed an “e” at the end.
When I read in Monday’s Herald about a stink over a specialty pet-supply store in Lynnwood called High Maintenance Bitch, I was both amused and annoyed. In its play on the word bitch, the business reminds me of my 7-year-old getting away with something.
I’m not stirred up enough to protest a store name. I’m not on a crusade to stamp out swearing. High Maintenance Bitch is just more proof that the civility I grew up with has eroded nearly to the point of nonexistence.
The article said store co-founder Lori Pacchiano sees the name as “edgy” and “hip,” one that “embraces women’s sexuality.”
All over the place, from T-shirts to television, there’s a tone so coarse and blatant I just don’t get it. Some time ago, I pulled into a parking space in Everett. In front of me was a nice sports car, shiny and new.
What do you suppose it said on the license plate holder? It said, “Skinny Bitch.” Why go to all the expense of driving a nice car only to present yourself in such a way?
Edgy and hip, fine. But crass and tasteless, that’s what the “Skinny Bitch” license plate holder said about its owner.
At school shopping time last summer, I received an e-mail from Lisa Hudgens, a Stanwood-area mother. She and her two daughters were discouraged by slogans they had seen on T-shirts at Fred Meyer and Wal-Mart.
“Most of them have sayings such as ‘Boy Toy’ or ‘Looking for My Next Boyfriend,’ and much, much worse,” Hudgens wrote. “We couldn’t find anything for my older teenager on the T-shirt rack that wasn’t offensive.
“I thought feminism’s goal was to get women away from being thought of as mere sex objects,” Hudgens said. “Our children are being told that they should portray themselves as sex objects.”
All of us raising daughters and sons have more important concerns than what’s on a T-shirt or how a pet shop labels itself. Still, we’re seeing objectification aimed at today’s young women that I don’t think they see.
There is power associated with being a “bitch,” skinny or not. But listen up, young women: Real power of your own – the kind you’ll have in your bank account when you’re 70 – comes with education and hard work, not with the size or shape of your body.
While Hudgens was out school shopping, the trendy retailer Abercrombie &Fitch was taking heat last summer over its line of young women’s T-shirts. Lettering across the chest of one of them said “Who Needs Brains When You Have These?”
Another said “Freshman 15” along with fake signatures of 15 guys. Slogans on other Abercrombie shirts read, “Blondes are adored, brunettes are ignored” and “I’d look great on you.”
How very skanky.
Online, there are products with many more overt messages. They’d draw attention, but is it the kind of attention anyone would want?
The Herald’s Business section has been publishing a series called “Dream Job.” Monday’s installment by reporter Bryan Corliss was a profile of Corky Townsend. Since 2003, she’s been Boeing’s chief project engineer for the 747.
Read to the end, you’ll find her favorite saying. It’s not hip, edgy or obscene. It doesn’t shock or evoke sexuality.
The top 747 engineer likes to say this: “Peachy.”
Columnist Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460 or muhlsteinjulie@heraldnet.com.
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