A fight for realism?

"Hollywood always wanted me to be pretty, but I fought for realism." ~ Bette Davis

It seems like talking about British culture has become today's theme. But then again, I've been thinking about it a lot lately. Mainly because I've been watching a lot of British television and missing bits about Scotland (the rain every day, the beer, the feeling of everything being foreign and yet so similar...)

Among those things, another sort of thing has enchanted me about British media, something I've noticed in novels and on TV shows. There seems to be a sort of trend of using female leads that aren't your traditional Hollywood types. They seem to appear in mysteries series or sci-fi genres (the ones I'm thinking of are the books The Eyre Affair, The Dead Lie Down, The Likeness and, you knew this was coming, the TV show Torchwood). They feature quirky, not-traditionally beautiful women who aren't afraid to speak their minds and do what needs to be done, even though they may not want to. They make mistakes. They're compassionate while still strong and not overly sexual. But they're still sensual and feminine - just not over the top. Over the top like how in CSI, Catherine Willows is always running around in tanktops and all the guys are in their full investigation gear.

Catharine Willows, CSI

Gwen Cooper, Torchwood

See the difference?

This is even a more glammed up version of Gwen, I feel like. I mean, the first time we meet her on the show, she's in full police gear with her hair all tucked up under her hat. No Catharine-like waves in sight.

Of course, I have to remind myself that England was also the country that gave us Twiggy. And thus in association, pants that will never fit women's hips. Of course, I guess the really scary thing is I look at Twiggy and think, "Oh, she's not that skinny." Then I take a closer look at her arms and I'm like, "Fuck yeah, she is." But then I think again, "No, not really - there's girls in my classes who look like that." Then I just feel weird and pissed off.

Twiggy, you're wonderful, but I hate you.

It's true that super skinny women have become WAY more common. Not so much in college, because people have finally realized that you can't walk a mile to class each day and not eat more to compensate. But high school totally sucked because it seemed like what like 50% of the girls (but was probably more like 10%) were frightfully skinny. And I, of course, was not. Example of what some of the girls at my school were like. One of my classmates got treated for bulimia and when she came back to school from rehab, the first thing one of her so-called-friends said was, I kid you not, "She looks so fat." And people wonder why kids hate going to school.

So, to say the least, it's certainly nice to see women like Gwen Cooper on TV, who are beautiful not because they're scantily clad or because they're super skinny or shit like that. It's nice that Gwen has imperfect teeth and seems to be of normalish body weight. Girls need to see more of this on TV, in books, everywhere. Why can't women be the way they look in real life? There's a difference between creating an imagined world and representing one person's idea of a utopia. Besides, beauty isn't the same think to everyone. Perhaps we're looking for it in all the wrong places. Maybe it's something simpler, more in line with this:

“The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears, the figure that she carries, or the way she combs her hair. The beauty of a woman is seen in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides. True beauty in a woman is reflected in her soul. It's the caring that she lovingly gives, the passion that she shows and the beauty of a woman only grows with passing years.” ~ Audrey Hepburn

It's not that appearance doesn't matter; it clearly does. But it's all about belief, confidence and your eyes. If YOU believe that you are beautiful, if you truly TRULY LOVE yourself, it will show. Of course, this is all easier said than done. But I believe it to be true. There is no one definition of beauty, and if there was, all of the people we consider to be beautiful would all look the same. And people like Paris Hilton would be more popular than Angelina Joli. But I think Audrey Hepburn's idea of beauty if more spot on and more of what these British female characters are beginning to show more of. So work on this, American TV. I'm a little out of touch with some of your shows, so maybe you've gotten better about this. But then again, we've still got this goddamn show: