My St. Valentine's Day: Warm Bodies, Monster High Doll & One Billion Rising

Oook, let's get to something happier!

After yesterday's rant, I need extra sweetness in my blog, so I'll tell you about my St. Valentine's Day, hoping I don't switch from annoying to cheesy.
But you know what? I'm not falling in single people's guilt trip, you know, all the bitter facebook statuses and stuff XD I'm proud of being lucky! Hah!
Ok, so XD.
Yesterday me and my boyfriend went to the movies. And we saw Warm Bodies.

I was the one who chose to see it among three options (for the record, the other ones were Django and Les Misérables), which were all suggested by me, so I was sure I was going to see something I liked XD. My boyfriend wanted to see Django but on Valentine's Day I wanted to see something romantic, so he suggested to see this one.

You know, I was pretty skeptical about this movie. On one hand I wanted to see it so badly because there's Nicholas Hoult and I love Nicholas Hoult, he's my baby, I would see anything with him in it. On the other hand, it seemed worse than Twilight, 'cause the concept of "zombie" seemed to have been completely misunderstood, besides, it looked like the classic Beauty and the Beast kind of story.

Well, that's what it was: it was sappy, clichéd, the same old story we've seen over and over again, and it was clearly meant for a thirteen years olds public.

And maybe that's why I kind of liked it and my boyfriend took up the cudgels for it when I said that, in the matter of knowing what the monster they were talking about was, it was even worse than Meyer's work. Whoever wrote this book doesn't have a clue about what a zombie is, this I can assure you, and turned the whole zombie trend into a blatant chickflick (but my boyfriend loves chickflicks, maybe that's why he appreciated it). But it was so, so sweet, it really gets to your heart in a pure and innocent way I haven't experienced in ages.

Yesterday I told my boyfriend that maybe he was influenced by what I call "the Sloth factor" (you all saw The Goonies, right?), which means, a clumsy monster who is thought to be evil but in truth has a heart of gold, but only the protagonist can see that, while the others tease him and try to hurt him.

I mean, this is an evergreen, I guess no one can not get attached with this kind of character: you are basically forced to be on his side and to pray that no one kills him.

Plus, Nicholas Hoult is amazing. I mean, there are actors who, no matter what they do in their lives, you always think of them in a particular role, you know? Even in other movies or shows where they're playing a totally different character. But not Hoult. I've seen him in About a Boy, Skins, A Single Man, X-Men First Class and now in this one, in all of which he played very different roles, and he was great in each one of them, and not one time I thought of him as Tony Stonem, which is the character that brought me to liking him so much.

So: if you're into The Walking Dead and that kind of stuff, please avoid this movie, you'd hate it. Same goes if you can't stand chick flicks: you'd hate it even more. Do not expect to see zombies, because you won't see any of them. But do not expect Twilight either, 'cause, even if there's more ignorance about the creatures and there's even less effort in building a plot, this movie is sweet and moving in a way Twilight can never be. And that's because it doesn't take itself seriously, unlike Twilight, and the two characters (if I can call them so, since they're each a stereotype for their genre) are adorable in a way you could only see in the movies of your childhood.

Go and see it if you're free from prejudice and ready to feel like a pre-teen again, I mean that kind of pre-teens who have pajama parties drinking hot chocolate and watching vhss all night, giggling and chatting about that cute boy in the other class.

And after the movie...

My boyfriend gave me presents :D! I didn't expect that. We had agreed to not give each other anything 'cause we're quite broke these days XD he's unemployed and I recently had to pay for my and his The Muse concert tickets (oh, by the way, I'M GOING TO SEE THE MUSE NEXT JUNE!!), and then I had to spend a lot of money on an unexpected and unpleasant travel, and on top of that my wallet was stolen, so not only I lost quite a lot of cash but I haven't even been able to use my credit card since my bank lost the new one that was sent to me a month ago. (Which is insane, imho.)

So I told him that his present would've had to wait, and he told me that by the way he hadn't found what he wanted to give me, but he hadn't told me he had gone looking for another present!

But before I show you that, please have a look at this.

My favourite cake. Heart-shaped. That was so thoughtful of him! I was so happy with this cake that when I received another present I was appalled.

Awww!

I'd seen her at the mall a few weeks ago and I was a little bit sad 'cause I liked her so much but didn't have money at the moment. I'd never figured he would've remembered that! And so after we came home from the cinema he gave me this present. This man knows me. And he's definitely the sweetest person on earth! All these surprises from him really cheered me up, I'm so grateful to him for caring so much about me.

And speaking of caring...

Yesterday I also went to the One Billion Rising flashmob in my city. This is the video of the event:

You can even see me in the distance in the very first seconds XD well, you can't really see anything... but if you look very carefully next to the column on the left, you can see two girls on the steps: the one on the right has a red thingie on her head and is holding something in her hands. Well, that's me XD with my bright red bow and my camera. (Side note: you couldn't imagine how much attention a bright red bow on your head can get you. Seriously, if I'd gone around in a full-goth outfit I wouldn't have gotten as many stares. Children seemed to especially appreciate it.)
This was a great event. There were even more people than it looks like on the video and the mood was absolutely good, there was some kind of energy in the air, full of positive vibrations. I didn't dance because I really suck at dancing, I couldn't keep the steps in mind for my life, but I'm glad I was there and filmed the event. To those who think that the whole initiative was controlled and exploited by politics, I say: you should've been there. Men and women and children dancing all together for women's rights. The crowded square and the feeling of sisterhood; nay, of siblinghood, since the whole thing was meant to be gender inclusive.
I think that going to this flashmob was as important for me as going on a date on Valentine's Day. And it convinced me that I'm fighting for something real and that I'm not alone. To all of you who relentlessly fight for women's right and face a wall of ignorance, indifference, hostility and violence, just know that you are not alone: we are not alone.

Yes, yesterday was definitely a good day.

Something different

Today I'm writing about something different than usual.
I'm not really in the mood for talking about clothes, for several reasons, so I thought I might share something that's been really bothering me these days: I hope you won't mind if I'll leave clothes aside for once and free some space for some feminist talk.
I know my readers are intelligent young women who take concern over gender equality, so I'd like to share my thoughts about something that recently happened in my country.

So, there a preface to be made: Italy's having elections. I'm not going to talk about this specifically 'cause the whole thing is starting to really get to my nerves, and I can't stand to see those faces on tv anymore, let alone talking about them. Oh, and then we have the Pope's side adventure, you know - for those who don't know: he resigned, so there's another election in the Vatican.
There are the elections, and the candidates are campaigning. So it happened that Silvio Berlusconi (I guess I don't have to explain who he is, and I don't mean it in a good way) was making a speech in a firm of a friend of his, and he called a woman on the stage to talk to her.
I don't know exactly what they were talking about, but at a certain point, here's what he said to her (you can see the video here, since it's in italian I'll give you a translation):
"I beg your pardon, but I haven't really gotten one thing; do you come? Do you come?"
"Yes."
"But uhm, excuse me: just once?"
"No, there are two plants!"
"How many times do you come?"
"Ok, so, we can put two plants and the leds, and a visit for each time, and we can even put the electric bycicle."
 "So, how many times?"
"Three, four, five, depends on what's demanded."
"How much time between each time?"
"You should ask our technicians."
"Ok, well, it seems to me like a favorable offer."
"Great! We're glad of it."
"Will you turn around one more time?"
"Excuse me...?"
"Towards there."
(I don't know if I was able to render the sexual subtexts, but his lines were FULL of them.)
As you can see from the video, the crowd laughed out loud and applauded him the whole time.
Awful, huh? This is beyond awful. And the worst thing about it is that this kind of sexism is perpetrated by a political candidate who should be a role model for his country. But I guess we deserve him for having voted for him in the past: the U.S. have President Obama, we have this crazy, sexist, racist, old douchebag.
Well, actually, maybe the worst thing is that people laughed and clapped, so it means that this old jerk represents the view of italian citizens (which is true, this country is sexist as hell).
But actually no, these weren't the worst things in this story, as awful as they can be. You know what happened next?
Italian press, and a lot of italian people, commented the news by blaming the woman. The victim of the harassment.
Why? Because she didn't respond properly.
This is the apotheosis of victim blaming, I mean, people, seriously. A political candidate makes sexist jokes about a woman, humiliating her in front of a crowd, knowing that she can't fight back 'cause she might lose her job, the people there pander him, and the blame is hers...?
Because she should have fought! Because she could at least not have smiled! Because she laughed in a silly way! Because it's because of women like her if men don't respect us! Because she sold her dignity in exchange for money! Guys, seriously, I'll stop now because I'm burning with rage. And I read these comments in feminist facebook groups. I don't even dare to read what people commented elsewhere. I might burst into tears.
Yeah, we're all so fucking brave behind a computer screen, aren't we? It's not like we paralyze when they harass us on the street and we don't know what to answer because we're so fucking humiliated and shocked by the fact that someone doesn't even think they owe us the least respect. No, we are cool, strong women! We don't care if every time we fight back instead of smiling we get thousands of "hey, why are you getting angry now, gawd, what's wrong with you, are you on your period? Jeez", because you should not only take sexist jokes but you should also laugh about them 'cause if you don't you are a rad fem with no sense of humour who hates men.
I mean, I've been a feminist for a long time, I've learnt to fight back when I'm a victim of sexism and I've dealt with the fact that I'll be forever the pain in the ass who can't take an innocent joke, and still sometimes I'm tempted to just smile and stay silent 'cause I don't want to raise the usual mess for once. And, I repeat, I'm a trained feminist who is considered to be brave. What if this woman wasn't, and didn't know what to do? We, as women, should be kind, and nice, and take every kind of joke 'cause hey, they're only jokes: imagine if she screamed "FUCK YOU, YOU PIECE OF SHIT" and stormed off in rage. Imagine what kind of treatment she would have received.
And by the way, for god's sake, she could have lost her job! She was just an employee and her boss was a friend of Berlusconi's, you can bet she would have lost her job. You know what someone answered to that? That I was being sexist because I was making it all about that woman-in-career crap.
... what. The. Actual. Fuck? No, seriously dude, what the fuck are you talking about. Let's leave the sexism in saying "woman in career" aside for a moment and let's focus on how he's trying to make me look like the sexist one there. This is vicious, guys. And I'm disgusted.
And they went on and on and on with women who have no self respect and on how it was all her fault and I literally saw NO comment about how horrible Berlusconi had been and most of all about the jerks that laughed. Not a single one. There were even some conspiracists who said it was just a little show they had prepared together, so she was an accomplice.
Next day, an answer to our doubts came from the firm, and turns out she wasn't offended, but flattered. A shower of "I TOLD YOU SO" came from the sexists.
Yea, too bad some hours later she declared that the previous declaration was totally fake and that she hadn't felt flattered at all; if anything, she had felt uncomfortable and embarrassed.
... and still they went on saying that these women sell their dignities just in order to not displease their boss, and that at least she shouldn't have smiled, 'cause you know, it never happens to these people to laugh when they're embarrassed or nervous. And one more time, they're telling women how they should behave and how they're just whores without dignity for not having behaved as they were expected to.
And that word. Dignity. I'm so sick and tired of people telling women that they should have more dignity. It's about time they shove that fucking word up their asses, 'cause I'm tired, I really can't take any more guys telling me and any other women what dignity is and what I should do because if I don't do so then I don't have any dignity.
So please tell me why dignity (or lack of) is never associated with men. Why are we always the one who are required to have "dignity", to respond properly because it's wrong to be silent even if you're shocked and embarrassed, to not scream and insult because it's wrong to be rude, to not go to bed with several partners because that's slutty, to not show our cleavage or our legs because otherwise we are looking for it and lack of dignity.
This has to STOP.
And if you think this is the end of it, hear the news: this woman's boss commented her last statements with "this is going to have consequences".
Do you think that shoving this in the sexists' faces finally made them shut up? No sir. She should have fought. She is no good example. It's all fault of women like her if. She could at least have.
And not a word on that crazy pig we have as a possible premier. 'cause that how he is, you know. This is the usual stuff.
Usual stuff MY ASS. I'm sick and tired of this man and of the culture of sexism he nurtured throughout his whole government, I can't stand it anymore. So he can be forgiven 'cause that's the way he is, but she can't because she's not giving a good example.
That's when I'm really glad I'm behind a screen because they could get me to murder them. Cold-bloodedly and without regrets.

And since this post is already quite long I'll spare you the debate over the sexist joke a comedian made some days ago on a female politician during a tv program, with the complicity of the host, or the incidence of the f word in this entry would probably get out of control.

I mean, I'm not one of those xenophile pseudo-intellectuals who worry about what the neighbour might say ("Omg, I bet the French/Germans/English/Americans are so laughing about us now" I really hope they don't, since it's the old jerk they should be laughing about, not me) and I don't consider myself responsible for what he says: he's not representative of the whole country's views, please remember that. But lately I found out he does reflect the view of most of italian citizens, and that's sad.
And please don't take this as a "hey, I'm a special unicorn, I'm one of the few clever people in this ocean of italian idiots" 'cause this is an attitude I really hate. In fact, I've always hoped I wasn't a special unicorn and I've always had faith in my fellow citizens, because I couldn't believe there were so many of them (them: sexist homophobic racist scumbags) and so few of us (normal, decent people).
I don't know, I'm disheartened, really.
Please tell me that things are different abroad, because I need a place to run away to when I reach the limit here. And trust me, that moment's getting close.