Film Review: Seeking Happily Ever After November 9, 2010
Posted by Onely in film review, Singles Resource, We like. . ..Tags: kerry david, michelle cove, princess fairy tale, seeking happily ever after, single women
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Seeking Happily Ever After: One Generation’s Struggle to Redefine the Fairy Tale. Directed and Produced by Michelle Cove; Produced by Kerry David. 2010.
“I keep seeing parts of the movie in my head,” said my friend Monica at dinner, after we saw Seeking Happily Ever After at its DC screening. This is usually the sign of either a very inspiring movie, or a very disturbing one. Seeking Happily Ever After deftly manages to be both. I hope our Copious Readers get a chance to check it out. If you don’t live near a screening, maybe you can arrange one in your area.
For the award-winning documentary, director Michelle Cove and producer Kerry David didn’t so much “interview” various single women (mostly heterosexual, but including at least two lesbians) as she let them talk–if and why they like their single lives, what “happily ever after” means to them, what their pasts were like and what their hopes are now. My favorite was the thirty-something woman who said she could imagine herself being perfectly happy as an older single woman with white hair down to her butt, turquoise jewelery, and a bunch of cats milling around at her feet as she sipped a martini with girlfriends (I may be combining one or more interviews, but you get the idea). The film is full of such gems.
But, like life, it’s also full of nails-on-chalkboard moments of awkwardness and horror. Cove and David don’t whitewash the world of single women. (more…)
Singlism or Sexism? You Decide April 2, 2010
Posted by Onely in Uncategorized.Tags: astronauts, change.org, China, family planning, myths about marrieds, sexism, single women
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Hi everyone —
Check out Christina’s latest post at Change.org, which is about singlism, family planning, and women’s ability to become astronauts.
— Lisa
Pop Culture: HOPE for the Onelys — Plan B January 16, 2010
Posted by Onely in Food for Thought, Pop Culture: HOPE for the Onelys, single and happy, Your Responses Requested!.Tags: one-night stands, plan b, single women, singlism in the media, we are single and happy
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So I was lazily watching TV a few evenings ago and saw a commercial that I have seen many times before – this Plan B commercial:
I’m not sure how long this commercial has been out, but it’s been out long enough for me to have had several competing reactions to it (for those of you outside of the U.S. who don’t know what Plan B is, just watch the video). Here is a brief trajectory of my thinking (which prompted this post): (more…)
Heeere Comes the. . . Single Wedding Guest? July 9, 2009
Posted by Onely in As If!, Guest Posts.Tags: heteronormative, single women, singles at weddings, singlism, solo travel, wedding guests
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Onely likes guest posts by other writers who think about singles’ issues. The views expressed in our guest posts may or may not reflect Onely’s views, but we are always interested to hear from other singles advocates. Today’s post is by Autonomous, a regular reader and insightful commenter at Onely:
Wedding season is in full swing again, and the invitations are starting to arrive. While fewer in number the older I get, it seems to me that couples marrying for the first time in their 30’s to early 40’s have more grown-up tastes, more money to spend, and thereby the cost of attending their nuptials is more expensive as well. Unless someone quite close to me is marrying, job and finances necessitate I be selective about which events I can attend. The ones I do say yes to become my vacation for the season given the commitments of money; travel; time off work.
The most recent invite was not on parchment stationary and addressed to me personally, as in the traditional “Ms. — and Guest.” Rather, it arrived in the form of a bulk e-mail explaining travel tips to Napa wine country, providing a list of accomodations in the area, and offering a wine tour. The lodgings ranged from high-end cheap, to posh and very spendy. Going with the least expensive ($140/night- min. 2 nights) was a no-brainer. I began tallying the other anticipated costs: gas, pre-road-trip auto service just to be safe, and dining/groceries for several days, maybe a new pair of shoes. Of course, the wine tour must be factored in, because why drive 5 hours to wine country and not really enjoy myself? (more…)
Friendshit June 17, 2009
Posted by Onely in As If!, Look What Google Barfed Up.Tags: cnn.com, single girl friendship, single women, singlism, weddings
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There are two strains of singlism: Type A, where the singlist actively disses single people, and Type B, where the singlist doesn’t even know they are commiting an “ism”. This CNN.com blog post, by a woman who mourns the inevitable death of her single-girl friendships now that she’s coupled, falls into the latter category. Yet somehow the author’s naivete doesn’t make the article any less horrifying–in fact, I would argue that her post is all the more horrifying because the assumptions she makes about single vs. coupled people are so insidious and (to her) unquestionable. She says she’s getting married a couple months, and:
. . . the days of “romancing” my friends — of luxuriating in their company all weekend long and most weekday evenings is (SIC) over. Given the choice — which, thankfully, I have now that my relationship is not a long-distance one — I’d rather spend most of my free time with my fiance. (more…)
Pop Culture, Scourge of the Onelys (Part 3 of 42,517): He’s Just Not That Into You June 10, 2009
Posted by Onely in "Against Love"...?, As If!, Heteronormativity, Pop Culture: Scourge of the Onelys.Tags: bad movies, desperation, exceptions, fuck you, he's just not that into you, proposals, single stereotyping sucks, single women, stupidity
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So this last weekend, under the guise of conducting “research” for Onely, I buckled down to watch the just-released-on-DVD He’s Just Not That Into You (HJNTIY for short).
And, OMG, this friendly little kid to the right expresses exactly how I feel about the movie: Fuck you, HJNTIY!
Yup, it’s that bad. Not only for what it implies about single people (more on that in a moment), but for its horrible acting, lack of a compelling story, and general waste of my time.
In theory, the movie should be pro-Onely — I mean, what better way for single (hetero) women (and gay men?) everywhere to get to a “happy” place than to accept that sometimes, he’s (really) just not that into you – and to decide that that’s okay? (more…)
Iranian Onelers October 20, 2008
Posted by Onely in Food for Thought, We like. . ..Tags: choices, dominant culture, Iran, single women
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I have a friend who is currently working on her Ph.D. in International Relations at Cambridge (in the UK). She has conducted extensive interviews over the last six months with Iranian women who were married during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-88) and whose husbands were killed (they are called martyrs). She is one of only a few doing the kind of research that works to highlight individual voices, and my friend is most interested in highlighting the lived experiences of these women because scholarship tends to pretend they don’t exist (they focus on the martyrs instead) or merely glosses over these women and assumes that the way the Iranian government portrays/represents these women is accurate.
Onely.Org 