Tag: Black Voices

Equality in Hollywood has been a hot topic for the past couple of years, and in 2016, it finally seemed like the issue was gaining real traction. We saw plenty of films with women in lead roles ― “Arrival,” “Rogue One,” “Hidden Figures,” to name a few ― and it appears those characters are reflective of a positive shift in the industry.

A new study, completed by the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University, found that the number of female protagonists featured in films in 2016 is up 7 percent from 2015. 

The study looked at over 2,500 characters from the top 100 domestic-grossing films (minus foreign films) from last year to determine that females made up 29 percent of protagonists in 2016 and played 37 percent of major characters (up 3 percent from 2015). Both sets of numbers represent a historical high. 

However, women comprised 32 percent of all speaking characters, down 1 percent from 2015, and audiences were still more likely to see male characters than female characters on screen. 

As Variety notes, after the commercial successes of films like “Bad Moms,” “Moana” and “The Girl on the Train,” studios are realizing that female characters are connecting with audiences.

“We have now seen over and over and over that female characters, when done well, they’re good box office,” Martha Lauzen, the center’s director and author of the study, told Variety. 

A study done by FiveThirtyEight in 2014 came to a similar conclusion, using the Bechdel test as a guide. (The test rates a film’s gender bias based on three criteria: Does the movie have more than one named female character? Do they speak to one another? And do they discuss something other than men?) The study found films that passed the Bechdel test actually made more money at the box office than those that didn’t. So, it’s actually beneficial for studios to feature women in roles beyond the love interest. 

In terms of racial diversity, the findings in CSWTF’s study were mixed. The percentage of Asian females in the top films rose from three to six, while the percentage of Latinas declined from four to three. The percentage of black female characters, however, saw a slight increase, going from 13 to 14 percent. 

The study comes as we continue the discussion surrounding equal representation in Hollywood. Many women in the industry, including Jennifer Lawrence, Hilary Swank, Patricia Arquette and Viola Davis, have been vocal about the sexism that exists, especially when it comes to wages and diversity. In the world of TV, Ryan Murphy, has made it his mission to include more women, people of color and members of the LGBTQ community in the production of his shows. 

Hollywood definitely seems to be moving in the right direction, but of course, there’s plenty of room for improvement. 

To read more findings from CSWTF’s study, click here. 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Even if you’re not actively aware of it, you use emojis to tell stories every day. But can you identify stories using those same emojis? On Sunday, Hollywood honors 2016’s best on-screen stories. Can you guess the Oscar-nominated films from the past year using only the given emojis as plot clues?  

Tap/click the image below to play!

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Janelle Monáe has just highlighted another “hidden figure” who should be celebrated.

The actress, who portrays NASA engineer Mary Jackson in the Oscar-nominated film “Hidden Figures,” made a surprise appearance on Good Morning America to help honor engineer Raye Montague, who revolutionized the way the U.S. Navy designs ships. 

Montague broke barriers when she became the first female program manager of ships in the history of Navy, “which was the equivalent of being a CEO of a company,” she said.

She started her career in the Navy in 1956 in Washington, D.C. as a clerk typist, according to the Encyclopedia of Arkansa History and Culture. She told GMA that she rose in the ranks and spent 33 years as a civilian employee. She was unable to earn an engineering degree in college, so she said she learned engineering skills on the job and attended computer programming school at night.

In 1970, her bosses told her department that they had one month to design a naval ship. Montague finished the task in less than 19 hours.

Montague said she wasn’t the first black person or the first woman, but the first person ever to design a ship using a computer. She was awarded the U.S. Navy’s Meritorious Civilian Service Award, the navy’s third-highest honorary award, in 1972.

The 82-year-old told host Robin Roberts that she faced a lot of the challenges that the women depicted in “Hidden Figures” went through. Roberts then brought Monáe out to surprise Montague.

The artist/actress brought Montague flowers and thanked her for her work.

“You are an American hero and you are hidden no more. Everybody sees you,” Monáe said.

Octavia Spencer, who portrays Dorothy Vaughn in the film, also thanked Montague via video message.

“It is such an honor and a privilege to thank you for being a pioneer and trailblazer for women across the world. I want to let you know that you are no longer hidden. We see you, we salute you and we thank you.”

Watch Montague’s full interview in the video above. 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

The final stage of global robot takeover is here: There’s a sex toy that simulates oral sex for women. OK, so maybe robots aren’t taking over the world, but this piece of technology sure seems life-changing.

The award-winning ORA 2 is one of the standout sex toys created by luxury pleasure brand LELO. The round, inconspicuous toy looks nothing like your go-to sex toy, but that’s because it does something most others don’t: It simulates the sensations that women experience when receiving oral sex. 

The original line of ORA products launched in 2009, but the ORA 2 wasn’t released until two years ago. While the product is not brand new, the HuffPost Women team was so curious about what the creation process was like and (let’s be real) how it works. So, we spoke with CMO of LELO Steve Thomson to find out more about this pleasure plaything. 

We decided to create an oral sex simulator that feels incredible, and wouldn’t look out of place on your mantelpiece. An oral sex toy for the masses.
Steve Thomson, CMO of LELO

As Thomson explained, LELO wanted to make an “oral sex toy for the masses”; one that looks so pretty you could put it on your mantelpiece. And that’s exactly what the luxury sex toy company did.

Can you explain how the ORA 2 works?

The most important part of ORA™ is the vibrating nub, which we’ve come to call the “tongue.” At a certain point on the front surface of ORA™, there’s a bulging panel that rotates, swirls and vibrates beneath the surface of the silicone. As it moves underneath, the silicone on the surface bulges and moves with it, massaging the user like a tongue. This makes the sensations very soft and fleshy, so that with a little bit of water-based lube, ORA™ feels very much like a real tongue but doesn’t look anything like one, so it retains its trademark LELO elegance.

The vibrating motor is positioned right under the tongue, so the vibrations and transmitted perfectly to the user’s body. Like all the best designs, it’s a simple concept that’s very hard to explain but absolutely intuitive to use.

ORA™ is not a substitute or a replacement for sex, but rather an addition to it. That means that it’s not the kind of sex toy that will do all the hard work for you. Instead, it’s the kind of sex toy that works with you. It includes a unique technology that we invented for this product, called SenseTouch™. This means that ORA™ senses how hard or aggressively you’re using it and responds accordingly. The firmer you press it against your body, the more powerfully the tongue swirls and rotates.

What inspired LELO to create an oral sex simulator?

At LELO, the inspiration for a new pleasure product can come from anywhere: personal experiences, market trends, customer feedback, you name it. ORA™ exists because nothing like it existed at the time.

There have long been male masturbators for men. Big, ugly things with 1980s porn stars on the box, promising sensations that are better than real oral sex. Men have a huge selection of oral sex simulators, but there were none for women that you would be proud to own.

Oral sex simulators for women had been attempted in the past. No joke: they literally looked like a tongue on a stick. They looked like jokes. There is perhaps a market for hideous disembodied jelly tongues, but it’s a bit niche even by our standards. So we decided to create one that feels incredible, and wouldn’t look out of place on your mantelpiece. An oral sex toy for the masses. That’s a tough brief, but we did it.

Is this the first-ever sex toy that simulates oral sex for women?

If you spend long enough in the sex toy world, you learn that everything you can possibly imagine has been made and tried by some brave soul at somewhere. People are amazingly innovative when it comes to sex. There is, for example, a sex museum in South Korea in which one of the exhibits is an old bicycle that was converted to have dozens of leather ‘tongues’ instead of a tire, and the user would sit astride it and pedal, turning the wheel ― and therefore the tongues ― against herself.

History is full of those examples, they’re hugely fun. So it’s not really possible to say ORA™ was the first oral sex simulator. But it is the first you can walk into a shop and buy. And it is definitely the first you can carry through customs without embarrassment.

What has the feedback been like from women who have used the toy?

Personal pleasure is a very subjective thing, and not every woman enjoys oral sex. So people who dislike those sensations won’t get the best from ORA™ 2. However, women who love oral sex really love ORA™ 2, and the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. It’s a great way to learn, control and explore your own pleasure and sensations.

Head over to LELO to learn more about the ORA 2. 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Kendall Jenner stepped out wearing an interesting look in London on Monday night. 

The 21-year-old model, who is in town for London Fashion Week, wore an oversize knit sweater over a cream dress, paired with black boots and bright red lips. But the most contentious part of her outfit was the two gold teeth she added to her look: 

Jenner donned gold teeth, and her sisters (specifically Kylie, Kim and Khloe) have a history of wearing grills, whether it’s for magazine covers, birthday celebrations or just an Instagram photo or two. 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Throughout the years Barack Obama was in power, Jordan Peele’s impression of the president emerged as the most recognizable, only rivaled by Jay Pharoah’s take on “Saturday Night Live.”

During the comedian’s appearance on Seth Meyer’s “Late Night” Monday to promote his well-reviewed new film “Get Out,” the host told Peele he thought the Obama impression “was the gold standard.”

Peele’s take on the president from his Comedy Central show, “Key & Peele,” would portray Obama as extremely even-keeled and calm. During these sketches his comedic partner, Keegan-Michael Key, would play an “anger translator,” expressing the frustration Obama presumably decided he couldn’t.

The popularity of the recurring impressions became so popular that the real Obama invited Key to be his anger translator for part of his speech at the 2015 White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

With this context, Meyers asked Peele to revive his impression and asked what Obama is thinking about the United States at the moment. Although he didn’t outright mention his name, Meyers heavily implied he wanted Peele’s Obama to respond to the fact that Donald Trump now runs the country.

At least according to this new impression, Obama no longer needs an anger translator ― the post-Trump Obama is willing to get mad all by himself.

Peele set up his take with a mention that Obama has been on vacation and a guess that the former president is now holding a glass of whiskey in his hands while watching TV.

“This is some messed up stuff here,” Peele’s drunk Obama yelled out in response to watching news on TV. Then while swirling the imaginary whiskey glass, Peele slurred in his Obama-voice, “Michelle, top her off. Michelle, top her off.”

Peele-as-Obama reacted again to the TV and said with clear frustration, “Well, you done done did it now, America!”

Before wrapping up the take, Peele referenced Trump’s past insistence that Obama was not born in the United States. In the impression, Peele’s Obama repeatedly asks Michelle where he is from, before stating himself that the answer is Hawaii.

His last line as Obama? “Well, mele kalikimaka mother f—,” making sure to stop himself short.

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

In artist David Shrobe’s multimedia work “Guerrilla Tactics,” the edge of a gold picture frame knocks up against a curved slice of mosaic nestled near an emerald-colored plastic crate. A triangular slab of shopping cart hovers atop them. They’re materials you might find piled high in your attic or garage, and pay them little heed.

Through Shrobe’s practice, however, the domestic materials are chopped up, rearranged and reincarnated, forming an unlikely canvas. A ghostly figure hovers atop the amassed materials, his or her invisible face demarcated by a frilly collar and decadent cape. The image of old fashioned nobility is shoved up against the stuff of modern-day detritus, forming a hybrid image that’s hard to place, but harder to shake.

“I’ve been collecting objects from in and around my family’s home in Harlem for many years,” Shrobe, a fourth-generation Harlem resident, wrote in an email to The Huffington Post. “Sometimes they make it into a work, sometimes they sit in the studio for months or years before I find their purpose. I’m often drawn to things that speak to a sense of home, things that are commonplace in our communities. They say a lot about us, from social status to the things we consume and the environments we live in.” 

In his exhibition “Homegrown,” which recently closed at Thierry Goldberg Gallery, Shrobe fuses his found materials into portraits that feel over-crowded and otherworldly. The artists responds to the elitist and exclusive tradition of classical portraiture with a visual display of texture, heterogeneity and abundance, offering an alternative to portraiture’s elitist roots and singular perspective. 

With the show’s title, Shrobe hopes to address the current political climate, raising the question of who is deemed a “true American” and why. “It came from questioning ideas about our nationalism and what it means to belong to one’s country or home, and the ways I see that being challenged, both now and throughout history,” he said. “It also speaks to ideas about consumption and domesticity and having a connection to the materials I find.”

Shrobe invites these materials, including clocks and mirrors and doorknobs and ceiling tins, to speak for themselves, allowing viewers to connect to and identify with them as they please. Through literally slicing up traditions of portraiture and rebuilding them anew, he makes space for a new kind of identity, which embraces multiplicity down to its core. 

“As a painter, I am always pushing my affinity for painting and interested in what painting can be and how it can function in this contemporary moment,” Shrobe said. “Collapsing divisions between past, present and future gives birth to fragmented portraits, mythological beings and hybridized forms who are not oriented to a specific time or place, but rather floating in a space of disquieting coexistence.”

Shrobe’s work, reminiscent of contemporary artist Titus Kaphar, offers a new model for representation, one that acknowledges the complexity and brokenness of its subjects. The images are especially resonant in this day and age, when complex and composite identities are under threat. 

“For me,” Shrobe said, “it’s about asking questions through the materials I use and creating new meaning from the histories that are inherent in the images and objects I reposition and the art historical canon from which I borrow and bring into a new context ― that of my own. To create spaces within which new forms and mixtures become indigenized; figures imbued with a sense of heroism and who embrace their humanity, while challenging what it means to be an American in these turbulent times.”

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Over the past 24 hours, it finally happened: America woke up to the incendiary, disturbing nightmare that is far-right troll Milo Yiannopoulous.

Following a controversial video in which Yiannopoulous appears to defend pedophilia, the CPAC rescinded their speaking invitation to Yiannopoulos. He lost his Simon & Schuster book deal. Brietbart seems to be weighing the options of letting him go. 

But the question on everyone’s minds seems to be: how in the hell did it take this long?

Yiannopoulos’ racism, xenophobia, sexism and transphobia have been well-documented for quite some time. In 2016, he subjected Leslie Jones to a horrific tirade of abuse that resulted in him being permanently banned from Twitter. That same year he compared Black Lives Matter to the KKK. Just last year he claimed trans people are “confused” about their “sexual identity” and are “disproportionately involved” in sex crimes. He is openly anti-Muslim and misogynistic. (Even as I attempt to type this list, I’m overwhelmed by the sheer mass of horrible and bigoted examples to choose from.)

But it was his seeming defense of pedophilia that went too far for his far-right base ― an idea that seems nauseatingly close to the classically ancient conservative, homophobic myth that gay people are pedophiles. 

The reasons why it took this long to actually bring down Milo are complicated, but also obvious. Yiannopoulos, like other homonationalistic white gay men who are now troublingly the face of gay conservatism, have become props and tools for conservatives. And these men are happy to oblige, in return for the power that this position begets.

The very fact that they are men who have sex with men gives them a permissibility to be more outrageous and more incendiary in their language and ideas. They are given more space to push the boundaries of racist, problematic language because they occupy a unique position in the conservative contingent ― one of minimal disenfranchisement while still embodying all the markers of power and privilege. 

Unfortunately, Yiannopoulos’ damage has already been done. Since his disturbing appearance on Bill Maher last week, a whole new crop of mainstream audiences have now heard a gay man speak power to their bigoted truths rooted in racist, transphobic, sexist and xenophobic ideals.

Even in my liberal bubble of New York City, I’ve had friends tell me about the way this Bill Maher appearance has penetrated their lives when it comes specifically to transgender identity.

One friend says he witnessed a trans-identifying person attempting to come out to group of their friends in a public space. A member of the group countered by citing Milo’s Maher appearance, telling their friend ― who had literally just come out ― that they were merely “confused” and probably could benefit from seeking some help, referencing Milo saying the same thing.

Another friend who considers her mother to be fairly progressive told me her mother ― who knows no trans people ― was shocked to hear a gay person speaking about trans people the way Yiannopoulos did. His words had a profound effect on her and ― because of the nature of his sexuality ― challenged her to be more critical of across-the-board acceptance of trans identity.

As gay identity becomes more mainstreamed, we are going to see more Milos emerging from the LGBTQ community. These people are recognizing that there is power to be wielded in the conservative right ― a contingent that has all but given up the fight against mainstreaming gay identity.

I shudder to think of the impact this interview had in other parts of this country.

Within the LGBTQ community, it is now our job to not only hold these gay men accountable for their words and actions, but to recognize them for what they are before they develop a cultural grip. We need to recognize our responsibility within the queer community to fight for the rights of all minorities ― and understand that some of the most dangerous figures in our current political climate are coming from within the LGBTQ community itself.

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Leslie Jones has responded to Milo Yiannopoulos’ most recent controversy after video of the alt-right poster boy appearing to defend pedophilia surfaced online over the weekend.

“You guys are giving him too much energy,” the “Saturday Night Live” cast member said to her followers over Twitter Monday night, adding, “I was done the day I blocked him.” The right-wing extremist harassed Jones with racist messages over Twitter, prompting some of his 300,000-plus followers to do the same, before he was banned from the social media platform last summer.

“Been done and moved on. He has no space here!” she wrote. 

Publishing giant Simon & Schuster announced Monday that it had canceled its deal to publish Yiannopoulos’ book, Dangerous, under an imprint in light of the news. It’s a deal, announced late last year, that Jones had criticized. Although the company stated it does not “condone discrimination or hate speech,” the comedian said over Twitter that giving platforms to people who do helps “spread their hate to even more people.”

Yiannopoulos, an editor at Breitbart, was also uninvited from the Conservative Political Action Conference where he was scheduled to speak alongside Vice President Mike Pence and President Trump top aide Steve Bannon.

In the controversial recording, Yiannopoulos calls age of consent “arbitrary and opressive,” suggesting that pedophilia may be acceptable between adults and children as young as 13. Spoiler: It’s not.

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Feminist (or Bad Feminist) author and essayist Roxane Gay hasn’t warmed to Simon & Schuster after the publishing giant canceled its book deal with Milo Yiannopoulos on Monday following his comments on pedophilia.

In fact, Gay dismissed the news as a simple “business decision,” she wrote on Tumblr, “the same way they made a business decision when they decided to publish that man in the first place.”

A tape in which the Breitbart editor appears to defend pedophilia surfaced online recently; the controversy also revoked his invitation to a conservative conference planned for next week with Vice President Mike Pence.

“Simon & Schuster realized it would cost them more money to do business with Milo than he could earn for them,” Gay wrote. “They were fine with his racist and xenophobic and sexist ideologies. They were fine with his transphobia, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. They were fine with how he encourages his followers to harass women and people of color and transgender people online.”

The author yanked her upcoming nonfiction book, How to Be Heard, from Simon & Schuster late last month in protest of the company’s decision to publish Dangerous by the white nationalist alt-right figure. 

Gay also claims that Simon & Schuster reacted to her decision with pettiness, stating the company moved the publication date of Dangerous to June 13 ― the same day her next book, Hunger, is set to be released by a different publisher. She confirmed that she will no longer work with Simon & Schuster.

Yiannopoulos’ list of offenses against women, people of color, Muslims, transgender people and other groups is long. In June, he was permanently banned from Twitter after inciting racist harassment of comedian Leslie Jones. His appearance is enough to spark outrage; students recently stopped him from speaking at the University of California at Berkeley after violent protests broke out, and a journalist canceled his appearance on “Real Time with Bill Maher” after discovering Yiannopoulos had been booked on the same episode. 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices