This past week, I got my first hate mail for the semester about the article I wrote that said Kristy from the Babysitters Club was a huge lez. It's not one of the best articles I've written, in fact I'm a little disappointed in how it turned out, but still...Who could have POSSIBLY taken it seriously? It's about a thirteen year old fictional character in a CHILDREN'S BOOK series.
Here's the letter (the article I wrote is pasted after it so you can see what he's talking about):
Dear Editor,
Thank you for the incredibly insightful and thought-provoking article
on Kristy Thomas in your Entertainer of the Week column. I'm so glad
that in this, the 21st century, we can have such an openly
misogynistic and homophobic point of view and pass it off as
entertainment. Thank you for perpetuating stereotypes and having no
sense of social responsibility.
Yes, we all love to poke fun at pop culture, but you have taken this
too far. Regardless of whether or not the article was pure
entertainment, it does nothing to enlighten your readership about the
absurdity of stereotypes. It promoted the stereotypes so many of us
work tirelessly to combat. Humor like this gives us a carte-blanche
to continue to perpetuate ignorant and outdated modes of thinking.
Before you write me off as an angry feminist, (but first consider the
fact that I am a man) think about what would happen if you rewrote
the article attacking a particular ethnic group. Do you think that
nothing would happen, that no one would be offended? I'm sure you
would immediately put a stop to it, but you feel that an article that
objectifies women and stereotypes lesbians is fine, apparently.
Oh, and please continue to use the word "slut" in your paper as much
as you want. It doesn't matter that such a word is as offensive as
"nigger", "spic", "fag", or "chink". Your recent expose on the
definition of the word "slut" was very insightful, especially since
no woman was interviewed and you took the uninformed opinions of two
skate-shop employees and a psuedo-intellectual as gospel.
Misogynistic speech lets our society continue to objectify women and
treat them like property, making violence against women permissible.
Or do you believe it's okay to tell a woman that she's a slut, and
that all a lesbian really needs is a man, but raping a woman is
crossing the line. All of it comes from a belief that women are
inferior. It was socially irresponsible for the Montclairion to have
printed this.
Stop hating women.
Sincerely,
(Name deleted for fear of Google searches)
Isn't that awkz?
Here's the article:
"The Baby-Sitters Club: Kristy and the Mystery of the Closet Case Lesbian"
With 131 books, over 200 spin-offs, a television series, a feature film and a delayed aging process that A-list actresses and trophy wives would trade their adopted third-world infants for, the time has come: Kristy, come out of the closet already. You're not fooling anyone.
Case in point: "Kristy's Krushers," the little league softball team you started. Do you think it was hard for us to figure out that that's the only bat you'll ever handle? Krushers jersey aside, let's take a look at your everyday wardrobe, shall we? Much ado was made about your uniform of jeans, t-shirt and baseball cap. Just add a flannel zip-up, oversized key ring, a case of Coors Light and we know you'll be first in line to see the new Angelina Jolie movie.
As evidenced by your status as founder and president of The Baby-Sitters Club, you clearly have a love for politics and bureaucracy, which invites the inevitable Mary Cheney comparisons. If you add the overweight millionaire father aspect, you're two steps away from being outed by John Kerry during a presidential debate and causing a minor political upset.
Politics aside, your motives in starting the BSC seem questionable. Do you really love to babysit kids? Or did you just want an opportunity to stay in close quarters with Stacy in case she goes into diabetic shock and needs you to administer an insulin shot in her butt cheek?
On one hand, we know that if Lifetime movies have taught us anything, it's that lesbians love child care. Whether it is If These Walls Could Talk 2-style epic quests to track down the perfect sperm donor for artificial insemination or domestic dramas surrounding prohibitive gay adoption laws in Florida, kids often rank along with Eagles tickets and Tori Amos albums in the scheme of lesbian priority. On the other hand, Stacy is pretty hot. Diabetes aside, she's a sophisticated New York City girl with a cutting edge perm. And lesbians love perms.
Do you think that all this denial is fair to Bart? Getting him all hot and bothered with your overzealous soccer mom calls to "hit the dirt" while the two of you coach your respective little league teams side-by-side and then resist his masculine wiles and promises of official BF/GF status? I'm sure he has inkling; we all have inkling. Technically, the two of you have been dating for twenty years, so he's bound to be a little suspicious. We've seen the book jackets. We know he's not an unattractive fellow. He has the same sharp masculine features and wind-swept surfer cut as K.D. Lang. He's not Katie Holmes and you can't keep him hanging by that one shred of heterosexual hope forever. Like going to a wake and seeing the dead body of a loved one, he needs closure to move on. You need to tell him that the only man for you is Mary-Anne Spier.
Now let's take a moment out to take a good, hard look at Mary-Anne too, okay? Two words: lipstick lesbian. With the combination of her shyness, quiet introspection and suburban Connecticut repression, Mary-Anne seems the ideal candidate to one day become a sensitive and socially-conscious lesbian singer/songwriter who plays alongside Ani DiFranco at sold-out Lilith Fair concerts.
Also, let us not forget when she 86'd her distinctive handlebar pigtails in favor of a bowler-cut. Perhaps she got tired of you wearing the relaxed-fit Bugle Boy pants in your "friendship" and decided to fight testosterone with testosterone. I agree she shouldn't have done so by taking a note from the book of Rosie O'Donnell post-talk show cancellation when she showed her true lesbian colors by making a terrible hair faux pas. But even though the two of them looked more like the lead singer from Flock of Seagulls than any of us were comfortable with, we all got the message loud and clear: did you?
Now, before you throw down the "serious relationship with Logan Bruno" card, let me remind you of a few things: A) He was a male babysitter B) He loved to give makeovers C) His group of friends consisted mainly of preteen girls and D) He dated a girl who was hestitant to even hold hands with him. Kristy, I'm sure you go to school with a lot more open-minded and free-spirited (i.e. loose) girls who would jump at the chance to take advantage of his Southern Belle charm. This is middle school, after all. I'm sure you've seen Degrassi: The Next Generation or Lifetime's "preteens with syphilis" epic She's Too Young. I bet you anything that somewhere, Liza Minnelli and David Gest are screaming "Marriage of convenience!"
Of course, not every one of your friends in The Baby-Sitters Club is gay. This is Connecticut, after all, not Thursday night at the Colosseum. Stacy is a total heterosexual slut and Jessi and Mallory love books about horses, which will probably cause its own set of relationship foibles with men later in life when they feel an unnerving sense of disappointment. However, you are definitely gay.
Naysayers may make the argument that you're only 13 and can't have such a realization. Said naysayers clearly haven't done the math. If you were 12 when the first book was published in 1986, then that would make you roughly 32 years old by now. The "of drinking age" actress who played you on the television show and the drawings of you on the book covers where you look more like Bea Arthur than a girl about to graduation from middle school have done nothing to dispel this claim.
Don't worry Kristy Thomas, a lot of people come out late in life, so don't suffer in silence. If you really are only 13 and somehow have the ability to celebrate the exact same summer break 14 different times and 14 different ways, then you're definitely a mature 13. You run a business, a little league team and go to school full-time. Why not add P-FLAG meetings and board game night at the local gay and lesbian center to the list?
Give Bart the boot, tell Mary-Anne how you feel, stick the hypodermic needle in Stacy's fanny and, for God's sake, give your audience something new to read about in the second chapter of your books.
