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Monday, December 21, 2020

My Essay on CNN Opinion: “This New Holiday Movie Would Have Changed Everything For My Teenage Self”

holiday movieSo…did you all watch Lifetime’s new holiday movie “Christmas Ever After” last weekend??

I saw the ad for it a couple months ago and screamed with joy! We are FINALLY getting disability representation in these movies! THIS IS HUGE, especially for rom-coms! I’ve ranted and written about this so much over the years, so to see it actually happening is…WOW.

DOUBLE WOW

TRIPLE WOW

INFINITY WOW

ALL THE WOWS

And, I’m so happy that my last byline of 2020 is from CNN Opinion!! Seeing Ali Stroker starring in this holiday movie rom-com was a big win for disability representation and I was here for it!

Here’s an excerpt of the piece, in which I plead to give disabled people our meet-cutes already…

Indeed, this movie isn’t just groundbreaking because it stars a disabled actress. It’s also groundbreaking because the movie is about love and romance, which is something you don’t see much of when it comes to characters with disabilities. Disabled people are very often viewed as asexual by our culture and this is reflected in the ways we see people with disabilities portrayed in movies and TV.

These views are all too often made through the ableist lens by non-disabled people, leading to inaccurate and sometimes-insulting assumptions about how disabled people actually live. There’s this societal misconception that disabled people don’t or can’t fall in love and have relationships just like non-disabled people. The total absence of social messages when I was growing up that women with disabilities can be sexy constantly left me feeling like romance wasn’t something that could ever happen for me or that there must be something wrong with me.

holiday movieI love rom-coms, but where’s the female disabled lead?

That was the question I asked in one of my very first published pieces this year. I’m so happy that I got to answer that question in my final piece of the year!!

These types of full-circle moments are my absolute favorite

You can read the full piece here and I’d love to hear your thoughts. Feel free to email me anytime at mellow1422@aol.com and let’s chat! And of course, feel free to share my essay on Facebook, Twitter or even your local refrigerator. If you share on Twitter, be sure to tag me @melissablake so I see your tweet and we can connect! I can’t wait to hear from you! Love you all… xoxo

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4 Comments Filed Under: CNN Opinion writing, Dating, Disability

Monday, October 12, 2020

Have You Heard?? Disabled Women Are Hot AF…

Disabled Women Are HotIf you’ve been reading this blog for awhile, then you already know how much I love, well, LOVE. But even more than just love, I love writing about/talking about/obsessing over the intersection between love and disabilities!!! It’s pretty much my favorite thing ever. Why, you ask? Well, for a very simple fact that the rest of the world is (maybe?) starting to realize: Disabled women are hot…

Flashback to my early 20s: I once believed I was the girl who would never be seen as some guy’s catch. I felt invisible and thought “You know your disability will just get in the way. Why would he find you attractive?”

There’s this pervasive societal perception that women with disabilities aren’t sexy and can’t possibly have romantic relationships.

Shame on society!! Because here’s the truth: Y’all need to start thinking of disabled women as viable romantic partners!!

Why don’t we talk more about dating and disabilities? The fact that asking a disabled person on a date isn’t even on some people’s radar is subtle ableism at its finest.

And by finest, I mean gross.

One of the most straight-up ableist things I hate is how people assume that disabled people aren’t interested in romantic relationships. Or even worse, that we’re not worthy partners. It’s the EXACT reason I wrote an entire Glamour essay about it.

I took all my disgust and frustration and channeled it into words, which is what I usually do when those strong feelings are a-stirring and a-pulling at my heartstrings!

So…

Disabled women shouldn’t post thirst trap photos?

Disabled women shouldn’t slide into DMs?

Every time I talk about dating, people say “you have to be happy with yourself. You don’t need a man.” I feel like we say this to disabled people so much more than non-disabled people.

I mean, I don’t need ice cream either, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want it. Ice cream is downright DELICIOUS.

Disabled Women Are HotIn my 20s, I worried how my disability would figure into romantic relationships. I feared having to “explain myself” and assumed that guys thought dating someone like me was too much to ask. I struggled with self-confidence and becoming comfortable in my own body and with my disability was a process. It most certainly wasn’t an overnight transformation! Learning self-love is a lifelong process, something that I’m constantly practicing and will be for the rest of my life!

But today, in my late 30s, yeah, I still worry…sometimes. But I also know I’m hot AF and worthy of romantic love just like anyone else! It’s been quite the happy revelation, to say the least.

Plus, you know what else is making me incredibly happy right now?? Seeing other disabled women talking about dating and disabilities!! Be sure to check out Alex Dacy (aka Wheelchair Rapunzel) on Instagram, where she talks openly about being a disabled woman and has so many of the same thoughts and feelings that I do.

I was chatting with a writer friend recently who said that she appreciates my candor in talking about dating and disabilities!!

This just made my heart soar because no one talked about dating and disability when I was growing up. I want to be that voice for young people, so to see us having these conversations now is huge!!

I once wrote these words in my journal: “Guys just don’t like girls in wheelchairs. Or with any sort of disability, it seems.”

Can we please prove past me wrong in 2020…?? Dating a disabled woman shouldn’t be intimidating or scary or out of the question. It should be realistic relationship goals!! Disabled women ARE worthy romantic partners! Disabled women are hot…

Get it together, boys…y’all are MISSING OUT! Thank you for coming to my TED Talk… xoxo

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9 Comments Filed Under: Dating, Disability, Love Lessons

Monday, October 7, 2019

Thoughts on National Boyfriend Day

National Boyfriend DayLast Thursday was National Boyfriend Day and I’d just like to give a shout-out to my teenage self, who painstakingly came up with this 12-point checklist for her “boyfriends and husband.”

Honestly, I’ve got to give her props for her sheer optimism and for knowing exactly what she wants!  Apparently, at that age, everything was crystal clear in the “What I Want In A Relationship” department because I distinctly remember sitting down to write that list and the words just came flowing out so effortlessly. One, two, three…before I knew it, I had 12 must-have qualities for the future loves of my life.

Don’t believe me? Check out the indisputable proof right here. For example…

I was a firm feminist at the age of 17…

National Boyfriend Day National Boyfriend Day#6. Supportive: “This is in both my personal life as well as in my career. I wouldn’t want any guy to hold me back — this is the ‘90s and I want a ‘90’s man!”

Turns out, I couldn’t deal with the mansplainers even back then…

National Boyfriend Day#9. Self-confident: “I need a man who believes in himself, but he must not be overly confident because that could border on being conceited.”

And then the other day, I was searching for something on the blog and came across this post from a year ago. It still rings true: Where HAVE all the good men gone?

It’s a question that I keep on asking: Where are all the good men? Where are all the good men? Where are all the good men? Those six words seem to haunt me to no end because I’m not exactly sure about the answer to that question.

As I wrote in the post…

“Are they all hiding from me? Are they at the local Target? Busy taking a morning jog? Or maybe they’re all “too scared” to come out and actually support women when we need it the most? Honestly, that last scenario is the only one that seems plausible to me right now. Because I’m sure not seeing these good men that people like my mom swear are out there. All I’m seeing are entitled, mansplaining dude bros who are exasperated that they’re being called out because, for some, their cushy little life has never been disrupted like that before.”

So here’s my plea (do any men even read my blog?): Please show yourselves, men of the world. For the love of all things, please, please just let us know you’re out there. Please let us know that good and decent men still exist in this ever-dimming dark world. Can you do that, please? Thank you and I hope you all had a happy National Boyfriend Day… xoxo

P.S. Someone’s name has been blacked out of the above diary entry to protect the innocent…and save me from embarrassment.

[First and last photo via Unsplash]

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9 Comments Filed Under: A Woman's Word, Dating, Love Lessons

Tuesday, July 2, 2019

My Essay on Cosmo: “‘She’s All That’ Was a Great Teen Movie With a Horrible Message For Women”

She's All ThatSuper cool news: I’ve got a new byline AND I’ve COINED A NEW POP CULTURE TERM. Does this feat earn me a coveted spot in the Pop Culture Hall of Fame?? For Cosmo, I wrote about “She’s All That” for its 20th anniversary and how the movie sends a dangerous message to young women, where the guy falls in love with the girl after she gets a makeover! I dubbed it the Hot After Makeover trope and I’m not here for this nonsense!

Now, I’ll admit that I did once love the movie. Maybe it’s because I was young and just a bit on the naive side — and, yes, that Freddie Prinze Jr. was a pretty fetching leading man in the late ’90s. But when I watched the film again a couple years ago as an adult, the horrific and toxic messages came bursting through the television screen. Ugh, whyyyy?

Here’s an excerpt of the piece, in which I talk about what the dangerous message in “She’s All That” tells young women about self-esteem, body image and relationships…

This thought that “If I just fix X about myself, he’ll suddenly like me” was powerful to teenage me, and I didn’t even realize that in thinking this way, I’d be fading into the background of my own life. I started believing all the stereotypes about people with disabilities: We’re broken, there’s something wrong with us, and all our scars and deformities would disgust people. As long as I wasn’t “normal looking,” I wasn’t worthy.

That’s why movies like “She’s All That” set up such false, unrealistic expectations for young women. Yes, Zack may have come to see the error of his ways by the final kiss, but even presenting this plot in the first place set a precedent that is hard to break—as evidenced by the fact that we’re still seeing movies like this in 2019.

You can read the full piece here and I’d love to hear your thoughts. Feel free to email me anytime at mellow1422@aol.com and let’s chat! And of course, feel free to share my essay on Facebook, Twitter or even your local refrigerator. If you share on Twitter, be sure to tag me @melissablake so we can connect! I can’t wait to hear from you! Love you all… xoxo

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Leave a Comment Filed Under: Cosmo writing, Dating, movies

Thursday, March 21, 2019

What The Bachelor Finale Revealed About Entitled Dude Bros

Bachelor FinaleIf I were writing a quick hot take about The Bachelor finale, it would go something like this…

Cassie: I don’t want to be with you…
Colton: I think she loves me. I’m going to go after her. 

Sound romantic? A gallant act of chivalry? Think again because Colton‘s behavior spiraled really quickly from a guy looking for love to a guy obsessed with chasing a woman who clearly turned him down. Instead of a grand finale, what we got was a grand reality check — an all-too-accurate snapshot of what women experience every day when they reject advances from men. If art imitates life, then The Bachelor finale is primed to be Exhibit A. And it’s not a pretty picture. It’s more problematic than romantic, more alarming than charming and, perhaps above all, more damaging than entertaining.

What exactly am I getting at? We have to talk about how that trainwreck of a finale was basically yet another example of an entitled white male who doesn’t understand what the word “NO” means?? Cassie’s words seemed to go right over Colton’s head, as if he didn’t even hear them in the first place. He assumed that he knew what she wanted more than she did — a sort of “you’ll thank me later” vibe that felt all at once condescending, insensitive and immature.

But, sadly, this is what women are used to hearing, right? They’re doubted and discredited, all too often made to feel as if their feeling are either wrong or just don’t matter at all. Colton jumping over the fence was the equivalent of saying “I know what she really means” and, in essence, we all too often disregard women’s feelings while men get a free pass at the very least and are even cheered on at the very worst; people had been waiting with bated breath all season long, wondering “Is Colton going to jump the fence in this week’s episode?” and when he did, memes galore spread like wildfire on social media. People couldn’t get enough of it — it practically felt like an Olympic sport.

Bachelor FinaleBut here’s the thing: The Bachelor finale is just a symptom of a larger epidemic. It highlights a trend we’ve seen time and time again where men, even dangerous men, are glorified and women are shamed. We saw it as recently as Netflix’s smash breakout hit You, in which Penn Badgley’s Joe becomes the ultimate sinister stalker. Despite the show’s gruesome premise, fans couldn’t help falling for Joe as if he was their favorite boy band member. In fact, I’ve seen people online say how much they’re rooting for Joe, and Badgley himself even had to take to Twitter and remind people to not romanticize his character.

For comparison, Netflix’s other foray into the dark and twisted Gypsy focused on a woman therapist who got a bit too obsessed with her patients. The show only lasted one season and no one was throwing words around like “hot” or swooning over how in love they were with the character.

Indeed, our pop culture lexicon has a nasty habit of putting these dangerous dude bros on a pedestal. We swoon over very, very bad men doing some very, very bad things. I’ve caught myself in this trap a time or two. In my teens, there was my obsession with Christopher Moltisanti, the mobster from The Sopranos who not only abused his girlfriend, but also had a hand in her murder.

And a few years ago, after binge-watching Dexter, I fell hard for – you guessed it – Dexter Morgan himself. Never mind the fact that he murdered hundreds if not thousands of people.

It’s this sort of sexist subtext that I can’t understand. Think about it this way: If the roles were reversed and it was a woman chasing a man, we’d call her a bunny boiler a la Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. We’d be saying things like “Oh, wow, she is just so desperate!” and “Why can’t she just take the hint and let go?” and “I feel sorry for her!”

This double standard isn’t cute or sexy or romantic, and I’m just not sure this show can — or even should — be taken at face value, especially in the #MeToo era. You can say that shows like The Bachelor are just mindless fluff – an innocent guilty pleasure – but we can’t ignore the dangerous message rippling under the sexy, glossy surface; ignoring it would be as dangerous as the message itself.

Bachelor FinaleIn the end, yes, you can argue that Cassie and Colton ended up together so everything must have worked out, but that misses the point entirely. Cassie telling Colton she wasn’t in love with him in the first place should have ended things right there. Her “no” was a complete sentence. If Colton really loved her, then he would have respected her words and her decision.

In essence, the show is glorifying this incredibly toxic relationship model, one in which a man gets the girl solely by wearing her down, and then holding it up as if this is the type of relationship to aspire to or that it’s OK when men do this because it really just means True Love.

I recently tweeted, “I want a guy to be so distraught when I break up with him that he jumps a fence…” I was half joking, but after The Bachelor finale, even I’m not laughing anymore. No one should be laughing.

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1 Comment Filed Under: Dating, Love Lessons, TV

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So About What I Said is a daily blog that covers relationships, disabilities, lifestyle and pop culture. I love to laugh and have been known to overshare. I also have an unabashed obsession with pop music, polo shirts, and PEZ dispensers. Read more...

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