I think
Amal Clooney is really, really cool. A little while ago, when she was on her
way into the European Court of Human Rights a UK Telegraph journalist stopped
her and actually asked her if she was donning any Versace.
How is it
even remotely appropriate for a journalist covering a human rights story to
jump completely out of that context and ask Amal Clooney what brand she is
wearing?
Besides
her effortlessly witty response (Amal retorted “Ede & Ravenscroft,” the makers of English legal
robes), I thought this whole event touched on a lot of issues we had discussed
in class with respect to the female body being the object of the gaze. Indeed,
it really highlights the ways in which the female body is fragmented and, in
turn, made more vulnerable.
On a physical level, that the journalist
asked what brand Amal was wearing not only reveals that clothing, fashion and
its associated status are more important than the actual substance of her job
as a human rights attorney, but also, more simply, suggests that when it comes
to a female in a position of power, what she’s wearing is actually apparently important (or, at least the public is curious
enough to want to know). So, physically, her achievements and work are
disassociated from her body.
This kind of persona fragmentation (Amal’s
job as an attorney disassociated from her physical body, which is the object of
gaze) unsurprisingly places her in a position of vulnerability. She can be a
human rights attorney, or she can be a woman wearing high fashion, but it seems
like the media is not ready to see these two concepts wedded together in one
person, when, ironically enough, they are in Amal Clooney. It is as if the
media refuses to see someone who is so authoritative and in a position of power
also be a woman and, simply, look good.
I agree with your post and even thought how weird it was at the Golden Globes that reporters were asking her about her wardrobe. One reporter even wanted her to take a shot on the red carpet and she declined. She's not a 'personality', she's a person with a sophisticated job, and I think the media often doesn't know how to treat women with that distinction, therefore they end up belittling all of their qualities into focusing on their appearance. Tina Fey and Amy Poehler said it best in their monologue. They said "Amal is a human rights lawyer who worked on the Enron case, an adviser to Kofi Annan on Syria and was appointed to a three-person commission investigating rules of war violations in the Gaza strip, so tonight her husband is getting a lifetime achievement award." I thought that this was a perfect way to express how ridiculous it is that as a culture we focus on the woman's gaze and the male's achievement.
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