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Feminism: Sex & gender discussions

"A super-cute Lolita look"

189 replies

IWouldNotCouldNotWithAGoat · 27/05/2011 08:26

here

Am I being prudish? Wear sandals with socks for a super-cute Lolita look? This is aimed at teenage girls!! Am I over-reacting or is this just wrong?

It's a New Zealand shop, BTW.

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wolfhound · 27/05/2011 08:47

I think the vast majority of people who have never read Nabokov's book mistakenly think that the original Lolita is some sort of sub-teenage-temptress instead of (as the book clearly shows) a young child being horribly abused sexually and emotionally by an adult male predator over many years. I find it hard to understand how anyone who knows this can possibly want their daughter (or any child) to be given that label.

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TrillianAstra · 27/05/2011 09:01

Link doesn't work.

And I agree with wolfhound.

People don't really know what it means.

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StewieGriffinsMom · 27/05/2011 10:24

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

SuchProspects · 27/05/2011 10:26

I agree most people don't realize what the book is really about. Bit I don't know how a shop can think it's ethical to be promoting a sub-teenage temptress look either though.

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suwoo · 27/05/2011 10:41

Can we have Lolita in the feminist book club? I cant wait to partake next month.

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TheRealMBJ · 27/05/2011 11:13

I started reading Lolita when pregnant with DS and couldn't get past the first chapter. It made me sick.

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ElephantsAndMiasmas · 27/05/2011 11:37

This kind of thing makes me feel ill, and shows just what society really thinks of men who abuse not young children but older, pre-teen girls - that it's naughty but understandable, it makes me think many more people would do it if they would get away with it :(

How else would a book about child abuse have become synonymous with "sexy"?

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redvelvetmooncupcake · 27/05/2011 11:40

I was watching Loose Women (no comment) and Coleen Nolan said Shane Richie called his daughter Lolita - I was like this . Not that I have Shane Richie down as a paragon of anything but still.

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GrimmaTheNome · 27/05/2011 11:46

I can't help thinking it would have been better if Nabokov had called the girl something really ordinary like 'Jane'.

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NanAstley · 27/05/2011 11:59

Lolita is probably the most misused term in the modern world. The name has become shorthand for a young siren tempting an older admirer. It is horrific how the characters have been twisted to make the younger girl into the temptress who knows exactly what she is doing and the older male has become the naive "victim'. Makes me foam at the mouth.

I have tried to read Lolita twice and failed. I cannot square the beauty of the writing against the horror that is being described.

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ElephantsAndMiasmas · 27/05/2011 12:13

Yes that's what makes it such a good book, Nan. I got through it once, but would probably never read it again. Watched half the film and then just had to turn it off.

But it's good that it exists.

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swallowedAfly · 27/05/2011 13:10

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sakura · 27/05/2011 14:24

Fucking hell don't talk to me about the Lolita look.. It originated in this godforsaken place. Here's some fashion links for you to browse at your peril:

Lolita Fashion

How to be a Gothic Lolita (WTF

The funny thing about all this is the Japanese government is actually SUPRISED that women in Japan are refusing to have children..flat out refusing en masse .. because their worth as women is defined by how infantile they can look. If there's one thing mothers aren't it's infantile

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sakura · 27/05/2011 14:28

LOL GrimmatheGnome

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Hullygully · 27/05/2011 14:30

I thought Lolita was brilliant. Nabokov is a towering genius of magnificence. Fact.

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sakura · 27/05/2011 14:35

How? What originality did he contribute to the world? That men like to fuck underage girls?

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Hullygully · 27/05/2011 14:37

Yes. That's it Sakura.

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Hullygully · 27/05/2011 14:38

Grimma, if she had been Jane, you wouldn't have had the three syllables that trip.

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DioneTheDiabolist · 27/05/2011 14:41

Nabokov called her Dolores. Lolita was her nickname (as far as I can remember).

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GrimmaTheNome · 27/05/2011 15:02

Hully - quite so. 'Lolita' sounds kittenish and sexy. A commonplace dull name wouldn't have provided such a convenient tag for perverts to hang their fantasies on.

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Hullygully · 27/05/2011 15:04

It was a jolly sad book. Sad sad sad.

When I was last in India I went into a tailor's shop where they were making engagement gowns for six month olds. And they will be married at 12.

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wolfhound · 27/05/2011 15:24

I think it was Humbert Humbert (the predator and narrator) who gave her the nickname Lolita, so as Grimma says, he was creating a fantasy name, as he did with everything about her.

I agree with Hully, a terribly sad book.

Sakura, I think for me the originality (apart from the sheer virtuosity of the way he writes) is in the way the book is entirely and convincingly told from Humbert's point of view, but the reader keeps seeing flashes of the awful reality beyond his fantasies. You see the overriding strength of his self-delusion (which I think is not uncommon amongst abusers) but you also see how wrong this is. Not many writers could pull that off without just being titillating and crude (which Nabokov never is).

I think the sheer awfulness of all the films made of the book show how remarkable the book is - the films seem unable to grasp the intent, let alone emulate it.

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ElephantsAndMiasmas · 27/05/2011 15:45

Exactly, wolfhound

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Hullygully · 27/05/2011 15:46

Also, when I said he was a towering etc, I was referring to all his books, not just that one.

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Ormirian · 27/05/2011 15:47

Hey! Paedophile chic! Always a good look

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