IWF: Hairy Brutish Monster? I'd Hit It. (Friday Fun Link?)

If you're looking for a simian-fetishizing, feminist-hating, metrosexual-baiting, when-men-use-hygiene-products-the-terrorists-have-won rant to close out '05, look no further than "King Kong -- My Kind of Guy" by Independent Women's Forum blogger Charlotte Allen:

… King Kong is, well, a brute but a guy you want to have around….It's Kong, furthermore not the wimpy humans in the movie (epitomized by the fey Adrien Brody playing sensitive-writer Jack Driscoll and supposedly Watts's love interest), who saves his lady from being eaten by dinosaurs. I loved the scene in which Kong first rips a stegosaurus's jaw in half with his bare hands, then beats his chest with pride. Brody, as ever in this movie, arrives on the scene too late. No wonder he's no match for King Kong in Watts's heart.

So I took away my own message from the movie: Whom would I rather have around when the going got tough: a jaw-jaw chattering class intellectual like Brody or a primitive red-state brute along the lines of King Kong? I think the answer's pretty clear.

Indeed! But as an aside, how is it that anti-intellectual types get to tear down under-muscled, overeducated males while wringing their promise-ringed hands over a university gender gap that supposedly shortchanges men? If all the real men are doing time at the National Zoo, what do we care about university admissions?

Comments

[Julian Sanchez]

Aww, you skipped my favorite part--the "it's so nice to see brown-skinned heathens protrayed as homicidal savages; more please!" riff.

[Jason Ligon]

I wasn't really made white-guilt uncomfortable by the island natives being all freaky. Should I have been?

[Jennifer]

I'm supposed to go see the movie tonight, so I'll avoid this thread for fear of seeing a spoiler.

Wait a minute--why am I afraid? I already know he dies at the end.

[Timothy]

KONG WIN NOBEL PRIZE, IF ONLY KONG ABLE TO OVERCOME GENDER GAP IN HIGHER EDUCATION!

KONG VERY BRIGHT BUT MISUNDERSTOOD!

KONG WANT CLIMB BUILDING!

YARGH!

[Jim Walsh]

In other words, the Kongster represents the kind of guy women want, as opposed to what they say they want (No wonder the singles scene is such a flustercluck). But what to make of the 1960's Saturday morning cartoon version where K2's sidekick was a boy who was, in the immortal words of the show's theme, "too young to know the danger?"
Where's Fred Wertham when you need him...

[Morat]

Jim: To be pendantic, Kong represents the kind of man Charlotte wants. I've found asking "What women want" to be a rather useless question, and tend to be leery of anyone answering such a general question.

Now, if you say "Women tend to like men who are something like their fathers", I might give you some wiggle room. It's not entirely nonsensical, and has the benefit of being entirely useless -- since the range of "Men who are fathers" is just as broad as "Women who want men".

[zach]

We'll see how much of a red-stater King Kong is when they tell him he has to wear pants and go to Church every Sunday.

[zach]

By the way, I consider myself at least somewhat intellectual, but I have a beard and don't use facial moisturizers. Does this mean I'm just fooling myself?

[Johnny Clarke]

There are two kinds of people in this world, Tuco...

Y'know, to pop a hole in Charlotte's false dichotomy, I would like to mention the immortal "Doc Savage", a fictional American she would consider too masculine for the blue states and far too "intellectual" for the red ones.

But if push came to shove and, after appropriate debate and contemplation the Doc decided he had to fight King Kong...I know who I'd put my money on.

[pigwiggle]

False choice. I'm a current events junkie, love to argue politics, theoretical chemist. I also hunt, fish, love to shoot, love to backpack; born and raised near the Tetons. My wife, now a physician, pulled green chain in her fathers lumber mill while growing up in north Idaho. In fact, I just spent a day on the (near frozen) Clearwater fishing steelhead with the father-in-law. There are intelligent well-educated folks who like to get dirty.

Aggression and muscle are worse than useless unless tempered with intellect. Kong isn't any less deficient than that lily skinned Brody.

[mtc]

but...it's not like brody's character was some pussy. he was always late on the scene because he wasn't a giant fucking ape, not because he was afraid or too senstive. if he had been a total sally, i could sorta sympathize with what Allen is saying. but they were the same fucking character, really, the ape and the man.

also jack black just can't be a villan, cripes.

[zach]

Mtc's got a point. Mr. Brody's character didn't hesitate to try and steal Watts out from under a sleeping Kong, nor was he scared to draw his attention to keep him from killing other people in Manhattan. But he did wear pants, and who knows whether or not he went to Church on Sundays.

[Karen Cox]

I read the original article. IWF Inkwell is the home of women who think "Leave it to Beaver" was a documentary. I'm the mother of two sons, and it would certainly make my life easier to just let 'em grow and leave the civilizing part to some woman twenty years from now. Unfortuneately, I think it's much better for society if I teach them to bathe, do laundry, eat with forks and such before unleashing them on the unsuspecting female population. I'm also quite sure Charlotte herself wouldn't look twice at any unbathed trailer park Romeo with a blue-collar income. This was just one more chance for a spoiled brat to earn fake-populist cred by attacking upward mobility.

[zach]

I'm also quite sure Charlotte herself wouldn't look twice at any unbathed trailer park Romeo with a blue-collar income.

You really never can tell.

[andy]

love the title!

I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw McDonald's ad. Could they possibly become any more square?

http://andrewteman.org/blog/index.php?p=39

[Douglas Fletcher]

King Kong, who cares? I still get the willies remembering Brace Bannon, for god's sake.

[Franklin Harris]

Well, Kong had better save Watts because he *is* the one putting her in danger in the first place! It's like being happy your man saved you from a bar fight when he's the jackass who took you to a biker bar in the first place.

[Douglas Fletcher]

Though if Kong is what women really want, perhaps the male motto should become WWKD.

[Franklin Harris]

Oh, and Kong is also a stalker. In New York, he tracks Ann Darrow down just so he can take her to the Empire State Building after closing hours.

[Alan Vanneman]

"I loved the scene in which Kong first rips a stegosaurus's jaw in half with his bare hands ..."

Charlotte, honey, it's a T. Rex,not a stegosaurus. Can't tell the difference between a T. Rex and a stegosaurus? Yeah, you're a chick.

[zach]

Though if Kong is what women really want, perhaps the male motto should become WWKD.

It does seem to come more naturally than the Jesus thing.

[Jarod]

Yeah, that wasn't a stegosaurus. Technically, it wasn't supposed to be a tyrannosaurus either; it was a venatosaurus rex, or "v. rex", a fictional dinosaur created by Weta (Peter Jackson's special effects house) meant to be an evolutionary offshoot of the t. rex.

You see how I did that? By pointing out one inaccurate statement in this piece that in no way affects the author's claims, I have managed to undermine her credibility - without addressing the substance of her thesis! I am the very model of a modern master debater.

[Eric the .5b]

Because ending with "Yeah, you're a chick" was clearly meant to give the impression of a serious attempt to undermind credibility.

[Ralph Reed]

"King Kong is, well, a brute but a guy you want to have around...."

Hmm, then what does that make all those freshly-scrubbed pink cherubs like Karl Rove?

[JK]

But in the movies you don't have to chose. There's Clark Kent / Superman. Or how about Indiana Jones - definite blue state tendencies, although he didn't suffer government bureaucrats gladly.

[Bonar Law]

This is all very interesting, but I'm still confused about what the Empire State Building symbolizes.

[independent worm]

She only said "when the going got tough." Not "for all purposes."

And technically, she didn't SAY she'd prefer Kong in those tough situations. She just said the choice was "pretty clear".

Clear to her maybe, but I find her answer to be vague and ambiguous.

Also, is there really any sense in this comparison? I mean, ok, if Kong WERE a human being and NOT an ape, and if he weren't 100 feet tall, maybe we'd have something. I wonder if there's a human being she could put in there in place of Kong, to make her point a little better.

[James Kabala]

Crud like this is what gives social conservatives (of which I am one) a bad name. And as for the "stegosaurus" issue, it's true that it has nothing to do with her argument, but the two dinosaurs look nothing alike and howling errors always undermine an argument even when they technically shouldn't.

[mk]

Would Charlotte still be starry-eyed if Peter Jackson hadn't edited out all of Kong's poo-flinging?

I don't think so.

If only John Waters had done this film using his legendary "Smell-o-vision" like he did with Polyester.Now that would have been something

[pigwiggle]

?Crud like this is what gives social conservatives (of which I am one) a bad name.?

Crackpot musings; no. Shit like anti-sodomy and drug laws, bullshit decisions like Raich; yes. Almost no one cares what social conservatives think, it's what they have government do on their behalf.

[Doc]

Bet she'd have a lot to say about carpet humping guys with back hair...

[andy]

"Crud like this is what gives social conservatives (of which I am one) a bad name."

And what, praytell, gives you a good name?

[crimethink]

Bwwaahhhaaa! I know it's been discussed already, but a stegosaurus was a freakin' herbivore. Breaking its jaw in half would be possible even for a human. Of course, that's assuming you managed to avoid its tail...

And it's telling that, with all the talk about what women want, no one ever wastes their breath on what men want. I feel discriminated against... 😉

[joe]

Some tight assed rich chick gets off on playing "Lifestyle Submissive," that's no skin off my nose.

But don't pretend you fetish is some kind of enobling political statement. Hon.

[Mr. F. Le Mur]

And it's telling that, with all the talk about what women want, no one ever wastes their breath on what men want. I feel discriminated against...[I hate smilies]

Speaking for men, what do you want, Mr. crimethink?

Since nobody asked me, given the choice between the chick, the semi-nerdy guy(?*) and the giant monkey, I'd take the giant monkey.
(*Aint seen the latest remake, so just guessing. Er, lying, actually).

[Larry A]

So the Brady Bunch types want King Kong to come to their rescue, while feminists prefer Jack Driscoll.

I'd prefer the kind of woman who, when necessary, pulls out a Dirty Harry S&W and bags her own dinosaur.

[crimethink]

Mr F Le Mur,

[channeling Steve Martin]

If I could have but one Christmas wish granted, it would be for all the children of the world to join hands and sing a song of peace, joy, and harmony... (or peace, joy and harmony as Nick Gillespie's MLA buddies would have it!)

[crimethink]

Forgot the link!

http://snltranscripts.jt.org/86/86fwish.phtml

[mongo]

Mongo like this film

mongo not like this thread

mongo start feeling good, feel like chance of getting laid

now feel not good

stay stinky or wash?
eat beans or salad?
ride ox or get Prius?

mongo very conflicted

mongo go drown sorrows in vat of beans

[wayne]

I have nothing to say about this remake of Kong because I have not seen it. I saw the original when I was about ten years old, and it bored me to tears then. Of course I was not yet interested in girls at that point. I am sure Faye Raye (sp?) would have a better impact on me had I been 14.

The whole dopey idea of a 100' tall ape is so stupid that I just can't get past it though. Stack on the idea that a 100' tall ape "falls in love with" a 5'3", 100 pound homo sapien and the stupid meter quivers at its extreme right bound.

[ChrisO]

Let me decode this article for everyone. That Kong, y'know, he does have pretty big feet. And we all know what that means.

[Njorl]

I haven't seen the remake, but from the original I'd say they got the title wrong. It should be "Queen Kong". There ain't no way that's a male gorilla. Some of those shots would show "it" for sure.

I interpret it as the supression of any kind of dominance in the female by a modern society. The aggressive, lustful aspect of the female (Kong) is enraptured by its own beauty (Ann Darrow) - and tragically destroyed by it.

Wow, that almost works!