Nothing Happened to Demi

I do not regularly read The Daily Beast, but through that wondrous pipeline of information and crap known as Twitter, I came across a vapid and pointless article by Gina Piccalo called "What Happened to Demi?" - as though Demi Moore had suddenly vanished, or shown up somewhere with no legs, or had gone catatonic.

No, Piccalo is just being what she probably thinks is a feminist but is really just a pseudo-feminist concern troll. To wit:

Demi Moore has apparently been domesticated. It’s evident in the way she touches that sleek Cher-hair self-consciously, how she so frequently refers to Ashton Kutcher as “my husband.” It’s in her coy indignation about the media’s focus on her looks, even the girlish way she speaks to the Webcam behind Buddy Holly frames in her YouTube videos. That ball-busting $12 million woman who was the Demi Moore of the mid-1990s would eat this fey facsimile for lunch.

Domesticated. As though she's a feral cat or something. And because she's not running around in G.I. Jane mode all the time, she's an airhead? Because she calls her husband "my husband", she's...what? A doormat? Yeah, JEEZ DEMI, what are you THINKING? Real feminists only refer to their male partner by his name or maybe as "the penis". I'm not sure what we decided on at the last convention.

Piccalo gets even more direct about it:

At the Los Angeles press conference for her new comic indie drama The Joneses last week, Moore, 47, looked great. But whatever claim she has to feminism or authenticity or even Hollywood star power felt especially stale on this afternoon.

And what exactly caused her claim to feminism and "authenticity" (!!) to be compared to a day-old bagel? Well, she had the AUDACITY to wear an expensive dress and heels. I KNOW RIGHT, a woman in Hollywood showed up a press event in fancy clothes. The movie is apparently about the ills of consumerism, so I guess Piccalo thinks she's being all perceptive and observant by mentioning this. But what did she expect - that Moore would show up in an outfit from Kmart? She's a person, an actor - not a character in a movie. Even if Moore supports the concepts in the film, her support isn't decimated by her desire to still wear expensive shoes. I care about the environment, but I don't carry a reusable coffee mug with me. I know, I'm such an asshole. And probably not a feminist, somehow, in Piccalo's world. (Because also: what, precisely, the fuck does feminism have to do with how a woman dresses? I thought we liked the idea of not judging women on their clothing choices, but I guess that was another change to the rules that I missed the memo about.)

A few paragraphs down, Piccalo uses the word "hubris" to describe a recent quote from Moore in UK Elle, in which Moore declares that when she said, years ago, that she wanted it all, "[i]t was coming from a desire for balance. I wanted to remove the limitations that I felt were being imposed on me.” Call me naive - or don't actually, because bullshit, I do not see hubris in that quote. A touch of pride and self-interest, sure, but that doesn't translate to extreme arrogance for me. Wanting balance in your life and wanting some control over how your very public life is proceeding is pretty understandable, actually. Wanting to feel like you can have things the way you'd prefer them is natural, especially for someone in a position of power who is able to actually make it happen. It's amusing considering just before this, Piccalo was criticizing Moore for what she saw as caricature-like behavior, and now she's calling her arrogant for saying something entirely common and human. So picky!

From there, she goes through a run-down of Moore's career, noting the blockbusters she notched in the 90s. Then she mentions how Moore's marriage to Bruce Willis ended and her mother died, and that "[s]he did one last film, a romantic drama Passion of Mind that proved once and for all that her days opening a blockbuster were over", and hey, I don't know about you but I know if my marriage ended and my mother died, the one thing on my mind? BOX OFFICE RATINGS, BITCHES. Yeah, no. Piccalo is essentially mocking Moore for this change in her status which came after two negative life-changing events. Way to go! Your feminism sucks.

After reading this piece, I really wondered what Piccalo's editor was thinking, not to mention Piccalo herself. What was the point of this? Why did she think there was a need to write a long article about her personal disappointment in a certain female actor's insignificant actions? It really felt like sour grapes, or just spite maybe. "What happened to Demi"? Nothing happened to her. She's living her life, and even if she has said that she "seemed to lose her way" as Piccalo states, it's nothing that doesn't occur in basically every human life at one point or another, and sometimes multiple points. So she loves having glossy hair, so she speaks in a soft voice, so she tweets as @mrskutcher - so what? Ms. Piccalo, it doesn't make you a better feminist to say another woman isn't one for things like this. When she starts filming ads for crisis pregnancy centers, or campaigning against fair pay initiatives, get back to me.