In The Buzz Cut, we give our take on all of the intellectual and Internet-famous, celebrity and bizarre, buzzy and overlooked family and parenting news we gossiped about all week.
(Non) fiction. While showbiz is slowly embracing more non-binary characters, unfortunately movie makers still miss the mark when it comes to casting: Scarlett Johansson was recently cast in (and backed out of) the role of a transgender man, actress Kubra Sait plays a transgender woman (with sensitivity) on Netflix’s Sacred Games, and actor Jared Leto won an Oscar for his performance as a transgender woman in Dallas Buyers Club. But is it fair to tell/capitalize on transgender stories when transgender actors aren’t given a fair shot? Difficult questions stalk other art forms, too: This piece explores the fine line between accuracy and age-appropriateness that authors of children’s stories about the Holocaust must walk — and what it means when one or the other is compromised. Elsewhere, an author calls for more children’s stories about depression and suicide, because we aren’t protecting them by avoiding the topics, she says. Finally, from the flip side, this piece suggests the way authors portray children in adult novels, says more about adults, than it does about kids.
Digital boundaries. Life online is famed for crossing borders and pushing boundaries, but that may be part of the problem in these two pieces: This interesting essay explores how social media set brakes on an open relationship, when in real life there were none. And this piece chronicles the difficulty of enforcing restraining orders in the virtual world.
The glass ceiling. For that person in your life who says, “Women just need to speak up when they’re being sexually harassed!” (we all have one…) here’s a great breakdown of how women who have been sexually harassed are coerced and manipulated into silence by higher ups and HR. And in other depressing news, India is lagging far behind when it comes to supporting female entrepreneurship.
Full hearts. Let’s end the week on a lighter note, and talk about love. Here’s all you need to know about what love is (according to Google). And this excerpt from Now My Heart Is Full hit us in our hearts. A peek: “It’s a paradox central to parenting: I wanted to be with her all the time, and yet I didn’t want to be with her all the time.”