Zooey Deschanel is sweet. She's the type of sickening sweet that lingers, coating your mouth. She's a steaming apple pie, with brown sugar baked into the crust and a generous helping of ice cream on the side. The problem is that our society is diabetic. Although she seems wholesome and American, those apples are poisonous and may lead to a regression of this country's feminist thought.
The popularity of Fox's hit show "New Girl" particularly worries me. The namesake of the show, Jess, played by the ever-indie Zooey Deschanel, is basically a stylized version of the actress herself. Dressed in a baby blue baby doll dress, blinking her big blue eyes, Deschanel's character uses childish immaturity to endear herself to the audience, in much the same way as Judd Apatow's man-child (think Seth Rogen in "Knocked Up") does. Unlike the lovable man-child, however, the "new girl" is never expected to grow up. Society embraces her citizenship in Never Never Land. As Becca Rothfeld wrote last summer, as a society, we embrace her middle school-esque sensibilities as "adorkable" and "quirky" ("All Quirk and No Play," Aug. 7). Suddenly, traits like social ineptitude and the inability to handle adult situations with grace become desirable. Zooey Deschanel is a grown woman, yet she promotes the "new girl" of our generation to be just that: a girl.
In the show, Deschanel's Jess personifies simpering, helpless womanhood. She acts like a child, an immature middle school student and a grown woman all at once. Dressed like a seven-year-old in church, she giggles at the word "penis" while talking about her sex life. It's the mix that disturbs me. Her gimmick is that of a perpetual pre-teen, and yet she is 31 and attractive. She's become a sex symbol, but she is devoid of the usual sexiness. Instead, she's cute and adorable, and, most importantly, non-threatening to the patriarchy. Even worse, this infantilism draws men to her, which seems almost pedophilic, instead of an act of accepting her flaws.
This, however, is not quite pedophilia. Men aren't attracted to her because she physically resembles a child, but because she emotionally represents the non-threatening nature of a young girl. Men will never have to worry about her mental superiority when her website has a name like "Hello Giggles." Her clothing also minimizes her threat. It's girly, and, yes, sexy, but in a 1950s way. High necklines and opaque tights characterize her wardrobe, revealing very little skin. Not only do men get to avoid being reminded of her sexuality (and the power it can bring), they don't even have to worry about the danger of other men looking at her. Her style evokes the strict gender roles of the 1950s and early 1960s, before women were allowed to be sexy, before marriage equality, before feminism. It's not just that Deschanel is batting her huge eyelashes at men across the country; she's winking in the direction of patriarchal nostalgia.
Forget about the fall of men and the rise of women; this is the rise of the girl, and it's just what men want. Perhaps men idealize her childishness because they don't want to acknowledge legitimate problems facing women today. A woman-child won't assert her right to equality in the workplace and won't insist on the sovereignty of her own body. After all, these are big-girl problems, ones that the childish persona of Deschanel wouldn't even consider.
As a woman, it scares me that men are attracted to such a girl and that society encourages this attraction. I want people to value me based on my humanity and positive contributions to society, not some polka dot dresses and mind-boggling awkwardness. Her personality seems to hinge more on what she wears and the fact that she has a ukulele with a bow on it than on her actual thoughts. I'm never going to be the girl that crinkles my nose under my oversized glasses after spontaneously breaking into song, nor should society expect me to be. I believe that the real Zooey Deschanel, underneath her bangs and glitter, is a strong woman who doesn't have to rely on girlish kitsch to get people to like her. With her fame and widespread appeal, Deschanel has the power to offer an alternative to the blonde bimbo starlet. Her alternative, however, is still trapped under the male gaze.
