Sexism? What Sexism? “iGirl”
March 16, 2009
by Kitt
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The "girl" from iGirl
“What’s all this fuss about sexism?”
“Sexism? I just don’t see it.”
“Can you give me some examples of this sexism?”
Sound familiar?
If you are like me, you’ve been on the receiving end of such questions over the past year. Today, my answer to these questions is another question:
Why is iGirl one of the Top 10 most downloaded and purchased iPhone applications?
What or who is iGirl? First and foremost, according to the iPhone app store tagline, “She Obeys”.
What else? Well, with iGirl, you can “Have your own virtual girl friend on your iPhone for less than the price of a cup of coffee or a beer, and shake her around!” What’s more, you will be rewarded with sounds of her arousal when you “blow her, shake her, touch her and more!” If that’s not enough, you can also activate “The Famous Marilyn Monroe pose” “simply by blowing on your phone” as well as “Zoom and rotate the iGirl with the iPhone touch screen to enjoy the iGirl from any angle or distance”. Basically, iGirl is a “beautiful 3-dimensional female model that can be manipulated by the user to perform various actions”. (emphasis added)
Based on the iPhone app store’s customer reviews, it seems the application is just not sexist enough for its main detractors who simply want the iGirl to be: naked, prettier, sexier, have bigger boobs, or be wearing a floss-style bikini. She’s described as “ugly” or “boring” by some.
For me, a few other adjectives come to mind regarding the application: objectifying, disturbing, creepy.
Sexist? Yes. Misogynist? You betcha!
The fact that iGirl is one of the Top 10 most downloaded and purchased applications for one of the hottest mainstream consumer electronic devices of our time tells us a little something about our society. Maybe, just maybe, it tells us that sexism is rampant in our society?
And it doesn’t stop there. As you can imagine, iGirl’s popularity is no fluke. Browsing through the App store will unearth a whole array of sexist, misogynist applications.
I wonder why?
2 of the top paid apps are, um, questionable at best
To me it is only sexist because apparently there is no Iboy app. That is no doubt because women are, according to patriarchy, not stimulated visually, they don’t care what men look like or even notice. HA!
Maybe some female programmer can design the feminist response to iGirl. It could reuse almost all of the iGirl ad copy, promising sounds of his arousal when you “blow him, shake him, touch him and more!” but with the added feature:
“Performs reliably every time, no Viagra required!”
Call it iDick.
*****A
creepy
LOL, oh goodness, that’s atrocious. I just can’t get over the picture of some guy blowing on his phone to get his igirl to move. That is not a guy I want to sit next to on a bus.
What? This bothers you? What’s wrong with you? You have no sense of humor. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
what about the walking-talking girl robot on Japan’s fashion catwalk?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....girl_robot
ironically – the original weighed 125 pounds, but the catwalk-model weighs 90 lbs!
maybe that’s not ironic, but just sad.
RE : Adrienne – I don’t think that’s a good idea, in my above comment I posted a blog about this app as well, and I don’t think we are helping gender equality by making EQUALLY degrading programs about different genders, then both sides become objectified, which creates BALANCE but not EQUALITY. I have thought about developing a response to this – the simulation is supposed to be of a girlfriend (right….) , so, I was thinking about duel app where you download your ideal mate, and there are 100′s of options (passive aggressive, behaviors, appearance, ethics, etc.) and you enter into real relationship dilemmas and successes. Then the apps talk to each other and make decisions etc. I mean it may seem convoluted and away from this (as a response), but I really hate that this is called a simulated “girlfriend”, with the three ethnic options, two language options, and other minimal options. I think the app sends the wrong message about our relationship with each other.
[...] at the iTunes app store and Apple keeps a percent of each sale. About a year ago, I wrote a post about some of the obnoxiously sexist apps for sale at the iTunes app store. At the time, I reported that at least two of the top 10 most [...]
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