Pussy Riot and Brittni Colleps – women in trouble/troubling women

A week ago Friday in Moscow, Russia, three women in their 20s were convicted of “hooliganism” and sentenced to two years in a penal colony. The all-girl members of the impromptu punk band “Pussy Riot” received world-wide attention after being arrested for an anti-Putin performance on the steps of an Orthodox church. Pussy Riot’s supposed primary victim, the Russian Orthodox Church, approved the prosecution of the women but asked the state for leniency. The female sentencing judge ignored the plea, calling the women a danger to society.

On the other side of the world in Fort Worth, Texas, another young woman was found guilty Friday of a serious crime. Brittni Nicole Colleps, a married 28-year-old mother of three and former high school English teacher, will be serving five years in jail for having “improper relationships” with five of her former students. She had sex with some of her students. Colleps’ defense did not contest that sexual activity took place between the teacher and the young men. Instead, her attorneys argued that the students, each of whom was 18 or older at the time of the encounters, were willing participants. Ms. Colleps’ sexual partners tried to keep their activity quiet because they “didn’t want her to get in trouble.” Discretion was unavoidable as Texas prosecutors never even considered a plea bargain. They wanted a jury to serve as “the moral conscience of the community.”

Brittni Colleps should not be teaching. Pussy Riot – now often called a punk art collective – are not good musicians. The consistency in jail time and the inconsistency in responses to those sentences is telling.

Pussy Riot’s ordeal has been a world-wide cause célèbre, with civil rights organizations, politicians and pop stars rising to the band’s defense. The paper of record, The New York Times, considered Pussy Riot’s sentencing front-page news. Those that support the prosecution assert that the women committed a premeditated crime against the church and Russian morality. The state, championing this view, has pursued justice by aligned itself every more closely with the Russian national church. Those who oppose the trial and conviction see it as a case of free speech being muzzled. Pussy Riot are media darlings, even in the tabloids.

Ms. Colleps ordeal is also a global media event with salacious details feeding the frenzy. She had sex with multiple men and one escapade was captured on a cell phone. The video was shown to her jury, adding to the scandal. The Texas prosecutors’ arguments are a defense of the community’s values. District Attorney Elizabeth Beach described Ms. Colleps’ actions as “completely disgusting.” Ms. Colleps’ lawyers, however, described the charges as an unconstitutional intrusion of the state into the sex lives of adults. The students, they argued, were of the age of consent. The jury convicted quickly. Ms. Colleps’ sexual behavior is her crime. Do not expect, however, for Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch to rush to Brittni Colleps’ aid. They and other organizations have been mute, as has the non-tabloid press. The New York Times has published nothing about her.

It is relatively easy for Americans to scoff at Russia’s ham-handed attempts at controlling speech and behavior. The female punk band, whose members look like and act like rebels, fit a recognizable stereotype. Further, Pussy Riot needed to be convicted in order to fulfill that role. Any number of musicians – female or not – can perform protest songs and never be noticed. After all, most musical protests are harmless. Pussy Riot’s conviction affirms a convenient way of understanding human rights, that freedoms are hard to come by outside of our shores. We are able to judge from afar while affirming our own sense of righteousness.

On the other hand, Colleps will gather little sympathy, even though the proportionality of crime to punishment may strike many as dubious. Her sin is more serious than breaking a law that was passed to protect children because her sexual behavior is incompatible with acceptable norms for teacher, mother and wife. In fact, Colleps’ transgression dishonored multiple communities – her home, her school, and, by proxy through her husband who is in the service, the military. Her sexual partners may have thought leniency proper, but framing that defense demands a radical re-casting of her sins into something different. “Free sexuality” does not carry the same currency as “free speech.” She will be punished severely.

Deeply held concerns about changing values and mores are more often than not played through our responses to the crimes of women and their perceived status as criminals. While the actions of Pussy Riot – playing music – and Brittni Colleps – having sex with adult men – may not in and of themselves be characterized as criminal, the context of their actions were judged to be dangerous to their communities. Pussy Riot’s music was a public affront to state and church; Brittni Colleps sexual behavior was an affront to community values for teachers. But in both situations, it is less about who has been put at risk and more about the political gains that are accrued from their prosecutions.

Pussy Riot helps to explain Russia – and it also helps to explain the way that many in the west rush to support a particular concept of free speech. Brittni Colleps can tell us a great deal about America’s concern about sexuality, public schools, and the fascination with the prurient. And both situations are extremely informative about the power of the prosecution to indict, convict and define.

August 29, 2012 American Culture Today, Curiouser and Curiouser

Deluxe – From Design to Bling and Back Again

Relentless branding and marketing extend luxury to the masses. But like America in the 1870s, famously called the “Gilded Age” and not the “Golden Age” by Mark Twain, our purchases are no longer quite so luxurious. Luxury has lost its luster, Dana Thomas explains, in Deluxe. Penned in 2007, when the luxury goods business grossed revenues of more than $157 billion, Deluxe chronicles a well-known capitalist arc. Initially an artisan works small, emphasizes quality, and grows a business. At a certain point, however, the business either stalls or is radically transformed through the injection of new capital and new models. It is the move from proprietary capitalism to managerial capitalism, a process that I’d wager is known by that name by Ms. Thomas but not stated in her book.

Within the luxury goods sector, the aggregation of “brands” under large holding companies, coupled with the advent of Chinese manufacturing, completes the story. Massive amounts of wealth are created by mass-market sales of what had been artisanal creations of clothing, luggage, accessories and scents. Luxury brands no longer are known by the quality of their components are manufacture. They are known by their branding, and ironically, it is easy to produce a counterfeit of a good whose primary distinguishing characteristic is ornamental, like a logo.

Thomas writes briskly. Her narrative, driven by a journalist’s curiosity, is tight and clean. She visits designer houses, factories, and board rooms. She talks with designers, sales people, marketers and consumers. Her arguments make sense.

And yet . . . nestled within this book is a better book struggling to make itself heard. The concepts Thomas presents are simplified, Cliff notes versions of oft-analyzed economic phenomena. The linkage of consumerism with mass markets and identity is a staple of economics, history and popular culture. One does not have to quote Marx or Veblen, but there are powerful ideas from the 19th century that support and scaffold much of Deluxe. Thomas, however, eschews the complicated or complex.

People appreciate and crave quality. They are willing to pay for it, too. The democratization of luxury without quality renders luxury an empty category, a ripe opportunity for the entrepreneurial.  The disruptive power of technology is facilitating multiple answers to the question of what the future of luxury will be. I believe that there are three paths: traditional luxury, internet-funded artisanal, and technologically transformed bespoke.

Traditional luxury will become ever more important as the luxury brands are challenged to retain the purchases high-end customers. Fashion houses are already familiar with the challenge of expanding couture just enough to make profits while maintaining a distinction from mass production. Brands respond by splintering into different labels, each of which is produced under different circumstances with different materials. However, consumers’ demand for quality requires something more than red and black labels. One strategy is to create an entirely new entity; another is to horizontally integrate by purchasing a smaller, more luxurious brand.  One fascinating new strategy is that some companies that have lost their way now create “heritage” or “legacy” sub-brands to make a commodified value statement. For these firms, the aim is to recreate quality from long ago and to reconnect with consumers.  Levi’s and Dickey‘s are two such firms, but examples are legion.

Another path to luxury comes from the ability of the internet to allow a manufacturers to control growth while maintaining quality. Competition is ruthless and relentless, to be sure, and customer reviews and the power of social media can whipsaw firms. That said, good quality and customer service can redefine a luxury good and be profitable. For the mid to lower end of the market, Etsy is primary marketplace for the hand-made, but many others – and a good search – will reveal multiple choices for inquisitive consumers. Artisanal firms in this environment can define themselves in different ways, too, offering an advantage over larger companies. Manufacturing only in America, or committing to sustainable manufacture, are two such distinguishing paths.

Finally, high-tech bespoke, be it from a 3-D printer or a fashion-site with made-to-measure clothing, is an increasingly viable option. The technology is not perfect, but it is getting steadily better and more reliable.

I used to believe that my desire for quality made me an outlier (interestingly enough, the name of a clothing company). After reading Deluxe and giving the matter some thought, I think that I’m on the crest of a trend: internet-enabled purchases from small, non-marketed companies with strong value-statements but no wide brand recognition. In other words, luxury will return to its roots.

May 29, 2012 American Culture Today, Reviews