Poor Bridget

     My mum loves Bridget Jones's Diary, book and movie. Growing up the CD with music from the soundtrack was played almost everyday on my way to school. When I finally saw the movie myself, I just saw a romantic comedy. I thought it charming, funny, and sweet. I've seen it several more times with friends over the years but until I read Thursdays reading from Englightened Sexism by Douglas I had never considered Bridget Jone's Diary to be one of those movies that followed other media of the 90's and early 21st century. But thinking back now...it's true. Daniel's email to Bridget about her shirt can be sexual harrassment and Bridget's inner voice would make most feminists scream in outrage. All she cares about is her weight and finding the perfect man. She slams feminists too in several comments throughout the book. Whiny and over the top, Bridget's character confirms enlightened sexism.
     What I find scary is that I had never noticed this. Until it was clearly pointed out to me I had never questioned the movie or the book. Sure I had seen Bridget as a bit pathetic and almost silly, I had never considered the implications that this media has had on society. It allows for women to be seen and thought of as various forms of Bridget, as women who care only about weight, and men. It makes women seem like they have no other aspirations and driving forces in their lives except that. Yet I still think fondly of the movie. Like other media from the third wave, it's addictive. And being one of the first movies with a female voice, many people believed that this is how women always think. Growing up watching it, it made me believe it was how I, a girl who would become a woman, was also supposed to think. I realized that Bridget was an extreme, but I thought that if it was a famous popular movie, and my mum loved it too, Bridget Jones' life and voice was a truth. And I realize again how society has affected and changed me.