Cuties: Our Response
We have been asked for our response on the controversial Cuties film. Our team decided we would view it ourselves first, before giving our opinion, which is our usual approach. The five of us viewed it last weekend. Some of us watched it more than once. We have discussed it most days since then, and considered the views of others we respect.
While we understand not all supporters will agree with where we have landed, we at Collective Shout value independent thinking (while respecting colleagues globally who may come to a different conclusion). This is a summary of where we have arrived.
The experiences of African immigrant girls transplanted into French society is the basis for the film made in 2017, first screened at Sundance, now streaming on Netflix.
Starring 14-year-old Fathia Youssouf as Amy, and directed by Senegalese-French film maker Maïmouna Doucouré, Cuties explores the lives of young girls growing up in the middle of two cultures – one demonising female sexuality, the other exploiting it and calling it freedom.
The film demonstrates Amy’s limited ‘choices’. Both involve conforming to cultures harmful to their wellbeing and freedom. It powerfully critiques social media and internet culture and its deforming impacts on girls. It shows how they imitate pop culture’s version of female sexuality – when they know almost nothing about sex - and how this puts them in danger. Adolescent girls see their female hip hop idols growing rich and popular through sexual dance routines and pornified lyrics– and desire the same attention for themselves.(If you haven’t already, visit our commentary on WAP here:
https://www.collectiveshout.org/response_defence_of_wap).
Of course we have issues with the dance scenes. These images were designed to make us feel uncomfortable – we are distressed, as we should be. In our opinion, these scenes, totalling around five minutes, could have been shot differently, from a distance, with fewer close ups of the girls' bodies. They are real girls and their wellbeing warranted more consideration.
The problem goes well beyond this Netflix film. If people feel they must delete Netflix, of course they should. But they may also need to delete Tik Tok, Instagram, You Tube and Facebook, where there is equally disturbing content featuring young girls. We document it daily. (Instagram is consulting with our team right now to try to do something about the child sexual exploitation material it hosts – and has just announced a new reporting tool to take down this material).
As we were formulating our response we came across Dance Moms, currently showing on Channel 9 Go. The dance routines and costumes were very similar to those in the film, the girls even younger. What we were confronted with on mainstream TV – bearing in mind Dance Moms is hardly a work of protest – we found even more troubling.
We interpret the film as a serious and urgent warning about what happens when we throw girls to the social media/pop culture wolves. How poverty and inter-generational disadvantage compounds this. And how they suffer when good role models and wise and sound parental guidance is lacking. That’s the big take-away from the film – how we have all failed. The world our children are growing up in is the world we have created. This is the crisis the film confronts us with – and could, if we allow it, contribute to the momentum for change.
At the end the film offers a glimpse of how childhood should be. It could motivate us to do better if we allowed it.
] might be torn over the anti-abortion shit.
