LONDON (Reuters) - A shopping chain has withdrawn the sale of beds named Lolita and designed for six-year-old girls after furious parents pointed out that the name was synonymous with sexually active preteens.
Woolworths said staff who administer the website selling the beds were not aware of the connection.
Woolworths staff had not heard of the classic novel or two subsequent films based on it.
"What seems to have happened is the staff who run the Web site had never heard of Lolita, and to be honest no one else here had either," a spokesman told newspapers.
"We had to look it up on (online encyclopaedia) Wikipedia. But we certainly know who she is now."
Woolworths said staff who administer the website selling the beds were not aware of the connection.
Woolworths staff had not heard of the classic novel or two subsequent films based on it.
"What seems to have happened is the staff who run the Web site had never heard of Lolita, and to be honest no one else here had either," a spokesman told newspapers.
"We had to look it up on (online encyclopaedia) Wikipedia. But we certainly know who she is now."
I guess as a parent I should be concerned with the continuing sexualization of young girls but the Woolworth staff have pleaded ignorance so I'll be more concerned with their plain old ignorance instead.
I've never read Nabokov's Lolita nor have I seen either of the two films based on the novel but the very name has become synonymous with a sexually precocious and barely pubescent girl, underag
e jailbait for older, insecure men. She pops up in pop culture periodically, Mina Suvari, the lust object in American Beauty comes to mind, but Lolitas are generally favoured by a less than savoury milieu. I thought that every reasonably informed adult knew what a Lolita was.....wrong!!
e jailbait for older, insecure men. She pops up in pop culture periodically, Mina Suvari, the lust object in American Beauty comes to mind, but Lolitas are generally favoured by a less than savoury milieu. I thought that every reasonably informed adult knew what a Lolita was.....wrong!! Here we have a room full of working people, some running a website for a major retail chain and none of them have ever heard of Lolita. Not vacant 10th graders at a run down public school, not crack addicts out on weekend leave from their half way house but gainfully employed and supposedly educated men and women who are allowed to vote, drink, drive, and procreate.
Is it possible that the internet with it's incredibly easy access to information about virtually anything is creating a generation of people who don't really need to know or remember anything other than how to open Wikipedia on their laptop??
More than sexualization of the young, more than morbid obesity, more than the Hollywood writers strike, this sort of intellectual laziness may prove to be our downfall. Meanwhile there's a fascist out there somewhere just chomping at the bit, biding his time until he can seduce the blissfully ignorant majority. "What's a fascist?" you ask......Google it.
6 comments:
Maria, you (and your posse) are so lucky you have connections!!
Hardly know where to start.
How can you accuse anyone else of intellectual
laziness when you haven't read the book yourself?
[at least see Kubrick's movie version]
Also: I'm not sure older men who are attracted
to particularly young woman [girls, even] are necessarily "insecure".
But you can argue that with me.
That's all for now.
Have a happy.
Troy Huber
Mr. Huber,
What an unexpected pleasure it is to find myself in defensive mode in the face of your slanderous inference.
That I haven't read the book or seen the movies may speak to my laziness in general but not to any intellectual sloth (Hmmm, note to self...an intellectual sloth, new mascot possibilities for The Blob, potential name Lay-Z, catch phrase: "I think therefore I is")
in particular.
Maybe the subject matter didn't interest me, watching Humbert Humbert being tortured by the unwitting (or is she??) minx Lolita who innocently flaunts her taut young body and budding breasts with a burgeoning sense of her awesome sexual power.
True though, my use of "insecure" was a generalization but in that spirit guys, older men, who lust after teens or 12 year olds usually aren't looking for an equal
and that's usually because deep down they feel inadequate in such a relationship but hey...whatever turns you on.
joustingly,
The Blob
It just seems to this grizzled, hardened, wizened [etc]
spectator that since you make a good deal of your cantankerous porridge on the backs of the ignorant
masses, you might be called out on your own
shortcomings.
[if a total lack of book-reading is not intellectual
laziness, I don't know what is]
Also - I still maintain your generalization regarding
older men and young women [nymphs, basically]
is ultimately hogwash. Who can judge what really
drives anyone into the arms of another?
"Lay-Z" is a good mascot name, mind you [I'll go
halvesies wiith you].
Have a spectacular,
Troy Huber
Troy,
I'm reading through your most recent attack and it occurs to me (MMMM...cantankerous porridge....)that my lack of book-readin' has made me a sitting duck for your well aimed poisoned darts.
While not "total" as you contend (I do manage to get through between.33 and .45 books per year according to the latest StatsCan numbers) it is true that I read few books.
I'll give you laziness but stick to my guns and will brook no mention of the word intellectual in tandem nor will I have any truck with those who attempt to pair the two!
I've never thought of myself as an intellectual but I do enjoy thinking outside the box and try to use my rational mind to make decisions rather than my emotions. I also love Captain Crunch and had a brief flirtation with Survivor so you be the judge.
Being able to find patterns and make connections between seemingly disparate elements rather than rely on facile empirical evidence is a good way to demonstrate intellectual vigour.
Maybe you know a well-centered older man in a meaningful and fulfilling relationship with a nubile and clever 14 year old girl.
I needn't tell you that this proves nothing.
I won't judge the attraction between consenting adults although I knew the whole K-Fed and Britney thing was a disaster from the word go but I can make some reasonable assumptions about Lolita-type situations. It doesn't take a Sigmund Freud...it barely even takes an intellectual!!
p.s. halvesies it is
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