We need to calm down about “Cutties”
About a month ago (or a full year in quarantine time…), the poster and trailer for “Cuties”, a Netflix production, were released and everybody was mad. Accusations of pedophilia and sexual exploitation were running wild, and the director of the film was forced to close her social media accounts.
The film has been finally released and people aren’t happier.
So, what is “Cuties” about? “Cuties” is a movie about the sexualization of children, especially girls. And… that’s it. Whatever point was expected to be made in the movie, it got lost because of the sloppy execution and, perhaps, an inexperienced director.
As I see it, there are two things that “Cutties” wants to say and that I somehow agree with: one, that the oversexualized culture that our children (both girls and boys) are exposed to is a dangerous machine that is robbing them from the experience of actually being kids by exposing them to things that are beyond their control and understanding.
Of course, here I can point out the hypocrisy of many of the critics of this movie in this specific aspect, especially progressive critics. There are accusations of how the outrage caused by “Cuties” comes from right wingers and conservatives casually throwing around the label of “pedophilia” while missing the point, but, can you really blame them?
Sexualization of children is something that is happening now and it’s not just coming from TV and media. And, even when comes from TV and media, you see people defending it by calling it “empowering” or “progressive”. Let’s talk for a minute about Desmond Napoles (a.k.a. Desmond is Amazing), who’s the poster boy of child exploitation on behalf of progressive causes. Desmond’s parents took him to a gay bar to dance for money and then had the nerve to say this and other stunts are “not sexual” despite that any normal adult would see any of his pictures and immediately recognise that, whoever took them, wanted to appeal to the many different pedophiles who are always lurking the child’s instagram account.
Desmond’s case isn’t the only one. He’s not the only “drag kid” who’s been seen surrounded by people of doubtful reputation. And “drag kids” aren’t the only example of the phenomenon of using children to virtue signal about sexual tolerance: we now have schools that feature “drag queen story time”, pornography, strippers… and people always pulls out the “it’s not sexual” defence because we’ve been exposed to so many sexual content that we can’t even recognise it now.
Yes, it’s important to talk with children about sex and sexuality, the bad and the good. And yes, schools should also do it. But it’s very hard not to see this situation as aggressive indoctrination rather than education. And it’s unfair to call any worried parent a “right wing prude” instead of accepting that there is some justification for their scepticism about this movie.
The smugness of the people defending the movie is practically the same we see when they defend sexually charged education in schools and instead of trying to understand them, parents and their views are insulted and called names based on their religious beliefs or affiliations.
Which leads me to the second point this movie tries to make: Maïmouna Doucouré, the director of “Cutties”, wants to denounce how strict religious beliefs can be oppressive for children and their natural development, which I agree with.
Doucouré comes from a Muslim background, a society that covers young girls and represses any attempt of sexual expression. Yet, Doucouré goes to the extreme when she accuses societies for being repressive of girls’ exploration of sexuality by presenting a straw-man, something that most parents would disagree with rather than focus on the very specific way in which her own culture oppresses girls: indeed, many western parents allow their girls to dance and dress like what you see in “Cuties” and many don’t even realise how unhealthy this can be, but this is frowned upon by most of society. The majority of parents allow their girls to express themselves in ways that are tolerable for their own standards and set of values (as is their right as parents), yet, they don’t go to extremes like cover their children from head to toe, mutilate their genitals, or murder them if they step out of line. Seems to me that Doucouré wants to make a vague criticism of her culture by using another culture as an escape goat.
If Doucouré wanted to tell a story about sexual oppression, why not the story of Maedeh Hojabri, a young woman who was arrested in Iran for dancing? Maedeh was older than these girls and her dancing was more appropriated for someone of her age. Maedeh, unlike these girls, was old enough to understand her sexuality and how she wanted to express it and she was punished for doing so. Could it be, because her story put the reality of many women living lives under Islamic regimes under the spotlight?
The dance of Maedeh was embraced by most people who knew of her story, something that hasn’t happened with “Cuties”. Like I said, maybe because Maedeh was older and what she did was normal and more accepted for a teenager. The age of the actresses has also been a point of polemic, and rightfully so despite Doucouré says she was careful about their well being:
“I decided to do research to see if they were aware and conscious of what they were doing (..) I met over a hundred preteens who told me their stories. I asked them how they felt about their femininity in today’s society. I wanted to know how they dealt with their self-image at a time when social media is so important, and they have access to so much information and so many images.”
Doucouré is not wrong about how young girls need to talk about the kind of sexual images they’re exposed to to understand what messages they’re receiving. Female celebrities that overplay their sexuality to sell music are also targeted to a young base that is encouraged to admire them and praise them for their empowerment. A young girl looking at Miley Cirus’ antics on stage could probably not see the sexual part of them and think she’s amusing rather than raunchy, but by doing so, she’s embracing a behaviour the she doesn’t understand and she could project it on others without realising how dangerous the signals she sends can be for her. And people are afraid of being more strict about it because they don’t want to be accused of “slut shaming”.
And, once more, this very important point was lost when Doucouré decided to include girls so young in her movie. When “Thirteen” was released, many noticed that, while the movie was good, the two actresses didn’t look thirteen at all. I agree, but what was the other option? Casting actual thirteen years old girls to perform simulated sexual acts? We already know cases of former child celebrities who were exposed to sexuality when they were too young to understand it (Shirley Temple and Brooke Shields are two of the many examples) and they have said how exploited they felt and how powerless they were.
So, what is the conclusion of this whole debacle? Is “Cuties” really a pedophile film? It’s not. “Cuties” is the result of a terrible attempt to include children in the conversation but not knowing how to. Because this conversation is often led by people who not only don’t have children, but they don’t understand them and their needs. And worst, they see children not as people, but as points and causes that they can use to present themselves more progressive and tolerant instead of realising that children need to be protected and shielded rather than be used as shields.
And it’s a real pity because the many topics of “Cuties” are the topics we all need to discuss and we need neither condescension or hysteria involved at the moment of doing so. And, at the moment, it’s the only thing we are having from both sides of the conversation.
