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Look at this stuff
Isn't it neat?
Wouldn't you think my collection's complete?
Wouldn't you think I'm the girl
The girl who has everything?

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Jodi Benson - Part of Your World (From "The Little Mermaid")

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I've got gadgets and gizmos a-plenty
I've got whozits and whatzits galore
But who cares?
No big deal
I want more

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What would I give if I could live out of these waters?
What would I pay to spend a day warm on the sand?

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When's it my turn?
Wouldn't I love, love to explore that shore up above?
Out of the sea

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Disney's Fairy Tale Weddings & Honeymoons

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Begin your fairy tale with a Disney wedding at Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Aulani, or aboard Disney Cruise Line.

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Wish I could be
Part of that world....

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Earlier this year, the Walt Disney Company began offering free Disney character-adorned bodysuits to new mothers in 580 maternity hospitals in the U.S. as part of Disney Baby, a campaign to "hook" potential customers (and more importantly their parents) while they're young. While critics have long attacked Disney for targeting young audiences and cultivating dreams of mass consumption, few have examined Disney's original claim to fame, the mode of animation itself, as a propagator of consumerist ideology.

Dr. Eric Jenkins, Assistant Professor of Communications at the University of Cincinnati, researches animation, and Disney feature films in particular, and argues that animation fuels consumer culture in a way that is distinct from, and more powerful than, live action cinema (read a press release about one of his recent presentations here).

While live action movies help normalize the consumer lifestyle and fuel it further by having celebrities promote certain goods, Disney cartoons insert the company's potent wish-upon-a-star version of the American Dream into animation to cultivate a more dangerous form of consumerism and to reach typically much younger audiences. As Jenkins explains, compared to live action cinema, animation grants viewers more participation in the process of constructing reality by transferring the task of lending life to the images on the screen to the viewers themselves. By inviting viewers to lend emotion to the moving drawings they see, animation trains viewers to perceive themselves as artists capable of bringing objects to life.

According to Jenkins, this habit of perceiving life in images and objects encourages a mode of consumption that invites audiences to "daydream life into commodities" and to engage with products as if they had lives of their own. And they do. Disney's animated images make the perfect commodities in this sense, as image-objects transferable from the screen to coloring books, toys, clothes, theme park attractions, fairy tale weddings, and so on.

Animation teaches this mode of consumption to the youngest possible audiences. Indeed, achieving one's dream in the Disney style involves only communicating a desire to one's fairy godmother, to an enchanted star, a mystical ancestor, or some other supernatural being and passively receiving that wish through a magical transfer. Removing the need to work for one's dreams normalizes the notion that consumers can obtain anything and everything they want, simply by wanting and asking for it (a process that has strong correlations in real life to children pleading with parents for the newest Disney product and watching the magical transfer of worthless scraps of green paper for valuable Disney toys).

While animation seems to fall into the childhood category of media consumption, large companies like Disney target not only children but also teenagers and young adults with animation and other realistic yet unreal moving images. In fact, in another article, Jenkins chronicles Apple's use of animation to make the iPod into an "iCon. " Icons, as Jenkins explains, are symbols just real enough to evoke emotion and connection, but transcend reality, thus drawing the viewer into the sublime. Viewers must project their own reality and depth onto the flat, surreal icon and lend life to the image as they would breath life into, for example, Disney characters.

Similar to Disney's animation, Apple uses this animated iconography in its iPod commercials to sell a mystical experience that, not surprisingly, encourages the purchase of a certain product. Across the media industry, according to Jenkins, companies recognize that selling the mode, rather than directly promoting the product itself, yields better results (read: bigger profits).

Imagine the iconic iPod commercials, with black silhouettes dancing in front of flat neon backgrounds to upbeat, not-quite-mainstream music, immersed in the experience of listening to the song. The ads conspicuously fail to relay any substantial information about the product itself (its function, storage capacity, or less-than-competitive price), and instead sell viewers the experience of total immersion in a song. The dancers appear distinctive enough to represent individuals, and indeed represent individual ism, but their faces, clothing, and any other features that might alienate viewers remain invisible in the ads. Like Disney animations, the commercials invite viewers to project their own emotions and identities onto the one-dimensional dancing images. The iPod ads encourage viewers to see a more rebellious, confident, and overall more hip version of themselves in the blank-slate dancers on the screen, and to aspire to become the idea they embody, the experience of total immersion in the music.

Of course, this description leaves out a crucial feature of the iPod commercial, the popping image of the white earbuds, cable, and body of the iPod itself. Despite the obvious presence of the device, the visual focus of the ads remains primarily on the dancers while the product itself becomes an assumed but unstated factor in the experience. Clearly, to attain this larger than life, youthful, hip experience of total immersion in the music, to become as cool as the dancer you can't quite see, you'll need an iPod. Without those little, glowing white earbuds, how could you possibly immerse yourself in a song that no one else can hear? The commercial primarily sells viewers the experience of immersion, with its connotations of coolness, and secondarily, indirectly sells the product itself. Jenkins argues that this approach to marketing has allowed Apple to use icons as a means of creating a cult value for the company and its products. Like Disney, Apple sells its audiences a fantasy and portrays itself as a humble provider of the means to realize that fantasy.

Both Disney and Apple promote consumerism through fantasy by using iconic images. The two companies' consumer icons (Mickey Mouse, the Disney castle, the rainbow-striped Macintosh apple, the iPod) thus function like religious icons. Religious icons portray saints and deities as flat, perfect humans to which viewers, or worshipers, can easily relate without perceiving as real. Religious icons communicate the abstract idea of religious figures without depicting them accurately (which is impossible in some traditions) and without detracting from their divinity by causing them to appear too much like ordinary humans. Disney and Apple similarly use realistic but unreal images to characterize an abstract concept without making it real enough to have any ugly imperfections. Viewers can thus relate to the images and simultaneously see them as perfect, even divine. Mickey Mouse, Disney princesses, the dancers in the iPod commercials, and indirectly the iPod itself, all signify the ideals of consumerism and allow viewers to build their lives around this ideology.

In short, without viewers ever realizing it, media companies promote consumerism by teaching us to relate to products in certain ways, projecting ourselves and our aspirations onto them, and even more sinisterly, creating a series of modern icons that celebrate, even deify, the consumer way of life. From early childhood through adulthood, Americans undergo conditioning to become faithful consumers, upon whose consumption habits corporations can rely for a lifetime.

--

Micaela Samodelov is a research intern with the Transforming Cultures Project

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Mickey Mouse's Iconic Role in Modeling Consumerism

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Earlier this year, the Walt Disney Company began offering free Disney character-adorned bodysuits to new mothers in 580 maternity hospitals in the U.S. as part of Disney Baby, a campaign to "hook" potential customers (and more importantly their parents) while they're young.

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Let's get down to business, to defeat the Huns

Did they send me daughters, when I asked for sons?

You're the saddest bunch I ever met

But you can bet before we're through

Mister, I'll make a man out of you

Tranquil as a forest but on fire within
Once you find your center, you are sure to win
You're a spineless, pale, pathetic lot
And you haven't got a clue
Somehow I'll make a man out of you

I'm never gonna catch my breath
Say goodbye to those who knew me
Boy, was I a fool in school for cutting gym
This guy's got 'em scared to death
Hope he doesn't see right through me
Now I really wish that I knew how to swim

Be a man
We must be swift as the coursing river
Be a man
With all the force of a great typhoon
Be a man
With all the strength of a raging fire
Mysterious as the dark side of the moon

Time is racing toward us till the Huns arrive
Heed my every order and you might survive
You're unsuited for the rage of war
So pack up, go home, you're through
How could I make a man out of you?

Be a man
We must be swift as the coursing river
Be a man
With all the force of a great typhoon
Be a man
With all the strength of a raging fire
Mysterious as the dark side of the moon

Be a man
We must be swift as the coursing river
Be a man
With all the force of a great typhoon
Be a man
With all the strength of a raging fire
Mysterious as the dark side of the moon

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Pocahontas | Colors of the Wind | Disney Sing-Along

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Look at me
You may think you see
Who I really am
But you'll never know me
Every day
It's as if I play a part
Now I see
If I wear a mask
I can fool the world
But I cannot fool my heart

Who is that girl I see
Staring straight back at me?
When will my reflection show
Who I am inside?

I am now
In a world where I
Have to hide my heart
And what I believe in
But somehow
I will show the world
What's inside my heart
And be loved for who I am

Who is that girl I see
Staring straight back at me?
Why is my reflection
Someone I don't know?
Must I pretend that I'm
Someone else for all time?
When will my reflection show
Who I am inside?

There's a heart that must be
Free to fly
That burns with a need to know
The reason why

Why must we all conceal
What we think, how we feel?
Must there be a secret me
I'm forced to hide?
I won't pretend that I'm
Someone else for all time
When will my reflection show
Who I am inside?
When will my reflection show
Who I am inside?

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Some day my prince will come
Some day I'll find my love
And how thrilling that moment will be

When the prince of my dreams comes to me
He'll whisper "I love you"
And steal a kiss or two

Though he's far away
I'll find my love some day
Some day when my dreams come true

Some day I'll find my love
Someone to call my own
And I'll know him the moment we meet
For my heart will start skipping a beat

Some day we'll say I do
Things we've been longing to
Though he's far away I'll find my love some day

Some day when my dreams come true
Somewhere waiting for me
There is someone I'm longing to see
Someone I simply can't help but adore
Someone who'll thrill me forever

Someday my prince will come
Someday I will find the one
Though he's far away
He'll find my love someday

Someday when my dreams come true
Oh please make my dreams come true

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Trump drops 'Pocahontas' jibe to Native American veterans - BBC News

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US President Donald Trump has mocked a political rival as Pocahontas - as he welcomed Native Americans to the White House. Addressing Navajo tribe members, the president dropped in his nickname for Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren. The former Harvard professor was criticised in 2012 when it emerged she had claimed Native American ancestry without offering proof of such lineage.

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You think I'm an ignorant savage
And you've been so many places
I guess it must be so
But still I cannot see
If the savage one is me
How can there be so much that you don't know
You don't know

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Mulan | I'll Make A Man Out Of You | Disney Sing-Along

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Dakota Access Pipeline Protesters: 'The World Needed To See What Was Going On' | NBC News

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How Disney’s “Mulan” Brazenly Challenges Gender and Sexuality | Features | Roger Ebert

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An essay on the subversive tendencies of Disney’s “Mulan.”

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Snow White | Someday My Prince Will Come | Lyric Video | Disney Sing Along

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"Some day when my dreams come true." Sing the rest of the words to this song from Snow White with this lyric video. What is your favorite scene from Snow White?

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"Who is that girl I see
Staring straight back at me?
When will my reflection show
Who I am inside?"

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The purpose of this short video is to show viewers that the media subliminally tells audiences that certain dialects are superior in America. Disney's audience is primarily children, and when Americans are taught from a young age to associate certain dialects with negativity, this can result in discrimination and can be linked to racism.

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"What are gender roles?"

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I have an unhealthy Disney obsession. My entire room is filled with Disney memorabilia, plushies, pins and paintings that I've made. My wardrobe consists of several Minnie Mouse ears, Disney inspired bows, Disney Shirts and even Disney purses...hell, I even have a Disney tissue box! Why do I love Disney so much? Because it makes me happy. Simple as that. Because of what was "started with a mouse" is a constant reminder to remain positive and to "just keep swimming" and take "Hakuna Matata" to heart.

There's a particular movie (and especially the heroine) that calls out to me. It also happens to be my all time favorite movie: "Mulan".

Mulan is not only a total bad-ass (who saved all of China may I add), but she's the perfect example of a true feminist. She's a person who believes in equality for all, and always stays true to her beliefs ("My Duty is to my heart").

The Movie "Mulan", since its debut in 1998, has encouraged little boys and little girls (and us adults) that nothing is impossible and that our gender should never stop us from achieving our dreams and attaining success. There is a multitude of life lessons that we can recount from "Mulan" and some of the following are my favorite:

1. Accept Others

Whether it's to a grouchy little man with a Napoleon complex (Yao), or a quirky, spunky grandmother (Grandmother Fa) Mulan displays countless acts of affection and acceptance towards everyone she encounters. She is kind yet does not allow anyone to belittle her.

2. Family is Important

Mulan literally risked her life and snuck into the army disguised as a man in order to save her father's life. She knew that the penalty for her "crime" could have been punishable by death, but she did so anyway. Her undying devotion and courage towards her father and his well being is inspiring and memorable.

3. You are stronger than what you give yourself credit for

It's corny but undeniably true: strength manages to find itself even in the darkest and toughest of times. When Mulan was just about ready to give up, she found herself saving the life of the general and becoming the most skilled warrior in her camp. She shows us that determination and perseverance is key to success.

4. Always follow your heart

Nothing is more honest and raw than following your heart. (Again, corny, but true!) Only YOU know your deepest desires and Mulan teaches us to stop and think "Hey, who/what's stopping me?" YOU are in charge of your own destiny and you owe it to yourself and your heart to be happy.

5. What are gender roles?

Who said women can't kick ass? Who said that a man can't rock a dress and lipstick? Who said that a miniature talking dragon can't make a healthy breakfast!? Whether you're a male or female, Mulan teaches us to look beyond the superficiality of what we look like or what our sexual organs are, and reminds us that gender roles are nothing but obtuse "rules" made up by society.

Mulan, besides having a fabulous soundtrack, attests to some of my deepest beliefs: the belief that we are all equal and should be treated as such. That we are capable of anything and nobody deserves to ever tell us no.

We are "a [person] worth fighting for!"

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I have an unhealthy Disney obsession. My entire room is filled with Disney memorabilia, plushies, pins and paintings that I've made. My wardrobe consists of several Minnie Mouse ears, Disney inspired bows, Disney Shirts and even Disney purses...hell, I even have a Disney tissue box! Why do I love Disney so much?

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Police Clad In Riot Gear Move In On Dakota Access Pipeline Protesters | NBC Nightly News

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Months of protests against the pipeline - which would run within a half-mile of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota - escalated as police moved in on a group or protesters. " Subscribe to NBC News: http://nbcnews.to/SubscribeToNBC " Watch more NBC video: http://bit.ly/MoreNBCNews NBC News is a leading source of global news and information.

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I can show you the world
Shining, shimmering splendid
Tell me, princess, now when did
You last let your heart decide!

I can open your eyes
Take you wonder by wonder
Over sideways and under
On a magic carpet ride

A whole new world
A new fantastic point of view
No one to tell us no
Or where to go
Or say we're only dreaming

A whole new world
A dazzling place I never knew
But when I'm way up here
It's crystal clear
That now I'm in a whole new world with you

Now I'm in a whole new world with you

Unbelievable sights
Indescribable feeling
Soaring, tumbling, freewheeling
Through an endless diamond sky

A whole new world
(Don't you dare close your eyes)
A hundred thousand things to see
(Hold your breath it gets better)
I'm like a shooting star
I've come so far
I can't go back to where I used to be

A whole new world
(Every turn a surprise)
With new horizons to pursue
(Every moment, red-letter)

I'll chase them anywhere
There's time to spare
Let me share this whole new world with you

A whole new world
(A whole new world)
That's where we'll be
(That's where we'll be)

A thrilling chase

A wondrous place

For you and me

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Why is Mulan not included in this image?

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Two different sides of her character; breaking the traditional gender roles

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Pocohontas

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Even Andrew Jackson Was Offended By Trump's 'Pocahontas' Crack

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Trump's 'Pocahontas' crack even disgusted the portrait of Andrew Jackson, which for some reason was hanging behind President Trump while he honored Native American war heroes.

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You think you own whatever land you land on
The Earth is just a dead thing you can claim
But I know every rock and tree and creature
Has a life, has a spirit, has a name

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What does this image imply about gender roles?

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You think the only people who are people
Are the people who look and think like you
But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger
You'll learn things you never knew, you never knew

Come run the hidden pine trails of the forest
Come taste the sun sweet berries of the Earth
Come roll in all the riches all around you
And for once, never wonder what they're worth

The rainstorm and the river are my brothers
The heron and the otter are my friends
And we are all connected to each other
In a circle, in a hoop that never ends

How high will the sycamore grow
If you cut it down, then you'll never know
And you'll never hear the wolf cry to the blue corn moon
For whether we are white or copper skinned
We need to sing with all the voices of the mountains
We need to paint with all the colors of the wind

You can own the Earth and still
All you'll own is Earth until
You can paint with all the colors of the wind

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Pocahontas and John Smith come face to face for the first time.

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Arabian Nights
"Where they cut off your ear

If they don't like your face.

It's barbaric, but hey, it's home"

The Huns attacked the imperial city in attempt to assassinate the Emperor

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I remember playing through Super Mario Brothers as a wee lad, wondering when the heck I was going to actually get to save Princess Toadstool.

I remember playing the Legend of Zelda, and doing my darndest to rescue Princess Zelda and save Hyrule.

I remember watching Sleeping Beaut y, cheering for the Prince to defeat the dragon and rescue the damsel in distress. And the list goes on, and on, and on...

There was Superman and Lois Lane, Prince Charming and Cinderella, and Aladdin and Princess Jasmine...If you couldn't tell, I loved Disney movies (and still do).

As the faces of our heroes and villains have changed through the years, there's one thing I've learned...
The Princess can take care of herself.
How did we get here?
I want to take a quick look back into our history and figure out how the heck we got to our idea of the modern woman.
When humans lived in hunter-gatherer tribes, women were expected to contribute and work...like normal people. Whether it was gathering water from far away sources and carrying it back to the camp, farming, or carrying children, strength was a desired trait! This is still true in many third world countries where major duties are shared.

In ancient Sparta, a society structured very differently from others at the time, "Girls were removed from the home at 7 and sent to school. Here they learned wrestling, gymnastics, were taught to fight, and endured other physical training. Spartans believed that strong mothers produced strong children. Young women competed at athletic events."

Moving toward the Middle Ages and more modern societies: women of noble birth were not expected to work, and in fact being overweight by today's standards was a sign of prosperity (for they could afford to eat) and thus made them more desirable. Women became more ornamental and decorative.

Fast forward to the 20th century, and gender roles had become more entrenched in western civilization: women had their place in the kitchen and in the home, and men were the breadwinners. Even after earning the right to vote in 1920, women were continually reminded throughout most of the century what their position was: frail, weak, and in need of constant supervision and protection. Yes, things changed when all the men went off to World War 2 ( Rosie the Riveter!), but during times of peace things returned to "normal."

Did you know women can open bottles of ketchup? I certainly didn't!

Take a look back at ads from the middle of the century (or watch any episode of Mad Men), and it's clear that progress was slow.

It's for this reason that movies like Alien (staring one of hollywood's most famous female characters, Ripley), Star Wars (Princess Leia), and Joss Whedon's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" were such big deals: they dared to change things up, and let the world know that sometimes the Princess doesn't need saving. Oftentimes, it's job to help save the world.

Now, although I believe we've come a long way and seen far stronger, multi-dimensional characters popping up in literature and pop culture, we still have a ways to go.
The mainstream still expects women to act and look a certain way, and has no problem pointing out those that don't fit the norm: We've even seen this happen first hand here at Nerd Fitness. Two examples jump out:
1) Our resident "Master of Deadlifts," Staci, had quite the success story. As a result of the popularity of this post, it has been reposted and shared thousands and thousands of times.

I can think of a few dozen comments that all had the same unfortunate message: "I liked her better in her before picture." These misguided men and women took it upon themselves to let Staci know that she never should have lost weight in the first place, and that she shouldn't try to get stronger.

I always loved Staci's responses to these comments: "Thanks for your concern, but I didn't do this for you. Or for anybody else. Or for some ideal. I did this for me."

2) We've received a few emails from disheartened female readers who lack support at home. They were trying to get healthier, and their loved ones actually told them they didn't want them to lose weight because they liked them better when they were heavier.

My heart breaks for these women; they're trying to better their lives in the way that excites them the most, and they're not getting the support they need from those who should be the most supportive.

Although we've come a long way, we still have a long ways to go. It shouldn't be okay to make fun of people who are strong, fit, and healthy. It bums me out!

These are men and women who have a vision in their head of what others should look like, and then chose to make fun of those who have dedicated themselves to getting in the best shape in the way THEY chose.
This is why we need awesome female characters alongside awesome male characters in this game we call "Life."
The ass kicking heroine
As a kid, though I didn't even know it, I devoted hours and hours of my life to playing through Metroid as a female character.
After defeating Mother Brain, you discover that you've been playing as Samus Aran, (A GIRL!!), the whole time. Although these days having female lead characters and heroines is more common, playing as a female lead in a video game was truly revolutionary.
(Unless you happen to be an awesome dad who can hack Donkey Kong, allowing your three year old daughter to play as Pauline and save Mario.)
Today heroines are breaking more and more into the mainstream: "the Bride" in Kill Bill, Katniss Everdeen in the Hunger Games, Dr. Brennan in Bones, Ripley in Aliens, Black Widow in the Avengers, and even Liz Lemon in 30 Rock and Leslie Knope in Parks and Recreation.

Most recently, two female characters who refuse to play by the old rules have jumped into the mainstream thanks to HBO: Daenerys Targaryen and Arya Stark - kickass characters from the A Song of Ice and Fire series (" Game of Thrones " to TV viewers). These two characters are such a breath of fresh air, as they face adversity and ridicule for choosing to be different, deciding instead to just kick serious ass. They are complex, full of depth, strong, and vulnerable...you know, like real people!

In an interview George R.R. Martin (author of the series) was told that he writes "women really different and really well."
Asked how and why, he simply replied: "Well, I've always considered women to be people."
It seems to me that society as a whole is becoming more and more okay with women being portrayed as actual poeple. More and more writers/filmmakers are making the same decision. Not just "strong" and "tough," but realistic:

Want to be super freaking strong? Awesome.

Want to be a gamer? More power to you.

Want to play with trucks instead of dolls? Great.

Want to do all of those things? Marry me!

I cannot say enough amazing things about the community members we have here at Nerd Fitness: we have both men and women from all walks of life, with varying levels of social status, economic status, religion, sexual orientation, and occupations.
On any community on the planet, this is a recipe for disaster.
Instead, we have a supportive and engaging group of men and women looking to help each other do the same thing: live a better life in the manner that fits one's personality and goals.

Whether you want to get healthy by starting strength training, lose weight by becoming an awesome runner, or just eat better and become more active, the Rebellion is here for you.

Real life heroes
When I started Nerd Fitness, over four and a half years ago (!), I wrote a series of articles highlighting what some actors did to get in shape for their particular movie roles.
Whether it was Daniel Craig for James Bond, or Ryan Reynolds for Blade III, I did the research and found out how they got healthy. I eventually came to a sobering realization that these actors will always have more resources and better genetics than 99.9% of the population. Try to follow their plans, while working a full time job, raising a family, having a life (without unlimited money) and you'll find yourself disheartened when you don't look like them.

So I started downplaying unfair celebrity comparisons and instead started playing UP the real life heroes and heroines I wanted people to learn from:
Guys like Joe and Saint. Programmers and IT guys who worked jobs and still found time. Women like Staci, Bronwyn, and Veronica....women with real lives who still found time to get healthy.
These people focused on building their workouts and diets around their busy lives and found ways to be the best version of themselves. They put their focus on getting stronger and eating better and found success.
Why did they pick this path?
Not to fit somebody else's ideal, or conform to somebody else's desires, but so that they could look in the mirror each morning with pride knowing they lived a better day than they did the day before.

The world needs you
"Now Cinderella don't you go to sleep. It's such a bitter form of refuge. Don't you know the kingdom's under siege. And everybody needs you."
Two weeks ago I saw the Killers in concert, and they played on of my favorite songs, "A Dustland Fairytale." While I was writing this post, those four lines above kept coming back into my mind:

I love the concept of a fairytale flipped upside down. I love the idea of taking control of your own destiny rather than waiting for Prince Charming to come rescue you.

If you're a dude reading Nerd Fitness, thanks for being here. Thanks for being supportive of your fellow rebels, both male and female, and helping them reach their potential. It's what makes this community great.

If you're a female reading Nerd Fitness, thank you for being here. The world needs you to be yourself. To stand up for what you want in life, even when it doesn't line up with the expectations of others. Strength is about more than just the physical. It's about a dedication to becoming better tomorrow than you were today.
Your friends, parents, and children need you to be their role model. This is why I love Bronwyn, and how she's showing her daughter that it's great to be strong: Bronwyn Chin Ups This is why I love Staci, who outlifts pretty much everybody in any gym she walks into. This is why I love Robin (Hammi!), who chose a different path and lost 100 pounds and changed her life.
This is why I love the Nerd Fitness Community: it's full of THOUSANDS of women (and thousands of men) who are leveling up their lives in their own way, for themselves, for their families, for their future.

Good luck
In life we're all playing the same game, and we should all get to choose the way we want to play.
When you play the World of Warcraft or anything similar, you get to decide if you want to be a strong warrior, petite assassin, or slender druid. Life should be no different. Whether you chose to play the game of life following a more traditional path or you decide to forge a different path, go for it.
The important part is that you make the decision to aspire to the goals and ideals that you set for yourself, not the goals and ideals that others expect of you.
I challenge you to inspire those around you to be great, and to inspire those who are afraid to be different to get started.
I challenge you to smile politely at the naysayers and keep working on being better in the way you chose. Everybody needs you to be YOU.
I'm glad you're here.
Let's have some fun. -Steve
PS - Speaking of women...we've been talking about it for over a year (oops), but Staci and I are finishing up content and finally getting close to the launch of our course specifically designed for NF Rebel women! We plan on launching an early version on September 23rd. Sorry it's taken us so freaking long, but I promise it'll be worth the wait. More details are coming in the next few weeks.
Today's Rebel Hero: Michelle R!
From Michelle: " I've attached a picture that my husband and I took in....Costa Rica! Yes, I decided to just go for it and do something different. I was sure to take my NF gear with me, so I wore it while hiking around the volcano in the rainforest. Amazing experience! I'm so glad that I joined the Rebellion! I was looking for ways to change my lifestyle around, and this was the answer!"
Want to be the next Rebel Hero? Take a photo of you doing something epic in your Nerd Fitness gear and send it to contact@nerdfitness.com so we can feature you on the site! ###

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What if the Princess Doesn't Need Rescuing? | Nerd Fitness

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I remember playing through Super Mario Brothers as a wee lad, wondering when the heck I was going to actually get to save Princess Toadstool. I remember playing the Legend of Zelda, and doing my darndest to rescue Princess Zelda and save Hyrule.

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You know a Steve McCurry picture when you see one. His portrait of an Afghan girl with vivid green eyes, printed on the cover of National Geographic in June 1985, is one of the iconic images of the 20th century. McCurry's work is stark and direct, with strong colors, a clear emotional appeal and crisp composition. His most recent volume of photographs, "India," is a compendium of the pictures he took in that country between 1978 and 2014, and it also gives us the essential McCurry. There are Hindu festivals, men in turbans, women in saris, red-robed monks, long mustaches, large beards, preternaturally soulful children and people in rudimentary canoes against dramatic landscapes.

In McCurry's portraits, the subject looks directly at the camera, wide-eyed and usually marked by some peculiarity, like pale irises, face paint or a snake around the neck. And when he shoots a wider scene, the result feels like a certain ideal of photography: the rule of thirds, a neat counterpoise of foreground and background and an obvious point of primary interest, placed just so. Here's an old-timer with a dyed beard. Here's a doe-eyed child in a head scarf. The pictures are staged or shot to look as if they were. They are astonishingly boring.

Boring, but also extremely popular: McCurry's photographs adorn calendars and books, and command vertiginous prices at auction. He has more than a million followers on Instagram. This popularity does not come about merely because of the technical finesse of his pictures. The photographs in "India," all taken in the last 40 years, are popular in part because they evoke an earlier time in Indian history, as well as old ideas of what photographs of Indians should look like, what the accouterments of their lives should be: umbrellas, looms, sewing machines; not laptops, wireless printers, escalators. In a single photograph, taken in Agra in 1983, the Taj Mahal is in the background, a steam train is in the foreground and two men ride in front of the engine, one of them crouched, white-bearded and wearing a white cap, the other in a loosefitting brown uniform and a red turban. The men are real, of course, but they have also been chosen for how well they work as types.

A defender of McCurry's work might suggest that he is interested in exploring vanishing cultures. After all, even in the 21st century, not all Indians go to malls or fly in planes. Should he not be celebrated for seeking out the picturesque and using it to show us quintessential India? What is wrong with showing a culture in its most authentic form? The problem is that the uniqueness of any given country is a mixture not only of its indigenous practices and borrowed customs but also of its past and its present. Any given photograph encloses only a section of the world within its borders. A sequence of photographs, taken over many years and carefully arranged, however, reveals a worldview. To consider a place largely from the perspective of a permanent anthropological past, to settle on a notion of authenticity that edits out the present day, is not simply to present an alternative truth: It is to indulge in fantasy.

What a relief it is to move from Steve McCurry's work to that of someone like Raghubir Singh. Singh worked from the late '60s until his untimely death in 1999, traveling all over India to create a series of powerful books about his homeland. His work shares formal content with McCurry's: the subcontinental terrain, the eye-popping color, the human presence. Within these shared parameters, however, Singh gives us photographs charged with life: not only beautiful experiences or painful scenes but also those in-between moments of drift that make up most of our days. Singh had a democratic eye, and he took pictures of everything: cities, towns, villages, shops, rivers, worshipers, workers, construction sites, motorbikes, statues, modern furniture, balconies, suits, dresses and, sure, turbans and saris.

The power of Singh's pictures lies in part in their capacious content. But it also lies in their composition, which rises well beyond mere competence, as he demonstrated in books like "River of Colour," "The Ganges" and "Bombay: Gateway of India." Singh has cited Edgar Degas and the American photographer Helen Levitt as influences, and you can see what he has learned from their highly sophisticated approaches (Degas's casual grace, Levitt's sympathetic view of urban oddity and the way both of them let in messiness at the edges of their images - a messiness that reminds us of the life happening outside the frame as well as within it). A photograph like the one Singh made of a crowded intersection in Kolkata in 1987 draws a breathtaking coherence out of the chaos of the everyday. The image, of which the key elements are a green door, a distant statue, an arm and a bus, is slightly surreal. But everything is in its right place. It reads as a moment of truth snipped from the flow of life.

I love even more a photograph Singh made in Mumbai a couple of years later. Taken in a busy shopping district called Kemps Corner, this photograph has less-obvious charms. The picture is divided into four vertical parts by the glass frontage of a leather-goods shop and its open glass door, and within this grid is a scatter of incident. The main figure, if we can call her that, is a woman past middle age who wears a red blouse and a dark floral skirt and carries a cloth bag on a string. She is seen in profile and looks tired. Beyond her and behind are various other walkers in the city, going about their serious business. An overpass cuts across the picture horizontally. The foreground, red with dust, is curiously open, a potential space for people not yet in the picture. The glass on the left is a display of handbags for sale, and the peculiar lighting of the bags indicates that Singh used flash in taking the shot. The image, unforgettable because it stretches compositional coherence nearly to its snapping point, reminds me of Degas's painting "Place de la Concorde," another picture in which easy, classically balanced composition is jettisoned for something more exciting and discomfiting and grounded.

How do we know when a photographer caters to life and not to some previous prejudice? One clue is when the picture evades compositional cliché. But there is also the question of what the photograph is for, what role it plays within the economic circulation of images. Some photographs, like Singh's, are freer of the censorship of the market. Others are taken only to elicit particular conventional responses - images that masquerade as art but fully inhabit the vocabulary of advertising. As Justice Potter Stewart said when pressed to define hard-core pornography in 1964, "I know it when I see it."

I saw "it" when I recently watched the video for Coldplay's " Hymn for the Weekend." The song is typical Coldplay, written for vague uplift but resistant to sense ("You said, 'Drink from me, drink from me'/When I was so thirsty/Poured on a symphony/Now I just can't get enough"). Filmed in India, with a cameo by Beyoncé, the video is a kind of exotification bingo, and almost like a live-action version of Steve McCurry's vision: peacocks, holy men, painted children, incense. Almost nothing in the video allows true contemporaneity to Indians. They seem to have been placed there as a colorful backdrop to the fantasies of Western visitors. A fantasy withers in the sunlight of realism. But as long as realism is held at bay, the fantasy can remain satisfying to an enormous audience. More than a hundred million people have watched the Coldplay video since it was posted at the end of January.

Are we then to cry "appropriation" whenever a Westerner approaches a non-Western subject? Quite the contrary: Some of the most insightful stories about any place can be told by outsiders. I have, for instance, seen few documentary series as moving and humane as "Phantom India," released in 1969 by the French auteur Louis Malle. Mary Ellen Mark, not Indian herself, did extraordinary work photographing prostitutes in Mumbai. Non-Indians have made images that capture aspects of the endlessly complicated Indian experience, just as have Indian photographers like Ketaki Sheth, Sooni Taraporevala, Raghu Rai and Richard Bartholomew.

Art is always difficult, but it is especially difficult when it comes to telling other people's stories. And it is ferociously difficult when those others are tangled up in your history and you are tangled up in theirs. What honors those we look at, those whose stories we try to tell, is work that acknowledges their complex sense of their own reality. Good photography, regardless of its style, is always emotionally generous in this way. For this reason, it outlives the moment that occasions it. Weaker photography delivers a quick message - sweetness, pathos, humor - but fails to do more. But more is what we are.

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You know a Steve McCurry picture when you see one. His portrait of an Afghan girl with vivid green eyes, printed on the cover of National Geographic in June 1985, is one of the iconic images of the 20th century. McCurry's work is stark and direct, with strong colors, a clear emotional appeal and crisp composition.