Dane Pop Frippery

Ideally I'd make a post like "It is pride month! Yay! :D" ...But it is getting increasingly hard to exist as a trans person, let alone celebrate it.

We should still celebrate it. That celebration doesn't need to be loud. It doesn't need to be noticed by anyone except yourself.

They want us to feel shame at who we are. They want others to fear what we are. Pride in yourself is the antithesis of shame. So please, now more than ever, make sure you celebrate pride. Celebrate you.

happy pride! remember that being a transgender is everything but fiction. there are so many real historical figures from every century about whose transgenderism we aren't even aware of

meanwhile every time a refined old crooner mentions a woman's "charms" you can basically imagine that "sexyback" by Justin Timberlake just started playing in the background.

"someone to hold in my arms/and know the magic of her charms" yeah sure mister bobby darin that sounds like a wholesome retro activity

This was pre ai but with tumblr and Pinterest coming along photo memes spread a ton of bs especially on older topics (one noted one from memory is a man with a twin on the back of his head who spoke evil to him. 90% of that story was fake).

Quinta Brunson annoys me, but I have no problem with her playing Betty Boop who also kinda annoys me (so it works). Here’s the real story about Betty Boop. And it’s wild. And long story short: no she wasn’t black. But she wasn’t human either.

Betty Boop debuted in the next super popular 30s cartoon: Koko and Bimbo. Koko was a clown and Bimbo was a dog. While the cartoons are inventive they also annoy me (but are very popular with old cartoon fans). In the 1930s the big cartoon characters were Mickey Mouse and co, Koko and Bimbo and Felix the cat. Betty Boop soon outshined her costars

She was originally Bimbo’s dog girlfriend before morphing into his human girlfriend. She appeared to be a mix of flapper actress Clara Bow and popular white singer Helen Kane.

What conspires next is well explained in this post with citations. But we’ll do our best here

Helen Kane and the news media noticed too (Clara Bow was going through a personal hell at the time and likely was too occupied to deal with it). The clincher being Betty Boop uses the phrase ‘boop boop a doop’ which was a phrase Helen Kane originated in a 1929 song

Betty Boop as a dog premiered in August 1930. Helen Kane sued for $250,000 which was a hell of a lot of money. The defense came up with an out: Helen Kane had ripped off black singer Esther Jones

Baby Esther was a black vaudeville performer who was 11 years old at the time of the 1930 lawsuit. Supposedly Kane had seen Esther performer age 6 and stole the phrase from her act. As proof defensed summoned one witness who was very vague on when this happened, and a sound test of Esther in 1928 singing 3 songs popularized by Helen Kane (well into the 1950s singers would often share a song. For example there’s easily 200 recordings of Its Only a Paper Moon from the 30s and 40s). This was 7 months after Helen Kane began using the phrase publicly.

Several other performers including two of Betty’s voice actresses also testified and claimed this was something in the ether at the time.

Weirdly a lot of online lore (including that photo who btw is from 2008 and done by Ukrainian model Oyla (Модель Оля) who in a dark twist, is not black) presents Esther as a full grown adult performing at the cotton club. Esther looked 10 and wore ballet style clothing on stage. She clearly wasn’t the physical basis.

And ofc there’s one more twist

Esther’s big claim in vaudeville was imitating popular black singer Florence Mills. She had been one of the first black performers to really crossover to white audiences. She died of tb in 1927. She wasn’t known for babyifying anything but her face does kinda resemble Betty Boop.

Aftermath:

Esther Jones toured the world (and never sued or even was involved in the Kane v Boop case). She was constantly upgraded to whatever black star was popular in her stage name (mini Josephine Baker, Farina’s little sister). She disappears from the record in 1934.

Helen Kane lost her suit and it prbly influenced future stars who had cartoons rip them off (Jackie Gleason and Fred Flintstone etc). Her style was so affiliated with the late 20s that it soon faded with the depression. She didn’t get a revival until the 1950s and died in 1966

For what it was worth the man who first drew Boop said he based her on a French poodle and Kane’s nearby sheet music.

Fleischer Studios remained popular through the 1930s and raced Disney to make the first full length color talkie cartoon film. It lost mostly due to paramount cheapness (their first film of that type was Gulliver’s Travels in 1939). They made it to 1942 before paramount ate them whole.

So some fanartist drew a “sexy” (read: booby) version of a (cartoon) character who is traditionally very non-sexualised. Fans of the character got mad about it because it’s kind of groundbreaking how that character is written and portrayed and this art totally ignores the entire point of the character. They demanded the art be deleted. In response to that other people said, well what the fanartist did may be distateful but they have every right to draw what they’re into. The two sides fight for days and each starts a harassment campaign and even report their “opponents’” accounts.

So far so typical. But things eventually come to a head and they decide that this will be settled by votes - not through a poll. Through donations to a children’s education charity via each side’s portal. Whoever can get the highest amount of donation wins.

it being introduced alongside botox and fillers and multiple of their clinics suddenly saying that they won't perform abortions on anyone above a certain BMI even though it's against their own internal standards