PicoBlog

What is your most bimbo-like quality?

Mine is that I love to copy my friends. If you’re reading this, you are most likely familiar with my best friend McKayla’s substack, Hello Darling. Or maybe my sweet friend Charlotte’s substack, Frequent Crier Miles? Or my (grand)daughter Emma’s substack, poetry, prose & personal essays? The point is — I have never had an original idea in my life. And here I am once again to copy my friends.

Over the past year and a half, I have found myself captivated by the idea of the bimbo in modern society. In the (unlikely) case I haven’t already mentioned it to you: my senior thesis was a play I wrote called The Body Electric, an adaptation of the Medusa myth set in the historical context of the Clinton-Lewinsky affair. In that piece, I described Monica’s character as “not a fucking bimbo.” But for the purposes of this substack, I would like to take that back. Monica Lewinsky is a bimbo, and so am I, and so! are! you!

At a critical point during that writing process, Framing Britney Spears was released on Hulu, and I decided to watch it with my roommates. I had already begun to put the pieces together that the media’s take on Britney and Monica were related — these were both women who were brutally attacked by the media for sport, who were labeled as crazy, stupid sluts, and who the public has only recently come out to support. I watched the documentary for research.

For a brief moment, the iconic New York Post cover of Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, and Lindsay Lohan with the headline “Bimbo summit” appears. You know the one…

I proceeded to hyperfixate on this headline for two years. For those two years I told anyone who would listen that I was writing a play titled Bimbo Summit – I didn’t know what it was about, I didn’t know why I wanted to write it, and I didn’t actually start writing it until I woke up in the middle of the night two years later with an idea. And now, I am once again stuck! It’s hard to be a bimbo and also a genius! So after discussing with everyone I know, I've decided that Bimbo Summit needs to be a substack first. And eventually, it will be a complete play or perhaps a television series, but not yet! 

In this, my very own completely original substack, I will take a periodic deep dive into bimbo-dom. Together, we will be looking into the lives of specific bimbos, investigating the media’s treatment of bimbos, the way that treatment influences public perception, and the impact that perception has on women/girls.

So here I am. That’s the backstory. Now, so we’re all on the same page, let’s do a little bimbo crash course. The term “bimbo” was originally used to describe unintelligent, brutish men in the 1920s. It originates from the Italian word for baby, “bambino.” Interesting… The term went in and out of style over the years, and its meaning evolved until the late 1980s, when “bimbo” found it’s primary position in describing hot, young, dumb women who get by on their looks. 

1987 was declared by news outlets as “The Year of the Bimbo.” A number of political and sexual scandals were brought to public attention, and the women involved were labeled as bimbos, for various reasons. An actual quote from a Chicago Tribune article in 1987: “It was a year for Jessica Hahn to declare ‘I am not a bimbo’ in an issue of Playboy magazine that also featured photographs of her smiling in little more than her birthday suit.” I find it important to note here that this was written in response to an article in which Hahn discusses being sexually assaulted by a politician – this will become a pattern, as I’m sure you know.

Approximately ten years later, news broke about what may be the most infamous presidential affair – can you guess what bimbo was involved??? I assume that most of my readers are women, which means you definitely don’t know the answer to my question. So I’ll tell you! Monica Lewinsky! Public enemy number one, my hero, both bimbo and evil mastermind. Come back soon (subscribe!) for more on Miss Monica.

The most recent “Year of the Bimbo” was 2007. These are the bimbos of my childhood: Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears. The Bimbo Summit girls, if you will. Another super awesome and not at all upsetting quote from the New York Post: “Whether dead (Anna Nicole Smith), jailed (Paris Hilton), bald (Britney Spears), knocked up (Jamie Lynn Spears), unemployable (Lindsay Lohan) or simply running down the street in raggedy old underwear (Amy Winehouse), the year gone by was young, ditzy and out of control.”

Although everyone I have mentioned thus far fits neatly into the classic bimbo canon, for my purposes, “bimbo” will be loosely defined. It can and will apply at different times to probably everyone who has experienced the world as a girl. But also perhaps to everyone who has experienced the world. We’ll see.

Are you really hot? You’re a bimbo! Are you bad at math? You’re a bimbo! Do you like to copy your friends? You’re a bimbo! Are you an optimist? You’re a bimbo! Do you have boobs? You’re a bimbo! Do you enjoy sex? You’re a bimbo! Do you like the color pink? You’re a bimbo! Do you sometimes forget things? You’re a bimbo! Does your heart beat? You are a bimbo.

Regardless of who can be labeled as a bimbo, I find it vital to understand the character of the bimbo in today’s world, and the way the presence of this character shapes our ideas of who we all are. Is the character of the bimbo holding us all back? Is she propelling us forward? Who does the existence of this character benefit, and who does it harm? 

I hope you join me on this journey, and I would love to hear any and all of your thoughts on the topic. 

Much love to all of you bimbos.

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