Last night I was watching Alan Carr: Chatty Man, where Lily Allen was being interviewed. I got the feeling there was institutionalised sexism through out the interview. I doubt this was Alan's interview, and at some points I'm sure Lily could tell he was coming across as sexist, however Lily Allen is very informal in interviews and prefers to have a laugh, and leave her music to do the talking. I'm going to compare Lily Allen's interview to Robin Thicke's on the same show.
When Robin Thicke was on the show, they talked about what an "amazing single" Blurred Lines was. They discussed how long he'd been writing songs and all the people he'd written for. He was given sympathy for the fact that although he'd written a song for Michael Jackson, he never actually got to meet him. The only criticism he was given was that in his old albums he had long hair. When Alan Carr begun talking about the song Blurred Lines, saying "did you know..", I was praying he would say "the true meaning of the song would have been found out?". Instead, he said "it would be such a success". Finally, the fact that some people were offended came up, and the audience clapped and "awwww"ed as he said the songs intention was to make people happy.
Now let's talk about when Lily Allen's time on the show. Unrelated: She walked on with two Corgi's and looked amazing! When asking about Lily breastfeeding he asks if she is a "militant breastfeeder", referring to women who breastfeed in public. He also talks about Lily's lyrics, whereas he never said a word about Thicke's lyrics ("I know you want it"). Although Lily tries to stay away from being "serious" in interviews, when Alan asks "What about that bit in Sheezus about your periods?" she replies "They do happen, once a month" and "half the world have them". Alan brings up the part of her video where the backdrop says "Lily Allen has a baggy p****"; now, do you remember when he brought up Robin's backdrop of "Robin Thicke has a big d***"? Me neither. Alan seems to have quite a problem with the female body: don't breastfeed in public, don't talk about your p****, don't talk about your periods.
Alan Carr isn't the only problematic talk show host. Many talk show hosts are harsher of females than males. This is obviously based around societies stereotypes/norms/values around women, as well as what they're asked to talk about by producers. I just feel like Alan could've easily spent a lot of time talking about at least one meaningful part of her album, rather than the part about her periods and p*****.
