Game on!
It is fair to say that the Fifa brand doesn’t conjure images of equality and fairness at the best of times, but this week its reputation has, to put it mildly, taken a bit of a battering. So the fact that EA Sports has announced that Fifa 16 – the next instalment in its ever-popular football videogame franchise – will include 12 national women’s teams for the first time, is one positive in an otherwise bleak week. Brazil, England, Canada, Italy, Mexico and China are among the sides that will be featured in the game when it is released in September.
England captain Steph Houghton, who will lead her team at the World Cup next month, told the BBC:
“To be one of the first female players included is something we’ll always be able to look back on,” adding that she hoped it would “help raise the profile of the women’s game even further”.
One of the reasons it has taken so long for women to be included in the game, which was launched in 1993, is, according to series vice president and general manager David Rutter, down to technical issues. The Fifa franchise prides itself on accurately mimicking the sport’s real life players in everything from movement to appearance, which meant changes would have to be made for the inclusion of women. Rutter said:
“We needed to have tools and technology in place that could differentiate between men and women. We’ve had to implement a new system that allows for the hips to be moved, the shoulders to be moved vertically, and the width of those bones and joints to be a factor too. It’s a pretty big change. The cool side-effects are that we now have scalable skeletons, so we can also support different body types in the men’s side of the game.
A doll’s life
Move over Spiderman – there are two new action heroes in town, here to save the day, one devastatingly sharp putdown at a time. That’s right, Tina Fey and Amy Poehler have been immortalised in plastic and been turned into action figures.
There is only one thing wrong with this innovation: Tina and Amy are mute – there is no string at the back for you to pull to hear the Fey and Poehler dolls parrot some of their pithy one-liners. So it’s up to you to narrate whatever it is you decide to do with the Tina and Amy in the privacy of your own home. No judgment here.
Cher today
Do you believe in life after … this ad? You should. At 69, Cher has become the newest star of Marc Jacobs’ upcoming autumn/winter fashion campaign, making Jacobs the latest designer to embrace the image of the Older Lady in their campaigns. Earlier this year, Joan Didion made her modelling debut for Celine aged 80, and at 71, Joni Mitchell was recently made the face of Saint Laurent. Last month, Givenchy creative director Riccardo Tisci cast Donatella Versace as the star of the label’s upcoming ads. It was a shocking choice – not because of her age, but because she is another high-profile fashion designer. Baby steps in diversity, perhaps, but steps nonetheless.
Could she be the most powerful woman in the world?
In news that came as a surprise to precisely nobody, Taylor Swift was this week named in Forbes’s 100 Most Powerful Women, making the 25-year-old the youngest woman ever to appear on the annual list. And while we’re all for Taylor’s world domination (or have at least accepted that we have no choice but to one day be ruled by her), her inclusion at number 64 on the list did perhaps steal the thunder of some of the 18 other newcomers. US attorney general Loretta Lynch was one, making her debut at number 34. Elizabeth Holmes, the 31-year-old self-made billionaire and CEO of blood donor company Theranos, now ranks at 74, while the prime minister of Poland Ewa Kopacz comes in at number 40. And not forgetting new Guardian editor Katharine Viner, who is now the 80th most powerful woman in the world. And at number one? Angela Merkel, who retained her crown for the fifth consecutive year.
Hardy by name, hard by nature
And finally, over to Hollywood – or, rather, Cannes – for this week’s Best Celebrity Male Feminist award, which goes to Tom Hardy for shutting down (yet another) sexist question about women having, heaven forfend, larger roles than the men in Mad Max: Fury Road. Staying true to his acting style, it only took Hardy one word, and a sheer look of disdain, to set this critic straight.
ICYMI
Helen Lewis reviews Polly Vernon’s Hot Feminist
