Benevolent Dictatrix

Dogs, babies, dogs with babies, feminism, pretty flowers

[cradilydeactivated-deactivated2]

did somebody say

cute boys

[fuckyeahrihanna]

The Story Behind Rihanna’s Red Carpet-Winning Met Gala Dress

The Met Gala red carpet was shaping up to be a respectful but restrained affair of tasteful red dresses and flame-like silhouettes on Monday night. ThenRihanna appeared on the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in an imperial yellow, fur-trimmed cape that was embroidered with scrolls and scrolls and scrolls of flora (and a headdress!).

“I’m so in love with this dress, but the train is insane!” Rihanna told VF.com on the red carpet. “I can’t really walk in it without any help. But it’s so worth it. I love this dress so much! It’s Chinese couture and it’s made by Guo Pei. It’s handmade by one Chinese woman and it took her two years to make. I found it online.”

“I was researching Chinese couture on the Internet and I found it,” she said.

That makes fashion’s most-watched woman (pop diva, category) one of the few attendees at this year’s Met Gala (theme: “China: Through the Looking Glass”) to wear a Chinese designer. It also caps off a big moment for Pei, who is fresh off a collaboration with MAC Cosmetics and has two garments in the Met’s exhibition. She is a go-to designer for Chinese stars like Li Bingbing and Zhang Ziyi and has been profiled by the Wall Street Journal and the Times, but her name remains relatively unknown in Western fashion (a curious phenomenon of the kind the Met’s show is well-poised to address). Profiling her in 2010, Cathy Horyn compared Pei to Charles James, the American couturier who was the subject of last year’s Costume Institute exhibit.

The laborious production process for Pei’s garments is something of a signature. Her “Magnificent Gold” dress that appears in the Met show took 50,000 hours to make, Pei told the Cut, while her “Blue & Porcelain” dress, also on display, took 10,000 hours.

In a comment that seems prescient of Rihanna’s show-stopping look on Monday, Pei told the blog of her designs, “The focus and attention paid to this dress will make it remembered by the world—I want is to make them remember…. It is my responsibility to let the world know China’s tradition and past, and to give the splendor of China a new expression. I hope that people do know China in this way.”

—with additional reporting by Paul Chi

[exgynocraticgrrl-archive-deacti]

Sexy Inc. (2007)

[exgynocraticgrrl-archive-deacti]

[Psychologist and author Sharon Lamb speaking in gifset]

“Sophie Bissonnette’s documentary analyzes the hypersexualization of our environment and its noxious effects on young people. Psychologists, teachers and school nurses criticize the unhealthy culture surrounding … children, where marketing and advertising  are targeting younger and younger audiences and bombarding them with sexual and sexist images. Sexy Inc. suggests various ways of countering hypersexualization and the eroticization of childhood and invites us to rally against this worrying phenomenon.” - (x)

The Dissected Cake

[jennydictatrix]

I'm way behind on Tumblr. Why is everyone mad at Joss Whedon? Is the new Avengers movie bad?

[terminar]

[jusadbellum23]

[basset-hound-world]

http://bassethoundworld.com/

[jennydictatrix]

God bless my BFF for getting married on derby day.

[derschneefiel-deactivated201501]

[thevoiceinthevoid-deactivated20]

I need exactly 40 of these cats.

[obeythepizzapolice-deactivated2]

Those aren’t cats.

Those are ghibli cartoons brought to cuddly life.

[retrogasm-deactivated20161109]

I like blueberry

[boredpanda]

Crazy Photographers Who Will Do ANYTHING For The Perfect Shot

[animalgifdaily]

[sandandglass]

Top ten Obama jokes from the 2015 WHCD (full speech)

[lovinuisez]

Obama’s got jokes!

[godbless-st-cyr]

[yobeccaboom]

This raccoon never left the side of a cat who was dying of a tumor. The cat was comforted for the final hours of her life by her long time friend.

[kilincsfogo]

legit tears

[pulvering]

[bathing-sun-deactivated20130213]

the last gif though, he pats the cat, omg 

[the-starlight-fox-deactivated20]

Oh man this is back on my dash after a year and it still gets me.

[pusssyliquor-13]

I wish someone loved me half as much as that raccoon loved that cat.

[thelastdiadoch]

This is why I say screw you to people who think animals don’t have emotions or can’t form deep, personal, and loving bonds with other animals (us included). They very clearly do.

[basset-hound-world]

http://bassethoundworld.com/

[micdotcom]

The side of the Baltimore riots you won’t see on TV:

On Monday, the media was quick to paint a single picture of Baltimore: a chaos scene of violence and mayhem filled with images of looting, rioting, the burning of a CVS and the torching of a police car. But on the ground, a very different story unfolded — and these remarkable photos and videos are proof.