World Without Actresses

Can you imagine a world without actresses? No long, fancy, revealing dresses on Oscar night, no “best actress” awards, no heroines to be saved by the heroes. Definitely no damsels in distress.

About a year ago, I noticed something. In what seemed a rather sudden shift, I began hearing actresses refer to themselves as “actors.” I’m sure the trend began long ago, but I probably noticed it when I started occasionally surfing onto Inside the Actor’s Studio on Bravo.

I have now seen the elimination of actresses codified into law. In a recent list of proofreading guidelines that I received into my email box, I read this:

It is important to avoid exclusionary forms. The following words can be easily substituted with other words or expressions:
mankind—humanity/people
man the deck—staff the deck
chairman—chair
congressman—congresswoman (or congressional representative)
mailman—mail carrier
actress—actor
ladies—women
girls—women
stewardess—flight attendant
Miss or Mrs.—Ms.

No more actresses? It seems that this will make the movies quite boring. In fact, it seems this makes life a little boring, too.

I prefer the way God designed things: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

That verse is interesting because there is diversity (“male and female he created them”) within unity (“God created man...”). It's a beautiful balance that Hollywood doesn't understand.

God created actors and actresses! Of course, that was a long, long time ago…