Jealous Boobs?

Just today I had a friend from home come to visit for a lunch date and just to catch up. Over our Alberto's extra cheese pizza she mentioned Reebok's new shoes that apparently do wonders for the female body. Being at Wheaton, without cable, clearly I hadn't seen the ads yet, but upon returning to my room decided to look into this miraculous footwear. This is what I found:



First of all, ladies, please tell me you don't believe this crap. The claim is that
1) the shoes "incorporate stability balls under the heels and forefoot to create a natural instability to force muscles to adapt and encourage toning." and
2)"make you feel like you're walking on a soft, sandy beach, providing 28% more gluteus maximus muscle activation, and 11% more calf and hamstring activation."

The commercial clearly suggests, similar to what was discussed in Killing Us Softly, that the main focal point of a woman is either her chest or her ass. For a low price of $99.99 at Lady's Foot Locker women can buy the self esteem that the corporate world has slowly but surely destroyed. I'll leave you with an ever so wise comment from one male viewer:

"oh my god this video is so hot her tits are amazing!! i love this video, GO REEBOK!!!!! man i wish i could bang this chick. and all the women who posted bad things on this video, get off the computer and go back to the kitchen where you belong!!"

If buying these shoes will get me "banged" by a man like this, then I prefer the cellulite.

Outrageous Act

For my outrageous act, Tarah and I went to a mall in Portland, Maine to interview people about their vote on the repeal of the gay marriage law. Our interviews started with us introducing ourselves as a monogamous homosexual couple that was very disheartened by the results of the recent gay marriage polls. We then asked people for their first name, age, marital status, and hometown. Once we had established a conversation we then posed the question of whether or not the individual had voted in the November ballots. If so we asked them if they felt comfortable sharing with us what they voted on Question 1 (No meaning to not repeal the legalization of gay marriage and Yes meaning to repeal the law). If they shared how they voted we then asked them to explain to us why they voted the way they did. If they did not feel comfortable sharing with us we merely wished them a Happy Holiday season and took note of their other responses. We were able to speak with 13 people, 6 voted No, 3 voted Yes, and 4 either didn't want to share their vote or hadn't voted at all. Each interview really shed light on how people are able to justify discrimination. For this to still be occurring today is such a shame. As a Mainer I am embarrassed that our state has digressed and joined the host of other places where gender, not love is the basis of marriage.

Objectification

The other day I was having a discussion with a group of friends and the phrase, "she is the object of my affection," came up. At first I did not think the phrase was anything out of the ordinary, because if is commonly used in reference to both males and females.  (Although mostly females I think.) The more my friends and I began to think about the phrase though the stranger it became. To think that we find it endearing when we are described as the object of someone's affection is somewhat absurd. Essentially this phrase serves to degrade as it lessens someone's status to that of an object; something that is so inhuman it is without feeling or emotion, simply existing for a specific purpose or use. When analyzed in the context of women I feel that this phrase becomes particularly offensive. It suggests that women are "objects," subject to men's needs and wants. Although this is a normal phrase in our culture, I had never realized what serious implications it ever had. I think it is very important to analyze the way that we speak and the words and phrases that we choose to use because they are often implying things we don't even mean. 

Tough Guise

Hip-Hop: Beyond the Beats and Rhymes is a documentary looking at how the hip-hop culture works and the gender roles created by it. One of the notions brought up within the movie was of Tough Guise. Tough Guise is the cultural construction for men in order to gain respect. A dominant masculine front put up to not be called negative things. Society takes the biology of men as being stronger then women. This is done so that woman can gain the respect of men. If a man receives a comment outside of the “box” of “manly” stereotypical words they are seen as weak and not a “man”. With there being no support for people outside of that box it is tough to live up to the notions put forth to being a man. This is why it is important for such things to be visible (being manly) so that the world can come to terms with themselves and to be able to deal with the stereotypes of the tough guise.

Tough Guise/Killing Us Softly

It really doesn’t seem noticeable until seeing a film like Jackson Katz’s the boxes that we confine each gender to. And then after watching these films it seems to be the only thing I notice. This isn’t the first time it’s come up either, we saw it when reading Baby X, but what I can’t understand is how to create change. If these images of what is female and what is male has become fully ingrained in society, so much so that it is unconsciously passed along to new generations, is it possible to reverse it? Even though we saw the pure degradation of women through advertising in Killing Us Softly, it seems ironic that women actually have an easier time pushing the boundaries of their gender roles. Maybe the first battle is getting people to admit there is a problem. To be able to address these issues we must first acknowledge that they exist.

Maybe to see change we need an army of baby X’s. What advice can we give parents of new babies to try and decrease the continuing cycle? It seems that the stories of parents fighting against gender norms are unique. They may be accomplishing a small piece toward societies improvement as a whole, but what is the cost. The cost is the unique family fighting against the norm. It takes courage and determination to reverse something as ingrained as this. Unfortunately, this world seems to be lacking in courageous and determined people, especially in this area. It is most likely a large struggle for parents to overcome their own life education that girls must be feminine and boys masculine. To watch their child walk out into the world pushing gender norm boundaries must be quite the dilemma for parents who are programmed to only want to do the best for their children and keep them safe. People who fight gender norms must be selfless, they are fighting for something that most likely will not be resolved in the near future and they have to have enough courage for those who will come after them.

Vietnamese Women

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2349059.stm

The above article talks about the plight that Vietnamese women suffer from because of society and inequality. While I wholeheartedly agree that those issues are deplorable and should immediately be resolved, I am so tired of reading and hearing about all these articles and coverage on how all Vietnamese women are mistreated. All of these articles and news coverage seem to do is give the illusion that Vietnamese women have nothing good in their lives; their portrayals make people think that all that happens to them is they get beaten everyday of their lives. A Vietnamese woman is so much more than a subservient wife and mother whose life is shackled to the home and kitchen. Instead of publishing all of these work that give Westerns the image of poor women needing to be saved, these newspapers and organizations should focus more on all of the other roles that Vietnamese women assume: in most cases, they are also business owners, the financial head of households, the glue that holds the entire family together. Like housewives in America, Vietnamese women are regarded as nothing but slaves; people who don't have stories and lessons to share, people who don't have their own opinions and aspirations of their own. Perhaps if everyone focused less on the negativity that Vietnamese women as a whole suffer from and focus more on the individual woman and her personal story, their living conditions, like all of these research and speculation, would become less based in academia and theories and more on actions and application.

outrageous act

For my outrageous act, I lead a guided duscussion about gender rolers with the 4-5 grade class at Pinecroft elementary school. THe students and I talked about what it meant to "act like a boy" and to "act like a girl". I had the kids give me sterotypical things that they considered to be masculine and feminine, and we organized them into lists. Next we talkedd about what happens to kids who try to break out of their gender roles. The students were very clear in telling me that kids would be teased and possibly rejected. A boy in the class expressed his opinion that boys where in more danger from teasing because boys are more likley to use violence against one another. (I thought it was really interesting that he was already thinking about that since it is something that we are just formally learning about now in college.) the last think I had them do is write me a paragraph about how they felt gender roles affected them and something non-gender typical that they would like to do. I got some interesting responces; surprising to me was that most of them felt that gender roles where both god and bad, and were able to defend both of their reasoning's. The girls were all able to some up with activities for me, but the boys had a much harder time feeling comfortable finding something non-gender typical that they would like to do.