Quick Blog #6

Age Diversity

Write a paragraph in which you respond to the following questions:

1. Is your social sphere (family, work, school, friends, hobbies, etc.) comprised of people of diverse ages?  How often do you regularly encounter young people and elders? Do you wish you had more interactions with youth or elderly people?

There are a lot of people that work behind the scene in the theater and film communities, people that look like normal (relatively kept and other days not so kept) human beings. As an actor, the amount of people between 15 and twenty make up the sea of individuals I find myself around. I’ll come across a middle aged person during an audition, but these are usually the people I see behind the doors, after encountering the sea of youngins like myself.

2. In many ways, our society is segregated on the basis of age.  Why do you think that is?  How are young people and old people often socially marginalized?  How and why are young adults and middle-age adults often advantaged and privileged due to their age?

I feel like youth tend to be more out going. I heard in a television show “New York City is for those who are in their twenties.” I think that was the real house wives of Atlanta. I’m probably more likely to find a community of elders up in Vermont. The privilege the young and middle age have is the amunt of social groups to be with. I find that my grandparents are really relying on family to keep them company. Maybe because they don’t want to get out. I always think about how wonderful it is to call up a friend and hang out while on the flip side those who are up in age my not have that luxury “Ethan, my friends are all gone.” A high school teacher of mine, probably in her 70’s, once told me as I was getting clarification of one of her assignments before the school day began. It’s a scary thought that most people don’t want to think about: the day we have out lived all our friends. Don’t want to think about that type of competing.

3. What are some possible ways to promote greater integration of all ages/generations and to challenge age-based segregation?  How can we as a culture work to promote respect for people of all ages, especially greater respect for old people?

            Watching old movies, listening to old songs. I prefer to call them classic, I feel their timeless. It’s fun when I’m watching a documentary about Shirley temple and my grandma comes and sits down, because that never happens.  Then I ask her a question about where she was during the 1930’s and she takes me back. For those who don’t have grandparents, they might be able to strike up a conversation with an elderly person at a local church. Those are areas I’ve found I could strike up conversation. I actually got to shake the hands and look into the eyes of a ninety-year-old women. I felt like a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of experiences she must have had. but in all honesty it is very difficult to see a community of old people outside of an old person’s home. Why that is would be a question to raise.

Quick Blog # 5

View or read one of the items in my diary on feminist anti-pornography. Do you agree with the message in the article/video?  Why or why not?  Do you believe pornography is contributing to the way men see women sexually?  Does pornography further the problems of sexism and misogyny? Why does so much pornography present women in a degrading manner and how might this impact young men who are consuming these images? Discuss whether you agree or disagree with the feminist critique of pornography...

I mostly agree with what the video had to say. I don’t think child pornography is okay, the portrayal of people of color in porn is sketchy, and I don’t think it’s okay for men to see women as objects for their sexual dominance. I think there is legit porn that is done by professionals and is marketed.

That being said, more dialogues need to be made public about sex, about porn, because it seems to have this taboo in our society. And I shake my head at this. Why is it a taboo? It was mentioned how porn is a billion dollar industry. Yet in our society, driven by gratuitously violent media, we allow the topic of pleasure (a natural body function) to go under the radar to the point where it gets out of control. I think not talking about it is more a reason why young and older men become sexual predators.  

            I don’t think all pornography is misogynistic, but allot of it can be. There are couples that actually enjoy watching porn together. So there is porn being made that caters toward both male and female viewers. Then there is a plethora of pornography that really is offensive and should have stricter monitoring.  

            The type of porn I look at, the women are generally taking an assertive role during the sex. So grappling the question of why women are presented in a degrading manner is not coming easily. The producers of porn are men. Women might get paid a lot for their contributions, but men run the show and thus are paid more. That’s a sneaky fact I didn’t know before watching the movie. That is probably a primary reason why so much porn has women in less dominant positions.

            I disagree with porn that is oppressive, which is most porn. However I’ve watched porn that does not fall into those categories. I don’t think all porn is bad and misogynistic, but I do feel more conversations and rules need to be raised to separate fact from fiction in our society.  

Quick Blog # 4

The Willow Smith video gave off this subliminal child pornography message that really bothered me. The argument is that kids flaunt themselves in kids pageants and dance competitions, but I think when this, for lack of a better word, sexing up of children is put on mass media a line is crossed.

            I might be speaking out of ignorance, but generally I fell there is a line that the dance community and pageant community have to not let sex appeal over shadow a craft. Mass media tends to take sex appeal to such gratuitous levels I become cautious to the creative process and the people behind the scenes. I felt Jodi Foster (with the help of Robert De Niro) gave an honest performance in Taxi Driver, and Natalie Portman (with the help of Jean Reno) gave an honest performance in Leon the Professional. The handling of the theme, the robbing of a child’s innocence, was carefully handled and respectfully performed. There’s something about the ideal innocence of youth that I fell many, including myself, aspire to protect.

            Watching Willow Smith and seeing how her career unfolds will ultimately shape my opinion of her. But at first glance, I feel like the there’s an abuse at play.

Quick Blog #3

Quick Blog # 3: Experiencing Class and Classism

Please answer the following three questions about class. You need only write a brief paragraph for each question.

1. Describe an experience where you were privileged or advantaged due to your class/socio-economic status.

New York is a very claustrophobic space to live and being raised in rural New England, that claustrophobia hits me ten fold. The apartment I live in with my Dad has this hall way where you have to side step around a person if they happen to be passing through. In bathroom (I’ll keep it clean) the toilet paper is literally hugging my elbow as I’m sitting down. That’s one of the many adjustments I have to make living here.

           

2. Describe an experience where your  were oppressed or disadvantaged due to your class/socio-economic status.

I came across a group of actors that got a kick out of telling racist jokes. They asked me first if it was okay to use them and, curious as I was, I told them to go right ahead. They were funny, so I went back to my Dad’s apartment to see what other types of racist jokes were out there. The ones I found were a lot more uncensored then what my buddies were saying, something I could see fueling a white supremacists desire to lynch a person. So I eventually went up to my acting buddies and told them I’d appreciate them not using anymore racist jokes when I’m around. They were glad that I told them this, it actually took me a bit of time to tell them not to use these jokes, so I remember one woman telling me how she wished I could have said something sooner. 

3. Write about an experience where you witnessed an incident of classism (remark, behavior, and attitude) and your reaction to it.

I went over to a friends house, this was when I was living in Vermont, and I could tell by the unkempt rooms and how cramped the living space was, this guy didn’t have the financial wealth my family had. He had a Game Cube Nintendo, which at the time I didn’t. Material qualities aside, I could tell from being around him and his parents, despite his families economical short comings, they still wanted to do what they could to provide loving parental support and a good education.

            When way I cope is by heading up to my father’s church. There’s so much space up there it’s criminal. This isn’t a church, it’s more like a castle and I can just go onto my dad’s computer, check to see if rooms for classes, or gatherings are empty and go to them to juggle, rehearse lines, or just read. If I were not my father’s son I wouldn’t even be able to pass the front entrances.

Quick Blog #2

 This is an article from Time about a woman named Aung San Suu Kyi (aka the Lady). She is a Nobel peace prize laureate and leader of a movement the National League for Democracy (NLD) whose goal is to democratize the existing Burmese dictators’ and provide a more humane conditions for the Burmese people.

            The article deals with themes of classism and violations of human rights. The Burmese dictatorship is hauntingly cruel toward its people and the lengths to which the interviewer goes to meet with Suu Kyi exemplifies how controlling the government is. 

Below is the site where this article can be found. You can also to www.time.com and type Burma’s First Lady of Freedom in the search engine at the top of the site. Or just cut and paste this URL http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2039939,00.html

Post #15

For me, having an affect on a community is taking a stance for an idea, and being self aware with why that idea is meaningful to me. Once that selfawareness is defined then I have the ability to share or challenge my friends, my family, my community with it. The reason I need to know what I want from myself first is so that when other opinions and ideas come my way, I can listen to them, take them in, and decide if their opinion is what I stand for or if it crosses a line that I will not support.

            Regardless of how I use my idea to effect others, how it affects me, how it will shape my life, has to be the foundation. I want to take into account what Angela Davis said about celebrating whatever accomplishments come even if they are a slight deviation from what the original intent. There are so many people in this competitive society that refuse to step back and pat themselves on the back for their accomplishments. I don’t want to be one of those many people.

            bell hooks was talking about how people should aspire, not to blame others, but to take accountability for their actions. If I can take this idea with me into conversations with family, friends, and my peer group, those difficult conversations may have the potential of running more smoothly.

            With this in mind, I have to remember that opportunities present themselves at the most random moments. I’ll have to use those moments to see how ready I am to be true to an idea of change, or if I’m going to cave into societal pressures, which could really leave a bad vibe: self regret or self satisfaction?

Post #14

I feel like being an activist takes courage, it takes having an out going personality, and a willingness to learn and share thoughts with others. bell hooks talks of a movie, The Proposal,  she watched that gave a negative portrayal of being  femenist: that the word “feminist” was used in a negative connotation and in a humerous way. She also talks about how the target audience for this film is between 12 and 16. And she used this to illustrate her point of the media’s backlash toward the feminist movement.

            Living in a competitive, consumer based society, the idea of sharing knowledge is costly. Getting a liberal arts education is costly as our student loans are constantly reminding us. Realizing this only empowers a person to challenge that system. It also allows us to see how thoroughly we are implanted into the system and that changing it will not be an over night fix

            I think my favorite activist is my father, though don’t tell him I said that. There was a time in Vermont when he was head of the United Church of Christ (UCC) . He began a movement to advocate churches to be Open and Affirming, to accept any type of member regardless of their sexual orientation, religious back round, race, or ethnicity. It was a courageous stand to make because there was a lot of back lashing that he had to personally address.

            I remember one night he came home, not a surprise considering his hours, and he told me, “I was just at a meeting where no one agreed with my point of view.” He told me recently, that he would go to meetings to hear the opinions of the few congregations that were resilient to having an open church. I think about how he must have struggled to keep his cool while all the fingers were pointing at him. That’s roughing it.  

Post #13

Ageism

“The thought of hair loss, saggy breasts, or wrinkles doesn’t sit well with people who have emphasizing fitness and youth” (Butler 558) My grandfather is really into tennis and yard work. He did this up until his 80’s, he’s now 85, and he plays golf more then tennis (must be less demanding on his body). I look at him and I don’t cringe at his age, I admire his willingness to take the challenges life offers him. At times, I probably cringe (if didn’t there’d be something wrong with me). Generally speaking, I respect the man.  

            I think ageism, and sexism both have this common denominator of only seeing a person for their aesthetic qualities and not their moral (that’s really any type of “ism”, but for the sake of focusing I’m using sexism). The video Tough Guys talked about how men should aspire to getting to know women through more open relationships. It’s being able to define that as masculinity as oppose to seeing a women as an object to sexually conquered. In Killing Us Softly 3 it discussed how women should not rely on facelifts of breast implants to be the object of a man’s desire. Both examples show how society objectifies, materializes the human condition. Youthful qualities are put in so much high regard, it’s almost taboo to appreciate that which has grown old.    

            It think ageism isn’t talked about much because other “isms” overshadow it or take more priority in society. Regardless if it’s not a high priority or if it’s overshadowed, the fundamental question is still there: will you find respect in a person for their moral worth or aesthetic worth? Can both be done? Depending on how a person answers those questions defines how they will contribute to a society.

Post # 12

When reading about the disable, I think about how this form of oppression revolves around a seemingly impossible pace of a society that runs on abelism. “[M]ost industrialized societies give non-disabled people (in different degrees and kinds, depending on class, race, gender, and other factors) a lot of help in the form of education, training, social support… and other services” (Wendell 479). With this thought in mind, I could have been mentally disabled if I were raised in a different community: a community that didn’t have proper educational or community opportunities. I want to focus on this because it’s where I feel I have a rare privilege that most people of color cannot easily attain. That I feel I struggled to attain. Yet at the same time, I can acknowledge that there people that have more difficult struggles and many times those struggles over take them.  

            I think about the documentary Waiting for Superman. It deals with parents of color fighting, and raffling, to get their children into a charter school. It also shows how resilient certain communities are to academic growth. I haven’t seen the movie, just interviews with the director. Nevertheless it allows me to have an appreciation for the school communities that I’ve been in. It allows me to feel out of place. Sometimes in a good way, sometimes in a bad way. The idea of being black and educated, even today, sounds like an oxymoron. I like to consider myself more a survivor as opposed to educated. However, after taking this course I know that’s probably more an excuse, my privilege acting up again: )

            Another oxymoron that was mentioned was the disabled dancers in Gimp. Not to undermine a disabled person’s set backs, I say this more meant to complement. Seeing people, who have underdeveloped or lost limbs, finding freedom in their own limitations, evokes an inspiration for me to find my own limitations and free myself to move. It’s a crazy paradoxical idea to wrap the mind around, but very true to a lot of situations I’ve been in.  

Post #11

“Samuel Cartweight [a mid 19^th century physician] decided any slave that ran away obviously had a mental illness. So he came up with a word called drapetomania” (Weiss White Privilege). This quote from Tim Weiss was one in a series of examples of him describing how white privilege in the 1850’s, 1890’s, 1930’s, 1963, and 2007 has consistently been oblivious to racial oppression. After watching Beautiful Daughters, and reading the article Trans Woman Manifesto, I’m realizing this is not only true for race, but also for the individuals who define themselves as LGBT (I really don’t know if that’s PC).

            When watching Queer Street, I was frustrated to see the misconceived perception our society gives toward people that don’t fit in with the White, male, heterosexual category. That a gay man needs to take drugs for being diagnosed with, obsessive compulsive disorder, attention deficit hyper activity disorder, bipolar disorder. How many more disorders does a man need to feel like society is beating down on him saying “your life sucks?”

 Another misconception our society makes is hyper sexualizing transgender women by “creating the impression that most trans women are sex worker or sexual deceivers. And by asserting that the transition is for primarily sexual reasons” (Serano 443). But it is hard to find that one person that will come out and say “this is not right.”

            This is why watching Beautiful Daughters was such a relief. It literally swung a bat at those stereotypes and said “God is into the heart not the body part.” I felt like I had a V.I.P pass into a community of women who have their ups and downs dealing with a society that normally gives weird looks toward those who are transgendered. However, despite those trials and tribulations, they all appeared to come off as very level headed people.

Recognizing the privileged or the oppressed that buy into the stereotypes, that practice the oppositional and traditional sexism, and telling them I don’t agree can help reduce the problem. Also, realizing that there are success stories of people who are transgender that come out and still live healthy lives. It’s not a dramatic, public speaking approach, but it’s something.

Post # 10

From Queer Street, There’s a reality that people in the job market will have a bias toward hiring a person if there apart of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT) community. Many people in Sylvia’s homeless shelter have allowed themselves to be agitated by this societal victimization. When reflecting on a conversation with Kristen (a transsexual who feels she has to hoe the New York streets at night), Loubrel jumps between denying and accepting this norm. “This is what transsexuals choose to do,” as if she was accepting there were other choices. “Now I see this is what we have to do,” as if she’s allowing herself to become victimized by society and follow this norm: to be transsexual you have to hoe around the New York City streets at night.

            One of the rare views that’s give is from Isyss. She describes how she will “look for a job.” Then thinking about all the individuals that take the drugs, that prostitute, that “abuse the system” of the homeless shelter she says, “I could have easily got into the habit of hanging out all day.” Isyss is aware of all the beaten down souls, but she still chooses to not let it get to her.

            I leave this video with this in mind; it also seemed to be the question Kate, the director of Sylvia’s Homeless shelter, was constantly struggling with. At what point does one question the society for oppressing the LGBT community and at what point does one question certain individuals in the LGBT community?  

Tough Guys + Killing Them Softly 3

            In Tough Guys masculinity is characterized as, an act, a pose, or a mask to hide men from being human. Like wise, in Killing Them Softly 3 femininity is having no facial lines, a trim chin, no pores, passive, and being an object of heterosexual desire or male assault. Both of these findings from the videos show that our society’s standards of what it means to be a man, what it means to be a woman, are mainly shielded by false depictions that mask our humanity.

            As far as race is concerned, Kilbourne showed an add that illustrated how most men tend to out size or have women in a lower, passive position, but changes when race is added. The next add shoed a black child looking up to a white child. That makes me wonder how many more adds there are of people of color being submissive to a dominant white figure.

            Seeing a picture of Obama tearing up over the Tucson shooting as he speaks to a crowd in Arizona about the tragedy, I think of how that image isn’t the typical portrayal men see in the media. A man crying seems to be the equivalent to woman farting. Both just aren’t suppose to happen

 I was watching the Charlie Rose show and Charlie Rose was talking to Brian Williams about the shooting. I was keeping in mind that in the Tough Guys most of the assailants to the school shooting crimes were passed as psychotic and separate from what normal, American society would influence. This is similar to how the Tucson shooter is presented. Even as I write this, it sounds so scathing, as if I’m saying the victims caused the assailant to do what he did. It’s not one victim, it’s the society as a hole that can make men believe pulling out a gun and shooting up the neighborhood is the masculine thing to do.   

Christianity in Public Schooling and in the Larger Society

As far as privilege is concerned, I recall going to church one time, and it’s a UCC/Baptist church, with my brother and his Taiwanese friend. As the congregation got up to greet each other, it’s customary to say “peace of god be with you.” My brother’s friend is Buddhist so he was telling me, after the service, that he would shake a person’s hand and take the “God” out. So he would say, “peace be with you.” I had become so accustomed to Christian services that the idea of different religions calling God something else slipped my mind.

 There were a couple of spots where Blumenfeld seemed to trail a bit off topic. When discussing how Christmas, Blumenfeld talked about “ the promotion of music, especially Christmas, by radio stations, and Christmas special played on TV” (250).” Most of the advertising for Christmas does not stem from Christian views, but the capitalist view of buying presents. So the comparison with Christmas music seemed a bit off because generally the music is not song from a hymnal.   

            Japanese concentration camps in America also felt like a bit of a stretch from religion. Isn’t that more a discussion on being Asian then being Buddhist? Those were the only two spots that confused me.

            Reading about the hate crimes against Muslims that occurred after September 11, 2001 was informative. I recall watching a 20/20 episode about Islam in America and it allowed me to see how disillusioned Islamic extremist have marred the religion with their anti-western teachings. I saw how the majority of people practicing Islam would cringe at the thought of even categorizing the extremists as Islamic.

            If you stop to think about it, Christian missionary groups have that same effect on Christianity, at least for me. I cringe just thinking about a group of people that go to different cultures and say, “Your beliefs are wrong. You’ll be damned to hell if you don’t change your ways.” That’s like Nazi brain washing.

Video Treatment Write up

The Topic

How are black people positively and negatively portrayed in the united states through film (film being television or movies)? This research will range from the beginning to the end of the 20^th century

Story

Present the positive and negative portrayals of black in American film through out the  20^th century.

Software

 I’ll be using power point. I’ve used it multiple times in the past for projects, so I have a familiarity with it. If I come across a problem, I’ll try Googleing power point tips or click the help bar on the Power Point Program.

Research

I’m going to go through a book called black firsts to get a list of influential black film projects (film being television or movies). I will Google clips of these individuals’ influences online. Figure out how to put videos onto a power point slide.

Time Line

Wed: Read the book black first and find 10 to 15 influential black performers in film. Google questions such as what are struggles black people have had in film 20^th century? What do American films convey about blacks in our society?

Thur: Find clips online and figure out how to incorporate these clips into a power point slide.

Fri: Write up narrative slide that illustrated a performers positive and negative influences and connect the slides with the video clips.

Sat: Continue to connect videos and performers influences

Sun: Summarize power point presentation and figure out how to post it online.

Note: My hopes are to be done by Sunday, but I understand set backs in my research or figuring out the technology could interfere with that deadline. So I won’t be surprised if it’s done by Monday or Tuesday.

Take away

For viewers to be more aware of the struggles blacks have gone through in the 20^th century to gain influence and positive, realistic, portrayals of their situation in society.

People Like Us/Who Will Listen to Dennis?

I think about class and how I had a few examples of upper class friends in Williamstown Massachusetts, a few working class friend s in Vermont. By the way, both towns did have a middle class that I was apart of, but out side of my middle class privileged society, I saw more upper class in Massachusetts and working class in northern Vermont.

            None of those two living areas come close to the class oppression I witness in New York City. My dad got a job as a minister here in Harlem back in 2006 and ever since then I would primarily live with him in the city and occasionally go back to visit my Mom, with my Dad, in Vermont.

            The walk from the church, the Columbia side of Harlem, to the

Lennox avenue

side of Harlem is like a walk between two worlds: upper class life and working class life. Last night I met a man named Dennis. He just opened up into random conversation with me, I had never met him. He was talking about how he contracted HIV, how he just got out of prison, that he was starving. He mentioned how bothered he was to ask me for help. That I wasn’t the first he asked.

            One guy said he’d pay Dennis $200 to have sex with him. Dennis recoiled at that thought and told me he was trying to clean up his life. Another guy he talked to, five minutes before I came along, said he’d go to his apartment and get him some food. However, time was going by and it didn’t look like Dennis was going to get food from this person.

            He and I started talking about his family to lighten the mood up. Nevertheless, throughout the conversation I’m wondering if this guy is conning me, if this is a gift where my class is being questioned. Will he kill me? Is he on the verge of killing himself? Looking into his eyes, I see he’s on the verge of tears. He seemed more beaten, battered, and mutilated than he was hostile.

            I ended up helping him out with ten dollars; I figured that’s enough to get him a meal. Then he hugged me…he hugged me. It was like I was taking this man’s burdens in my arms. I didn’t know what to do or say. I wished him good luck and went back to my Dad’s apartment. This happened yesterday, so as I write this I’m still trying to wrestle with what happened: how these two worlds can coexist in this one city.

            My Dad asked me why I walked home at night. He could just drive me back to the apartment. It’d be safer. I know if I took that path, I wouldn’t be able to appreciate how safe and warm the communities in Massachusetts and Vermont are because I wouldn’t be able to compare them to the brutal and unfair lives people, like Dennis, live in New York City.

Why do I think class is so invisible in this culture? I’ll answer that one with another question. Who would listen to Dennis? The argumentative Staten Island couple (I’m trying to put in People Like Us as best I can)? The suburbanites with friends in low places? I could barely listen to the guy myself. So I come to the conclusion that I don’t care if you’re upper class, upper middle class, middle class, or working class, the oppression I saw last night is very difficult to embrace, but if that oppression isn’t embraced a class conversation becomes difficult to have.  

Gaga and Ke$ha Article

“Blue eyed/ Brown eyed”

As far as the ends justifying the means, in the scenario of the “Blue eyed/Brown eyed” exercise, ends do justify the means. Okay, one kid punched another kid in the gut, but he wasn’t hospitalized. That would cross a line. One could argue this experiment might influence school bullying. However Ms. Elliott seemed to have gone into the exercise with the controversy in mind. Through out the video, she seemed to have a routine down for multiple scenarios.

            There was a moment during the exercise with the adult group when a woman wouldn’t cooperate because Ms. Elliott did not call her by her name. Elliott then enlarges her control by questioning a brown eyed participant, “Is she being rude, inconsiderate, uncooperative, insulting? Are all those the things we accuse blue eyes to be?” The members silence only fuels Elliott’s oppressive authority. It also pulls the example from The Privilege, Power, and Difference book concerning the privileged blaming the oppressed for the oppression: victimizing the victim.

            To follow up on that moment, she asked the privileged brown eyed group why they didn’t defend the blue eyed. It was concluded that questioning the privileged, whether oppressed or not, is much more difficult than taking a back seat and letting a few do the fighting. It’s the path of least resistance.   

            If any experiment needed questioning, as far as safety was concerned, to me The Stanford Prison Study was more questionable. Elliot had done her homework more thoroughly than Philip Zimbardo did with The Stanford Prison Study. In watching the two, I felt Zimbardo’s experiment had more potential to fall apart than. Elliott’s. There’s irony in this. Elliott had no formal training in psychology when creating her experiment, Zimbardo did.

I don’t know if the Brown eyed/Blue eyed exercise is still being practiced, but the fact that this is one of many videos that shows footage of racial oppression’s cruelty can get the point across. Some of these forms of oppression are dated, but some aren’t. By extracting the oppressive behaviors that are practiced still in society, and having a discussion about such oppressions, people can be empowered.  

Post #5

I like the section that talked about the “deny and minimize” because it seemed to make an effort to meet the privileged half way. As I’m reading this chapter, my heads nodding in agreement, because I can pull up conversations I’ve had in the past with white friend of mine, I identify as black, and talking to them about race. I’ve heard them say that there is no racism in Vermont, it’s in other states. I have a lot of incidents in the past where I would catch friends or teachers, practicing what I call, blind racism. But that particular incident I let pass. Can’t get them all, but now I’m aware.

            The one that was really hard to swallow, because it exposed my male privilege, was the “sick and tired” strategy. I remember having a conversation with one of my gal pals about comedians that I enjoyed. She listened and pointed out they were all men. So I named a few women to stay in her favor, but I can’t deny that apart of me felt annoyed because I thought she was whining. However, reading this chapter, I realize it was my privilege of male dominance she was exposing. So good for her and good for me. I think what can interrupt the cycle of oppression in the future is questioning that oppression, but also the privileges.

            In chapter 6, Johnson states how the path of least resistance being the easier one to follow. “Resistance can take many forms, ranging from mild disapproval to being fired from a job, beaten up, run out of town, imprisoned, tortured, or killed (Johnson 81).” Being bullied for resisting oppression is difficult, because resisting oppression goes against conversational norm. I’ve done it with my friends. Each time it has been uncomfortable. So while I can relate to stopping it in my own life, I understand why others don’t do the same in there’s. It’s scary.   

    

The Stanford Prison Experiment

In the video about The Stanford Prison Experiment it was mentioned how “the goal was to show how power corrupts. That it is difficult for the victims of abuse to stand up and defend themselves.” The abused in this experiment were the prisoners. They would resist their abuse with hunger strikes or putting bed posts up against their cell door. However, when the prisoners resisted the oppression, the ward would use their power to humiliate, physically exhaust, and psychologically degrade the prisoners.

            When connecting this experiment to race, I think about the Rodney King race riots. How black people rioted in Los Angeles over this crime of police brutality, but despite the riots, the ruling racial group (whites) got away with the crime because the assailants who beat Rodney King were acquitted.

            It was the same for the prison ward (who were like the dominant white race). They were able to get away with oppressing the prisoners (who were like the non-white race) because they were the dominant class. It’s mentioned in the reading how the privileged want to have a competitive edge over another person: that they are “reluctant to lose anything that gives them and edge” (Johnson 70). That edge is their power. It can corrupt the prison wards, the police officers, it can corrupt anyone and lead to oppression.

Post #3

The extent of John Gray’s book was quickly defined as men and women are so different that the possibility of them communicating and listening to each other is rare. Kimmel’s counter argument is that communication can happen because men and women are more similar than they are different. I felt that Kimmel’s argument was more on target, one because I heard more of his side, but also because the points that he makes seemed to clarify my own failed conversations on gender

            Talking about the women’s sexual revolution and how women are more entitled to talk about pleasure. Kimmel throws the fact that in 1975 40% of women would fake an orgasm where in 1995 less than 10% fake that orgasm. So there’s a change.

            However, with that change I feel like there’s a generation gap between, not just men and women, but women of different generations. I know first hand that those conversations about sex can get really uncomfortable. I had been talking with a friend of mine, and she and I had been friend for a couple years so I didn’t think this conversation was too creepy. I told her (and bear with me on this), “I don’t think masturbations a bad thing. I do it and you probably do it yourself, right?” Awkward silence. Okay, she doesn’t like to talk about that. Then we go to a Spencer’s and I see her sexually curios side. I think that’s really confusing. The confusion may come from the different generations, the mother and grandmother, being raised in environments where conversations on sex were not okay. So the change in talking about pleasure is not just difficult for men to grasp, as Kimmel mentioned, but I also think there’s something going on with the women.

The F Word

After watching The F Word I can see how the feminine movement has gone through, and continues to go through its trial and tribulations. The stigmas that the media throws out to the public of what feminism is (lesbian, man hating, abortionists, that have hair under their armpits) has created destructive set backs. The video showed how these stigmas were not accurate definitions. bell hooks defined feminism as “the elimination of sexism, sexual exploitation, and sexual abuse.” I like that definition and I’d support it, because it’s a call for equal rights among the sexes.

That being said, I don’t see myself as a feminist. I have an all-or-nothing mentality and if I’m not fully committed I feel I’m underperforming: doing sloppy work. Those making a living out of this cause for equal rights among sexes through, writing books, doing rallies or marchers, they’re the true feminists. I see myself more as a supportive spectator of the feminist.

            I have difficulty accepting the notion of feminism on the decline. I’m an actor and women are a very large demographic in that field. A lot of my thoughts around acting have been shaped by strong intelligent women. From that background it’s difficult for me to see women as inferior. However the video did unearth some memories of passing comments from a friend of mine who described how he didn’t like feminist (he would say feminists with a belittling tone). The documentary shed some light on why he had this view. I think he allows himself to be fed by the stigmas that the media presented. So video was a breath of fresh air in that it gave me a relatively concrete depiction of what the feminist movement.

Gender, Power and Privilege Post # 1

As a black man, when Bell Hook started talking about the negative images of race exploited on forms of representation (movies) it hit a personal note for me.  the image of a black villain in the movie Smoke is frustrating to look at because I could see myself, as a child, questioning if that is what I should aspire to be. If it’s not, why is it constantly being thrown in my face? What’s going on in our society to be so ignorant? Hook mentioned talking with the director, asking him why he chose to have a black man as a villain. In short, the director’s response was he felt a black thief would present a clear “good-guy-bad-guy quality”: black vs. white.

             Hook had mentioned the movie Smoke was recently released. That was back in the mid 90’s. In the past ten years movies like Hotel Rwanda, Miracle at St. Anne, Precious, The Pursuit of Happyness, and Waiting for Superman have shown honest interpretations of race. I recall an interview with Dave Chappelle explaining to  Oprah Winfrey how people he was working with were pressuring him to wear a dress and convey a humorous, but negative, stereotype of black men cross dressing. Chappelle tuned down the idea, because he didn’t want to wear the dress. The media continues to perpetuate negative racial stereotypes in place of honest interpretations. However, I believe that as people of color become more empowered and influential the stereotypes become challenged and overshadowed by original and honest interpretations.