R.I.P Trayvon Martin

I am sure that most of you have heard of what is being called "An American Tragedy". Which is the unjust shooting of 17 yr old Trayvon Martin, if you haven't, a quick Google search will inform you with numerous details. The bottom line is that a neighborhood watchmen shot Trayvon while he was unarmed and running through a white collar, gated community wearing a hoodie over his head in attempt to get home in the rain. Finally 45 days later the man was charged with murder in the second degree and I am unsure of the current trial updates.

There has been constant media coverage and there is one recent poll that has been of much debate. The poll taken by Reuters/Ipsos, showed that 91% of African Americans believed Trayvon was unjustly killed while only 37% of Caucasians felt that way. The Hispanic community lied in between at 49%. For details click here http://www.ipsos-na.com/news-polls/pressrelease.aspx?id=5585 from that page you can then download the full results which are very surprising.
I believe that the results represent how much racism is still a big problem not only here in the United States but globablly. I think that social and family institutions of the people polled played a huge factor in their feelings/responses.
I saw a similar dichotomy in my own community, at the time in South Anchorage, after 9/11. We lived in a part of Anchorage that was predominately white, however I was very close friends with a Muslim girl named Ayesha and my family with her family. I cannot recall the number of years ago they had moved from their home state in the Middle East, but it was not long. Almost directly after the 9/11 occurrence Ayesha and her siblings were largely shunned by those at school, even those who were once their "friends".
The hate was felt beyond just at school. Her father owns a very successfull used vehicle dealership. Suddenly his business fell under huge scrutiny by officials and was almost shut down. There were numerous false accusations and audits done. I was horrified.
Years may have passed since then but the hate is still there in our neighborhoods, as shown by the Trayvon Martin case.

durum

Hello everyfolks: just for giggles, I thought I'd share this article my mom heard on NPR, if you have time.

http://www.npr.org/2012/04/26/150727939/lillian-hellman-a-difficult-vilified-woman?sc=emaf

Also, the length of this post hopefully indicates I'd rather not have it graded. It's up to you, of course.

Be safe.

this will be for a grade afterall :)

I just thought this was a cool picture. Found it on one of my friends Facebook pages. Isn't crazy how little kids view marriage!

The social construction of gender and marriage in little kids is still evident. Boys believe the same as a man would about marriage. They too think that they should never marry or if they do their views on how a wife should be are gender biassed. The little boys said that their wife should "keep the chips and dip coming," but why couldn't the women be watching the game while the guy keeps everything coming! I like watching sports just as much as a guy does. I get into it and yell at the TV too, it shouldn't be view that sports are a male pass time. The other little boy said its never a good time to get married, but the little girl just thought of an age that would be good. Even as little kids girls love the idea of marriage and being a man's wife and the little boys just do it because the women want to. The gender roles that men and women play in marriage is thought of in the same way as adults and kids. Both young boys and grown men think that the women keeps house and that the man provides for the family. This view has been this way always, until recently most families have both parents providing because of the economy, but every boy who grew up with a soccer mom believes thats how their wife should be when they grow up. We really need to change how our children see this world and the way gender roles play into it. Even if you are a soccer mom, you should teach your kid that women don't have to be just the mom and housewife, that they can be the breadwinner and the sports fanatic!

The "F" word, 23% discount for women, caustic comments, & course concepts

When I saw the rousing (and I would venture caustic) comments on this "Economics of Happiness" picture posted on Facebook (link below), I thought immediately about how this might connect with the "F" word blog post here in our blog (great post by the way), and another WGS 201 student's experience when he suggested (for social sustainability in Sustainable Housing) 23% less rent for women because women make 23% less than men.

Take a look at the "F" word post below in our blog, and the comments on the "Economics of Happiness" FB post (linked below). See if you see some connecting threads that might weave threads of connectivity between these three examples & comments with course concepts for WGS 201.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=365733306810666&set=a.365725980144732.109231.112339142150085&type=1&theater 

Late third posting :(

This posting is going to juxtapose two similar things that are viewed in very different ways. This is the way that titles are used instead of names within "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan" and within Alaska Native culture (or at least Inupiaq because that is the culture that I have the most experience with.) By "titles", I mean, throughout the book people are referred to by their place in a family. For example: in the first few chapters, Lilly talks about "Older Brother", "Third Sister", "Mother", etc. Rather than using names, she uses titles, which given the context, makes these references sound cold and distant. However, something that I have noticed through interaction with one of my close friends' family (who is Inupiaq), is that this tradition was also held in their village before they moved to Fairbanks. The parents refer to the 4 boys as "son" the majority of the time, the boys refer to each other as "younger brother", "middle brother", "older brother", etc.

The thing that grabbed my attention the most was the difference in the tone between these two. As stated above, the use of titles to refer to family members within "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan" causes the tone to sound cold and as if there is a great distance between each family member, which I suppose their was. That family structure was meant to be very official, which seems to take the closeness out of the relationships within the family. On the opposite end of the spectrum, at least from what I have gleaned through spending extensive amounts of time with this family and their other friends from that village, the use of titles within the family unit is a distinct sign of closeness and strongly valued relationships within the immediate family and extended family (in the case of Aunties, Uncles, Cousins, etc.). 

Also, completely off subject. Here is a funny video I thought you all would appreciate. A spoof on pop culture. This is a suffrage themed take off of Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance". Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYQhRCs9IHM

amaranth

     To prove that I actually have something up-to-date-ish to share, I discovered this article: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/04/09/ashley-judd-slaps-media-in-the-face-for-speculation-over-her-puffy-appearance.html?fb_ref=article&fb_source=home_multiline . As successfully academic as the articles we’ve read, and have access to, have been, Ashley Judd has the presence of mind to retranslate some of their most potent and immediately-useful messages into language that almost anyone can understand, if not appreciate. For us, it serves as a reminder: of the communal and often subconscious nature of social privilege and disadvantage, of the myriad and miniscule details of everyday interactions carrying with them heavy interpersonal consequences, and, to reverse my reversal or her argument, the disproportionate effects of social subjugation, by probably 1% of the population, on the rest of the “weird”, meaning women, “indeterminates”, and men who don’t wear jeans, play rugby, or belch in public (from the preface to “the Kaleidoscope of Gender”).

     Moving right along, and to be even more flat and academic, I thought I’d bring up the general concept of virginity, a concept well-reported upon in the “Women’s Voices | Feminist Visions” textbook I’m supposed to have ditched by now. As much as the word is used, to ask an individual its exact meaning is generally impossible. It’s not even so simple as saying that it simply cannot be defined, like the word “is”, for instance: virginity is a word whose meaninglessness and variable ability to be misunderstood empowers its users to either damage themselves or the women around them. (I say women because, unfortunately, except in stupid jokes about pubescent boys, virginity is only ever used in reference to women.) As was well-stated in Leah’s posted image about the damned-if-you-do/don’t paradox, virginity is another means by which women can be judged and stunted unnecessarily by undefined degrees of sexual contact.

     My posts are always unhelpfully entropic. Perhaps not. Anyway.

     By the way, all the indentation and paragraph spaces are where I’m invisibly ranting about my unpopular opinion regarding hypersexualization in America. I find it rather annoying, but I can afford to let the opinion live unseen. Oh wait . . . .

     Then there is sizeism. What does one do with it? Who is allowed to make a call about whether someone’s BMI is culturally unusual or personally unhealthy? How do we raise awareness of the fact that some people BMIs are genetically predisposed to be culturally unusual? How do I escape the dreadfully uninvolved it’s-not-me-judging-people-here tone of this paragraph?

     And I really like, or rather try as hard as possible to acknowledge, the fact that we’ve been putting women’s and human’s and environmental issues all together: as I think Enei has mentioned, environmental disrespect and destruction has the closest possible connection to human well-being and equity issues (the TEDx talk about Pono was cool too).

     Now the rest is all gone. Hope it was good enough. P.S.: I hope none of you mind Amanda Palmer, because she did a really neat music video in beautiful defiance of spousal abuse, found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lzek4sHZp-c .

Thousands of "Rape Kits" Discovered Unprocessed!

A few days ago, while listening to NPR, I was disgusted to learn about the 11,000 "Rape Kits" that were discovered in Detroit unprocessed.  These "Rape Kits" are the DNA evidence used to catch and prosecute the assailant.  According to this NPR story, row upon row of boxes of these "kits" were never utilized in the justice system, in fact it was mentioned that only 2 of these potential cases are set for trial.  Inside the kits is DNA evidence that is collected "from every orifice" of a recently raped person, a process that could take up to three hours.

Furthermore, Detroit is not alone in this gross negligence, this is the case in cities across the county.  Any one who learns of this injustice has to wonder just how little our society values women to turn a blind eye on this huge number of abuses.

Of course women are not the only victims of rape, according to the RAINN website "about 3% of American men — or 1 in 33 — have experienced an attempted or completed rape in their lifetime."

• In 2003, 1 in every ten rape victims were male.
• 2.78 million men in the U.S. have been victims of sexual assault or rape.

I found more disturbing statistics - Lifetime rate of rape /attempted rape for women by race:

• All women: 17.6%
• White women: 17.7%
• Black women: 18.8%
• Asian Pacific Islander women: 6.8%
• American Indian/Alaska Native women: 34.1%
• Mixed race women: 24.4%

For a long time in my life I could not even look at statistics like these, rape is such a close subject for me.  Just about every one close to me has horrific stories around this subject as well.  In fact, when I was in high school my younger sister told me of an incident she had been living with for years.  Even though the incident had taken place years earlier, our parents insisted she file a police report.  When the police came to our house to document her story she was unable to talk to them about it directly.  What she was able to do was to whisper the details into my ear and then I spoke them to the police.  Even now, almost 20 years later, I can't remember that time without using extreme restraint to keep from breaking down in a flood of tears.  And yet, the police report did nothing to stop or hinder my sister's attacker. 

Sadly I have far too many stories related to rape and subsequently how these attacks have had the ability to destroy a person's life if we don't find a way to survive the trauma.  So how do we break this appalling cycle of violence and disrespect for our fellow human beings?  I think we must talk about it; we must yell about it;  we must scream for justice in our own homes, in the halls of court, and especially in the streets of the communities we live in.

This NPR story and the writing for this blog has inspired me to do more.  I found this organization here in Fairbanks that I plan to get involved with: Interior Alaska Center for Non-Violent Living.
Facebook name: Iac Fairbanks
http://www.iacnvl.org/outreach-projects-volunteering

other resources for getting involved:
http://www.rainn.org/get-involved

websites with info I used for this blog post:
http://www.npr.org/2012/04/21/151113247/untouched-thousands-of-rape-kits-await-justice
http://www.rainn.org/statistics

Because this post is so grim, I also wanted to just mention this beautiful book that a number of my friends have contributed to - Imagining Ourselves: Global Voices From a New Generation of Women, http://www.herterstudio.com/Imagining%20Ourselves.htm.  This is a wonderful book of women artists and poets and some of their art-form.  It is both empowering and inspiring.

Feminism-Just Above The Universe and Just Below The Pyramids on the People's Scale Of Understanding

I'm not talking Facebook or the word that rhymes with duck

Facebook is an incredibly easy way of gathering opinions as people seem to rather enjoy sharing them, when solicited and not.  Sometimes, a post will hit on a topic that I am passionate about, and I find it hard to resist joining.  The following is a post made by a friend (Person A) and two of his friends (Person B and Person C). 

Person A (boy):
"To everyone out there that feel as though feminism is all about equality of the sexes... please look up Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar. Their basic theory according to one of my books is that men's art should be banished for an extended period for retribution for doing the same to women in the past...."

Person B (boy):
"Most feminism isn't for equality, but rather for the addition of privileges to the female sex. As said by the Amazing Atheist, "Feminism is the idea that we can make both sexes equal by focusing solely on the issues of one of them."

Feminists often insist that women are constantly downtrodden, however women do have quite a bit of leverage when it comes to things like domestic abuse (How many people take domestic abuse of a man seriously?) and child custody (usually the mom gets the child). Also, prison sentences are usually a lot less harsh on women, not to mention that women don't have to sign up for the selective service and such.

Anyone that reads this though, do not think I hate women or feminists. I love women, I think they're great and have much more beautiful bodies. But there are severe upper hands that women have concerning some issues.

That's just my two cents though, forgive me if I ever sounded hateful during this."


Person C (girl, or “female”):
" ughhhh... feminists just need to stop giving females a bad rep. i'm soooo over this shit."

It was after the last comment that I lost my ability to abstain from commenting. 

I feel as if the word ‘feminism’ has deliberately been given a bad rep and has been made to be harder to want to claim.  Whether this is because there are those who want to maintain the status-quo of power and patriarchy,  or it is perhaps not as serious as that, I can’t know.  Person C’s attitude and belief differs far from my own, and perhaps it agitates me more because it is a girl or woman that is damning the very movement that is fighting to keep and promote equality for her among others. 

True enough, feminism can mean different things for different people; I won't presume that my understanding is shared by everyone (clearly, it's not).  However, there are just some definitions that are so perverse from what I understand it to be, it's just astounding. 

One would think she’d be “soooo over” being paid 23% less than a man, or “soooo over” having her reproductive rights endangered, but yet she feels “soooo over” this “shit” that is feminism. 

Power in Words

    The other day in class the phrase "douche bag" came up in conversation and we shortly discussed the meanings behind it and the power that it holds.  Being the daughter of a librarian and a teacher, words have always been a very powerful tool to me.  Words can be used in a number of ways, but sometimes we don't think about how these words come across to others.  The kaleidoscope metaphor is perfect for breaking down the usage of words; someone's personal patterns and possibilities make all the difference in how they will interpret words.  Everything from someone's generation, education, background, race, ethnicity, sexuality, economic status...etc. all have a chance to change the way we understand the words people use.
    There is a group on Facebook called Guerrilla Feminism that is a place to post all kinds of feminist photos, images, messages and news.  The idea is to create awareness and to encourage communication between people about these issues.  The other day I saw this image posted on the Guerrilla Feminism page:

 

    While this image , and does, refer to many things, I immediately looked at the word "slut" and thought about the power behind it.  There are many words in the English language that have cruel, hurtful and demeaning connotations.  The origins of these words differ, but many of them come from things that aren't negative at all.  Pussy, gay, cunt, dick, twat, bitch, fag...just to name a few.  

    Alone, words have immense power.  But, they have even more power in the ways in which we choose to use them.  We have the power to make words hurtful.  We also have the power to talk about these words and ask people not to use them.  This is one small way that we can make a difference in our world; we can call people out on these words and challenge them to make sure that they understand what they're saying.  I have caught myself using words that after I thought about it, are never appropriate, and that if I heard someone use them, I'd quite possibly be offended. 

    I guess it all comes down to the old Golden Rule: treat others how you'd want to be treated.  If you find any negative words or phrases offensive, chances are that many other people will too.  There are millions of alternative words in the English language, we just have to get creative.  Name-calling has never solved problems, and it never will.  We simply have to rise above that and use our words to communicate and educate others.  As Thumper in the Disney movie "Bambie" said, "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all."