Response 4 to Jaimee Schuster

Jaimee brings up two different points that I think they are both great add ons to the conversation we had today in class. The dolls every little girl owns/owned was Barbie. She has the perfect dimensions and is the ideal stereotype for a young girl. Like Jaimee said her proportions are off. Her head is bigger than her waist line. Obviously Barbie had her soul mate because she could not survive without a man, Ken. This idea of a partner to survive is not unique to this situation. People with disabilities tend to seem very needy and dependent. Women and people with disabilities are seen as the lower men on the totem pole.

Blog 4 Disabilities and Gender

The connection between the essay “Integrating Disability” by Rosemary Garland Thompson and the film Frida has the sole concept of disability. In the beginning of the movie, Frida Kahlo is in a bus accident leaving her with the chance she could never walk again. Even though she was able to walk, she had to live with the disabilities the accident left her for the rest of her life. In the essay, it describes women with disabilities as unfit to reproduce, overly dependent, and unattractive. Frida had a lot of hardship in her life. She miscarried her child early in her pregnancy. Bother her and her husband had affairs but the one that threw Frida over the edge was the affair Diego had with her sister. She was unhappy when they were living in the city because there was no family around them. Frida had a unibrow making her unpleasant to look at. With Frida’s disability, she is able to push through the pain and walk but in the end her disability creates an infection in her body resulting in death. Many of Frida’s traits mirror what Garland Thompson believes people with disabilities are seen as which is comparatively similar to women.

Gender or disability is a way of signifying relationships of power. It is inherently seen by society that women and people with disabilities are weaker than men. The essay states “Sickness is gendered feminism” (Garland Thompson 81). Women are always the ones who are seen suffering and going through difficulty. When men go through the hurdles with disability or other problems, there identities are tested and come out stronger then they were before. They are more powerful and stronger which enables them to overcome their disability as an obstacle.

In the television show, Friday Night Lights, star quarterback of the Dillon Panthers football Jason Street, was hit the wrong way during the opening game for the team. From that day on Jason was paralyzed; he went from being the town idol to the cripple. He was an attractive young man with a disability and life alteration. His parents want to sue the football team for not teaching Jason the successful tools to block a hit. He does not want to get money that way; he wants to be self-sufficient. He spends a week feeling sorry for himself and starts his physical therapy, which leads to his come back into sports. He joins handicap teams to allow him to be competitive, stay active, and reconnect with athletic person he was before the accident. An aspect of a disability is the relationship between the body and the surrounding environment. When Jason was still learning the changes in his body, he had a huge support system. Not only did he have his family, but he also had his coaches, ex girlfriend, football team, and the town of Dillon, Texas helping him adjust to his new life. People still respect Jason even with his disability and he becomes very independent trying to get a job. Even though his chances of conceiving a child were one in a million, it happened. He allowed his disability not to define him.

I find that even in three very different sources the ideas of disability and gender are quite similar across the board. Women are viewed as the weaker of the two genders and with disabilities it puts them at a greater disadvantage. 

Response 3 Alexis Levy

Alexis brings up the concept of the underserving poor vs the deserving poor which was something I was unfamiliar with before reading the lecture. It is ridiculous because these two categories were used to judge poor women only not men. The deserving poor were those who had no blame for their misfortune. The undeserving poor were those who lack good work ethic and morals to bring in the cash for their families. The example for the underserving poor was a woman who had a child out of wedlock. To me this is very critical solely against women, these two categories can easily apply to men. Homeless men are the first thing that came to mine mind for present day poverty. The deserving poor are those men who were fired from their job because of the economy or some unfortunate reason. They have lost everything because could not keep their money in order. The undeserving poor are the homeless who just didn't care about their job are addicted to drugs and alcohol. Their families cut them off because they were too deep in their addiction and refused help. They are the ones who are holding up sign need money for alcohol or drugs.  Their addiction makes them feel alive and that is the only reason they need money.

Blog Post #3

Poverty is hard to ignore; it is a consistent problem. We try and act like it is not a huge chunk of our population. We can’t pretend that our country has a classless society and does not have oppression or privilege it is inevitable. America has the highest income inequality. There is a lot of unemployment are our shaky economy today. Money makes a lot of possibilities and creates a lot of privileges. After reading through the power point and Peyton Place, SATs were the first thing that popped into my head. In my town the tutor you chose for studying for the SATs was the key to success. The tutors were all getting booked up well into the summer before our junior year some started the tutoring the middle of sophomore year. People would easily drop a couple of thousands on tutoring to make sure there child got into the best college. Money would bring the tutors and the tutors would teach you the tricks to receive high SAT scores. These good scores meant you would go to a good college, which meant a successful career. For my last SAT, I was taking the test in this town called Spring Valley where I legitimately knew no one. My parents would not let me drive to this school by myself because it was in an unsafe area. As I walked through the school, it was run down, had very old computers in the classroom, the system for taking the test was completely unorganized compared to my high school. Sitting down and waiting over an hour for the test I decided to people watch, I was listening to conversations around me. The kids in my classroom only had one shot to take the test and had no tutors. I realized they were at a huge disadvantage. Due to the lack of money, they were not offered the tutoring to succeed on the SATs. This test creates a larger gap in between the classes because when poor people have lower SAT scores they do not get into high caliber with a great education.

Social classes are not a new aspect to American lifestyle. In Peyton’s Place, which took Place during the Great Depression, the different characters were in different social. Selena lived in the shacks, which was the poor area. She had been abused by her father, became pregnant, and got an abortion. Problems like the ones Selena faced seem to happen to those who are in the lower social class. This is like a typical stereotype for the lower class but in actuality these situations do not only happen to this social class. Many wealthy women have gotten raped but the way books and movies make the illusion that the troubled lower classes typically have these issues because they are less civilized and more chaotic. Poverty and the stereotypes that come with it are hard to be ignored. There needs to be a change with the way society treats and views the poor.

Response to Jenni Rogoff Blog #2

Jenni's blog made me connect Hester's story to the character Lyla in Friday Night Lights. She was dating the quarterback of the Texas football team. When tradegy strikes, Lyla sleeps with her boyfriend's best friend, Riggins. When the school and students find out what happened with Lyla, she is ostracized while Riggins comes out of the situation with nothing on him. He actually became a little more popular in the student bodies eyes. She sits alone at lunch and no one will talk to her.  There is a always a double standard. A woman is seen as "whore" when she is not in a monogamous relationship or cheats on her spouse. A man on the other hand is not known as a certain term. They are rewarded for the bad actions they do with popularity and cheers from their peers.

Blog #2

Women have come along way since the time in the readings. College educated housewives are bored with a life in isolation and confinement. Women were lacking equality and being suppressed because of their sex, race, and class. Maria W Miller Stewart was the first woman to publicly speak. A lot of these characteristics of women to me related to a character on my favorite television show One Tree Hill. Although this show was on recently, her character portrays many similarities of what was going on with women. Brooke Davis started off the show as the popular, provocative girl. She seemed very shallow and was pretty much sleeping around. She was popular but only had one true friend. Her parents gave her no attention what so ever; they would throw her money whenever needed to keep her entertained. Money did not buy her happiness; it only provided her with new, fancy things to surround her in a big lonely mansion.

Like oppressed women, Brooke was lonely and was internally suffering.  Through her struggles, she became much stronger independent woman. Similarly the way housewives focused all of their time on their family was the same way Brooke spent her time focused on boys. She started pouring the energy she used to give boys attention into herself and things she wanted to do for herself. She decided to run for high school president.

She wrote a speech that personally moved me when she stood in front of the student body explaining, “You think you know me, but you don’t and that means you don’t know what I can do. You see me as someone who’s popular, and has all the answers, that’s not true. I may not always know what I’m doing, but I’ll try to make things better, and when I make a mistake, because face it, we all do, I promise I’ll ask for your help…John F. Kennedy said the courage of life is the magnificent mixture of triumph and tragedy. A man does what he must in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles, and dangers, and pressures, and that is the basis of all morality." (http://onetreehill.wikia.com/wiki/The_Hero_Dies_In_This_One).

This speech explains personality perfectly but also the struggles women were going through during their oppression. She won the presidency at her high school but her goals did not end there. When Brooke broke up with her boyfriend at the time, her friends pushed her to not let a boy dictate her happiness and life. She always had a passion for fashion so she started to design her own clothes and make a clothing line that was sold on a website. The name of the company fits actually perfectly for the idea of feminism, Clothes over Bros.

Flash forward a couple of years later when Brooke Davis enters the real world, she is a successful single world-renowned fashion designer. She didn’t succumb to the pressures of society, she had the opportunity of a lifetime and she seized it. In one of the reading’s it describes how money shaped women’s identities but Brooke Davis never let that happen. She used her money to help others become just as successful as she was. To me, she portrayed many feministic characteristics after she stopped letting boys dictate her life. Brooke Davis stands up for what she believes in; her fashion line became a huge successful with a magazine. She refused to allow emaciated models go on the cover of her magazine. Her brand emphasized the slogan that zero is not a size.  Even though Brooke’s character grew up in a different time she went through similar issues as the oppressed women went through. Brooke once said “Anyway here's all you really need to know about today; if. you're fat, dumb, sexual and a guy, you're OK. If you're a girl, not so much”( http://www.searchquotes.com/search/Brooke_Davis_One_Tree_Hill/2/ )

Brooke Davis understood the difference between men and women. She rose above the difference and was a great example of a strong woman. 

Response to Jaimee Schuster

As a follower of the television show Sex and the City, I understand all of Jaimee's point with the four main characters. They each portray a different stereotype some that generally fall under the typical idea of women. After our discussion in class today, it dawned on me the different television shows I watched in the past all have different ideas of parental unit. In the television show Brothers and Sisters, Sarah, the mother of two kids is the "bread winner" of the family while her artistic musical husband is watching the kids. After the first couple of episodes, Joe (the husband) felt lost in the shuffle of being a stay at home dad and felt like he had no true identity. He was being honest and outspoken on how he felt as a stay at home dad but if a women said that their husband would most likely not understand how they feel. Sarah and Joe's marriage ended in divorce. While they were going through the proper legal matters of divorce, custody became a debacle. From what people have said, most of the time the mother normally receives sole custody of the children. Joe used Sarah's successful job as a way to prove she had no time to take care of their children. He wound up winning the custody battle and received full custody. To me this was a very bold statement. Women worked so hard to get to where they are today. To me this showed, that being the "bread winner" was the reason Sarah could not share custody of the children. Bold moves are being made in the television world and not living to the stereotypical ideas from the past.

The First Blog

"Stereotypes are unavoidable", Monica Novoa writes in the article "Latino Stereotypes Thrive in the Media, Negative Attitudes Dominate". Society has certain roles that men and women live up to because of social media and pressures. Each article had something new to bring to the table of stereotypes. With in the articles that were about the Newton shooting, it brought something new to my eyes. Consistently those who are in charge of school shootings are white, young, angry men. It is not only in real life but in television shows too. In the television show One Tree Hill, there was a school shooting at Tree Hill High School. Jimmy Edwards a character that showed up in the first season for the first two episodes as one of the protagonists friends. Jimmy reappeared on the series two seasons later on an early release of the time capsule. His time capsule which was supposed to be released 49 years later illustrated his anger and sadness of his high school experience and his hatred towards the student population. He was the stereotypical young, white, angry, hurt teen that the articles describing about the shootings.The reasons for Jimmy to bring a gun into school was because of the bullying and isolation he went through during school. Mark Schwahn the creator of this show stated, "It's big on a number of fronts,I felt a sense of responsibility [in telling this story] that I don't know if I've ever felt before. This episode deals with something that is happening in the real world — the rise of violence in our schools. And to have the opportunity to address something that's happening now, almost weekly... it's actually heartbreaking." (http://www.tvguide.com/news/Shocking-Tree-Hill-38794.aspx) Technically the shooters fall under one of the stereotypes that is portrayed in men is the criminal using his violent ways to show his greed through unjustifiable acts. Men are always portrayed as being violent which is common for males because when they are young they learn to define themselves through violence and expect control.

In most circumstances, men hold all the power but in the television show, Sex and the City the four main protagonist hold the power and presents men as objects for consumption. This show gives us an inside scoop from a women's perspective of men and their sexual encounters with them. This show reverses the usual stereotype in society where men judge women. Sex and the City gives four very different women's take on men and what they want out of a relationship. From watching the show, Charlotte wants to be your typical stay at home mother. All she is longing for is a husband with the perfect story and the fairytale ending. Her positive attitude towards her love life is a classic stereotype for a woman. While Samantha on the other hand would be seen as having a man's desires in a relationship. She treats sexual encounters very casually and is the one who does not believe in one relationship for the rest of her life. Charlotte and Samantha are polar opposites of one another. One is an example of how a woman should be in society and the other is how a man is in society. The show provides a plethora of different types of woman and stereotypes that are seen in today's lifestyle.