Barefoot, Sneakers or Heels?

While this week we explored the topic of bullying and how gender's have different expectations on how to react, I am taking this week's blog as a way to close off this experience.

Here are the top 5 things that I have learned from this blog:

5. It is sometimes good to write it out!

I have never kept a journal as a child (I always read my sister's, so I assumed she would read mine) and therefore have never really expereinced the power of writing your ideas down consistently. Whenever I become extremely frustrated I would write a letter to someone and never send it as a form of relaxation. However by writing this blog even on the prescribed topic, I have truly found my opinion and have been able to see how it developed during the term.

4. Blogs aren't just words.

When I just started this class, I assumed blogs were venting out my own opinions in lots of words. Through exploring other people's blogs, my view on blogs have developed and I have learned that pictures and videos can jsut be as powerful as a lengthy blog. As I can see in my own blog, I have begun to take this approach and I found it has improved my blog over all.

3. Blog = Thinking

I know this idea seems basic, but to do a blog post you really have to understand the topic and your view on the topic. Therefore, I have really had to reflect on the idea and understand where I stand.

2. Sometimes it's easy sometimes it's not

I am sure if you have actually read my blog (and thanks for that), there was a lot of repetition on the topics being addressed. I found that a lot of the time I was highlighting the same idea that society has created these expectations of gender and for change to happen we need to challenge society's stereotypes. While this is an important concept, i sometimes felt like a robot saying the same ideas over and over, making the blogs sometimes repetitive.

1. Needed in my life

If you haven't gathered I will not be continuing this particular blog in the future. However, I think blogging is a great ability to express my ideas or problems on the online and therefore I am looking into continuing this process somewhere.

This blog is highlighting last week readings, however off of seeing this following video I felt it was needed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFpe3Up9T_g

I strongly recommend watching this video as it has a great song played in the background which reinforces that girls are "more than princess brains" and "girls are all that needed to bring us up to speed".

The video is an advertisements for GoldieBlox, a company which provides toys for girls who are aspiring engineers. 

I LOVE the message of this video - I wish I had a young girl in my life who I could buy this gift for and show to them that they are not required to only sit there and look pretty, and that if they want to build a spaceship go for it!

This video makes me optimistic that there are companies out there who are sick of the 'Barbie' world and are starting to make a change. Hopefully then by the time I have a child there will be more options like this out there, or even better this is the new norm.

Amy Bix challenges her readers to be the homemade who runs her house instead of being one that is run by her house in her article 'Creating "Chicks who Fix": Women, Tool Knowledge, and Home Repair' (2009).

While the article explains the exposing side of females being about to fix their own house, I believe that my sister and myself have been raised showcasing these opposing views.

My parents never had a boy, so my sister has become the "fill-in" in terms of doing the grunt work around the house. Whenever my father needs help around the house in terms of building or construction or heavy lifting, my father only calls on my older sister as I was "too delicate" to help. Due to this outlook, my sister is comfortable using various tools and has the skills to run her house.

However, because I was the youngest and labeled as the 'ditzy' daughter, I was always encouraged to help my mother in the kitchen. While I am grateful for the skills I learned around food preparation and hosting dinner parties, I definitely fall in the camp of the house running me. 

Frustrated with this lack of independence, I have worked on becoming the pillar of strength in terms of doing "male labeled tasks" since moving to university. I am the person my roommates come to to kill the spider or open the stuck jar. I have also gone on trips with Habitat for Humanity and help build houses in El Salvador in attempts to prove to my family that I am not too delicate. And while I am still convinced that my house will run me if I am put into that situation - I have attempted to fight this limiting scheme that my parents have placed on me. 

According to "So Full of Myself as a Chick": Goth Women, Sexual Independence and Gender Egalitarianism, Goth women engage in an active sex life in order to create gender egalitarianism. They believe that it allows them to:

1. feel sexy

2. allows them to engage in sexual play while avoiding stimga of society

3. see themselves as strong and independent women (Wilkins, 2004).

This idea initially seemed as an attempt by Goth women to justify their raging sex life. However, as I began to consider this concept, I began to see how these individuals were able to think that by taking away casual sex from being a male dominated activity, women were able to be seen on an equal playing field. 

I have to consider, is casual sex the only way to equate the playing field? Is the male dominance that is exhibited in our society based on the fact that 'men can have casual sex and women can't'?

To me those words seem almost ridiculous! How could we simply state that years of being considered second class as females be based on the assumption that girls' need an emotional connection of some sort before sleeping with a man? I know from personal experience in university that there are both men and women who have the view that casual sex is a fantastic experience that allows them to achieve those three aspirations the Goth females experienced to, but at the same point, I know just as many women and men who desire having something more than a name to sleep with an indiviudal.

I feel that by reducing the past battles of gender equality and labelling it almost as simply the ability to have casual sex as an attempt to oversimplify the problem and ignore the multi-facets of the situation that exist. I don't think that as a society we can change this power dynamics by encouraging women to sleep around - nor do I think that is a healthy option.

"If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my friends,(gotta get with my friends) Make it last forever friendship never ends, If you wanna be my lover, you have got to give,(You've got to give) Taking is too easy, but that's the way it is. "

   ~ Wannabe by Spice Girls

Growing up in the 90s, I was surrounded by Spice Girl and girl power. Anita Harris defined girl power as "is a provocative mix of youth, vitality, sexuality and self-determination" (2003). I am grateful to this day that I was surrounded by the ideals of having power and self-determination and never feeling like I was subordinate to men. I felt that I had the ability to choose whether I was the sporty girl, the "baby", or the scary one. I never felt pinpointed into being a princess girl who would clean and wait on others until their prince came, I felt that I could create my own destiny. 

As grateful as I am for the girl power ideology, I fear that the present generation is missing this ideology. Even when we consider Taylor Swift  who is often considered to be a positive role model, highlights her relationships with men and her reliance of who is she based on boys. Which celebrity truly focuses on friendship and that a relationship is a two way street?

Is this lack of ideology in the modern generation going to create adolescence who are unaware of this option to be a "spice girl"? Has media become so over consumed with sex and the idea of "sex-sells" that it is almost a faux-paw to mention that girl power is an option?

The last 3 movies I have watched:

1. Rock of Ages

2. Life as we Know It

3. Mean Girls 

While movie selection is often done simply on a whim of what interests us, it was not until I completed this week's assignment that I realized the power movie watching has on us-- Introduce the Bechdel Test.

This previously unheard of test has caused me to reconsider what I had known about movies and women. Here is the simple test:

To pass, a movie must

have at least two women in it

who talk to each other

about something besides a man

I know it sounds like were asking for a lot, but all we are looking for is women who talk to each other about stuff besides a guy! THAT'S it folks- nothing over the top, nothing extravagant!

In terms of the movies I have happened to watch, they all passed the Bechdel Test, however 42% of 144 movies that were released this year did not. It's not like we are looking for career savvy individuals in movies, we are just looking for women who talk, and 42% of movies could not even provide that!

In a culture where the media dictates what we are supposed to wear and act, it is crazy to think that movies are teaching our girls to sit there, and if they happen to have a girlfriend and they both can talk, they are only allowed to talk about boys in 42% of their interactions. If this is the world we are trying to create - we are never going to see a women Prime Minister or many women CEOs, unless their primary role is to decide whether that boy is sexy.

While I know I have never realized this before now, I hope that many other girls have been oblivious to this expectation of women in society. I hope that we are able to move beyond "sleepover" talk which focuses solely on boys and dissecting what his text message meant, to conversations that pose questions and work to advance society. 

Growing up as a female, I am fully aware of the additional pressures and expectations placed upon you from multiple sources of media, especially magazines. I have recently enjoyed reading Cosmopolitan, in which I am confronted with women who are "toothpick size" with rock hard abs and a society deemed "beautiful" face. I do not have that killer body nor a gorgeous face in terms of society and have to deal with the constant challenge of never seeing girls who look like me in magazine. 

This idea seems to be common to women when they look at magazines, however this idea is now recently being applied to men. According to "An Analysis of Hyper-Masculinity in Magazine Advertisement" 90% of advertisements in magazine had some level of hyper-masculinity 89% of them targeting men 20-29 years old. It has suddenly caused men to feel this lack of support from the media. These magazines suddenly try to sell men on being muscular, dominant (especially towards women), and dangerous. I don't know where these marketers seem to live, however walking down the street at school, I never see a man poising, let alone dressing like 90% of these ads. 

They force men to become this over sexualized individual which not only convinces men that they need to mature or grow into these individuals; it also convinces women that they need to have a man who fits these similar models that we see in advertisement. 

As a girl, it was always fun to play pick your celebrity crush. The individuals always changed depending upon my age, however since becoming a teenager the list has been pretty constant with my friends:

Ryan Gosling 

Alex Pettyfer

Chase Crawford 

Taylor Lautner 

When looking at this list of men, they are extremely fit, and often extenuate this factor. They are not the "average" guy we often see on the street, they appear to be a "god-like" version of men. Much like the men in the magazine, they showcase to men that for women to be attracted to them they need to rise to this extreme expectation. They need to be fit and strong, but also sensitive and able to protect us. 

I dont know where you live, but I have yet to see people looking like these individuals walk down the street -- trust me I would have chased them (not really, only creeped). As much as society focuses on women being exploited we need to acknowledge that men feel this same pressure. 

They always say girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice and boys are made of snips and snails and puppy-dog tails. While I don’t think men are comprised of actual puppy dog tails, this nursery rhyme does showcase how boys are expected to be adventurous and easily excited.

However what truly makes a man these days?

According to Masculinities and Athletic Careers, white men are made with a part of athletics that they contribute their success to, however they mainly focus on academic as they realize that athletics will only allow them to achieve a certain level of success. However people from lower economic backgrounds, especially black men are made primarily of athletics as they see little hope to achieve academic success.

These limitations of men in different socio-economic classes appear to have the same restriction as women have versus men. The only problem is that women are presently voicing their concerns about the discrepancies between men versus women, however the socio-economic division between men is not considered.

What else are men made of?

We always used to think of men being hunky, bulky and jacked. However, since the creation of ‘The Notebook’ and other romantic comedies, women start desiring men who look like Ryan Gossling and others who are lean. The physical appearance of men seems to be fluctuating depending upon which Hollywood A-Lister is gracing the front covers. However what has remained consistent is that men are expected to be tough and able to kill a spider, keep a woman protected from the “scary world” and still supportive enough to cuddle and understand our problems. With these contradicting views, no wonder men are having trouble figuring out what society deems them to be.

Was it better to have a clear outline for men or is a varying approach allowing men to choose themselves a better approach?

Thinking about what I look for from men, I think I set the same expectations from men. I always speak about wanting a man who will "protect me from the world" when he hugs me, and at the same point I fear a clingy guy who constantly texts me when clearly I don't care. I want a man who is going to be a "man" but who is understanding enough to realize that I need some protection. All I can say is good luck to the guy! Clearly, society's confusing ideals of a man is causing women to create these equally confusing expectations of men. While I think that men have a wider option of characters that they can play (i.e. the nerdy skinny one, the bulk protector, the player, the gay fashionista) compared to women they have yet to have the ability to choose their own role. 

Being surrounded around media all day, it is impossible to ignore the Miley Cyrus "Twerking situation". Over the past few weeks thousands of reactions and posts have been made either supporting, condemning or commenting that Miley's bottom is not voluptuous. However little has been said to address the impact her sexual actions have towards women rights. 

Miley had told MTV, "Madonna's done it. Britney's done it. Every VMA performance, anyone that performs, that's what you're looking for -- you're wanting to make history. Me and Robin the whole time said, 'You know we're about to make history right now,". In her mind, the sexual actions performed on the stage were done for the sole reason was to become popular and likely make money. Robin Thicke had mentioned that he was aware of this entire plan.

Did either of them think about how this will impact individuals today? By Miley "twerking" and using a foam finger for things that should NEVER be done on television, young girls who may have looked up to Miley from Hannah Montana day, now think that women empowerment is flinging themselves around a man. While there is truth in highlighting that women are now able to do clearly whatever they choose to do on television without having to wear a floor length puffy dress; is this the equality we are looking for?

According to Miley's definition of women's equality is "we can do what we want" and that "We can't stop" (from her We Can't Stop Song) and clearly she has. I would just feel prouder as a women if doing what we want involved representing our gender on a world stage with some clothes that didnt look like undergarments and that our skills such as our voice or physicality was the focus instead of where I put a finger or how full/flat my behind is.

It seems so fitting that this weeks readings are surrounding about doing it all, as I am presently feeling the pressure of attempting to balance it all. While I am not be in a long-term relationship or have a family, I still experience the same battle. I am presently juggling my 4th year course load, volunteering as well as my part time job and an attempt of a social life- to but things in the simplest sense, things are BUSY! I however place no expectation on any other individual to help me balance my expectations. As I would like to see it- I am an independent woman! However I understand that when I enter into a marriage with my future partner, things will have to change. I will be required to share my responsibilities with another individual. While Spar mentioned, “women must realize that having it all means giving something up” however I think that this article forgets that a man would have to give up something as well. Yes, women have to go to doctor meetings and pump their breast milk, however men are often there to support their wife in the doctor meetings or take on further responsibilities while the woman is breast feeding. While traditionally women may have had to give up more in order to allow the man succeed in his business, I believe (maybe hopelessly) that this is changing. Due to the economic feature of society, it appears that the individual who earn more (whether male or female) traditionally give up less in the family compared to their counterpart. It is important to note the glass ceiling that exists for women, that may lead to them earning less money, however depending upon the career the women may have made more. In my personal family, my mother had always had a dominating work world, with my father taking more of a ‘traditional women role’. I have to consider that this is an important factor in my understanding of the superwoman as my mother was able to achieve it. I have seen this role reversal work in real life and therefore and positive that I can find this situation in my own life or at least find a balance in which I am contempt with.

And to the articles point, yes, women view relationships different to men, however it is media that is to blame. The sexual view that men have on relationships,can only be changed if we re-market society to stop sexualizing women. Porn and even the basic television show often has at least one woman who dresses sluty or uses her sexuality to make advances. It is this constant sexualization that makes this view persist. However, how easily can we change media?

I grew up on Romantic Comedies (or as I refer to them as RomCon). My mother and I would sit and watch women and men fall hopelessly in love each other and talk about this hypothetical moment in my own life.

 I am the product of Disney Princesses and have spent much time hoping that my Prince Charming would suddenly appear and scoop me off to my own fairytale.

I am a hopeless romantic by trade and it is these ideals that Barbara J. Risman speaks of that causes the females to remain the inferior gender.

I always experienced a confidence boost when a male holds the door open instead of slamming it in my face. It is almost as if he said, “your looking good today, so you can go ahead.” It is these small moments of courtesy that caused me to give the guy a second look and wonder- date material? However, thanks to Risman my whole mindset has been flipped upside down.

According to Gender as a Social Structure: Theory Wrestling with Activism, this politeness of holding open doors, and walking on the dirty side of the street helps to persist the subculture of male dominance and that women need men to protect them. This minor acceptance of men’s help has caused a ripple effect in society, as women are now unable to challenge these social norms of being protected without their partner and themselves becoming ostracized by society.

Is Risman trying to say that I have to fight against these polite boys and be grateful for the boys who slam doors in my face? Sorry not going to happen!

I always viewed that these small gestures of kindness are a way for a man to say he appreciates you and therefore you deserve to be #1 for once. While writing this blog I know it sounds like a contradiction, and really it is. I am a strong and independent woman, and at the same point want a big strong man to protect me. Is it possible to have it all?

Despite the lack of equality that we see in the workforce and the glass ceilings that women everywhere face, I am not willing to part with these kind gestures. While I have begun to realize that my prince charming will not have perfect hair or ride on a horse, I still hold out hoping that he will at least treat me with respect and allow me to break stereotypes in the realms of my work and being independent, but at the same point still protect me from the world.

I guess as I continue to blurt out ideas in the entry I am simply asking whether Risman can be wrong and that women can still be excepted as equals and be protected?

The Revolutionary Gender Neutral Easy Bake Oven