#section18

Punishment for Early Age Marriage & Sapinda Relation Marriage | Sec 18 HMA 1955

1. Lourdes Advincula 2. Trinidad Agpasa 3. Corazon Alba 4. Marcelina Alcaraz 5. Virgilio Aligaga 6. Hilda Ancheta 7. Naida Aquino 8. Teresita Arriola 9. Loreta Balisi 10. Felix Belarde 11. Erlinda Beltran 12. Ernesto Buguis 13. Arturo Canlas 14. Teresita Cruz 15. Kasalia Derie Dass 16. Leonardo Dayrit 17. Remedios Dayrit 18. Roberto de Jesus 19. Erlinda Divinagracia 20. Rosalinda de los Santos 21. Martha Haloc 22. Esperanza Hermogenes 23. Ricardo Hernandez 24. Juanita Isidro 25. Renato Isidro 26. Lydia Jugado 27. Zenaida Laron 28. Milagros Limin 29. Herminia Limuco 30. Benjamin Lopez 31. Filomena Macapagal 32. Josefina Maigue 33. Elena Manlapas 34. Gil Marquez 35. Jaime Mendoza 36. Lolita Ortega 37. Antonio Osteria 38. Felipina Pineda 39. Amelia Ramirez 40. Estrelita Racho 41. Narcisa Roman 42. Zenaida Santiago 43. Emily Santos 44. Rosalinda Santos 45. Rosendo Serrano 46. Lourdes Sistoso 47. Nelia Sorrel 48. Leticia San Diego 49. Delia Tiongson 50. Angelita Trinidad 51. Nicael Yambao 52. Magellan Zuniga

 I think my favorite discussion we’ve had this semester has been on the LGBTQIA+ community. In recent years, our nation has seen a significant increase in activism and education about the community, but I feel like there is really a lot that has been overlooked and ignored. For example, I’m really glad that we spent an entire class on Transgender and Intersex, because this is something that a lot of people really don’t know about, or if they do it’s something that is mocked and ridiculed. Sexuality and sexual identity is something that is very hard to come to terms with, and for a lot of people, discussion about these topics is something they have never experienced before. I tend to speak about these issues a lot with my friends, but being able to share ideas with a larger community was a really impactful experience for me. I just think that there’s a big problem with stigma in this community, both those who oppose it and those within the community who antagonize another part of it. While I don’t condone it in the slightest, stigma and ridicule against the LGBTQIA+ community from those on the outside of it is more or less understandable, because a lack of education makes it difficult to accept something that seems so wildly radical to a lot of people. However, the groups within the community who attack each other make it even more difficult for people to understand and accept what it means to be a part of this community. For example, bisexuals are considered to be “not gay enough” for the community, but also are “not straight enough” to not be a part of it. This seriously undermines the validity of bisexuals and makes it much harder for them to feel safe in their sexual identity. This was something that we talked about in class, and I’m very glad that this issue is getting more attention. My hope is that people, including myself, can take what we learned from this discussion and bring it to the outside world in order to fight the stigma against this community.

Growing up in a home where the only choice I had was to be pro-life, this was a talk that really made me question my upbringings. Since I’ve moved out, I’ve become wildly more liberal and more willing to accept what it truly means to be a feminist. One of the things that has been very hard to learn was accepting that women should have the right to choose to have an abortion. It certainly is a process of unlearning and understanding why abortion and other reproductive rights are so crucial to women around the world. While abortion is still something that makes me a bit uncomfortable, I do wish that it were a right that was safe and accessible for all women, and that it should always be a choice for women who desire to have an abortion. I was seriously taken aback when Lauren was talking about the protestors who would harass the women going into Planned Parenthood clinics. I think what this talk really brought out was the idea of shame that hides behind abortions. And while it’s something that maybe women don’t feel comfortable sharing about themselves, I think it’s important that more people hear talks like this one so that people can be educated about abortion and that women don’t have to feel so ashamed about having had one. It really is a matter of society, and right now our society is in a place that is not supportive of women at all. Providing education and spreading true, factual information about the processes of Planned Parenthood and other abortion clinics means guaranteeing safety for women and an end to stigma on women’s reproductive rights.

As a member of the IRW Learning Community, I have had the privilege of attending each of these distinguished lectures and learning about the effects of poverty as they apply globally, but also specifically within our nation. This lecture in particular captivated my interest, as the topic is very similar to what I am exploring for my final research project for the learning community. The presenters talked about the issue of redlining, which is a way of segregating neighborhoods in cities by race. These presenters spoke about the work that they’re doing in the Bronx, where my research is focusing on New York City as a whole, so this was still entirely applicable to me. The issue of redlining began back in 1934 when banks would only grant loans to white people, and the areas where loans could not be granted were “redlined” districts. In the 1940s, real estate investors began to scare the white people in cities into selling their homes and moving to the suburbs, telling them that their homes would be of very little value. These homes were then sold to poor blacks at unfair prices, in what is known as blockbusting. Thus began “white flight,” which was the move of the white people into the suburbs during the 1960s, and then “capital flight,” which was the move of factories out of cities. The result of these two being that neighborhoods were losing an expansive amount of income. “Planned shrinkage” then began, which was when cities would take the resources of the poor sections and give them to the already healthy and thriving sections, thus making the poor sections poorer and contributing to epidemics. Issues were then blamed on the city’s poor, the people who were merely victims of bad investment choices by the city. We then see a bunch of other processes coming up that we think are helping these areas of the city on the surface, when, in actuality, these communities are not being consulted on these issues, and the fixing procedures are really only doing surface work. Gentrification, for example, is the building of new and expensive buildings in poor areas with the idea that they will help build the community. And while they may draw in wealthy families and singles, it makes the cost of living more expensive for the urban poor who are already in the area. I wish to work in New York City public schools when I’m older and continue doing work and research in city development, so this lecture was totally captivating for me. I learned a lot of things that I think are very useful in understand the flaws of our system and really how it’s a system that works entirely against the poor communities.

When I listened to Lauren Rankin’s talk, I was not disturbed or shocked by the word “abortion.” I recognize that there situations that are unfit or unfair to raise a child, so I understand that it is necessary to have the option to abort. However, I understand now that it was very necessary to call abortion what it is. It is important to be knowledgeable about the subject. It’s important to introduce the word into our every day language because it is only vilified further otherwise. It should not be a taboo subject, especially because many women face having to make this decision every day. Ignorance kills, and it is very unfortunate that we as a society collectively allow it to happen.

I attended the viewing for The Hunting Ground a couple of months ago, before I even realized it counted for class. Although I wished to have walked away in shock, I wasn’t. It may be because I am currently a senior and these situations have happened to people in my life, regardless of gender. During my freshmen year, I did not carry a pepper spray with me whenever I left my dorm, although I was wary and knew the statistics of sexual assault in college campuses. They were only numbers to me until those numbers had faces and names and stories, and that was when I realized that it was a very real threat. I am glad that The Hunting Ground was made because it gave a voice to those who had suffered and still suffer today. 

While this may not be considered much of a challenge at a place as liberal as NPR, having a woman in such a high public standing is a crucial part of change being made in female representation. Other media outlets have trouble moving past the idea of a female being more than just a pretty side piece to the old male news anchor, and there is certainly much to be said on the validity of these news sources that can’t even treat their own female coworkers with the slightest level of respect. Perhaps we can see changes made to that in our lifetime. But for now, the work being done by Pam Fessler at NPR is very motivating and is truly paving the way for other women in the field.