A Meme My Brother Sent Me

I'm writing about a meme right now and that relates to my paper. It was a single picture with a muscular white man standing in a firm stance just barely in the ocean. He is looking out to the water with an intense gaze and words that were added read "I will fight this ocean for calling me gay" and it perfectly fits the topic of my essay, For one, I understand it's a joke but the joke has truth in it. As it's being portrayed as a joke it's mocking men who think like this so strongly to the point where they would fight an ocean. This displays my idea in how masculinity is central to homophobia since being homosexual is seen as unmanly. This a false nature because gender and sexuality are separate. A man can be homosexual and yet be masculine. Also, in the meme he is going to fight the ocean to prove that he isn't gay or not masculine. This displays my idea in how violence is central to masculinity in proving themselves as masculine which makes violence against homosexual individuals with more occurence. Masculinity encourages violence to homosexual and gender nonconforming individuals.

Benefit of the Doubt

I'm writing my essay about homophobic violence and gender nonconformity. Why? I'm not homosexual or gender nonconforming. I haven't had first hand experience with what I'm writing about. So why would I want to write about it? Because I like to give people the benefit of the doubt, let people be them, not be clouded by my judgement of others and it's something that matters. People criticize, ridicule and mock others that are different from the perceived "norm". They experience violence, discrimination, and bullying because of their differences. I think they should be praised for those differences and how they fight to remain that way. It's admirable to watch someone be so authentically them even when miles and miles of people are shouting at them to stop. I've tried my best to live my life to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. I try not to judge or assume anything about anyone because from what I've experienced, it's almost never true. I firmly believe you should give everyone a chance and allow them to be them. Don't hold anyone back because of what you expect them to be because of this or that. Let them be them and you be you. There is no other them and there is no other you. and that's why the world is beautiful hidden underneath the storms.

Article of the Day 3/31/17

Girl v.s. Women

Think of examples from your own lives, think of other examples of language that perpetuates stereotypes, prohibits social growth and/or keeps groups of people subordinate.

"language matters, words have meaning" 
Calling women girls is a unconscious way of making them subordinate or inferior. You don't call men boys because it's demeaning. It's the same for women. The intentions may be good but some things can be unintended and hurtful. Let's start being more careful about our language because it matters to what we make of people and how they make themselves. Meanings are hidden and unintentional and subtle but they can still effect someone - even if you don't intend it. 
"The way things are are not the way they have to be"

Article of the Day 3/28/17

Danger of a Single Story

I loved this Ted Talk so much I actually ended up including it in an essay I wrote for my Anthropology class. I think this is so important because a one sided story leaves out so much information and perspectives that are valuable to the entire picture. There isn't a single story for everything. History, Experiences, Relationships, People. Everything is made of layers and layers of stories and limiting ourselves to a single story also limits our ability to gain knowledge and gain a valuable and wider view of life and our surroundings. You can't just focus on the tree when there's a forest around you.

Music

I love music. I love music so much. I'm addicted. I walk down the hallways every day listening to music. You can count on me having a new song playing through my headphones every week. I find new music so easy. I used to be so pretentious about music and believed that my music was the best and good music was only one thing. If you looked through my music on spotify, you would know that's not true any more. I love music from all genres and languages. I don't limit myself anymore because there is so much good music and it's not defined by a genre or language or time of release. Music is atmospheric. Music can teleport. Music can give tranquility. Music is a necessity.

Traits should be Flexible

Traits should be flexible. They shouldn't be restricted to one type of person. If you really think about it, there are never types of people. People can't be put into categories no matter how hard we try. I once went on a date with a boy and I was extremely frustrated with how he would constantly try to categorize me. He was trying to "figure me out" and I found it incredibly annoying. There is no "figuring someone out" because that's trying to place or categorize someone. Everyone is so vast and deep and varied that they never quite fit in the category you place them in. You might say I'm a girly girl because of how I love the color pink, makeup, wearing dresses, and hate sports. Except, I don't quite fit in that category since I mostly wear black, enjoys violent video games, loves horror movies, and my favorite foods are foods typically found at a sports grill (I can eat the hottest hot wings at buffalo wild wings, don't fight me). I'm a mix and so are we all. We all have a mix of our definitions and categories. No one fits in any of them so why do we try to hard to place them there? Traits should be flexible and be allowed to apply to anyone. Nothing should be restricted to a particular gender or type of person.

My Car is a Boy

There are so many things surrounding us that's defined as for girls or for boys. We gender almost anything we can. We gender colors: pink, purple, yellow and orange are "girly" colors while blue, green, and red are "boyish" colors. We gender music: boy bands and pop music are for girls while rap and metal is for boys. Why are we gendering things that have no actual gender? People have genders. Colors and music were made with no gender. Another interesting aspect is how we also give sex to things. When talking about various feelings or objects, they are sometimes given female or male pronouns. A politician talking about The United States of America refers to the countries beauty as "her beauty" implying that the country is female. A man talking about his truck refers to "his strength" implying that his truck is male. My car is named Angry German Boy. I've assigned my car several human aspects that wasn't actually inherent to it. My guess is that we do this to humanize objects and it's fun to personify them in reality like how we do in stories.  Although, my point of this is showing how we gender ourselves and others and how it shouldn't be such a hard concept to grasp when people don't identify as the one assigned to birth. The maker of my car could've said it was a girl when made but I went and decided it was more of a boy.