Posts Tagged ‘Sexism’
Agnes Scott College Opens Its Doors to Road Trip II
I had to repost this article because I can’t believe that Agnes Scott College would allow something like this to happen on their college. I can not understand why they would open their students up to this kind of harassement, ridicule, and objectification. As if it isn’t hard enough to get away form the social stigmas of just being a woman, but these intelligent women decided to attend a woman’s college probably to have a safe space where they don’t have to deal with the types of social issues you get at co-ed institutions, like the sexism, the objectification, etc. Instead, now it’s being thrown in their face and they’re basically being forced into situations they probably don’t want to be a part of. This part of the article really just gets under my skin:
The students were also subject to horrendous stereotyping as the film crew shot the “Lesbians Until Graduation” scene which only eroticizes lesbianism as nothing more than an experimental “choice” made in the absence of men and, in the movie industry, sells women and their sexual identity as a heteronormative gift for men.
…the scene involved the male protagonists
stumbling upon the room full of these “making-out lesbians” (to
presumably “convert” them?). When we expressed offense, the recruiter
said she was warned about encountering uncooperative students who were
“really into being women” (versus into being objects?).Other incidents of objectifying the students at Agnes Scott were documented, including reckless behavior of extras working in the movie. One student reported being told that she was so attractive, she should be careful of being raped. Another student, carrying a cup of coffee, was asked by an extra to get him one as well. [emphasis mine]
I find that bolded portion to be absolutely disgusting and would consider that a threat that should be brought up to the school, and if the school doesn’t listen, the authorities. These people should not be allowed this open door policy at this institution especially in light of this nasty behavior they’ve displayed towards the students. The students are there to learn, not to be harassed and told what they should or should not be doing, be objectified and forced to watch things that are demeaning. This is misogyny at it’s worst.
Pro Golfers endorsed by Wilhelmina
I really don’t know how I feel about this article. It’s got me stumped. Let me explain what’s going on. 7 female pro golfers have been approached by Wilhelmina Artist Management and they are sprucing them up, sexing them up, and taking shot of them to promote them and get them endorsements.
When Dieter Esch began looking at the players on the LPGA Tour, he quickly figured out that something was missing. He sensed they always appeared out of place . . . swinging nine-irons, hitting out of bunkers, putting cross-handed on the green.
So Esch decided it would be a great idea to put the golfers in something different, something the casual public does not see them in, at least up to now.
Like bikinis. Like lingerie. Like evening gowns.
“This was perfect, to show the world there are sexy, athletic women who can play,” said Esch, who is using his company and his clout to turn seven female pro players into model citizens.
I have such a problem with this because why do women need to prove that they’re sexy and can play? I don’t see the same thing happening for men. It’s as if they need to show their sexiness and their femininity in order to be recognized for the players that they are. This sounds a lot to me like what’s happening with the WNBA and how the women are being sent to charm school. I also wanted to mention that we don’t see male athletes in their tighty whities to promote themselves. Granted Michael Jordon has the Hanes endorsements but have you ever seen an ad of him in underware or half naked? Have you ever seen him wearing less clothing than what he would wear on the court? Why do women have to expose themselves in bikinis and lingerie, which is NOT something they should be seen in public in period, not like the article suggests.
The part that I am happy about is that they will be promoting them and trying to get them better endorsements.
The agency will seek sponsorship and endorsement deals for the women as a group and as individuals.
Wilhelmina has launched a campaign to get them work, and, well, exposure.
Clients interested in one of the group or all of them may make up their mind as they thumb through a bound booklet of color photographs of the players, posing in bikinis, summer dresses, and more slinky dresses.
If it’s not just a good read, Esch says he thinks it’s certainly worth at least a look, or several.
There is a basic need being met here, he said.
“There was simply not enough pizazz on the LPGA Tour,” he said. “The players had no representation to speak of, no advertisements to speak of. It’s a crime, so Wilhelmina is taking it upon itself to change that.”
Endorsement income for female golfers is far from great, especially when compared to their male counterparts, although there are exceptions. Michelle Wie’s estimated $12 million is the highest among LPGA Tour players, according to Forbes’ Celebrity 100 list, while No. 1-ranked Lorena Ochoa earns an estimated $6 million from her endorsements.
Those totals pale in comparison to the estimated $90 million to $105 million that Tiger Woods annually brings in from his endorsement deals.
It seems like a double edged sword. On the one hand they’re trying to promote these women and get them the same amount of money in endorsements that their male counterparts get, but on the other hand they’re basically forced to become models and parade around in bikinis and slinky dresses in order to get these endorsements. I don’t think that’s right. I think they should be endorsed on their merits as professional athletes, not on how they look in bikinis and lingerie.
History in the making
Today, I am proud to be a democrat. I am proud to be a woman. I am proud to be watching history in the making. I sat here and watched Hillary’s concession speech on CNN and I felt proud because for the first time in the history of the United States we had the decision to either elect a woman or a black man to run for presidency. For the first time ever we have a black man running to be president of the United States. This is a moment that I am proud to be able to see, and I am proud to be able to share the importance of it with my stepson and explain to him what a big deal this is and how this is going to open him up for many choices in the future. I’ve been saying from the very beginning that should Hillary not win I would vote for Obama, because regardless of what the differences between them is, and regardless of how I feel about him personally, the issues are still there and they will not away easily and we need to tell the government about how we feel about this issues. The biggest way we could tell the government is to vote for the person that addresses these issues and promises to change the way the government is controlling our rights.
McCain, I feel, will be the worst person to run this country. Allowing him to serve a term would be the equivalent of giving Bush a third term. He’s wishy-washy. He has no enthusiasm for what his issues are, he goes up at to the podiums to make his speeches and I fall asleep. There’s no chemistry, no passion, nothing. He’s like a wet fish. Obama has passion.
I have to comment about something because after her speech they were interviewing random people on the floor and they were all saying that if Obama would not pick Hillary as his running mate, they were not going to vote for him, and I’ve heard rumors of people not going to vote at all because they don’t want to have to vote for the lesser of two evils. I have this to tell them: YOU’RE STUPID! Barrack Obama believes in basically the same issues that Hillary believed in. Both Hillary and Obama are about instituting social change in our country that has already been crippled by a president who’s more concerned about his pride, his ego, and his pockets, then the real issues at hand, and I see the same thing in McCain.
Here’s McCain on the Ellen Degeneres show. Watch and I’ll comment below.
This man starts off as saying that he feels a contract is ok between people of the same sex, but what gets me is what is the different between said contract and actual marriage? Why not just go ahead and say “I agree with gay marriage”? In truth, you can’t force the church to allow this, and that’s their decision as a private, religious institution, I just won’t support that religious institution. Simple. But when it comes to the government, if they’re willing to allow “contracts” that give gay couples the same rights as married couples, just go ahead and call it a “marriage” already, because that’s what it is. At this point it’s just a play on words. Even after Ellen made some incredibly good points to him on how segregated his thoughts are, he stands by his point but almost embarassingly. This is not a man who stands by his convictions.
McCain was just here in Miami talking about conserving the Everglades, but he’s the one that voted against funding conservation efforts to begin with. Why now does he have an interest in the Everglades? I can tell you why. Because he wants the hispanic vote here in South Florida, and he’s also trying to get the conservationists to support him, but in truth-at least for me- his words are not enough. His actions have said loud and clear that he’s not about supporting the Everglades, and he can’t backtrack now.
His issues on the gay marriage, I don’t agree with. His issues on women’s rights, I don’t agree with. I get the sense that he wants to go back to a time that is outlined in the Feminist Mystique, and I am not for that at all. Women have more brains then men give us credit for. We are capable of thinking for ourselves, we are capable of working and making decisions when it concerns our lives, our futures, and the future of our children. We do not need a man to hold our hands and tell us what to do, because we can and will do that for ourselves, and people like McCain will try to turn back the clock so that we aren’t allowed to make our own decisions. Bush already tried to start the ball rolling when he signed the Partial Birth Abortion Act, which is an inaccurate term, and on top of that, they don’t even take into consideration the true facts about the procedure!
Under state law, abortions are permitted for up to 24 weeks or six months after pregancy. It is also permitted after 24 weeks if the woman’s health or life is in danger. [emphasis mine]
The partial-birth or IDX abortion procedure is usually done in the second trimester, from 18 to 26 weeks.[emphasis mine]
What is incredibly disturbing about this isn’t so much the process in which it’s done, or the act itself, it’s the fact that the government is not taking into consideration the risk that not doing this procedure may place on the woman’s life who’s trying to have the procedure done. What they’re doing is setting rules as to what we can do with our bodies, and in essence what they’re saying is that a life that most probably can not survive outside of the mother’s body for more than a couple hours or maybe even a couple of days is more important than a living, viable life that has been established for a good couple of years already.
I know this post is all over the place, but the thing is that these issues are the topics that need to be addressed during this election. This and many more are the reasons that I will be voting for Obama come November because I know I don’t want anyone telling me what to do when it comes to my body or any other decision I make, and should I have a daughter in the future, I do not want that decision being taken away from her either. I want my daughter to have all the same rights that I do and more. I want my daughter to be President of the United States if she so wishes. I want my daughter to be able to have an abortion if something were to happen and she were to have an unwanted pregnancy, and most importantly, I want my daughter to have easy access to birth controls until the time comes when she does decide to have children, and that choice needs to ultimately be up to her and her partner-male or female-NOT the government, therefore I will be voting for Obama because he stands for these issues and he stands for these changes. I really wish I could have seen a woman in office, but I’m not dead yet and won’t be for a very long time, so I’m sure the day will come when I will see a woman in office, and I will be proud when that day finally comes.
Vatican threatens to excommunicate female preists
I know this is making the blog rounds, but I have to have my say in this because this is just flat out stupid. The Vatican has now decided that any woman who takes part in ordinations will be excommunicated. Here’s what Yahoo! News has to say:
The Vatican insisted Friday that it is properly following Christian tradition by excluding females from the priesthood as it issued a new warning that women taking part in ordinations will be excommunicated.
[…]
The church has always banned the ordination of women by stating that the priesthood is reserved for males. The new decree is explicit in its reference to women.
“The church does not feel authorized to change the will of its founder Jesus Christ,” Amato said in an interview prepared for Vatican Radio that was released to reporters. The reference is to Christ’s having chosen only men as his Apostles.[emphasis mine]
Asked whether the Roman Catholic Church was going “against the tide” in respect to other Christian confessions, Amato said the church was in “good company” with Orthodox and ancient Eastern churches and that it was the Protestants who are breaking with tradition.
In March, the archbishop of St. Louis excommunicated three women — two Americans and a South African — for participating in a woman’s ordination. They were part of the Roman Catholic Womenpriests movement, which began in 2002.
Here’s my problem with this statement. Firstly, nobody knows the true will of Jesus Christ because what was written in the New Testament was written by followers of Jesus Christ years after his death, and was written biasedly. The true word of Jesus Christ is not known, so to say that they’re following the will of Jesus Christ is horseshit. Secondly, as stated above, we only know from what was written and also from the books that the Vatican approved worthy for the bible. There are several other books that were not included into the bible, so who’s to know the truth of whether or not there was a female apostle, especially considering since Mary Magdalene is rumored to be an apostle as well, but the church is trying to keep that hush, hush.
My BIGGEST problem with this is the Roman Catholic Church has been so full of shit for so long that they’re losing parishioners. Between the priests molesting everyone, they’re barbaric views on the roles of women in society, and now their random excommunications, they are their own worst enemy. To not allow their priests to marry I think is causing men to not only not become priests, but is becoming a good refuge for pedophiles (hence the molestation of little boys). They’re views are so backwards that they’re not realizing what they’re doing to themselves. Most people I know who are Catholics are not devout Catholics because of all the stupid rules they randomly come up with and those who are devout Catholics are pissed off with the church sweeping major issues under the rug and paying people off, and the others are just flat out freaking fanatical loonies that don’t know their head from a hole in the ground. It’s totally ridiculous. Not to mention, how in the world can the church decide what you’re beliefs are? Just because you’re excommunicated that does not mean that you will stop believing the teachings of Jesus Christ. In my opinion the church has veered so far off from the teaching of Jesus that stupid shit like excommunications are occurring. I really don’t think that’s what Jesus had in mind when he decided to teach people his philosophies.
Here’s what Aisha Taylor, executive director of the Women’s Ordination Conference had to say:
The Women’s Ordination Conference is outraged by yesterday’s Vatican decree, which reminds Catholic women once again of the animosity they face from the hierarchy, despite being the backbone of most Catholic parishes throughout the world.
Out of fear of the growing numbers of ordained women and the overwhelming support they are receiving, the Vatican is trying to preserve what little power they have left by attempting to extinguish the widespread call for women’s equality in the church. It will not work. In the face of one closed door after another, Catholic women will continue to make a way when there is none.
We reject the notion of excommunication. In our efforts to ordain women into an inclusive and accountable Roman Catholic Church, we see it as contrary to the gospel itself to excommunicate people who are doing good works and responding to injustice and the needs of their communities. While the hierarchy prattles on about excommunication, Catholic women are working for justice and making a positive difference in the world.
This inappropriate use of excommunication and the Vatican’s stance on ordination are based on arguments that have been refuted time and again. In 1976, the Vatican’s own Pontifical Biblical Commission determined that there is no scriptural reason to prohibit women’s ordination. Jesus included women as full and equal partners in his ministry, and so should the hierarchy.
The call for women’s equality in the Catholic Church is reverberating loudly in the public consciousness. Around the world, over sixty women have been ordained as priests, deacons or bishops by the group called Roman Catholic Womenpriests (RCWP), and there are nearly 100 women in the RCWP preparation program. There are 16 national organizations from 11 different countries that advocate women’s ordination, and the vast majority of US Catholics support the ordination of women.
The refusal to ordain women is nothing more than an egregious manifestation of sexism in the church. It is time for the Vatican to listen to its own research, its own theologians and its own people who say that women are equally created in the image of God and are called to serve as priests in a renewed and inclusive Catholic Church.
As found in Feministing and The Female Impersonator
Shows him!
Do you remember a couple years ago, 2005 to be exact, Lawrence Summers, the prestigious president of Harvard University made an interesting remark during a conference that basically said, ” that innate differences between men and women might be one reason fewer women succeed in science and math careers.” If that were the case than why is it that they are now finding that “In more gender-neutral societies, girls are as good as boys in mathematics”? (Miami Herald) And even in some countries where girls aren’t equal to boys, they are still doing better than them in math tests.
While searching for information on this asshole, I found this article in the New York Times that actually went one step further and tried to prove/disprove what it is that he said.
“We adults may think very different things about boys and girls, and treat them accordingly, but when we measure their capacities, they’re remarkably alike,” said Elizabeth Spelke, a professor of psychology at Harvard. She and her colleagues study basic spatial, quantitative and numerical abilities in children ranging from 5 months through 7 years.
“In that age span, you see a considerable number of the pieces of our mature capacities for spatial and numerical reasoning coming together,” Dr. Spelke said. “But while we always test for gender differences in our studies, we never find them.” [Emphasis mine]
In adolescence, though, some differences in aptitude begin to emerge, especially when it comes to performance on standardized tests like the SAT. While average verbal scores are very similar, boys have outscored girls on the math half of the dreaded exam by about 30 to 35 points for the past three decades or so.
That final paragraph is disappointing. What I think is going on though is that during middle and high school girl are trying so hard to get the attention of the boys that they’re dumbening themselves to allow the boys to look smarter because we all know that boys are terrified of a girl who’s got a real head on her shoulders. There seems to be a correlation with the onset of adolesence in girls, media that brainwashing girls to be thin and beautiful and more sexual to get the boys, while at the same time they’re sending the message that they must stay virgins. With all the crap that’s fed to teenage girls, it’s no wonder their intelligence isn’t what it was in elementary school, but more and more I’m seeing young girls mimicking pop stars and dressing like them and dancing provocatively. I know of one girl who’s aspirations is to be a super model and is playing with make-up and going on diets so that she can achieve this goal. This girl is 9.
I found this video on YouTube that I think makes the point for me.
This very thing that I’ve been talking about, the way women are portrayed in magazines is trying to teach young girls that this is what they should look like and that this is what boys want and in order to get the attention they want, this is what they have to become. It think it’s sad that this is what our society is teaching our girls. I think instead of the anti-abortionists focusing their attention and their energy on a life that isn’t yet, they should focus on the lives that have been established and work on trying to fix this problem. They should work on girls are viewed in our society otherwise things like what happened with this Indian couple will happen here.
Now, back to the topic at hand. If you continue reading the article in the Times, it goes on to say,
Japanese girls, for example, were on par with Japanese boys on every math section save that of “uncertainty,” which measures probabilistic skills, and Japanese girls scored higher over all than did the boys of many other nations, including the United States.
In Iceland, girls broke the mold completely and outshone Icelandic boys by a significant margin on all parts of the test, as they habitually do on their national math exams. “We have no idea why this should be so,” said Almar Midvik Halldorsson, project manager for the Educational Testing Institute in Iceland.
Interestingly, in Iceland and everywhere else, girls participating in the survey expressed far more negative attitudes toward math.
The modest size and regional variability of the sex differences in math scores, as well as an attitudinal handicap that girls apparently pack into their No. 2 pencil case, convince many researchers that neither sex has a monopoly on basic math ability, and that culture rather than chromosomes explains findings like the gap in math SAT scores.
This back and forth with who’s better and who’s smarter and blah, blah, blah seems like a bunch of horse shit to me. I’d like to believe that we’re all equals. I think that there are other factors that the scientists and the researchers aren’t completely taking into consideration because I don’t see a reason why if boys and girls are at the same intellectual level when it comes to mathematics and science early on that all of a sudden girls are going to not grow intellectually in those departments unless there is something else going on with them, something going on in society, or a message that’s being sent to them. I think the message is, “boys don’t like smart girls” and the moment they hit puberty and start taking an interest in boys, that’s when they decide that math and science isn’t as important to them anymore.
Personally, I’m a math nerd. Maybe not as hard core as some of these girls that are winning awards, but I graduated high school with Calculus and understood it. I’ve taken Physics, and understood it so I don’t understand how this stupid, misogynistic, ignorant little man can stand there and say this about women. It really does not compute.
Until You’ve Walked in Their Shoes…
I read a great post concerning what happened with Hillary last Friday and the remarks she made about Senator Kennedy’s assassination in 1968. In truth, I admire this woman greatly, and I don’t mean for this comment. She has accomplished a lot in her life and all she ever gets for anything she does is a lot of negativity from everyone. Comments range from her looks to her intellectual capacity to things about her relationship with her husband and things that really should not be of anyones concern. I can’t imagine how hard it must be to be her. I can’t imagine what it must be like to pave the way for other women to be able to make it as far as she has. She is on the forefront of something big, just like Obama is, and I find all the racist and sexist remarks pretty appalling.
We’re living in a day and age where we claim that we are a free nation that everyone has supposedly been given equal rights, yet daily we see comments from people in the media and on the streets bashing both of these Senators simply because one is a woman and the other is black. We see segregation in how we live, where we send our kids to school. It’s like an invisible, unspoken rule of how things are supposed to be. When we hear remarks like the one that Trotta made the other day after a “slip of the tongue” this is really what should be big news in the papers, not some misunderstood statement that Hillary made. There was no misunderstanding Trotta’s remarks. She made herself perfectly clear when she said,
what some are reading as a suggestion that somebody knock off Os–Osama–um, uh–Obama. Well, both, if we could…
There is no misconstruing that statement, and that is the true tragedy of these campaigns. The off-handed remarks made by the media meant to cripple the proponent or that persons party is unnecessary. I can understand if you’re a republican and you don’t have the same views as the democrats do, I can understand that, but certain comments really just should not be made. It goes back to what you’re taught as children, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all” I think we’ve forgotten this very good and wise philosophy of life, and I think some people in the media would be wise to remember it.
What I feel people seem to forget is that these political figures are still, in fact, human. They make mistakes, they may not word things the way they wanted to, and most importantly, they still have feelings. I’m sure Hillary is not the only one who’s gone back to her hotel/bus/what-have-you and cried over comments that have been made towards her or attacking her, yet when she does display any kind of emotion whether it be anger or sadness she is considered the weaker candidate and comments like, “See?! That’s why a woman could never be president!” are made by men all over who would have no idea what a day in her shoes is like.
She is far from perfect, and I know this, but so am I and so are the people who are making comments against her, and most importantly, so are the other candidates who are running for office. Nobody is perfect and everyone on this campaign has made some off-handed remark, or in the case of McCain, have flat out avoided any of the more serious concerns (I may be wrong here as I haven’t really followed McCain all that closely, but when I have read or seen things about him, everything just seems scripted by the Republican party).
What I feel is most important at the end of the day is that Democrats stay united. Let me pose this question to all the Democrats out there, if the person you don’t like is voted in during the Democratic National Convention in June, will you still vote democratically? If not, what do you think will happen to our nation if there were another Republican president?
Please, think about the issues first. This may seem like a popularity contest, and in many ways it is, but the truth of the matter is that you need to take into consideration the facts and what these people stand for. Personally I’m very afraid of having another Republican Conservative president in office because I’m afraid of what’s going to happen to our already crippled economy, the war that I feel we should never have gotten involved in in the first place, and most importantly my reproductive rights which are slowly being chipped away by old white men in office who would have no clue what it’s like to get pregnant or the issues surrounding that.
Think these things over and lets discuss.
Not all Cuban Women are Prostitutes
I want you all to watch this video first, before I say anything.
Done? Good. Now this is an ad campaign that Iberia airlines started (and eventually pulled) to promote a giveaway to win tickets to Cuba. Can anybody tell me what is the problem with this video?
First of all, not only do all cuban women NOT look like these women, they don’t go around half naked the way these two did, they don’t all have these oversized lips, and they don’t coddle guys the way these two do to this baby. What they are promoting in this little ad campaign are the jineteras in Cuba, which are basically women who have been forced into prostitution in order to survive. This is an insult to women, an insult to Cuban women, and it makes me mad as hell that a company like Iberia saw fit to start this ad campaign.
So what do Cuban women look like, you may ask. Well, here, this is one of my favorite divas:
and for a more real cuban woman, there’s this one…
That me, and these are my grandparents
If you want to see more images of real Cubans you can also head over to My Big Fat Cuban Family and see for yourselves, or even to Babalu Blog. But what I feel they’re promoting in this ad is not the reality of the Cuban female population that is still in Cuba, but the ones that are forced to be sex-workers in order to survive and make a living and are taunting it as something men can look forward to when they arrive in Cuba. It’s a damn shame that these women fell they need to resort to this way of life in order to survive in the first place, but for a big corporation like Iberia Airlines to be promoting this is horrific. Read the article from the Miami Herald below, and leave me your opinions.
Airline yanks ad called ‘insult’ to Cubans
BY FRANCES ROBLES
frobles@MiamiHerald.comIberia Airlines yanked a promotional cartoon video off its website, featuring an infant who wins a trip to Havana and gets babied by voluptuous black beauties, after a consumer group complained the ad denigrates Cuban women.
The video posted earlier this month on the company’s website showed the baby being coddled by two black women with exaggerated full lips and wide hips squeezed into hot pants.
The women fed, massaged, fanned and danced with the infant as he sang, in an adult male voice, “Mulattas, feed me. Come on mulattas, take me to the crib.”
”It used the imagery of two sexy women of color, not nurses or home attendants . . . and the image of Cuba as the place for the male Spaniard to go and be pampered like a baby,” said Ileana Fuentes, executive director of the Miami-based Cuban Feminist Network. “If that’s not a sexual tourism ad, then I’d like to see a sexual tourism ad.”
The ad played on the stereotype that Cuba is a hotspot for single European men to find dark-skinned ”girlfriends” know as jineteras. The cartoon, part of a series of videos promoting an Iberia.com contest, was yanked from Iberia’s website but has found a new life on YouTube. Other ads featured a sheep rapping in New York and a vacuum cleaner doing the tango in Buenos Aires.
It was the Cuba cartoon that drew fire from a consumer action group, which said it was a sexist insult to Cuban tourism workers.
”Cuban tourism workers do not massage you, fan you and dance with you,” Ruben Sánchez, spokesman for the Consumers in Action Federation, said by phone from Madrid. “This ad denigrates people who work in tourism.”
He said the ad violates a 1988 Spanish law that prohibits advertising that is denigrating to groups of people. In this case, Sánchez said, the video was demeaning not only to tourism workers, but Cuban women and Cubans.
The organization complained about the ad last week and Iberia pulled it four days later, he said. Advertising professors are requesting copies so they can show them to students as an illustration of what not to do, he added.
Originally found on God is a Dyke.
Uncensored Feminista 