Steph484's Blog

Blog 16.5: Women

steph484 — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 01:26:19 +0000

It is a known fact that the ratio of men to women in jail and prison is drastic. A man’s percentage in jail or prison defiantly surpasses a women’s by more than half. What is an interesting aspect of it is why each gender ends up in jail or prison. Focusing on the woman aspect of it, it is said that the majority of women usually end up i jail or prison for drug use or prositution. But going deeper into these reason ad after reading and having class discussions on it, I believe it is fair to say that a fair percentage of women who prostitute is an indirect cause of abuse. Whether it be sexual or physical. Now living in American and being a some what sheltered child I personally believe prostition to be woman standing on a street coner in a bad area trying to make money for their how should i put this- their pimp. But as I got older, I learned many women get forced into prositution by being sold from their own family! Another thing I ever thought about is how women tend to have or find pimps. After doing so research I learned that a common case is women who might have be abused when they were younger sometimes might run away to somewhere, where they feel safe with a boyfriend or something- then it turns out that usually the boyfriend would pimp out his own girlfriend! This shocked me because I can’t understand how you could do that to someone you loved. But after trying to wrap my head around it this was my conclusion- its a dominance thing, certain men in cases such as these want to be dominate and because the woman is already so vunerable and feels she has no where to go she agrees to this. It’s a sad situation but after the readings I realized this does happen a lot.

Blog 16: The Maury Show

steph484 — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 18:46:18 +0000

After reading the reading on Sexual Abuse as a Precursor to Prostitution and Victimization Among Adolescent and Adult Homeless Women, I was a bit blind sided. I never really realized the science behind why women tend to prostitute- sure i knew that family troubles growing up contributed to it but I never really thought how it would in fact contribute to it. The article mentioned parenting was a factor.I sat for a while thinking if I have ever had an encounter with something like this and the only thing I could possibly think of is the Maury show. Maury does segments on acting out teenagers who have crazy sex all the time and prostitute themselves for dumb thing such as a bag of chip or a pair of sneakers. I couldn’t help but after reading this article relate it to this segment. One consistent characteristics all these troubled teens girls had was the disrespect for their parent. (Which usually was a mother or female guardian- I have yet to see a male figure come on the show, in a segemt like this). After realizing this characteristic, it brought me straight back to the reading. Which basically stated that many prostitutes never really had a close relatioship with a parent figure. I thought this was interesting because on the show all of the girls that came on had absolutely no respect for their parental figure. Another interesting point I drew from the reading was the reading basically talked about females and prositution and I have never seen a male teenager go on the Maury show on one of those segments. I find that very interesting the idea that prostitution is portrayed just by females- I mean there are obviously male prostitutes, but we never really hear about them not even on a show as wild as Maury.

Blog 15: A Reality Check

steph484 — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 03:04:47 +0000

Focusing on the reading about Nike, it was actually kind of sad. We hear stories about these so called sweat shops. Reading up on it gives me three very distinct emotions; sympathy gratefulness and anger. I sympathize with these women in the Nike sweat shops because of their daily lives, working sixty-hour plus work Weeks, is crazy I can not imagine doing that then being expected to go home and be the woman of the house hold and cook and clean etc. But what truly made me sympathize was their pay. These women who obviously work so hard get paid less than a fraction of what their selling the shoes for. I felt grateful because we live in a nation where that type of work would be considered illegal. I’m grateful I live in a nation where you have a set minim wage and their are other options for jobs. Most of these women in countries such as these would kill for a job working in a Nike shop just so they could get work and make money even if its just under forty dollars a month. Reading article like this one really puts a lot of thing into perspective for me, and makes me realize how blessed and lucky we are to be able to live in a country where these things would not fly. I was angry because reading how Nike and companies like Nike take these women in and extort them for their own beneficial relief. Companies don’t see these women as people but rather someone who will make them money and will take advantage of them if they need to. Its funny how reading about something can make you so passionate about it but thankfully it gave me a reality check that things like this can happen and do happen

Blog 14: A Woman’s Work

steph484 — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:14:42 +0000

One thing that stuck out to me in this reading was the fact that in America there was not a large difference in jobs slaves had between men and women compared to in the Caribbean and other places women tended to be inside the house working as a slave. I couldn’t not seem to understand this or wrap my head around it at all. The only explanation and difference I could possibly come up with is the location and culture where these slave owners lived. I am a Hispanic woman who has family and relatives in the Caribbean, being a puerto Rican woman it is expected from me to be inside the house doing “house work” like cooking cleaning etc and its a “mans” job to be outside of the house working. Could this be a reason for why most women slaves in the Caribbean served inside the home? Personally I believe it could be. The fact that women slaves in American served both inside and outside the home is quite interesting but also seem explainable. When Immigrants moved to American it was more than common for women to work in order to feed their families. Although more men worked compared to women, women did work when they had the opportunity too. So this could explain it, Since some immigrant women in the AMerica did work, men were already used to see women work so it didn’t matter to them that they were woman men children they saw them as slaves and with that in mind had them worked and serve them with whatever needed to be done.

Blog 13: An Excuse?

steph484 — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 01:16:58 +0000

One thing that stuck out to me in this reading was the ides that if a woman traveles away from her home with out a male escort it comes up as unrespectable. I thought that was ridiculous! Now in days I can not see how that would be true or a typical reason why men travel over women. I find that men tend to be more in the business field which requires someone to travel so I can see how men would travel more than women. But I can not seem to figure out how that would be disrespectful. The only way I could wrap my head around it is could it be men insecurities? You see this is the only way I could believe it to make sense. The idea and fact that women are in fact capable to travel and protect/ be independent in a completely foreign place probably diminishes a man’s masculinity. If women can protect and fend for themselves then where does that leave men? A man’s ideal role is to be the provider and protector if things like travelling can prove women can do it on their own, then women must be able to do multiple things on their own as well which would leave men having nothing to provide or protect. This is where the idea of women travelling can be looked at as disrespectful in a man’s eyes. The idea of it being disrespectful could be an excuse or cover up for a man’s ego.

Blog 12: The “Perfect Body”

steph484 — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 02:12:01 +0000

We have all heard these types of body types: Hourglass, pear ,apple, brick etc but while reading this weeks text on women’s bodies, one thing popped into my head; What is in fact the perfect body? You see I have thought about this question multiple times considering I love to work out, but one thing that always seems to cross my mind is don’t different body types appeal to different cultures? I find it hard for myself or quite frankly anyone to actually determine or imagine what the “perfect body” is because there are so many preferences out there. In both the African American or Hispanic cultures men prefer thicker curvier women. Where as in a Caucasian culture men prefer slim women with large breast. Most Oriental cultures prefer the more petite women. I think that’s what the problem is in determining what is the “perfect body”. Another flash back popped into my head, about a year ago I was watching a show television and it was about the “perfect body” what the experiment they did was had women who contradicted the ideal body type for their culture and had them stand behind a screen so just their silhouette appeared, (one short and petite, one tall and slim and, one woman who was very curvy) Then they asked women from the audience to guess their race. Basically every one guessed the petite woman was Asian the tall and slim woman- white and the curvy woman- Black. It was at that point that I realized wow are their actual body types your supposed to have depending on your ethnicity? Another experiment the show did was before they revealed the women’s ethnicity’s is they had men from each race go on and critique each woman’s body. Each man was harsh to say the least but they all seemed to be attracted to one body type, The black man preferred the curvy silhouette, the white man preferred the tall and slim silhouette and the Asian man preferred the the petite silhouette.
I guess its hard to determine what in fact is the perfect body type, but one thing I know realize is society expects you to have a certain body type depending on your ethnicity, which I believe to be very sad!

Blog 11: I didn’t Expect this

steph484 — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 14:47:17 +0000

Wow, I do not know what to think about this article i just read, When I first read the title: How to tell your friends from an Arab”, I did not know how to take it. Initially I thought; o maybe there’s some similarities that I am not quite fimilair with since I am not Arab or south Asain. But then when I started reading the article thats not what it was coming across as. Although the article did explain some of the differnt physical characteristics- it did not come across very nicley in my opinion. I came across kind of raciest. To me it seemed that the author was alot more tolerant about how she explained how the south Asian women wear their viels compared to how an Arab wear them. The author used word like loosley and freely fit over their head compared to speaking about an Arab women she discribed it, as pinned tightly at the chin. Another point the author made that I was taken back by was when she noted that it looks like Arab’s have sinisster smile and the point she brought up when she spoke about Arab men’s turbans and realted it to terrisiom, I was actually really annoyed about that and though “okay not every Arab is a terrorist, just like not every American Lation White black etc is one eaither”!
I really didn’t like this article it really rubbed me the wrong way it came of raciest and mean to me and the way they author described certain aspects of both cultures her language to the Arab culture cam across more mean and rude compared to how she spoke about south Asains.

Blog 10: One Thing

steph484 — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 23:02:47 +0000

More than half of pre-adolensent girls have all done it: Stood in front of the mirror hoping and wishing to just change one thing about themselves. then they would be perfect! While reading the article on Modeling one sentence struck me: it stated that although pre-teen boys and girls are the same age, their are no magazines targeted to men as their are compared to women. That’s absolutely true! You never hear or see a cosmo-boy, sure theirs Maxim, but for the gist of it, in Maxim they advertise women. So this got me thinking; Why do magazines target young girls? We’ve all seen them 100 ways to look hotter, 10 makeup tricks that’ll blow your mind, what makes women want to pick up a magazine like that and buy it? Personally I believe it goes back to standing in front of the mirror and just wanting to change that one thing, that’s it- one thing and you’ll be perfect. The media through magazines, television, newpapers etc has sculpted our mind into believe what’s beautiful and whats not. Magazines tend to build on that because young girls are most vunerable At the preteen age even know were finding ourselves in society and struggling with self-esteem. That’s what magazines have built there empire on, young girls being at a vunerable stage will do anything to be accepted in society, and a magazine who has what we define as beautiful plastered on the cover attracts the young girl to pick up that magazine, with believing that in fact they too can be beautiful- with the 100 ways to look hotter and the 10 make-up tricks that’ll blow your mind. Young girls who pick up and buy this magazine believe that they can change this one thing, that will make them flawless, which in turn by changing or “fixing” that one thing, another one thing arises- causing many “one things” to appear and that’s how magazines build their empire, they aimed at one of the most vunerable stages a women is in and manipulates them to believing they can change that one thing were in fact when you do happened to change or “fix” that one thing other one things arise. When in all actuallity your not fixing anything.

Blog 9: Sam’s Story

steph484 — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 16:42:45 +0000

While reading this weeks article on sexual assult and masculinty I found Sam’s story to be more interesting, so I decided to focus more on his story rather than John’s. We all hear about the “John” Stories boy who grows up in a bad home and carries that on with him in life. But what particulary struck me about Sam is he came from a lovely close-knit home. When asked Sam said his conceptions of masculinitly at the time was: success at work, power, strong, money being like dad. “Being like dad” showed his admiration for his father and what he believed his father was like. Sam didn’t experience abuse at home but rather at school (bullying). While processing this I thought that must be a scary thing going everyday somewhere where your force to go and constantly being bulled- that has to tramatizing ans scary for anyone!
When Sam confided in his father- where you can imagine Sam was looking for sympathy and love his father was telling him to fight back. He wanted to be tough and strong like dad and the fact that Sam couldn’t actually bring himself to fight the other boys (the fact that he was scared), he would be beaten up lead him to someone he knew he could physically have more power over.
So here we are: Sam was not percieved as tough because he wouldn’t fight back and he wasn’t in control because he was always being teased, so Sam had no power or control over what was happening to him at school. Consequently those happen to be two characteristics he listed in what makes someone a man. The baby sitting job gave Sam a time to feel he was in control. He felt he had power over the little girls he babysat, causing him to commit the sexuall assult acts.
After reading this article my mind was jumping all around because the one thing I could not seem to get out of my head was: If Sam had never been tease could we say that he would have not commited those Sexaul assult acts?

Blog 8: Women’s Rights

steph484 — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:27:05 +0000

Throughout history one consistent thing that has always been fought is women’s rights. Whether women have gained the right to vote in nineteen-twenty, or women are able to get an education and work in almost every field, it seems as though women have come a long way. Sounds pretty simple, women have basically the same rights as men. Which in some sense they do. Women do vote, women do attend college and there are women doctors, lawyers plumber etc, Women have a lot of the same rights as men. Then thinking about the reading which talked about women having to fight for their rights, it seemed it was not always like how it is today. This got me thinking; is it this clear cut as I’m thinking? Which made me want to do some research of my own. I found that although women represent fifty-one percent of the American population there are only 1.2% of Fortune five-hundred CE-Os. (Source: Catalyst Census of Women Corporate Officers). Only 15% of congress are women (Source: Women’s Research and Education Institute) on the economic spectrum, only 5.5% of women as compared with 15.8% of men reported earnings of $75,000 or more. (Source: U.S. Census Bureau)
Looking at the facts yes women do have a lot of the same rights as men, although women make up the majority of the American population woman are of a minority classification in society. Although women do basically have the same rights as men, there is an obvious difference is what men obtain compared to women.