Author Archives: kv134847

Our final topic of discussion this term was sex and gender inequality; a topic I feel very strongly about. Although rape is one of the more frequent acts of violence, it is reported to the police the least. And many men and women believe that women bring rape upon themselves depending on the clothes they are wearing. Personally, it saddens and disgusts me to think that a women has to constantly be afraid or have a thought about what type of message their outfit may or may not send out to men. It doesn’t matter how much skin a women is showing, if a man asks to sleep with her and she says no, the answer is no. There should never be the excuse of, but she was asking for it because she was showing off her body. What a women is wearing doesn’t send any mixed signals to men or give any man the right to touch a women inappropriately without consent. If a women is comfortable with her body, she should be able to wear whatever she feels confident in without thinking that someone may act violently towards her. I know many women who dress the way they do for themselves and not to give off any sort of impression towards men. In NYC, it’s legal for individuals, men and women, to go topless. A women’s body on display doesn’t mean she’s looking for attention. It’s sickening that in instances of rape, women have been blamed based on what they’re wearing and that they should be the ones to change their actions.

Last summer, in NYC, there was a protest called Slut Walk, where people were bringing light to the issue of individuals placing blame on women for getting raped. In the video, an individual states that even a police officer in Brooklyn stopped a couple of girls to suggest that they do not wear skirts because there is a rapist in the neighborhood. A woman shouldn’t have to change anything. Instead, there should be deeper investigations these horrible situations.

http://rt.com/usa/news/workers-usa-middle-class/

Until a few years ago the middle class in America represented the American Dream. Being able to have a steady job and to own a house and a car became a symbol for reaching the American Dream and living a life of happiness. But recently we’ve witnessed America pushing into the direction of a two class society.  In Chapter 10 of the textbook, the text discusses class distinctions and how in the past few decades the income gap between the rich and the poor is continuously growing, ultimately driving out the middle class. The video discusses the struggles for many Americans to accomplish the American Dream given the horrible conditions for finding a job, and how the “middle class is being squeezed out”.  What once was more than just a dream, has become a fantasy.

The video gives a statistic that there are over 13 million people still looking for a job in the United States and that although people are in desperate needs of jobs, there continues to be an increase in military spending. It’s disappointing that the main focus is not on solving the wide income gap and helping the millions of people that are suffering without a job. Instead of putting so much money into the military, there should be a priority of creating jobs for our people. The job search for individuals keeps getting more and more difficult, even for people with an education or with experience from previous jobs. And a lot of individuals with jobs are living their lives through each paycheck, and having very little left to make, for example, mortgage payments each month. America has been looked at as a country where if you work hard, you will succeed. But individuals are working harder than ever, and dreams of living a life with a steady job and a house are becoming tougher to turn into reality.

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/07/30/free-plastic-surgery-for-bullied-kids/?iref=allsearch

In Chapter six of “Sociology: Exploring the Architecture of Everyday Life,” the author discusses managing impressions and how we form impressions of others. The way we first view a person is usually by physical appearance. By the way someone looks, we assume how their personality is and if we like them or not. How we appear to other people has become extremely important to us, that we tend to shape and alter our image in order to impress other individuals. I believe that the media, standards of society, and the opinions of others has made people obsessive over physical appearance to the point where it isn’t healthy. One way individuals, mainly woman, alter their looks is through plastic surgery. The increase of plastic surgery being used to change how we look proves that many of us aren’t content with how we appear to others. Society’s standards of what beauty is tends to be what causes us to feel insecure about our looks and change our image to seem physically pleasant to another person’s eyes.

In this video, it shows a young adult that faces bullying based on her physical appearance and her desire to get her ears fixed due to the name calling. The video mentions that there is a cosmetic surgery firm that is willing to perform plastic surgery for kids that suffer from bullying. I think that allowing kids to change their appearance gives them the idea that in the situation of the bullied and the one bullying, the one being bullied is at fault for what is happening. Before changing a child’s appearance it’s important to encourage them that we all have our imperfections that make us who we are.  This video represents the fact that we are all wrapped up with society’s standards and that we should change ourselves based on other people’s opinions. Personally, I feel as if getting plastic surgery under the age of twenty-one is too soon because a lot of us don’t grow into our features until our later teenage years or even early twenties. By allowing these children to get plastic surgery, we’re giving into society’s standards of what is considered beauty and letting the eyes’ of other individuals control how we look or how we are meant to look. Although, the young adult in the video says she is much happier, I believe it’s too much, too soon.

Through the media in America, the issue of gender roles is still present. It feels as if it’s nonexistent because women have the same opportunities as men but despite this, the media continues to portray women as stereotypical house-wives.  This idea has stayed consistent. From a young age, children are exposed to commercials and television programs that emphasize gender roles. The media has continued to shape this idea and keep it in our society. Usually girls are shown playing house, as shown in the commercial above, or playing with dolls, and boys are associated with action figures and cars. The interview with children shows that they connect this image with what their roles should be in real life. When asked which barbie doll takes care of the baby and does the house work, every girl and boy answered the female doll. If commercials, for example, dealing with children’s toys, represented both girls and boys playing with the toy, there would be a larger possibility that children wouldn’t associate genders with specific toys which would hopefully lead to gender roles in society to come to an end. But unfortunately, gender roles portrayed in the media continues into adulthood. Commercials dealing with cleaning, such as the laundry commercial, a women is the one doing the work. Men are portrayed as strong individuals, who supply for his family, whereas women are typically the ones who take care of everything at home. This image has been burned into our brains.

Personally, when I moved to the states at age two, my mom was the one who was working and my dad took care of me. But when I would go to a friend’s house after a day of Kindergarten, it was always the child’s mom at home, doing the necessary work. It’s upsetting that although there are many more dads staying at home, taking care of the housework or children, people are still surprised at this idea. In my home, there isn’t a gender role. Both of my parents cook and clean. And I think that’s important to showcase to children because it shows them that it’s more than just a females duty or responsibility.

Throughout the last decade, people have been putting in a lot more work, and having a lot less breaks, although, there are a limited amount of hours in the day. More specifically, many college students are forced to balance five college courses each semester, a job, after school activities, and a social life. With so much on one’s plate, it becomes difficult to do each task at hand well which in the end all leads to stress. This outcome is referred to as role conflict, which is a person’s feeling of frustration when one command interferes with the commands of another. With student loans and bills to pay for, college students are finding that it’s impossible to go through college without having a job. Also, students are made aware that it’s important to build up a resume through after school activities or experiences that help make one student stand apart from another. It has come to the point where there is too much pressure on people to complete every given task in the day. It has been repeatedly drilled into our heads that we always have to do more in order to succeed and to stand out from the rest. Without adding one more activity or task in our day, in most people’s minds, it then becomes a risk for the future of finding a job. Society has become concerned and surrounded around wealth, and we’ll do anything to succeed wealth, regardless of high stress levels.

Being a college student, I constantly feel that there is pressure to complete an impossible amount of things in a day. Although, my days are filled with going to University, having a job, and taking separate non credited courses at FIT, I still feel as if I’m not doing enough. Especially with the difficulty of finding a job due to the economy, I feel an increase in pressure and the feeling that I have to do even more in hopes to stand out.