Pop-Culture | Posted by Talia on 04/28/2011
Some Feminist Musings on Hop
I recently saw the movie Hop (free advanced preview tickets!), which was fun, considering the last time I was at the movies was to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. (I know, it’s pathetic.) Before I say anything else, I want to say that Hop was adorable, full of fuzzy bunnies and fluffy cotton tails, and I genuinely enjoyed it.
(SPOILER ALERT) The movie is about E.B. (Russell Brand), a teenaged rabbit that wants to be a drummer but has to become the next Easter Bunny. He runs from Easter Island to Hollywood, where he meets Fred O’Hare (James Marsden) and moves in with him as he pursues a career. On Easter Island, Carlos (Hank Azaria), the Easter Bunny’s second-in-command, wants to take E.B.’s place as the next Easter …
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Feminism | Posted by janedoe225 on 03/11/2011
What Is Rape Culture?
There is a married woman and her husband works long nights and doesn’t return until the early morning. When her husband is away, the wife gets dressed up and goes to an island where she has affairs with random men. When these men get too close to her, like if they want to take their affair to the next level, she purposely gets in fights with them. Then she takes the ferry back home before her husband arrives. She’s also really drunk.
So one night she does her usual routine. She goes to the island, has sex with a guy and then acts like a jerk so they can break up. As she is on her way back to the ferry she realizes she doesn’t have enough money to get …
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Feminism | Posted by Regina on 02/23/2011
The Link Between Beauty, Privilege and the Media
We don’t live in a vacuum. Our ideas, our lexicon, and our beliefs are shaped by outside forces like society, culture, environment, and religion. Fields like sociology and anthropology prove that.
Words matter. You said something heterosexist because your parents / the media / your religion told you; you weren’t born a bigot. Forces like that reflect and shape your ideas. When people, especially celebrities, say transphobic things they fuel transphobia and other people think it is ok because their ideas aren’t challenged. Their bigotry is reinforced every day by outside forces like that. We are conditioned to say things that hurt other people, but we don’t change it because it seems like it doesn’t affect your reality.
That’s where privilege comes from. If the dominant culture constantly puts out …
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Feminism | Posted by Liz P on 02/1/2011
This Is What a Feminist Looks Like
In the first meeting of my Gender Theory class my professor asked the class if we were feminists. I think all but one hand (out of 8 students) was raised. I experienced a brief moment of shock and pleasure – shock because this was the first time I’d been in a room (other than meetings of the Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance, of course) where almost everyone identified as a feminist, and pleased because I was surrounded by so many feminists.
Now you might be wondering who that lone not-feminist was. After all, he/she was sitting in a Gender Theory class! And I might have been thinking that too if this were my first year in college. But after taking intro levels and GenEd women’s studies classes, I know that being …
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Feminism | Posted by Marie L on 01/24/2011
In Honor of the Anniversary of Roe v. Wade
My awareness of Roe v. Wade goes back to high school (a few years ago) when in a 12th grade English class we were given a list of important events that occurred from 1960 through present day. We were told to investigate and report on one event as “unbiased news journalists.” The supreme court decision of Roe v. Wade was on the list, and I picked it as my research topic. At the time, I had a very scant inkling of what Roe v. Wade was. From what I can remember, I only knew that it meant women were free to choose child-free lives, and at the time, with four siblings, I was all about never having kids – -so Roe v. Wade it was!
I didn’t know squat about the …
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Feminism | Posted by Lily N on 01/6/2011
Good Girls Don’t Go To Jail
I hit him out of frustration, or maybe out of love. I hit him because I was scared and confused and hurting, but none of that mattered. The part that mattered is that I hit him. I found out that jail was exactly what I thought it would be. It was the stale cold from a poorly heated building in a Colorado winter and the pinching of the handcuffs on my outer wrists and heels. It was the pit in my stomach as I held back the tears in my mug shot and the hard cringe as I stripped my clothes off for the female officer. Mostly it was the rush of disappointment and confusion as I removed the pink bow from my hair. It reminded me that good girls …
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Pop-Culture | Posted by Vicky C on 12/27/2010
Diamonds Aren’t a Girl’s Best Friend
Ah, the holidays. The time of year when houses are lit up, the streets are crowded with shoppers, and the whole family spends quality time together watching specials on television.
It’s all well and good, until little gems like these pop up.
I’m sure you’ve all seen this lovely commercial from Kay Jewelers. Where a couple is watching the storm outside, and suddenly the thunder scares the poor little girlfriend into her man’s arms. Then he gives her a sparkly necklace and everyone’s happy!
…Wait, what.
You know, I was actually thinking the last fifty-or-so years of the women’s movement actually had some impact on the way women were portrayed in the media. When I watched this commercial, my mouth literally dropped in shock.
Because along with enticing me to buy …
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Feminism | Posted by Brian C on 12/8/2010
Just Because Berry Is In The Name…
Does anyone else enjoy partaking in the outlandish factoids of Snapple caps? I recently got a fact that stated that a banana is technically a berry and strawberries are not even berries. I will repeat this, because it bears reiteration. A banana (the yellow things you have to peel) is a berry whereas a strawberry (red fruit of deliciousness with BERRY in the name) is not a berry. So I had an initial shock and a moment of muddled thoughts. Society has played this trick a number of times on me throughout my life. Koala BEARS and panda BEARS are not even bears. Furthermore I concluded that this type of poor labeling by society is why I fight for gender equality.
To me, equality is a condition worth fighting for …
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