Colorism, inspired by Stuff Mom Never Told You

I listen to this podcast every week and it's really opened me to inter-sectional feminism.  The podcast is hosted by two white women, who make a point to address their privilege and to also discuss the struggles of women and men of color from a respectful position.  Cristen and Caroline also are sure to address cis-gendered issues while still acknowledging their privileges.

This episode was really interesting because it discussed how darker skinned black girls in school are more likely to be suspended than lighter skinned black girls.  Whenever people tell me that black people have the same opportunities as whites in America, it's so incredibly frustrating.  The imbalance of the justice system and how black men are more likely to be incarcerated, and how darker skinned black men are more likely to receive the death penalty.  I just ordered "The New Jim Crow" to read once the semester is over.

This podcast makes a very important point, that the solution to colorism ISN'T telling darker skinned black women that they are beautiful or sexy or desirable. That's incredibly insulting, racist and demeaning.  The answer to the problem of colorism shouldn't be to tell a woman she is valued as a sexual being.

The podcast also discussed colorism around the world and discussed India at length.  I have seen several short news stories on how skin bleaching in Brazil and other South American countries have led to women being hospitalized.  Lighter skin is valued around the world, and it leads to increased violence against darker skinned people. Emma Watson has come out in the past couple years as a feminist, and as someone who has launched the #heforshe campaign.  She is often accused of being a "white feminist" and she has been criticized for a skin whitening cream she promoted several years ago.

In the notes of this podcast, they reference an article about how there is a movement in Pakistan to combat colorism and encourage self-acceptance among darker skinned girls.  The article and the podcast both made sure to discuss how colorism is not just about women, but that this is a men's issue too.


http://www.stuffmomnevertoldyou.com/podcasts/colorism/

http://www.indiawest.com/news/global_indian/forget-fair-and-lovely-dark-is-divine-pakistan-s-first/article_8d1f87ae-1f5d-11e5-8684-0bfe7ff82da8.html

http://asia.be.com/beauty/beauty-news/celebs-beauty-news/emma-watson-is-accused-of-promoting-skin-lightening-117649.html

Representation in Disney

So, Disney is supposedly making "progress" and we discussed this in one of our class sessions.

While sure, it's true they've had a few women of color as their main protagonists, but that doesn't negate the fact that people of color are still under-represented in Disney films and media overall.

I thought this tweet below was a great way to respond to Disney and media defenders.  Progress has not been made quick enough, nor has significant progress been achieved.

Online Harassment

So, I am pretty active in the Twitter community. I am faced with harassment online all the time, so the video by "Just Not Sports" hit very close to home.  I am have been threatened twice online with physical violence, one man telling me, "I want to tape your bitch mouth shut."  I have been told in person by a man when I worked at ROSS to, "shhh your fucking mouth."

The video by Just Not Sports made me cry when the men almost refused to continue speaking.  I re-posted the video on my Facebook and two male co-workers came to talk to me about this.  These men have never talked to me about anything else I had ever posted on Facebook, and they are openly anti-feminist.  They both told me that the video disgusted them and made them really question what they had thought about women being harassed online.  I told them to take a look on Twitter or on the comments section of a female celebrities blog or Facebook and they will seen rampant sexism and threats of violence and rape.

A man I am friends with on Facebook recently liked a post on Jennifer Lawrence making a suggestive hand gesture.  I counted ten posts saying something to the effect of "I want to hold her down and fuck her mouth."  I stopped counting at ten because the other comment surrounding it were even more vile, it was hard to stomach.

Just today, a man tweeted this to me.  I had tweeted about how happy I was that Ted Cruz dropped out of the Presidential race.  He is a Trump supporter.  I don't understand why he clearly felt the need to tweet these things to me, but he did....

being called the "C" word on Twitter is new for me.

http://jezebel.com/i-hope-you-get-raped-again-female-sportswriters-listen-1773096108

Scarlett Bot

I was horrified when I saw that a man has created a Scarlett Johannsson robot for himself.  The creation of this robot demonstrates that men feel that they are entitled to a woman’s body.  This robot creator doesn’t have the ability to be with Scarlett Johannsson, so he felt entitled enough to create her for himself, giving himself access to what he wants without Scarlett’s consent.  It’s incredibly problematic that we as a society feel that celebrities OWE us their bodies.  Amy Schumer recently encountered a scary male fan who told her that she OWED him a selfie.

I thought this article was interesting because mentioned how Siri is a female voice and that technology tends to have women as “helpers”.  Female voices are used in technology to help people with things, like they are our secretaries.

Female celebrities are constantly being harassed, objectified and violated.  This is yet another form of violence that Scarlett Johannsson is subjected to. She has had her personal photos stolen, photos that were meant for her husband.  Recently the “Fappening” released hundreds of stolen photos of female celebrities like Jennifer Lawrence, Audrey Plaza and many others.  Erin Andrews just recently won a lawsuit against a man who filmed her against her will in her hotel room. She has spoken out about how she every day someone tweets a screenshot of the video to her. Everyday someone tweets an abusive tweet to her regarding her body.  She described men shouting and catcalling at her about what they saw in the video.

In this day and age, we are unable to escape harassment.  The internet remembers everything and never allows victims to forget that their privacy was violated and stolen from them.  We hear about teenagers who kill themselves because of bullying, and I feel that they have increased since the internet.  These teenagers, men and women, straight and gay, can’t escape their tormentors when they go home from school.  

http://www.today.com/popculture/amy-schumer-rethinks-photo-policy-after-1-fan-scares-her-t89946

http://www.wired.com/2016/04/the-scarlett-johansson-bot-signals-some-icky-things-about-our-future/

Gender doesn't just mean women

I re-watched the first ten minutes of “Tough Guise 2” three times because I feel it was such so well written, I wanted to listen over and over. The culture and glorification of violence in America is deeply troubling to me. I recently criticized Piers Morgan on Twitter, and he re-tweeted me. Hundreds of his fans, who I assume are mostly British began to tweet back at me photos of Sandy Hook, Donald Trump and jokes about Americans and guns. I didn’t defend myself against the jokes at the USA’s expense regarding gun violence, because they were all right. We have an obsession with our guns and masculinity in America is tied very closely to violence. Just look at the violence that is encouraged at Donald Trump rallies (a man encouraging and inciting violent actions in other men).

I married into a gun loving family, and this past Christmas, my 12 year old nephew was given a gun because it’s a transition into manhood.  He proudly showed it off to all his friends (who were all male) and practiced shooting stances. My mother-in-law said to me, “oh, boys will be boys.”  I personally am disgusted by the idea of a 12 year old having guns, but this is the culture in where I live.  The idea that Jackson talks about, how “men’s violence is somehow inevitable” is incredibly dismissive and damaging to men. Men’s violence is only inevitable because the media and culture perpetuate, glorify and reinforce it.

“All of this is partly a function of how dominant ideologies work linguistically to conceal the power of dominant groups” (Tough Guise 2).

I was most intrigued by Jackson’s commentary on how the dominant group (whites, heterosexuals, and males) are allowed to remain invisible. The words and phrases the media uses are deliberate, or were deliberate at a time.  The focus on race when African Americans and Arabs are involved is appalling and so incredibly obvious, I can’t believe media outlets defend their reporting.  I had not thought about how violence when perpetrated by women is reported. According to Jackson, “gender becomes the story” (Tough Guise, 2). I really appreciate that this video was assigned because this class is called “Race, Gender and Media” and as the video points out, gender is not just women. I hope that men in this class will feel safe in our discussions to talk about the pressure towards violence and how its portrayed. The "gender cops" discussed in this video have no place in our classroom and I hope that men are able to reflect on this video and see where they were "policed" by these cops, or cases where they themselves were a "gender cop". I can relate as a woman who has been "slut shamed" and has also "slut shamed" others. I have learned how those experiences hurt me, and how I hurt others.

#womennotobjects

I first heard of the #womennotobjects campaign on Twitter. I went on their site, womennotobjects.com and learned about the filters they use to determine if an ad is objectifying. I decided to dissect a few ads myself because this class has brought this issue to my attention, and now I can't thumb through a magazine without being frustrated with the advertising in them.

The site lists filter 1 as “Props”: “Does this woman have a choice or a voice? Has she been reduced to a thing?” I thought about ads I have seen in class and in magazines. There is a company, “Suitsupply” which I only recently learned about who is known for their controversial ads and how they depict women. I have done some research into this company and this ad campaign below is titled “Toy Boy” and claims to be sexist towards men, and not women. Their ads are truly disgusting.

Suitsupply ads have been criticized for years because of their overtly sexual ads and their depiction of women, but the company remains successful and defiant of its critics. Like their ad campaign, they are "Shameless".

Another example of women being used as props is Robin Thicke’s music videos:

I think it’s ESPECIALLY important to combat the use of women of color specifically as props to white celebrities. Miley Cyrus was criticized for this recently because of her treatment of Black women in her performances and music videos, but who could forget Gwen Stefani’s Harajuku Girls? 

This is a disgusting trend that we need to speak out against. Celebrities overall have been dismissive of the criticism, but we can’t continue to allow white people to appropriate and use people of other cultures to their advantage. These women that celebrities use are not granted a voice in the performances or videos, they are only props and it needs to stop.

The other filter that I was interested in was filter 3 Parts: "Has this woman been reduced to a provocative body part?"

Once again I found myself thinking of "Suitsupply" and how their ads routinely reduce a woman to a part and how this removes a woman's voice, face, and overall status as a person. She is now only an ass, something to sell a product.

Or this Tom Ford ad for a MANS COLOGNE. 

I think the ads above are evidence of just how important the #womennotobjects campaign is. I think that this Media Literacy course has helped some people in our class to see just how harmful and pervasive ads that objectify women are. Before this class, I hadn't thought about how ads reduce women to a body part and the ramifications on that in society. 

http://womennotobjects.com/what-is-objectification/

http://www.buzzfeed.com/rossalynwarren/suit-supply#.nwRnd3A8e

Diversity on TV and on Netflix

I haven’t had the opportunity yet to watch too many Netfix Original Series. However, I’ve been able to watch a few of them, and have read positive things about the direction towards diversity Netflix seems to be taking.

One show I’ve watched in “Master of None” which follows an aspiring actor in New York. Aziz Ansari, an Indian American created and stars in the show. I remember there was a running joke on “Parks and Recreation” where Leslie Knope insisted Tom (Ansari) was from another country, when he was really born in South Carolina. I think it’s absolutely fantastic that an man of color created and is now starring in his hit show. The best part about this show is not just that a man of color is behind it, its that other people of color are included in the main cast. Unlike “Friends” and “How I Met Your Mother”, “Master of None” features a group of diverse friends.  “Master of None” features an inter-racial relationship as being 100% normal, and mocks a person in the show who takes issue with it.  “Master of None” features other men of Asian descent as Ansari’s best friends. The show also features a woman of color who is also a lesbian.

My favorite episode is when Ansari auditions for a small role in a TV show.  This role calls for “an Indian cab driver’.  Ansari auditions without a stereotypical Indian accent and is dismissed because of it.  Later in the episode, an executive likes Ansari and wants to cast him in a lead role in a TV show.  However, Ansari’s friend, who is also Indian, misses out on the part because “you can’t have two Indian guys on a show”.  This made me think of other shows that really only have 1 character of color, surrounded by white people. I am really grateful that Netflix is producing content that is honest about these issues in the entertainment industry.  The really refreshing element of this show, is that it's not a show based on an Indian man being Indian. It allows an Indian American to be an average-everyday person whose ethnicity is a part of him, but it doesn't define him, it doesn't limit him, and it doesn't stereotype him.

I also really appreciate how “Master of None” took on feminism and allowed the women in the show to tell their own stories. Ansari’s character listened to the female leads in the show. I loved that this episode also called out the advertising industry as well.  Ansari and several women are in a commercial for a store like “Home Depot”.  Ansari is originally featured at the BBQ, while a woman brings him a cold beverage.  This show mocked the stereotypical gender roles that advertising reinforces. 

I really hope that network television sees the success of these kinds of shows on Netflix and reconsiders their programming. The American public is clearly interested in more intelligent and diverse programming, so from a monetary perspective, it only feels like a smart investment.

http://www.salon.com/2016/03/18/asian_guys_get_to_be_sexy_too_finally_tv_gives_me_the_romantic_leads_ive_been_waiting_for/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/act-four/wp/2015/11/12/master-of-nones-refreshing-take-on-diverse-friend-groups/

http://www.salon.com/2015/11/20/you_dont_get_a_cookie_for_doing_the_right_thing_how_master_of_none_evades_the_very_special_episode_trap/