Kira

Intersectionality: Creating Parallel Lines, Everywhere

 Posted by on Tue, 10/11 at 5:19pm  reading  No Responses »
Oct 112016
 

So, today I learned about Intersectionality Feminism. It’s actually pretty cool. It reminds me of Post-Modernist Feminism, where because there are so many factors contributing to an individual, it is impossible to solve women’s problems because they are so diverse.

I like intersectionality because it encourages to consider different points of view. Not all women view topics in the same light, because of their culture, educational backgrounds, body type, life experiences, religion, etc. etc.

Here are two articles that informed me what it is supposed to be about: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/10572435/Intersectional-feminism.-What-the-hell-is-it-And-why-you-should-care.html and http://everydayfeminism.com/2015/01/why-our-feminism-must-be-intersectional/

I identify with this because as a female, I feel privileged to have grown up in a home with a supporting father, not caring whether I was a girl or a boy, and teaching me all the same lessons and instilling a strong sense of self-esteem in me. I am privileged due to my class and my level of education. My issues don’t match other women’s issues. So it’s good to distinguish between the two!

However, there are some issues I have with this ideology, and others have with the ideology as well. I feel like this is being spoiled, much like feminism is, by extremists, and – dare I say it – elitist exclusionarists (not sure if that’s a word, but let’s go with it).

The Problem of Invalidation:

http://intersectionalfeminism101.tumblr.com/faq

https://www.tumblr.com/intersectionalfeminism101/83064427958/how-to-be-a-good-ally-intersectional-feminist-edition

“Check your privilege.” Despite what I said above, this phrase absolutely kills my soul. Everyone’s life experiences are important, and even though there is an overwhelming majority who has taken control of the dialogue, people don’t have to be rude to take it back. A much better, understanding slogan would be, “Every point of view is validated,” or “Listen to all different forms of life experiences.” This would create an open-minded discussion where everyone is on a level-playing field. But intersectionality doesn’t seem to want to make anyone equal. They want to highlight groups who have “suffered” more than others and give them a larger voice/more power in the conversation. And while I think it is very important for them to have a voice, I don’t think it should be at the expense of anyone else’s. I don’t want people shaming me because of the privilege I will readily admit, and I don’t want anyone to believe I am patronizing them when I am trying to listen to their problems and offer support because “I can’t understand.”

The Problem of Division:

This leads to the problem of division. There are so many different “privilege” factors that the number of combinations becomes infinitesimal, until nobody can relate to anybody. I value the intersectionality that encourages us to embrace and acknowledge our differences, and stand by each other to support struggles that aren’t necessarily our own, but are valiant struggles that need some spotlight attention nonetheless. I don’t value the intersectionality that prevents me from bonding with my black best friendsand supporting her troubles because of my “white privilege.”

I also have a problem with the Tumblr article I linked above, saying that if you are not a black woman, you do not have a right to call yourself an intersectionalist. You are encourage to practice intersectionality, but you cannot appropriate their paradigm if you are non-black (including other minorities!). I find this ridiculous, like women telling men they can’t be feminists. Apparently, I can be an “ally,” but I am explicitly told that allies are not needed to fuel the movement. Well, who exactly are you trying to educate with the movement? The “others” with privilege. And if you don’t welcome them into your movement, or if you plan to constantly belittle them, they aren’t going to want to support them. Sadly, you need the majority on board for social change. So I am very disappointed with the rhetoric of this ideology.

The Problem of Victimization:

Lastly, this ideology is eerily Hegelian, proposing a Dialectic of Self vs Other. In this case, Self is the Privileged Majority, and Other is the under-privileged minority. Yet by trying to reclaim their sense of self, they are forced to subjugate the privileged majority by invalidating their experiences. There is no way to achieve an equilibrium of equality here. And no matter how privileged a person is, they’re going to have emotional baggage and scars too. And so then, there forms this hierarchy of privilege, where the less privilege you have, the more power you deserve in intersectionality feminism. There is a theory that being under-privileged forms a richer experience, which in part is true, because in the face of adversity, you learn a lot of lessons by undergoing it and overcoming it. However, that isn’t to say that adversity is linked directly to “privilege,” and that certain types of adversity are more worthy than others. This creates an atmosphere of victimization, because the less privileged you are, the more attractive you are to the cause. This also creates an atmosphere of undermining others’ experiences to further emphasize the disadvantage you are in.

Overall, I think intersectionality can be a beautiful, flourishing ideology because there are so many different facets of feminism that need to be recognized, embraced, and supported through their struggles. HOWEVER, I do not agree with all of the exclusionary and demeaning rhetoric. It’s like fighting fire with fire. If people are demeaning to you, being demeaning to them isn’t going to fix anything. Instead, trying to educate these very people about why they are wrong is the more important aspect to focus on here.

At least, that’s how I initially feel after surveying this limited scope.

Going back to Salt-N-Pepa

 Posted by on Tue, 10/11 at 4:11pm  ideas  No Responses »
Oct 112016
 
“Let’s talk about sex, baby.”
Sorry, I just HAD to.
But I realize this is a very important conversation circulating the feminist sphere, and so I figured I might as well give my two cents (or raise a lot of dubious questions).
A major concern is how casual sex has become, especially for teenage girls in high school (I am focusing on this as more of a “first world” sort of problem, ignoring issues of rape, consent, drunkenness, and mainly using Western society as a means of analyzing rhetoric and ideology). While this generation has the lowest teen pregnancy rates, that may be due more to an awareness of contraception and different options girls have. Abstinence is being labeled as “outdated,” and it is becoming more and more common for girls to have sex without romantic relationships, and just “hook up” with different boys.
This same generation is one who doesn’t feel the need for the label “Feminism,” because they can do everything a boy can do. Including “meaningless sex.” That’s not to say that every high school girl in the Millennial generation is loose and throwing themselves at a ton of different guys. But the fact that a percentage are, and that it is a behavior most are familiar with, is concerning. Peers just turn a blind, disapproving eye to this sort of thing. Nothing is actually being done to stop it.
The girls who are pursuing this type of sexually awakened behavior feel that they are liberating themselves through their bodies, and putting themselves on the same playing fields as guys. They are breaking the glass ceiling of a double standard, where boys are applauded for losing their virginity and girls are admonished for it. Instead, both sexes are now treated as equals in the bedroom. It’s no longer the stereotype of the “experienced boy” and “innocent girl.” Now the girls are just as experienced as the boy.
And while there is nothing wrong with that per se, it’s important to examine the adverse effects of social norms on this situation. If the reasoning for this behavior displayed by girls is “because boys are doing it,” then who are pushing the boys to do it? Each other? Where does this belief come from? Surely there are boys who believe in monogamy or even abstinence. Why are they the silenced minority? This movement of embracing casual sex maybe be spiraling out of control, if girls are now ascribing to this ideology and further fueling the fire. Why do girls feel more powerful when they are engaging in sexual activity than when they are being abstinent? If girls are having sex because that’s what the boys are doing/want to do/are pushed to do, then the girls are going to push boys further, and boys are going to push girls further, and slowly casual sex is going to become more and more popular.
This whole thing makes me think of the phrase “two ‘wrongs’ don’t make a right.
For the record: I don’t think pre-maritial sex is wrong, and I don’t think having multiple partners is wrong. But it abhors me that people can be Pro-Choice (which I am out of necessity that there’s too many suffering children in this world already) and then prance around jumping into each other’s beds, forgetting the significance that sex can create life because of the abundance of birth control.
I find this behavior a regression. If you’re in a romantic relationship as a teenager and want to have sex, that’s fine. If you’re curious, that’s fine. But there should be some standards. Both girls and boys are throwing their bodies at one another, because “why wait?” It’s kind of degrading to both genders, quite honestly.
The previous principle of waiting for marriage is crumbling due to outstandingly high divorce rates and the further purveying of pre-marital sex. But just because somebody don’t want to wait until marriage doesn’t mean you shouldn’t wait at all. It doesn’t mean you should have sex whenever an opportunity presents itself. Instead, both girls and boys should be taught the value of a monogamous, committed, romantic relationship.
It’s not even about pregnancy at this point, although I feel the units in high school do little to even cover the responsibility of having a baby (with those stupid little egg projects). It’s not necessarily about sexual health, either, although STDs are a very large concern and can ruin your life if they are viral instead of bacterial. This is more of a self-esteem issue. Why has the youth lost faith in finding love and saving sex for those special cases?
Interestingly enough, a lot of young men have said that they would never take a relationship seriously with someone who has slept around a lot. So girls are yet again being held to this double standard, where sexual liberation comes at a price: losing a good reputation.
And then there is the principle of “slut-shaming,” which may be more of a negative now. The term was first used in regards of chastising girls for showing ANY amount of sexuality. I believe we’ve certainly broken past that point in America, where sexuality is more openly embraced (think about all the teen shows on Free Form, formerly ABC Family). However, now whenever somebody raises a concern about a girl becoming too focused on sex, to the point where her self-esteem suffers without partaking in it to keep the attention of boys, the term “slut-shaming” is used. And I don’t think that’s healthy. Because young girls, and boys, need to curb this behavior that I believe is coming from a pessimism regarding marriage and love and romance that this generation is shouldering. So I think it’s a feminist’s duty to call out any media circulating ideology that you need to have sex to be in a committed relationship, or to be considered beautiful/attractive/desired, or to be empowered as a woman (or a man, for that matter), because it’s wrong! And I think it’s very important parents and teachers are aware of this and address this before it further goes out of control.
These are the articles that got me thinking, for the record:
http://www.mamamia.com.au/teenage-casual-sex/
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/teenage-hookup-sex-leaves-feminism-behind-20140627-zsolw.html

The Chasm in which many of our sisters have fallen into…

 Posted by on Sat, 10/1 at 11:32pm  ideas  No Responses »
Oct 012016
 

So in my Southern Renaissance Literature class, we’re talking about two famous and influential black scholars and activists during the Reconstruction period: WEB DuBois and Booker T Washington. (Don’t worry, this will connect back to feminism, I promise)

The two had two very different approaches on how to integrate now freed African-Americans into society.

This is a very rough low-down so I can get to my bigger point.

WEB DuBois wanted to focus on something called “The Talented Tenth.” He believed that if one in ten black people went on to become classically educated and became some of Americas greatest scholars, poets, musicians, engineers, politicians, etc. that black men would earn a place in society (I use men specifically, because this opportunity wasn’t extended to black women, but that’s not the subject of this blog post).

While that sounds great and all, my question is: what about the other 90%? DuBois doesn’t do much to address them (of course, I’m not super well-read on all of his plans and theories, so he might have, but in the big picture, they’re left mostly ignored).

Then there is Booker T Washington, who believed that vocational schooling was the best course for all black men. As soon as they could master a trade and earn a living, white men wouldn’t care whether a black man or a white man made their horse hooves as long as they had the same skill. And thus they could integrate themselves through society this way.

It’s much more of a “pull yourself up by the bootstraps” kind of way, with an accessibility to everyone.

But, the argument here is, the gradualism to integrate blacks into society might take too long if you just leave it at that (and again, I know for a fact both theories are much more in depth than this, so excuse my crudeness). And then there’s some sort of glass-ceiling hovering over their heads.

I feel like the same problem exists within feminism today. There are those feminists who are upset because powerful business women are encountering glass-ceilings, and they want more Marissa Mayers in the world. While our numbers are thankfully larger than 10% of women leading successful careers, it still poses of problem of those left over.

There are so many women who are living in impoverished circumstances, who make up the majority of jobs as waitresses, janitors/cleaning ladies, and other similar low-grade jobs in that sector. They have a trade, they have a means of making money, like Booker T Washington proposed, but there seems to be no chance of improvement or enrichment for their lives.

I think we need a philosophy that bridges this gap, a middle ground. There needs to be a means to help the women who are barely getting by and surviving and elevate their living conditions, if only slightly. And to ensure better opportunities for their children as well. I’m a pragmatist, I know that not all women are going to become wealthy, middle-class citizens who’s biggest worry is how to balance their flourishing career and being a proactive mother and manage their home. Not all men will belong to that class, either.

It just seems like this widening gap, between women who are born in already feminist-value friendly environments and demanding more, and women who aren’t, and have no means to change their environments at all. But if we could find some way to bridge that gap slightly, to lessen the dramatic difference in conditions, then it would be a service to both men and women, to families and children, to the future!

I feel like redefining gender norms/breaking stereotypes are second to the living conditions of some women today. Issues of rape/consent, and respect, and conduct are important, don’t get me wrong. But these conversations feel very…middle-class? I get the impression that the women who are discussing ideas such as these (profound and important ideas) aren’t the women who are suffering under the thumb of society, patriarchal or not. I feel like, personally, I would give up some of my privilege, some of my “equality” that I have encountered constantly and has caused me to believe that feminism is no longer needed, to ensure a woman had access to the resources she needed to feed her children.

But it doesn’t work like that.

Because at a point, feminism is just rhetoric when there are people out there suffering, people you might pass in the grocery store and never realize it. And maybe they’re not suffering because of their gender per se, but why do we seem to be focusing on only those with some already established privilege when discuss feminism? What about the struggling single Mom on government aid to support her children, who’s barely scraping by, who’s working more than one job, who’s on the brink of homelessness? How does feminism help her? How can we change it so it does help her?

HeForShe…but who is She? And Where?

 Posted by on Sat, 10/1 at 10:52pm  reading  No Responses »
Oct 012016
 

So, I finally decided to do some research on the UN’s involvement in Feminism and Women’s Rights in their international movement: HeForShe. Spearheaded by Emma Watson (who totally inspired my Pixie Cut, not going to lie), the movement is to get boys and men on board and have everyone working towards creating a perfectly equal society in which men and women co-exist.

I watched her speech to the UN when she accepted the position back in 2014 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-iFl4qhBsE). She’s a tremendous speaker advocating for a great cause, but there is one thing I am hung up on: the totally one-sided name. Emma Watson establishes that feminism is supposed to uplift and liberate both men and women. So, why didn’t she pick a name like HeAndShe. Or hell, SheAndHe, if the order matters.

But that’s a rather minute complaint in the span of things.

Overall, I liked her speech. I like how she mentions “inadvertent feminists,” the people who have helped her along the way and didn’t treat her any differently because she was a girl. I like that she’s getting people to talk about feminism again and to become active.

My only worry is misdirection. Because there are certain statistics and stereotypes circulating within the feminist philosophy that aren’t true (I wanted to do a whole blog post on her later, but I might as well introduce her here now: Christina Hoff Sommers and her wonderful youtube channel Factual Feminist, which in a video debunks 5 widely circulated statistics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TR_YuDFIFI).

My biggest worry is that gender equality has to be quantified when you’re dealing with it on such a large scale, as Emma Watson and the UN are. And quantifications can be easily malleable based on variables and data manipulation. That isn’t to say that I purposefully believe that they would manipulate the data, but instead, to say that success isn’t definite. It’s just a big question mark.

I went to the HeForShe website to try and look up a platform. I found that it focuses on 6 different areas: Education, Health, Identity, Work, Politics, and Violence. For each of these areas is a Project headed by an Impact Champion (either a Head of State, a Corporate Leader, or a University Dean) to create the most impact by 2020. These take place in countries all over the world, such a Rwanda, Indonesia, Romania, Britain, the US, Finland, Uruguay, and more. The leaders have provided somewhat specific action plans (I was almost disappointed that they only had summaries on the website, instead of the in-depth measures they were going to take) of how they were going to make an impact on women’s lives in their countries.

For some reason, I have mixed feelings about this. Of course I admire and applaud their efforts! I really hope they have ground-level initiators making a difference.

But that’s the key-word: ground-level.

I stumbled across this article http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/why-feminists-are-so-cagey-about-class-plan-uk/18761#.V_BuHPArLHp talking about Feminism in the UK. And I thought it was fitting, since one of the world’s largest feminism advocates is from the UK.

Basically, it dissects a study performed that ranks the quality of life for girls in different places in the UK. And, surprise, the poorer the area is, the worse the quality of life is. Of course, the study doesn’t compare girls’ quality of life to boys’ in the same area, but just girls across the board. The author of the article points out how sometimes the feminist movement ignores class and expects women from all backgrounds to be treated equally and have the same opportunity. But it’s just not true, because men from all backgrounds aren’t even treated equally and have the same opportunity!

But it just makes me feel…I don’t know, awful(?) that there are so many people suffering, not necessarily because of their gender, but just because of plain old poverty. Both girls and boys are growing up this abysmal circumstances that no organization is focusing on in the slightest. I just feel like HeForShe is at risk of glossing over the real problems that encompass gender inequality.

Basically, I feel cognitive dissonance because I feel Feminism is too narrow of a label to really help girls. I feel like the whole point of feminism is to be lifting everyone up equally. I am the first to say that there are women in Asia, the Middle East and Africa who deserve our immediate attention because they have practically no human rights incorporated into their daily lifestyle.

But for countries with not so drastic conditions, like the US, and the UK, and Japan, we shouldn’t necessarily be focusing on bettering women, but bettering everyone. Emma Watson mentions this in her speech, the feminism should help men, too. But this goes beyond gender roles. It has to do with the economy, and government, and living conditions, and the impoverished sectors of society nobody likes to look at.

I know this isn’t a complete thought, but it’s just this visceral feeling I’m still wrestling with. I don’t have a solution. And I suppose I’m being too harsh on HeForShe, because at least they’re doing something. But at the same time, I don’t trust their statistics. I don’t know if they’re actually getting the job done, if they’re actually helping and empowering women on the scale that they say they are. I don’t know what the ground-level effects are. Because if poverty is still a problem in these places, then some women just aren’t going to make the cut. So maybe these countries are solving for the wrong problem. I’m not usually this skeptical, I swear. Usually I’m the opposite: completely naive.

But for me, there’s this duality of feminist experience: immediate, and at large. I think HeForShe does a good job at addressing both. It includes questions to post on your social media to stimulate discussion about various different topics, and highlights personal stories of how people have worked to change gender norms in their area. And it also includes the aforementioned projects of the Impact Champions for the “at large” component.

And I feel like, on a personal level, my immediate experience is fine, and that’s why I have felt in the past I haven’t needed the feminism label. But then there are those who really do need that feminism label – both boys and girls -and need a helping hand, and are facing oppression because of their gender, and aren’t able to escape gender roles, and are having doors closed in their face, and I’m afraid that those people who need the label won’t be able to get it. That HeForShe won’t get to them in time, these overlooked people hidden in the masses of first-world countries, suffering from poverty and living in unimaginable conditions.

I think I’m still hung up on Sarah Jessica Parker’s comment from my first post: I’m a humanist, not a feminist.

I don’t know. Maybe I demand too much from the world. I should be happy that HeForShe is making a dent in the world’s problems and helping people! But I have to ask myself…which people? Is it mostly girls? Should it be, when men in the same area might be suffering a similar burden? And where are they? And why do we ignore the cases right under our noses?

Coming out of the Closet…as a Feminist

 Posted by on Sun, 9/25 at 4:30pm  reading  No Responses »
Sep 252016
 

Reading 1: http://www.pacificu.edu/about-us/news-events/four-waves-feminism

So, I found this article very interesting. While I’m very familiar with first wave and second wave feminism, third wave feminism is where the movement starts to lose me. And before I read this, I found the fact that since the fourth wave’s platform wasn’t yet quantified, it weakened the movement.

But I think this might have changed my mind.

I learned that third wave feminism re-adopted high heels, lipstick, and cleavage, among other trends in physical appearance, that their predecessors sought to get rid of. 3rd wavers reasoning was that women should look beautiful for themselves, as the subject, instead of dressing this way to attract attention and belittle themselves into an object. They were also making a statement that no matter how a woman dresses and looks, she can still be intelligent and have a mind of her own, as well as articulated opinions.

Technology and the internet is a large part of the 3rd wave’s identity, and I hope to explore that in more depth.

I also found it interesting that the 3rd wave feminists don’t like the word feminism, because they find it “limiting and exclusionary.” They also find the struggle persisting on an individual level, where women need to grapple with their own position in society because the previous two generations have already given them all the tools they need. 3rd wavers want to be the last wave; they don’t see the need for a wide-scale feminist movement anymore.

I think this is where I have previously seen myself, at the tail end of the third wave. I’m not a fan of the word feminist because I feel it doesn’t address true equality, and I’ve believed that it’s up to women to come to their own terms with their gender and how that may affect their goals and ambitions, as well as how other people treat them (and how they’ll let that affect them also). It’s up to women to shape their own fate, even though antagonists are ever present. They need to rely on themselves, not a movement as a crutch.

Or so I was previously convinced.

But this article kind of puts things in perspective as why we may need a fourth wave. During the third wave, feminism became very academic and resided mostly in universities to be studied and talked about. While women were treated equally for the most part, perennial problems still exist that are crying out for feminism to address it. The fourth wave itself may be the movement from the university back to public discourse, to address problems such as: “sexual abuse, rape, violence against women, unequal pay, slut-shaming, the pressure on women to conform to a single and unrealistic body-type and the realization that gains in female representation in politics and business.” I think it’s super important that this dialogue is absorbed by the public and every day people have conversations about it. One thing that rubs me the wrong way about feminism is that some feminists make remarks that women “aren’t feminist enough” for disagreeing with certain principles or beliefs the majority holds. That kind of behavior has turned me off from a forum type discussion. But I realize those type of close-minded people hold true for any political or social discussion, and you have to push past that to get to the heart of the argument. Hence, me opening up to learn about a subject I’ve avoided for too long.

The author of this article addressed fourth wave feminism as women”coming out of the closet”  and admitting that they are a feminist, despite all the bad rap the word has received from all sides of the argument. Those joining the fourth wave are realizing that the 3rd wave was perhaps too optimistic, and that feminism is still needed by many women. And I relate to her analogy greatly.

She also makes an interesting point that fourth wave feminism is not a re-incarnation of the previous waves, but a completely unique movement spurred by millennials to treat problems that have been modified by a new age in which we live in.

It’s going to be interesting to see what the fourth wave turns into, and if we’ll be successful in recruiting men to our cause, and if we’ll pierce the heart of all classes, races, sexualities, and cultures.

An Ode to Alice

 Posted by on Mon, 9/19 at 10:03pm  ideas  No Responses »
Sep 192016
 

In class on Wednesday, Professor Mason brought up one of my favorite cartoon characters, Alice, and used her as evidence as how women in fields dominated by men are depicted are overly-emotional and unreasonably hysteric (fun fact: the word hysteria actually stems from the Greek word for uterus, and was used specifically to describe women’s emotional conditions, which were blamed on their physiology). Since I decided on Feminism as my topic of inquiry, I figured a great opportunity to address this would be through a blog post!

Professor Mason’s statement surprised me, because I had never considered to examine the cartoon through a “feminist” lens. Both my Dad (who is a computer scientist) and I are huge fans of Scott Adams and adore his comic strips, “Daily Dilbert Dose.” Alice has always been one of my favorite characters due to her bluntness and office tactics. I had never considered how Alice represents all women in these environments – I had only considered her as just Alice (especially since there are other recurring female characters who act vastly different from her).

So, I decided to go back through my saved stash of Dilbert cartoons and study her attributes and reactions across the board. I’ve attached some examples at the end of this blog post so you can get a feel for Alice as I argue on her behalf.

I had always perceived Alice as a woman who was just as smart as her male peers, if not smarter, and knew it. Thus, she becomes easily fed up with idiocy and doesn’t have any sort of filter when it comes to showing it. I never considered her outbursts to indicate any stereotypical volatility in the female emotional state – I just saw them as reactions from a smart individual fed up with those who refused to use their brains, would dodge work, or were just flat out stupid.

Alice is a character in a cast who all suffers from some sort of quirk or another. Dilbert is socially awkward, Wally is lazy beyond belief, Asok suffers from anxiety, the “Pointy Haired Boss” is unbelievably idiotic, and the list goes on and on. Alice’s trait is her anger, which stems from her intelligence and comes in the form of sarcasm and an incredibly short temper. I think including Alice in this canon, instead of posing her as the only “sane” worker, is very progressive because it puts her on the same playing field as her male peers. She’s not just the token female character – she has her own sense of humor she brings to the mix and a certain style to it. She’s her own person, with her own strengths and flaws. I believe her aggressive antics would be funny whether coming from a male or female character.

I also researched her Wiki page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_(Dilbert)), to see how they described her: “Alice is depicted as being one of the hardest-working engineers in the comic. She was at one time the highest paid engineer in the company, and on another occasion she was feted for receiving her fourteenth patent. She stands in contrast with Wally, who does no work and receives nearly the same reward. Alice suffers all the problems of being a female engineer. She has no tolerance for the discrimination she experiences, but she has little sympathy for other women who claim to be the victim of such discrimination, generally considering herself to be better than them.” (Don’t worry, I’m not counting this in my word count! I just figured it would be easier to copy and paste than paraphrase)

I find Alice a strong, self-reliant woman whose intelligence is often underappreciated. Instead of being rewarded for her contributions, she’s just asked to take on more work and continue to deal with the “idiots” that aggravate her so much (such as her verbally berating the “Inexperienced Guy”). She doesn’t try to hide this annoyance; instead, she speaks her mind. I think this is where she parts with the “stereotypical” women, because a trait found in most women is they don’t always say what they mean and they cause men to play guessing games. Alice is the complete opposite, where she lets everyone know exactly how she feels about them, and speaks things most people would be terrified/ashamed of saying out loud.

But, I have to play Devil’s Advocate. Did Alice’s flaw have to be her short-temper and sharp tongue? Is Scott Adams trying to make a statement on the conduct of women in the professional realm? (I tried finding statements from him regarding Alice, but I couldn’t find any, but I personally think that Mr. Adams is not blind to the challenges women face in the business/engineering world and highlights them in his cartoons, including some of the ones attached). I think he could have made Alice lazy (there is an unnamed female secretary who irritates Alice because she shows no initiative) without there being the same outcry, but I feel if she had the anxiety Asok displayed, that would be even more offensive, showing that women can’t handle high-stress environments. And of course, if she was as dumb as the Pointy Haired Boss, it would also be an insult, showing women can’t think for themselves. She could be socially awkward like Dilbert, but I find Dilbert to be a rather bland character (despite his obvious engineering prowess).

There is Tina the Technical Writer (who is the black-haired, purple shirt lady in one of the cartoons below, complaining about Alice’s humor), and I have personally considered her a relatively bland character who serves as a tool to exploit Dilbert’s social ineptitude, and is a relatively normal person amidst the social chaos. But after reading a bio description of her on the Internet, I found that she “believes any conversation within hearing distance is intended as an insult to her profession and her gender.”  I think that she serves as a foil to Alice to show conflicting stances on feminism, and that of course her disposition is exaggerated, because the entire universe is based on utter satire.

When you take into consideration that all of these characters are caricatures, Alice is still an impressive individual because she is intelligent, hard-working, driven, and relatively successful in her career. (Her dating life is another story, although it is considerably more successful than Dilbert’s and her other co-workers). Her short-temper and foul language just make her human; a character without flaws is boring. Many office folk find her outcries the highlight of their day before they delve into their own redundant activities.

I think Scott Adams isn’t entirely blind to the female dynamic in the office either, and pokes fun at it in various ways. In one of the cartoons, Asok, a man who is established as non-white (but his ethnicity is never specified), uses the “racist” card to win all arguments. Until he meets Alice, who provokes a stale mate with the “sexist” card. While his cartoon doesn’t show whether he takes a stance on whether he supports lofty words like this being thrown around, he does have Alice embrace her gender and use it to her advantage. There is also the “Social Networking” cartoon, where the male boss encourages Alice to network, but when she tries to, she is automatically assumed to be “hitting on” her superior. Here he sympathizes with women who are thrust into this position, acknowledging that it happens, but in successive cartoons, Alice  defuses any accusations by simply saying, “Relax, it’s just Networking,” rather than getting all offended (although she’s reasonably ticked off). Then there is the fact that Alice is holding tools as she announces she is the highest paid engineer in the department. Dilbert asks the question that we’re all thinking: are the two related? And I do have to wonder: would I ask that same question if Alice was male? And I think I would, if that male had the same aggressive disposition Alice is portrayed to have.

Alice is also used to point out deficiencies in male culture, such as in the cartoon with the Robot, where she programs an unsuspected “defect” into the robot by having him be interested in male hobbies and think like a man. I think the fact that Scott Adams consistently pokes fun at both genders throughout his cartoons show that his intention in crafting Alice to be someone who easily flies off the handle isn’t to be intentionally offensive to the female engineering community.

But then we have to ask, is it sub/unconscious (I’m never sure which to use after learning Freud)? I don’t know if there’s a way to prove it. I don’t think so, because he doesn’t consistently make all of his female characters angry. Annoyed to some extent, yes, but all the characters in his cartoon are. But if it were somehow proven that he sub/unconsciously made Alice the way she is because that reflects a detrimental female attribute, how does that affect society? Does that limit women in any way? Is Alice affected by a “glass-ceiling?” I believe she certainly isn’t getting the respect she deserves – but the same goes for Dilbert as well. I don’t know the answers to these questions, but hopefully after studying the subject in more detail this semester, I can think of some.

I think it would also be interesting to perform an in-depth study of the evolution of Alice’s character. In the older cartoons, I found a lot more instances of Alice being violent and invoking her “Fist of Death” (two are attached: one involving her work being used as a “back-up” and the other using her “eye cannons”). In the newer cartoons (circa 2010), however, Alice is more likely to explode verbally or berate people with a horrendously hurtful sarcasm than to physically harm anyone. Does this represent a sophistication of her character of some sorts? Does this reflect the workforce and a change in which women present themselves? Or has Mr. Adams’ humor just evolved with his age?

Just so I actually engage in some critical thought in this post, I think a person’s interpretation of Alice also has to do with whether they think gender is performative, or inherent. If one considers gender strictly performative, then I do not believe Alice has any defining “female” attribute, besides whenever she uses her gender to get what she wants or have the final say in arguments. I believe her behavior can translated to someone who is physically male, without him appearing effeminate. With that being said, I don’t believe her current behavior limits her as “butch,” either. She’s just an intelligent individual who is easily pissed off.

But, if you view gender as being inherent (meaning directly related to your genitals/hormones), then I can see how there might be some offense taken from Alice’s behavior, because of the whole hysteria thing I explained in the first paragraph (why is that so much further than I thought it was…?). Does Alice act the way she does because of her hormones, not simply because that’s who she is? Has Scott Adams crafted her with women’s mood swings and other “symptoms” in mind? Or is she a consistently irritated person, because of a consistently perennial “problem” of simply being female?

I personally feel like that belief is so archaic, because despite all having the same hormones, women’s personalities are so vastly different. Some women are aromantic, some don’t have any emotional attachment to children, some can be angry all the time, cry at everything, or completely apathetic. Just because Alice happens to be angry doesn’t mean it necessary speaks for her sex/gender; I’ve always seen it as it just speaking on behalf of her character (however questionable it may be, at this point).

I think these questions also raise a larger question of how women today want to be represented in different ways, and what this means for feminism. If a female character falls in a trope, does that cause her to limit female development and behavior by propagating a certain behavior or belief? Even if there are a substantial number of women who still belong in that trope, such as the house-wife? Even if there are other characters who are starkly different from this trope in circulation? How do women feel about this? Do they care?

I think the main question in regards to whether Alice is a healthy expression of female character is: are women in business/engineering/male-dominated professions consistently being represented this way, when in fact, it is completely inaccurate. I don’t know. Maybe they are, and if so, then I will renounce Alice and advocate for a new character who breaks those confines of female portrayal.

To be honest, I don’t know how women are represented, because there are so many different representations in circulation. But hopefully throughout reading on contemporary feminism and reviewing all sorts of media, I’ll gain a better understanding of how society sees women. But as for now, I still love Alice as a character, I don’t find her in opposition of feminism (even though she displays tendencies of being a female chauvinistic pig, by not having sympathy for women who play the female card and always bring up talk of discrimination when it is not relevant), and will continue to enjoy reading about her mishaps and laugh at her cleverly construed one-liners.

These are just my personal opinions (and probably biases, too), and I hope my presentation was cogent enough (I may come back and edit this, but I feel like that’s anti-organic, so I’m not sure). If you end up reading this Dr. Mason and would like to critique Alice’s character and turn-over any of my insights/arguments, I would be absolutely pleased! 🙂

Hope anyone who comes across this enjoys the cartoons at least, even if they don’t have patience to read my ramble.

alice alice-12 alice-11 alice-10 alice-9 alice-7 alice-6 alice-8 alice-1 alice-2 alice-3 alice-4 An Ode to Alice

“Yes, but” Feminism

 Posted by on Wed, 9/14 at 8:59am  Uncategorized  No Responses »
Sep 142016
 

Alright, so after deliberating a little bit, I decided to pick a topic I’ve been avoiding for multiple reasons: Feminism. While I’m inherently feminist in the sense of the word and it’s origins (I strongly identify with first wave – Charlotte Perkins Gilman, enough said – and second wave feminism, but third wave kind of starts to lose me, and I’m not entirely sure what the platform of today is), I’ve always preferred to think of myself as a “humanist,” because I want to encompass not just women’s issues, but LGBTQ issues and international issues as well (and I also believe that men, although significantly less than women, but still so, deal with the struggle of breaking performative roles and are limited by the expectations of society as well).

Interestingly enough, I’m not the only one with this view! I found that Sarah Jessica Parker told E! Weekly that she was not a feminist (http://www.ew.com/article/2016/08/04/sarah-jessica-parker-not-feminist). After scrolling further, I learned that she identifies with the word humanist. *cue eerie music and goosebumps* I 110% identify with everything she said. While I identify with the values of feminism (I want myself to have the same rights as men, duh), I’m not entirely sure if it’s still needed today as a label. There are going to be both misogynistic men and female chauvinistic pigs (FCPs) out there, and I believe no matter how much we educate people, they are still going to exist. But I love what SJP said about “If you’re a feminist, you’re just a normal person, and if you’re not, then you’re sexist.”

So I suppose my topic/question for class is: What exactly is the current wave of feminism? And is it still needed? Does dissent from the movement by women prove that we’ve reached a sort of “glass ceiling” on women’s rights, where most women do feel equal to men? How about women’s rights abroad? Shouldn’t feminists be focused on women in third world countries who have very limited rights?

I found a quiz on the Washington Post (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/national/feminism-project/feminism-typology-quiz/?tid=feminismseries) that would identify what kind of feminist I am, and apparently, I am a “Yes, but” feminist. And honestly, that’s how I feel.  Of the 95% of women who identify as feminist, but 16% identify as a “Yes, but” feminist. Some of the qualities of this sub-category include: believing feminism is not “focused on the changes they want,” does not “accurately reflect the view of most women,” “looks down on women without jobs,” and “unfairly blames men for women’s challenges.” While the last one is somewhere where I am personally unsure of where I stand completely on it, I believe the former three things.

So, I want to use this project as a way to educate myself about the historical and current conversations of Feminism, find where I stand, and hopefully contribute some new insight to contemporary feminism.

Interestingly enough, I found two photo banks with women holding up “signs” explaining why they do need feminism (http://whoneedsfeminism.tumblr.com/) and why they do not need feminism (http://womenagainstfeminism.tumblr.com/archive). I think the dichotomy is very interesting, and would like to study what creates this differences in opinion. While I more closely identify with the latter in most cases, there are some points on the other side that I identify with as well.

The personal problem I have with feminism is because I know a lot of people who attack other women for not being “feminist” enough – and I think that’s disgusting! Like, that’s the ANTI-THESIS of feminism! Feminists should believe that women have the capacity and right to make their own decisions, regardless of whether they agree with you or not. I can’t stand FCP’s, but if that’s how they want to uphold themselves, then fine – as a women, you’re allowed to do that.

At the same time, I realize I can’t despise feminism without learning more about it. I don’t want to put the women who support it in a large basket – I want to learn about the platform and if/how it is benefiting women in America, and then study it in an international context.

Okay, enough of my commentary (hopefully). Here is my research:

“Trickle Down Feminism” (https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/trickle-down-feminism). I could honestly annotate this whole article, but I’m going to try really hard not to. It’s saying a lot of things, so I’m going to highlight the main points: First, Feminists shouldn’t be focused on how high women can go in the workforce or if there is a “glass ceiling,” but instead be focused on uplifting the women at the bottom of the workforce (I agree with this; it makes me very mad that Meryl Streep, who makes at least 7 million dollars a year, is complaining about equal pay, when there are women who’s entire, life-long work effort would never even equal half that much). It also argues that people shouldn’t parade the growing numbers of women in the work force as a good thing, since they are primarily entering the poverty sectors. It also notes that how after the Great Recession, many women were displaced by men who lost their jobs in other sectors. This I find a true concern – the Recession could have reverted America back to the mindset that men need work first, not necessarily women. However, in the article, a feminist states “All work is gendered,” and I disagree with that. It talks about women primarily being janitors, but most of the janitors I have encountered in my life have been male – and I certainly do not consider that a gendered career. I believe that just because a career is dominated by someone of a specific gender does not make it gendered. I do agree, however, that it is important for women to advance their opportunities through education, and that they should have access to resources that will help them do so. But I believe this about impoverished men as well.  They also make a point that other feminists who are climbing towards that glass-ceiling are doing so on the backs of hardworking women in unfortunate circumstances, who they are not even giving a second glance. I particularly like this excerpt: “But that work still needs to be done, and, Poo notes, the conditions that have long defined domestic work and service work—instability, lack of training, lack of career pathways, low pay—are now increasingly the reality for all American workers, not just women. When we focus on equal access at the top, we miss out the real story, which historian Bethany Moreton points out, “is not ‘Oh wow, women get to be lawyers,’ but that men get to be casualized clerks.” The economy affects women, and perhaps more so than men, as women seem to be going into certain, low-paying professions more than men, but I believe if we help impoverished families as a whole, women’s conditions will improve. (I also eerily remember Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s essay, “Can the Subaltern Speak.” I’m a woman, but this subaltern is the lower-class women. Can I speak for them? Can I formulate opinions on how to help them without being patronizing?)

I’ve already written far too much, so I’m not going to even address the pay gap here, but it’s something I do want to do more research on. Personally, as of right now, I’m not sure if I believe there is a pay gap (Ivanka Trump said something very interesting about there being more a wage gap between “mothers” and working men, rather working women and working men, and I’d like to explore that). You can’t compare men and women in different sectors, different states, or even of different ages, because of seniority. It’s very hard to compare, and I look forward to reaching the numbers for myself.

Next Article: “Betty Friedan to Beyoncé: Today’s generation embraces feminism on its own terms” (https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/feminism/betty-friedan-to-beyonce-todays-generation-embraces-feminism-on-its-own-terms/2016/01/27/ab480e74-8e19-11e5-ae1f-af46b7df8483_story.html)

Alright, so this article said that the New Wave of Feminism is more focused on broadening it’s membership and ideology rather than with a shared struggle against oppression/identifying narrowly targeted enemies. And I think that’s what most Millennials see as a disconnect. In the beginning, it talks about how a college student doesn’t see Feminism as a political movement. It’s because we’ve already been indoctrinated with these beliefs, for the most part. It seems redundant to reiterate them. And maybe we’re reiterating them to the wrong community. Maybe we shouldn’t just be preaching this ideology at Universities, but instead hold a community outreach to lower-class, working women who may not have access to the ideas and resources that college-educated women do. The article also says that people are more likely to align with the terminology “the women’s movement” rather than “feminism.” People support feminist ideals, but not feminist labels. It is also arguing the definition of feminism has evolved after the past two generations, and women have their own, personal meanings of what feminism is.

But that’s my whole question: If everyone has a fractured, personal meaning of what feminism is, does that mean feminism still exists? Does that mean we can purport it and instill it in future generations, when not everyone is on the same page?

That’s all I’ll say on this one, but it was a really rad article and I hope I can reference it in my essay.

Okay, I swear I have more on my reading list that I have skimmed and topics that I plan on looking further into, but if I continue at this rate I’m going to write an essay, so I’m just going to do a summary (heh, yeah right) of one Academic article and call it a day.

“Girlfight the Power: Teaching Contemporary Feminism and Pop Culture” by Alyson Bardsley featured in Feminist Teacher (accessed through JSTOR)

So, I typed “Contemporary Feminism” into JSTOR and the most recent article was from 2006…not quite sure how to feel about that. I’ll obviously use some different databases to research more recent ones, but I think the article has some pretty good points that I want to delineate.

In the article, Professor Bardsley teaches a course on Third Wave Feminism, and learns that it’s a lot more than the “Riot Grrl” movement (and I’m kind of in the same boat as her before she learned all the different dimensions, that’s the only paramount characteristic I am familiar with). I learned that the Third Wave Movement branched from the second wave, because women found it too “anti-sex/heterosexually based” and frankly, too boring. Third Wave provided an ultimate venue for self-expression, including body art, new clothing styles, do-it-yourself projects, writing, etc. etc. The article mainly gave me a wealth of pop culture to review regarding Third Wave Feminism, including the movie Girl Fight and other gems such as the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, some bands, magazines, and scholarly articles.

I really look forward to the weekly, informal writings, so I can pick an article and just dissect it entirely! This was too much information for me to cover effectively (I don’t know how I passed Communicating Business Info, I’m one of the least concise people I know), but I hope I did you justice, Professor Mason.

 

 

 

An Exacerbating Exploration of Exigency: An Excruciating Exhibition

 Posted by on Thu, 9/8 at 11:08pm  Uncategorized  No Responses »
Sep 082016
 

I’m actually completely perplexed right now. Because never have I ever once sat down and asked myself, “Why am I driven to write?”

And frankly, I do not know.

And that really, really bugs me.

 

I happen consider writing a very private act. Author writes book. Readers consume book. Readers have questions. Authors answer very little of them – if any! And that’s that. Authors shape more lives than they know, in a very ex post facto sort of way. When I’m writing, I simultaneously juggle what the reader will get out of reading this, and what I will get out of writing this.

But that still doesn’t answer why I write.

I mainly like creative writing, and I like the form because authors can use rhetoric to dance around big issues. They can bring awareness to these monumental ideas through the subtlety of themes and motifs and allegories (and all of those figurative language terms we were forced to memorize in high school) without taking a stance on any of it. Writers are like that infuriating Freudian psychoanalyst who constantly asks us throughout the novel, “And how does that make you feel?” when we would much rather like to learn how THEY feel about the subject.

As much as it frustrates me, it invigorates me, and I love to weave controversies into my writing. I like to get people to think, and I love this sort of oxymoron that fiction presents, when something completely fabricated can illicit these profound ideologies.

What I write about varies, and how I write it constantly changes: sometimes it’s a standard short stories, and other times an ill-bred informal essay raising my complaints with the world. Of course, I write essays too, but never for fun – even though I have boatloads of fun whenever I write an essay (if it’s a boring topic, I challenge myself to sound as pretentious as possible so the professor has as much of a headache reading it as I did writing it).

I try to think of the things I’ve written out of the most urgency – and always, they’re when I’m trying to process something, when I’m working through cognitive dissonance. Sometimes, I settle on a solution. Other times, it spirals out of my control and I abandon ship.

I just realized the previous paragraph is very “meta” in it’s context, because RIGHT NOW I am writing due to cognitive dissonance. And I didn’t even know where I was going when I started, so I’m pretty impressed with myself. I must be on the right track.

Okay, so apparently I write because I want to explore different avenues of thought and select the one that suits me best. And I believe it holds true whether I do so through informal essays or through manipulating fictional characters like a puppeteer. Everything starts with a question, and writing is an answer.

I feel like that’s fairly self-explanatory and it shouldn’t have taken me this long to arrive at the conclusion.

But it’s weird, because I don’t think about why I write. I just do. The other night, when I had to make a very “future plan” altering decision, I wrote a rant exploring the poor justifications of why people run away from the things they love out of fear. My mind was buzzing at a million miles an hour, and I just sat down and started typing. When I’m fueled by emotions, I always start scribbling or typing away. I can be ecstatic, or depressed, or perplexed, and I’ll write about it. And it’s not so I can record it for Future Kira (although I do like re-reading my outbursts), and it’s not for other people’s eyes. It’s for me, in that moment, desperately trying to reach a conclusion.

But it doesn’t always just happen in one sitting. Just recently, I wrote a short story about how it’s impossible to avoid getting hurt by love, whether you’re the hopeless romantic or the bitter pessimist, and how to come to terms with that ground-shaking realization, and how to live your life knowing this, and the consequences of the path you choose when handling this (I realize I sound like a very sappy person, but I’m actually not). And right now, I’m writing about how paranoia of a very tangible but ostensibly distant danger can affect different dynamics – and how it plays out when that danger comes (is it a weakness, or is it a strength? Of course, there’s different degrees of paranoia, awareness, and ignorance to explore).

Bottom line: I write because I like to explore the limits of my imagination when it comes to answering a question. And it fascinates me because out of the millions of different ways I could have answered that question, I chose this one. And I’m especially amazed because sometimes it doesn’t seem like a conscious effort – sometimes it feels like the story has already been written.

With ALL of that that being said (I hope I answered the prompt – I spent way too long on this considering I have other homework due tomorrow), I have absolutely no clue what my research topic is going to be. I have too little exigency in me right now – anything I’m remotely interested is lukewarm. I need to crank up the heat this weekend get to philosophizing (wow, that’s not underlined in red for whatever reason, I thought I made that word up), because I know if I think about something long enough, it will consume me.

 

 

It’s just too bad I have the attention span of a – ooohh, what does this button do?

 

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