#I am saying that society deems it such. Sports is generally just sports‚ but women's sports is women's sports.

[into-the-milgramverse]

So, this interro answer

It gets kinda memed, like, "that's very trans of Fuuta", but like, I wanna look at this stance of his seriously, combined with how he willingly chooses to express masculinity (example, how he's openly into things that society considers as masculine interests, such as sports and gaming.)

I wonder if the reason he feels that way about being a man is a more unique case to him that likely doesn't apply to other men. Like, his behavior that he gets made fun of and called childish or having a tantrum, if it was done by a man larger than him, that man would be seen as dangerous and aggressive (example, T1, how he literally tries to attack Es, but all Es does is laugh at that attempt). I wonder how much his belief comes from the fact that he's not taken seriously as a man, that he really has to work for being seen as one. He'd literally have to change his personality completely, to quiet down and act calmer (and honestly? that likely wouldn't help either).

If he's not seen as a proper fully grown man by Milgram, what's it like outside? I can't really imagine it being any different, which is what may have shaped his views. I've mostly only seen this belief be attributed to his father being old fashioned.

[destyni-is-me]

okay so I read Brave New World yesterday and I am going to be talking out of my ass for a minute because I got some stuff I want to say but also I am not willing to articulate it in a way that makes more sense so without further ado here is my bullshit analysis about Lenina Crowne thank you

The book takes place in a society that believes “everyone belongs to everyone else” ie there isn’t really anything like monogamy and having multiple partners is a societal expectation. Not only is it expected, but it is indoctrinated into the citizens during their youth so it’s not just an expectation, but something they feel practically compelled to do. One of the themes in the novel is about challenging the societal conditioning- actively vying for freedom and choice over psychological manipulation and an assigned fate. 

Okay, you might be saying... what’s that have to do with Lenina? 

Lenina, in the book, is described as a healthy and beautiful young woman. She is popular with the men at her job and she likes society how it is. Every inch of her appears to be the model citizen. 

But she has one flaw... 

When we meet Lenina, she has been going out exclusively with the same man for nearly four months. The man, Henry Foster, has been seen not participating in this exclusivity in the same way as Lenina as he is a healthy standard society male. Lenina doesn’t mind that he’s doing this, but she has to be coerced by a friend of hers to see other people aside from Henry. The person she ends up going out with aside from Henry is Bernard, who everyone deems undesirable because he is short and negative. 

After her disastrous time with Bernard, there is a new man she is interested in. And once again, we see her falling into a monogamous mindset. John isn’t from the society, and thus was not indoctrinated in the same way as everyone else and doesn’t understand their world. Still, Lenina finds him attractive and tells her friend that she can’t stand being with anyone other than John to the point that it’s painful. Even taking drugs is pointless, because when they wear off she’s still only interested in John. 

John likes her, too, but has a very negative attitude towards sex most likely stemming from his mother and how her many lovers impacted their lives when he was a kid. Lenina is sexually active, though, and offers herself to him only to be attacked by him. John’s attitude towards sex continues to be an issue as towards the end of the book, Lenina once again offers herself because despite everything she still likes him, and this time instead of just his hand against her it’s a whip. Her overall fate is unknown. 

I’m sure it’s obvious where I’m going with this, but I will explain anyway. 

Lenina plays the part of the average, healthy society citizen well. However, she desires just a single partner on multiple occasions. In fact, at the end of the book she is with Henry again. Throughout the book, Bernard tries to impress and shock her with his own radical thinking, and though it disturbs her greatly she doesn’t get him in trouble or anything when she so easily could. 

Lenina herself is just the kind of individual that the society in the book should be afraid of. With her monogamous streak in her interest in both Henry and John, as well as the same romantic singular feelings she herself inspired in Bernard, a woman like her would be considered dangerous. Yes, Lenina enjoys sex and she enjoys the sports she is conditioned to enjoy, but she is also at heart a romantic which is the exact kind of thing they don’t want in their society. On top of that... Lenina is one of the 30% of women left naturally fertile. It is entirely possible, though highly unlikely, that she could become pregnant and give birth to a future generation of dissidents and thus be the very key to bringing the society down. 

I’m probably overthinking it, though, because honestly they never bring up Lenina’s own oddness outside of the inciting incident where she accepts Bernard’s offer of a date to avoid getting in trouble for only showing interest in Henry. All in all, I think Lenina was an interesting character who I wish had more focus in the book. 

[forsetti]

On Racial Justice: Time For Action

When I was in high school, a young girl went missing. There was a rumor she had been abducted. This was years before cell phones and then internet. Word spread through phone trees, in diners, at the gas station, in the barbershop and hair salon. The entire county became quickly invested into finding her. It was as if someone took a big stick and beat the hell out of our little beehive.

She was found, later that day, up one of the canyons that bordered the rural valley where we lived. She had been killed. I know this because my father was the county coroner, as well as the local mortician. As the news of her murder spread as quickly her abduction had earlier in the day, a wave of anger and fear blanketed the valley. Anger because of what had happened to “one of their own.” Fear because there was an existential threat to their own children out there, somewhere, still at large. The beehive was whipped up into a frenzy.

I can't remember if it was later that same day or the next but the local police soon found and arrested what they described as “a drifter from California,” for the young girl's abduction and murder. They locked the man up in the little jail that was located in our town hall.

Once news of the arrest and jailing hit the hive, the emotions that had been building over the past couple of days began to boil over. By that evening, after a number of drinks at one of the local watering holes, a number of men had worked themselves up into a frenzy over what had happened. At some point, one of the men suggested they drag that “mother fucker” out of the jail and administer some “good ol' country justice.” Before you could say, “vigilante justice,” a number of armed men in pickup trucks were parked in front of the town hall ready to reenact their own personal version of “Death Wish.”

With all respect to the local police force, the few officers on duty were able to talk the inebriated, heavily armed group off the ledge. The men eventually drove off to their respective homes, no one was lynched, and a crisis was averted. A few hours later, in the middle of the night, the police transferred the prisoner to a larger jail a hundred miles away.

The reason I bring up this story is because I am reminded of it every time I hear white people lecture black people on how to behave after one of their unarmed sons and daughters is killed by the police. I watched, in real time, an entire community get worked up to a fever, murderous pitch over the course of a couple of days over the murder of one of their own. Yet, people just like those I grew up around who, within a few hours, rationalized a lynching over one unjust death, cannot imagine the release of pent-up fear and anger many black communities feel that has been building for generations.

The reason Colin Kaepernick kneeled during the National Anthem wasn't because of the killing of one person. The reason there were riots in Ferguson MO in 2015 wasn't just because of the death of Michael Brown. The reason there are protests and riots in all fifty states right now isn't just because of the deaths of George Floyd or Breonna Taylor. The reason for all of these is the centuries-old, systemic practice of viewing and treating black bodies as expendable.

When citizens do this like we've recently seen with the murder of Ahmaud Arbery, it is horrible and deserves moral outrage and legal repercussions. When this happens at the hands of those entrusted to serve and protect the very people it kills, without consequences, it is evil. When this happens over and over and over and over....again, it is a moral failure not just of the law enforcement officers who do this but of our society because we've turned a blind eye to the deaths, pain, and suffering of our own.

It doesn't take a lot of thought to imagine what would happen if it was unarmed white people being killed by the police. One of the turning points in how the nation viewed of the way our government was handling the Vietnam War was shooting deaths of four young, unarmed students at Kent State in 1970. Like the rural area where I grew up, white America doesn't tolerate the killing of their own by agents of the government. Not for one fucking second.

Yet, a whole lot of white America can't seem to understand why Black Americans get so worked up whenever one of their own is murdered by the police. I've seen more video of white people screaming at police for pulling them over or for asking them to obey safe practices during a pandemic than over the killing of their fellow, unarmed citizens.

I know there are a host of hot takes as to why white America doesn't really give a damn about the killing of unarmed minorities. If the analysis doesn't begin and end with, “as a whole, white America views minorities as inferior and expendable,” it isn't worth a damn. This doesn't mean all of white America is racist. It means that, as a group, white America doesn't care enough to change the status quo. This shouldn't be a revelation to anyone who pays attention to the world around them. White America hasn't given a damn about minorities since, forever. They have really never cared about Native Americans. They've only given a half-assed care about blacks and that was only after seeing images of church-dressed men, women, and children being attacked by police dogs and brutalized with batons and fire hoses at the hands of racist, Southern police. Once the Civil Rights Act passed, White America pretty much went back to not giving a damn about black people. It almost seems like giving blacks the right to vote was all the care White America could muster and a lot of them couldn't (and still can't) do that. The fear and anger the people in my community felt over the course of a few days back in the late 70s led them to be willing to break whatever laws they deemed necessary to get the justice they felt they deserved. Imagine this same fear and anger not building up over a few days but a few centuries. Imagine not one member of your community being unjustly killed but dozens and dozens each and every year. Imagine the fear and anger not that these deaths were the result of some random person but by the very people hired and entrusted to protect your community.

The surprising thing isn't that black Americas are angry. The surprising thing is they've kept their anger in control as well as they have. White Americans protest and riot over their favorite sports team winning or losing. They protest and riot over a beloved football coach being fired. They protest and riot over having their favorite drink being taxed. They protest and riot over not being able to get their hair cut and flower beds properly tended. Black Americans are protesting over the killings of their loved ones.

I cannot imagine what it is like to fear for your life every time you encounter the police, regardless of the circumstances. I cannot imagine worrying about any of my children being harmed, let alone killed by the police. I cannot imagine being punished more harshly by the police and courts for doing the same things that others have done. I cannot imagine being viewed as “violent,” “lazy,” “a thug,” “a threat,”... , no matter how wealthy or successful I am, by a good portion of society, just because of the color of my skin. I cannot imagine my water supply being poisoned with lead and no one with any power gives a damn. There are thousands of things about being black in America I cannot even imagine.

Just because I can't imagine these things doesn't make them not real. It doesn't make them not important. That I cannot imagine these things just means I've been fortunate enough to be on the other side of the systemic racism in our country. As I watch the current protests over the latest police killings of unarmed blacks, I'm hopeful and afraid. Hopeful because the number of protests not just in big cities but around the country in towns large and small means, like the images on tv from the 60s of the Civil Rights marches, are having a real impact on white America. Fearful because I know the history of this country when it comes to the levels it will go to protect the white patriarchy.

Within the past few years, I watched the election of someone who is the personification of white supremacy as a backlash to the first black president. Trump won the election because the majority of white men and women voted for him. They may not do the same next time around but that they did the first time tells you all you need to know about where White America stands when it comes to racial justice and equality.

When it comes to the deaths of unarmed blacks by police, to the overpopulation of our prison system, to the gross wealth disparity of whites and blacks, to too many issues to list here, to my fellow White Americans, I quote Pogo, “We have met the enemy and he is us.” You know damn well you wouldn't tolerate being treated how blacks our in our country. You know damn well you wouldn't tolerate the killing of your sons and daughters by anyone, especially the police.

It is time to stop pretending the problem isn't systemic and it is the responsibility of minorities to fix. White America built the system. White America has and still does, to a great extent, support it. White America, all of it, benefits from it. It is up to us to dismantle it. We can either go down as the ones who did what was necessary to live up to the promises of our Constitution and Bill of Rights, or we can go down in history as just another era that made promises it never intended to live up to. This isn't something that could or should wait another day to happen. It is centuries behind schedule. Trying is no longer enough. To quote a Jedi Master, “Do or do not, there is no try.” We owe it ourselves but, much more importantly, we owe it to Black Americans past and present.

[growingstronglikeahighgardenrose]

Christmas Wishes

We’re nearing the end of my 12 days of Sanditon journey, this is the last Regency era fic. But it’s a long one to compensate. If brevity’s the soul of wit, I don’t have it.

Pairings: Babington/Esther, Crowe/Clara, Sidney/Charlotte

For the 12 Days of Sanditon Prompt ‘Tree’, hosted by @sanditoncreative​

Synopsis: A Sanditon AU in which the Parkers and Denhams are rich, Crowe is a lord, and Babington isn’t.

Full story available on AO3

‘Miss Denham, Miss Heywood, Miss Brereton, I'd like to introduce my friends. This is Lord Crowe and Mr Babington.’

Esther, Charlotte and Clara studied the men in front of them. The Lord looked at them appreciatively, but he didn’t appear to be too steady on his feet. His friend, on the other hand, had quite a studious look about him with his beard and less stylish clothes.

‘Our friend assures us of good sport here,’ Lord Crowe smirked, ‘shall we find any?’

Another immature playboy, unable to grow up because he never had to worry about a thing in his life. Esther fought to refrain from rolling her eyes. Her aunt wished for her to marry soon and well, since she was already past twenty-five, but it appeared all men she met suffered from the same chronic ailments: stupidity and superficiality.

‘I believe there is very little shooting in the neighbourhood, sir.’

‘I wasn't thinking of shooting.’

Now her eyes were rolling, and she didn’t even care.

‘My friend was thinking of dancing, I'm sure’, the one named Babington said with a light-hearted laugh.

‘Could we persuade any of you young ladies to dance with us?’ Mr. Babington asked.

Clara’s eyes took in the drunk lord. No doubt she saw in him a way to escape her situation. ‘I'm sure you could, sir’, Esther replied as Clara and Lord Crowe were already taking each other by the arm.

The bearded man offered Esther his arm and she took it, allowing him to take her to the dance floor.

Your brother will be very pleased with you, Mr Parker’, Charlotte smiled.

‘Yes, I hope so. Crowe’s a well-intentioned man, he just has a couple of bad habits he has a hard time kicking. But what’s more important, he's a good friend of the Prince Regent. Now, if he could be convinced into coming to Sanditon, then the general rejoicing would be unconfined, I imagine.’

Charlotte couldn’t help but agree as the two continued their walk.

‘So, Mr. Babington. A friend of Mr. Parker?’

‘Ah, yes. I taught him at college.’

‘You’re a professor?’

‘I’m only a doctor, unfortunately, the world does not need many of those’, he admitted with some shame.

It was a polite way to say he had a hard time finding a job, but the man was a scholar nonetheless. At least he would be more interesting to talk to than the other guests present.

‘What’s your field of expertise?’

‘Economy and Philosophy.’

‘Practical studies and formulas versus the study field of dreamers? How odd.’

He couldn’t help but respond to her amused smile with a laugh of his own.

‘Ah, but the economy as it is, is proof of a certain philosophy. Right now, the philosophy of our economy is capitalism and liberalism. Our economy is formed by our idea of what a good economy should be. I enjoy reflecting on economic systems. You frown, Miss Denham, do I displease you? Perhaps you find the topic tedious. I confess, it isn’t the most engaging topic for most people. Forgive me, I am not used to the company of women, or society in general.’

‘I don’t mind philosophy, but I rather dislike economy. It’s only money.’

Mr. Babington’s eyebrows rose, as would anyone who didn’t know Esther Denham but knew how much influence money had on one’s life.

‘I don’t like sounding superficial, Miss Denham, but money is never just money.’

She rolled her eyes.

‘I dislike money because in my opinion, far too many people consider money the ultimate goal. Everyone’s obsessed with it. According to me, it is a means to an end, not a goal in and of itself.’

‘Ah, there is a philosopher in you’, he laughed.

‘You thought me shallow?’ she inquired, raising an eyebrow.

He shook his head vehemently, before turning her around.

‘No I did not. You never gave that impression. I simply misunderstood your previous statement given your position in society, but I understand now. I believe I agree, but just to be safe, might I enquire as to what you deem a worthy goal?’

He was incredibly honest, Esther had to give him that. Even though she was pretty sure he’d just confessed to being surprised that a rich woman didn’t care a lot about money, she found herself interested in continuing the conversation. If he kept it up this way, she was almost tempted to have a second dance with him after this one.

But now she wished to impress him, instead of answering with generally accepted goals. Unfortunately for her, her goals were in fact quite commonplace.

‘A goal could be happiness, ample money helps to take away worry and makes one able to do things one enjoys. To have a happy marriage would be a goal, if both or one partner are wealthy enough, they are able to marry instead of being kept apart by circumstance. Children are a goal, and money comes in useful to provide for them when they need clothes or a doctor.’

‘Just my two cents’, Esther shrugged.

‘Now I understand, and now I can say I agree?’

‘I thought a philosopher always managed to critique or question a certain idea.’

‘Oh I can, but I don’t see a particularly big flaw in your line of thinking.’

‘Humour me, provide me with one critical note.’

‘There are philosophers, and countless of everyday examples, of poor people being very happy, and rich people being miserable, of children lacking in nothing with parents having plenty of money yet dying.’

‘Money helps achieve a goal. It helps. There’s still other forces at play. But I daresay for the majority of people, money is necessary to at least have a shot at reaching their goals. Those who can be content despite incredibly poor circumstances, are few and far between.’

‘I know. I knew my argument was weak, and I already agreed with you, but since you asked, I told you. I would not dare to go against a lady’s wishes.’

That made her smile, and decide to have another dance with him should he ask. But Lord Crowe asked her for the next, and Babington didn’t try again.

♦♦♦♦♦♦

‘Aunt, what is that?’ Esther asked upon entering the room her aunt was currently occupying with her commanding presence.

‘You too?’ Lady Denham asked. Clara shot her an apologetic look, but Esther simply turned away. Their bond had bettered, but she still hadn’t forgotten her frolicking with Edward.

‘A pineapple. I’ll host a dinner to celebrate Miss Lambe’s arrival to Sanditon. New money always comes in handy in places like these. Had your brother not been the stupid oaf he was, I might have been able to couple them, but he simply had to squander away his life the way he did. No matter. Miss Lambe needs to be convinced of the merits of Sanditon to invest in it, and Lord Crowe needs to be convinced of yours, Esther.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Lord Crowe is a prize well worth the winning. You will be seated next to him. And you will present yourself as a lovely and eligible wife. You are a wealthy English lady of impeccable family. I am well aware that you have so far frittered away these advantages and wasted your most beautiful years with walking, painting and reading silly books, but you must marry one day and he is rich and has important acquaintances. I married well twice to ensure our family had money. I only ask you to marry well once. Though it is unfortunate he appears to be young and in good health.’

‘The man’s a drunk’, Esther sighed while ignoring the stabs her aunt tried to deliver.

‘You may prize yourself lucky if that’s his only fault. Besides, most drunks can’t do a lot. At least he’ll leave you in peace.’

‘Perhaps you should put him with Clara, since she didn’t seem to mind yesterday.’

Her cousin threw her a shocked look, but didn’t disagree. She would be stupid to insist on not sitting beside such a wealthy bachelor.

‘No, no. There will be no escaping this Esther, you have to try at least.’

‘Doesn’t Clara have to marry as well?’

‘Yes, but you’re the easier one to marry off. You have money and name.’

‘One could say that after attending two season a year for almost ten years in a row, she is obviously not easy to marry off’, Clara noted sharply.

‘Girls. What did I tell you after that fleabag left? There would be no fighting over my inheritance and there would be no animosity between the two of you. But if this is the case, I shall put both of you next to him. Betting on two horses has always been the wiser strategy. I trust you do understand the difference between the arts of courtship and sarcasm, Esther? I hope I do. You'd better. If neither of you secures him, I will be very disappointed in you. And you don't want to fall out of favour with me, do you?’

‘No, Aunt’, the girls replied.

‘You have your work cut out for you. That man has seen a lot of the world, and without a doubt a lot of women. It shall take no little amount of flirting and being pretty to make him choose country girls over the age of twenty like yourselves. Once you've secured his hand in marriage, you can go back to wasting your days like usual. I want to see both of you married before Christmas. And that is both a wish and a command.’

The girls nodded and waited until Lady Denham left before Esther went back to her novel, and Clara to her piano.

[knightofquail]

Tall Girl, on Netflix

Okay so this movie has been rocking my world for like a good few hours. Mainly over the idea is being a tall woman a subordinate identity?

I do think that it can be a lot of contexts. Obviously there's the whole thing about society just not being made for people over six foot. For example, seating on public transportation (or even private sometimes, like I can barely drive my grandmothers little, yellow Volkswagen bug), doorways being too short or even just door handles not a comfortable height to open doors, beds not being long enough, the list is endless. That is generally stuff that can be applied to tall people in general regardless of other identities.

However with the tall identity it can be seen as the dominant identity in other contexts. When it comes to jobs, those who are taller are more likely to be remembered, when it comes to crowds it is easier to see over people, and when grocery shopping you can always reach the top shelf (I have been asked so many times to grab stuff for people). There is a stereotype that tall people are generally more athletic or have a higher chance to succeed in certain sports like running, volleyball and of course- basketball, but also there's a beauty component to it. There is also that whole idea that tall people are thin, beautiful, athletic people who are ripe for modeling. Which like any stereotype there are some truths to them but there are obviously people who don't fit into those ideas of tall people. For example, me. I'm not athletic or elegantly thin and my own insecurities tell me I am not beautiful but that's a whole other conversation.

However, when adding the identity of being a woman the whole situation changes. Men have the dominant identity when it comes to gender, we know, but also the whole height situation changes as well. Men are celebrated for being tall, in many social situations, like highschool (ugh) it can add to their social status and power. I'll never forget this one guy in high school who was remarkably similar to me in a lot of aspects. We were both tall, white, somewhat attractive, good at school, active in theater and sports (although him a lot more than me), and had similar tastes in media (okay we were both nerds and loved a lot of the same shows). However, in theater he was always chosen for lead male roles while I never had a chance at lead female roles because I was tall (I'm 6'3" for instance, and he is now 6'6"). He also had so much more power than me because he was accepted by our community immediately while I had to fight for my acceptance. In the movie, it showcases this with Stig being able to quickly soar to popularity, while Jodi has to march up on stage and declare her humanity.

The beginning of the movie also portrayed a frustration that many of us tall girls understand well, clothing. The clothing that is available to us darling tall people widely varies on location and our economic status. My tall friend from high school is able to express his gender identity a lot easier than I was able to because stores, even the rural area I lived in had clothing more available to him than to me. Meanwhile I felt as though I had to embrace a 'tom boy' identity because of the clothing that was available to me, which was athletic wear or farm attire- carharts, jeans and a T-shirt. I thought that the movie did embrace that at the beginning, having the main character Jodi wear pants that were short and a lot of athletic wear. However I thought what the movie didn't address was that clothing options for the main character seemed to be easier than most. For example, she was able to find clothing in a store that she could actually put herself into, and that it wasn't too expensive for her family to buy for her. In my experience and because of my rural location I could never walk into a store (that wasn't hours away) and try on clothing and have it fit the way it was meant to fit and reflect the way I wanted to present myself. The closest I ever got was the whole Maxi Dress movement which allowed for a dress that for a lot of tall girls meant actually having cloth near my ankles. But unfortunately that was not for me because I was still too tall for maxi dresses and because of what was available before I had fully shunned feminine clothing at the time. Dunkers was able to buy Jodi high heels that fit her because they were in a urban enough location to have a store dedicated to drag queens- something that couldn't be found in the very small, farmer populated rural area from which I was raised.

What was available to me was the internet, for which I am very lucky to have now, and came at a crucial time for me- again highschool. Through the internet I was able to buy clothing meant for tall women. However what isn't said a lot of the time is how expensive that stuff is. The question came to be, am I going to wait however many weeks it takes for my long pants to get here that I paid $70 dollars for, or I am going to go to the Walmart 30 mins away spend $60 dollars on three pairs of jeans that are too short and limit my wardrobe to figuring out what looks acceptable with rolled up jeans to hide the fact that they are too short for me? As someone who is now scraping every penny to go to college I was going to use the rolled up jeans look and have my ankles freeze in -30 degree weather so that I at least had three pairs of pants to wear not just one. Also, a lot of those websites who cater to tall women specifically cater to tall thin women, something that tall men would probably have less trouble because of 'big and tall' stores (although let's admit they still have trouble). But at least I can wear men's shoes and no one gives me sass for it!

Also speaking of sass about wearing shoes, I found it almost refreshing that when Jodi eventually did wear heels in the movie- no one gave her any sass for it. I have distinct memories about the few, rare, times I would wear heels everyone in my school would tell me, 'why are you wearing heels? you don't need them'. I don't think they should be necessary for anyone and I cry for anyone who they are necessary for because damn they're uncomfortable but unfortunately because of my height I was forbidden from partaking in a feminine practice of wearing heels.

Then there is just the identity of being the tall girl. I think the movie put it well when Jodi commented on how that's what people see when they look at her. They don't see that she more than just her height, only her friends do. The rest of the school sees her as an amazon, a giant etc. And yes, that's something that's never going to change. When people talk about me, they're going to say, "Oh yeah, she's that really tall girl, right?". Yes, it's a physical descriptor, but depending on the person's attitude about their height it can suck. If a person who views their height as negative, then every time that happens, every look a stranger gives to make sure you're not wearing heels or standing on something, or every comment whether it be about your perceived talent for basketball, the weather, or just 'whoa you're tall' can hurt like hell. Especially if all you want is to fit in which is a very common need/want in high school, which is exactly what the show tells us. If you had a big nose, would you like it if people checked all the time to make sure it was real? Or say 'whoa what a big nose?' I dont think you would.

I think the movie also did a good job of portraying the process of acceptance that a lot of tall girls have to go through. There was a moment where I had to accept that I will never wear a size medium t-shirt. I cannot change my height, or the effects that it has had on me. The scene where Jodi looked up how much it would cost to have height reduction surgery hit home for me. I believe that a good portion of us have been there. As I said earlier our mental attitude about the subject can drastically change our experience. By accepting that part of yourself and 'letting your freak flag fly', your entire experience of the world changes. By accepting and owning that I am tall, I am able to keep those comments about how tall I am assure me instead of making me miserable. Jodi is able to do the same thing. I believe that there is something to be said about that because unfortunately there is no other choice. I can't make everyone I encounter to not mention or think about my height, not without making a huge stink about it in a public sphere that won't really make a difference anyway because let's face it. There aren't that many of us. There's a reason that many tall girls aren't portrayed in media because there is less of a demand for it. But unfortunately, we stick out like sore thumbs.

I had a friend that I made in a music festival text me weeks after to tell me that in her highschool statistics class they were discussing heights and she mentioned me and my height. The teacher took it as an opportunity to calculate how many standard deviations I was from a 'normal U.S. female height'. 2.5 standard deviations. 2.5 standard deviations away from 'normal'. I am an outlier, and a lot of women on this page are also probably outliers. After watching that movie, even though it's catered to teens and not my specific genre type I was just so happy to actually have a movie about people like me. People who are deemed outliers. It was the first time I had seen a film of any kind that a extraordinarily tall woman wasn't the butt of a joke or just a comedic factor.

Sorry this turned into a freaking essay.

TL;DR this movie, despite some of it's flaws was an amazing step forward in representation of tall girls

[cpbandr]

Final Reflection

In this class, I learned the value of being an independent woman. After reading so many different stories about women in other cultures that are often forced to marry in order to be protected, and how they have to cover their beauty so they are not physically assaulted I believe no woman should be told how to dress or have their role assigned. Growing up in a free country I know that I am fortunate because I can make my own decisions and I have decided that the best way to help women stuck living with outdated cultures or governments (those that do not believe in women’s independence) is through education. A great meme in our course syllabus states, “Write what should not be forgotten.” This is true for teaching women that they deserve to live equally with men and that joining feminist movements can help in the fight for equality. We are identified based on our gender, race and so much more, but at the end of the day we all are human and for that alone we should have equal rights. Being homosexual, a different race or gender should not determine how we dress or how much we get paid, but it does in many cases. Using the media to shed light on the discrimination women face in everyday life is a most valuable way to end stereotyping. A powerful woman such as Ms. Crenshaw and Ms. Okpranta are just two women that are helping to increase change through their writing.  TedTalks can help reach women that are not allowed to live freely. In order to live in a world that allows independence, the value of acceptance is another important lesson I learned this semester. When people accept who you are, you are able to express yourself freely and not feel forced into a box that society chooses for you, based on gender. I am only nineteen and have no clue who I am, yet, but I choose to live every day with an open mind allowing me to become the person I will grow into, and having the support of my family and friends is the best thing for me. After reading Three Daughters of Eve, I felt as if I understood so much about how her mom viewed religion and the struggle people face every day when their parent’s views do not align with their own. However, after doing some research through the weekly powerpoints, I was distraught to learn the author, Ms. Shafak was prosecuted for “insulting Turkishness” and would face up to three years in prison. Her book is so important in helping women understand the way gender and tradition are typically viewed by some religions or cultures, or statuses (class structure).  Issues are just a few of the important themes discussed in the book. Not having literature bring to light the way things are in other countries is the way governments stop educating women on how they could live their lives. Not having writings also stops the effort that people go through in order to spark change. Women often try to break the stereotypes that culture forces them into believing.  A valuable lesson Mohanty shared is that we are often blind to a perspective outside our own. This reminds me of a horse that has blinders on,  stopping him from looking around at things that might cause distractions. Knowing that so many women are raised not being allowed to see life choices and opportunities is horrible. However, this brings us back to educating women through writings which can help to remove the blinders some women are forced to wear.  Finally, they can see how other women are living independently and choose which way of life they really prefer. There have also been many words I have learned throughout this semester including androcentrism and ethnocentrism, but the words that taught me the biggest lesson were the difference between sex and gender. Until this semester, I had assumed that both words meant the same thing. However, I now know that sex is what you are assigned at birth while gender is how you are assigned culturally/ socially. With my generation focusing on being more “woke” I think this is a powerful thing to educate others about. Luckily with the use of gender-neutral pronouns, we are able to easily recognize how someone chooses to identify themselves rather than just assuming based on outward appearance. I have always been terrified to identify myself as a feminist due to the many men I know who would think I do not like them based on their gender. However, I was able to be educated on what the term feminist means and can confidently identify myself as one because I believe in equal rights and especially equal pay. The thought of being judged for a gender I was born with and not have any control over is sickening to think about. After searching ‘What it means to be a woman?’ I found an article that states “Being a woman means being able to be powerful and assertive, yet kind at the same time. It means being compassionate and vulnerable towards those we love in our lives without feeling weak for doing so. It means striving for our goals even in the face of the adversity we may encounter along the way.” As women, we are told to hide our emotions unless they are deemed nurturing, but for men, they are able to show their emotions and be told it's because they are “men.” I work in an athletic store and when there are sports questions by customers they typically never ask females to help them in our golf department rather, but our most qualified staffer in that department is indeed a woman.  Oftentimes men would rather hear things from someone of their own gender because they feel as if we are “lacking qualification” just because we are women. Even though we all have to go through the same exact training, they prefer to hear it from a male. 

A quote found in the same article mentioned above is a better representation of what it means to be a woman “To me, being a woman also means using my own privilege to support others—Black women, disabled women, and trans women—who face even more barriers than I do. I love being a woman, and I love having the privilege to fight for my right to be a woman with full control over my body, future, and life.” said Tegwyn Hughes. We have the power to control our future, our bodies, and our life based on taking a stand against things we consider sexist and by using our voices to create change and against things that are unfair. We are fortunate to be able to educate women in countries such as India whose culture believes  “a woman’s sole purpose in life is to be a good wife and mother.” Nowhere in this statement does it mention that a woman’s role is to provide and have a job and live an independent life outside of the home. These women are raised this way by their mothers and the culture is causing them a lack of education so they don't ask for equal rights. Thankfully, powerful women all over the world are writing books and starting movements with other women to bring about change. As found in the ‘Radical women, embracing tradition’ one woman spoke up about how she felt about injustice happening in her country and talked about the issue with other women, “first just 10 or 20, then 50, and finally hundreds of women---- wearing white, singing, dancing, saying they were out for peace.” As a woman I know I would have the support of so many other women if I ever spoke out against feeling upset about the way I was treated. I remember being younger and thinking I wish I was a boy, it would be so much easier. Now after taking this class and learning about the movements and goals women have created to help create gender equality makes me proud to be a woman. Every day women are a force to be reckoned with, especially in sports. A woman currently in the news that has had the support of so many other women is Simon Biles. After deciding to not be in the final of the 2021 Olympics, women from around the world took to social media to stop any hate she was receiving. At first, I had no idea why they were supporting her because as many articles stated she had lost us the gold medal. However, Ms.Biles is so much more than an athlete and a medal. She is a woman who has been assaulted by her own doctor and used her voice to speak against him alongside many other girls on her team. Oftentimes, sports allow male doctors to get away with what occurs by paying off the athletes, but instead of letting that happen, the gymnasts used their collective voice to show that it is okay to speak out and stand up for themselves. 

[tramgedachten]

..A RANT ON WHY I AM A FEMINIST..

Today I was crying in the toilets at work. That probably seems like the most stupid thing to say when you want to promote equality... but hear me out. Today was also International Women's Day, and since my colleagues think is fun to use me as a dartboard whenever the subject FEMINISM comes up I had to endure a lot of jokes. And to be fair, I don't mind jokes. However when they are paired with the inability to see your own privilege I kind of get upset. I would have stayed and debated them, but I did that the first 20 times and it just doesn't work. #learningthehardway

I know that I get very emotional about this subject. I know I will get angry. And you know what, I should have to the right to get angry. THAT'S THE WHOLE FUCKING POINT. But instead of fighting a battle I can't win, with 10 people against 1. Let me write out why I am still a feminist. And what it really means to me.

Feminism is not about hating or discriminating men. Whoever told you this doesn't know what they are talking about. Screaming 'Girls to the Front' does not mean 'Guys to the Basement'. Putting the focus on girls, giving girls a platform, does not take away the voices of men. It just gives women a voice as well. And yes... it is true that we criticize some of the behavior that men have: men-splaining, men-spreading, harassment (obviously), misogyny (obviously), and whatever else. Because it makes us feel uncomfortable and belittled. And we are not little girls. We are women – real humans, with emotions and thoughts -- and we want to be seen as such. Don't see it as a personal attack, but if you feel addressed maybe that is food for thought?

What we do hate, is the Patriarchy. And here is why you should hate it too. The Patriarchy has brainwashed society into thinking that everything that is associated with femininity is less. Less important. Less trustworthy. Less. Girls need to be soft and submissive, or sexy and mysterious. Men need to be aggressive, need to drive cool cars, do sports, fuck beautiful women, game, play guitar, drink alcohol and what not. Men need to be manly. And if they are not, they are deemed unworthy or 'gay'. Do you remember your father (or your mother) telling you 'boys don't cry'? THAT'S THE PATRIARCHY. Lots of boys struggle with their emotions, because they never learned how to express them. Which means they miss an essential part of communication skills. This is why a lot of men end up frustrated and misunderstood. And yes, maybe they even take this frustration out on women. And then again, maybe they don't. There are lots of different men, and everybody handles their problems differently. That's why you should never assume that because something is not a problem to you, that the problem does not exist. That is for me an essential part of feminism.

The Patriarchy is at the root of so many things that I have a problem with. Monogamy for instance. Or heterosexuality. Body negativity. Or the wage gap. All these things are constructed so we would live – voluntary -- in a society that uses us. And for some, these claims might seem extreme, but I need you to tear away from your comfort zone for just a second, and really take a look at the world.

It's 2018. We are still at war. There is still poverty. We are still getting influenced by nationalist thoughts. Racism. Still. Exists. Women can not walk the streets at night and feel totally safe. I can still make a person disgusted because I grow my fucking armpit hair. In some countries you can get shot or raped because you are a boy who likes boys. And some people don't believe that you might identify as a gender that is different from your genitalia. Still... In 2018.

Ok, in most parts parts of the world women have the right to vote. But what for? Let's take the 2016 election for President of the United States. The democrats at least had the choice between Bernie and self proclaimed feminist Hilary Clinton, who was on the wrong side of the LGBTQ-marriage issue until 2013 and let's face it, if not for Bernie she would have been way more centered then she now was. In the Republican camp there was no one to represent the female vote. Oh sorry, that's a lie, Carly Fiorina was in the race until February. But let's be fair, we all know that she only got to run because they needed a female to stand up to any comment from Hilary about inequality. She never had a chance. And now, women in America might loose the right to their own body, because not a enough people at the top UNDERSTAND what it's like to be a woman. AND THEY DON'T CARE. They care about money. They care about preserving the power. They are the patriarchy. And as long as they exist, we will never have equal rights.

But a feminist cares about more then just rights for women. And yes often they are portrayed as white and successful... Yet let's keep in mind that it was black women who 'recently' saved Alabama from getting another republican senator. A true feminist, for me, is an open-minded person who sees everybody as equal. Whatever gender, sexuality or race you define as. A feminist should have your back. If we want control over our own bodies and minds. EVERYONE should have that control. A feminist who doesn't think the refugees are welcome here, is NOT a feminist.

Which brings us to the million dollar question 'why then call it feminism en not equalism?'

Very simple. Our issue still remains mainly focussed on putting femininity at the same level as masculinity. By which I mean WE WANT TO BE ABLE TO DO WHATEVER THE FUCK WE WANT, WHENEVER WE WANT. Every minority should have their own platform, because for example: I as a white girl, can not speak about what it's like to be black. It's not my place to take the lead in a debate about racism. Will I help create and defend that platform if my help is needed? ABSO-FUCKING-LUTLY. But I know that you can best defend your own experiences. And as a woman that means: I don't want to be harassed on the street, I don't want to be treated as a sexual object rather then as a person over and over again. I want to be in control of my own body – whether that means being able to choose to not want to get pregnant. Or just not have to live up to the expectations of societies (impossible) beauty standards. I want tampons to be seen as something vital. I want to be able to choose my own career and make just as much money as the guy with the same job. I want slut shaming to stop. I want girls empowering girls instead of putting each other down with gossip and snide remarks. I want the law to condemn rape.  I want my stories represented in movies and shows and books. I want to be able to go to a punk concert by myself without being literately removed from the mosh-pit. Every. Time. I don't want to have to be ashamed of my emotional side. I want the right to be angry. I want the right to define myself with a name that corresponds to the issue that I care about the most. I want the right to call myself a feminist!

And if you can't understand that... If you are really bothered by the fact that we are naming ourselves after an issue that is affecting at least 50 percent of the word population. If you are really triggered by the fact that we get 1 day in the entire year that we are 'allowed' to stand up... I fear that all hope is lost. The patriarchy has you in it's claw...

I worked in a book store for some time and it broke my heart every time a mother refused to buy her son a Dora the explorer book, because it was 'for girls'. How we raise our children is an essential part in how we want the future to look. And god damn-it...  I don't want the next generation crying in the toilet because they felt so disappointed about the people surrounding them.

I am not asking you to scream 'I am a feminist' right away. All I want is for people to respect us, take us seriously and give us a shot. Talk to girls. No. Really. Talk to them. Lots of them. We are all different and beautiful in our own way, but still most of us have encountered the same issues. They are real. And we are not going to retire. We are not giving up, because someone says 'we're just making a fuss'. We will continue the fight. We will smash the patriarchy.

[rickyweikle-blog]

Concept Reflection #7

Lance Weiner: I watched Tough Guise.

The main idea in Tough Guise is that we need to change our idea of what it means to be a man. Too often children are taught that being a man means to be aggressive, dominant, and tough when really this is just encouraging violence and counterproductive to bettering themselves. Being a real man should be knowing when to adapt to a situation rather than asserting dominance to prove a point.

One of the most relevant concepts from class evident in Tough Guise was Gender Role, which refers to the attitudes, behavior, and activities that are socially defined as appropriate for each sex and are learned through the socialization process. Tough Guise kept displaying how in society men are stuck in a box. If they leave the box by showing emotion or not acting the way a “man” would in society, then they are often ridiculed about their sexuality. 

One point that really stood out to me is that the conversation about violence and school shootings is always about mental health and gun control, but in reality, we should be focusing on the portrayal of what it means to be a man in society. The majority of school shootings and just violence, in general, are by males. The reason behind this starts at a very young age where parents and society say a man should be dominant and not a “wuss”. 

I did agree with the perspective of society and gender/sexuality in the movie. People always make school shootings and violence a political issue when really it is a social issue. In movies, video games, sports, and every aspect of culture, men are shown to be aggressive and dominant. Learning these attributes at a very young age can be a recipe by disaster. By no means am I saying this is always the case but there is a reason it is generally males. The filmmakers brought up a great point about how women also suffer from mental health but they rarely act in violence, proving violence to be a gender-related issue. 

Ricky Weikle: Miss Representation

I watched Miss Representation and the main ideas were that women in society are put down and given a label of who they have to be. That they are behind men in society and only represent a small amount of congress, there has never been a woman President and claim that they learn their body matters, not their brain. From a young age women learn that the image they have and their look is the most important part of themselves, which is not true, but that is what they are taught. They are supposed to be pretty and wear make up, that later in life they won’t grow up to fill a man’s job such as the President. 

Some relevant concepts from class depicted in the movie are patriarchy where men control social organizations. The role of media in depicting women, and the gender role of women where they are given specific attitudes, behaviors and activities by society. Pretty much what is appropriate for a woman to do and different activities and behaviors that she can partake as a woman. 

One point made by a Stanford professor during the documentary that stood out to me was the fact that usually women are more mature at a younger age than males. Usually a child/teenager is fully brain developed around a person’s early 20s, that means brain growth is pretty much over, but knowledge can still be gained and etc… Yet, the idea that children around the ages 7 or 8 have the maturity of an adult is insane. Another point that stood out to me was the youth governor voting scene. Where one girl ran against two guys and she explained how she believed she was only being looked at from the viewpoint of her gender and being a girl. She ultimately placed 2nd in the voting to one of her male opponents, yet, 65% of the students voting were female. This brought up the idea how women can be tougher on other women. I found this to be very interesting and I had not really thought of that or looked at it from this angle. 

Yes, I do agree with the perspective of society and gender sexuality of women in the documentary. I have two sisters and a mother I have lived with my entire life. From a young age I saw how women were put into a category for just their looks and taught that men were the strong group. I saw my sisters putting on pounds of makeup so they could “look pretty”, I saw how much it hurt them when I boy commented on their body or judged them for what they looked like. It hurts them and it hurts me. Fast forward and all the women in my family are feminists and have been searching to live on their own other than my mother who is married to my father. The evidence presented in the documentary supports the perspective that women have a harder time climbing the social status ladder. It is crazy to think 51% of the U.S. population is women, and they hold 17% of the seats in Congress. Women have to put up with catcalling and random guys staring at them all because of how society raised us. That is not women’s fault and times are slowly changing in my opinion from the time the documentary was made, but it is going to take a while for women to take an equal status or higher status than men. 

Answer we both came up with: The overarching theme we came up with is the “box” method. That men and women are confined in a box. They are allowed to believe and think or say that is deemed necessary/acceptable. If they reject this idea, or rebel, they will leave the “box” and quite possibly have their sexual orientation questioned by society. Gender roles really plats an intense, large role on society. At a young age, girls and boys are taught to associate and what is okay for their respective gender. This ends up being counterproductive because they are not their true selves, they are societies. They pretend to be the ideal version of their gender. 

[brettaresco]

The End of Open Secrets

NOTE: I initially wrote this column in March of this year, when the Michael Jackson documentary was released and Patriots owner Robert Kraft was arrested. In finally publishing, I’ve updated with minor changes and an addendum concerning another poster boy for this phenomenon, Jeffrey Epstein.

“I’m shocked to find that there is gambling going on in here.”

-Captain Renault, Casablanca

If, as Martin Luther King, Jr. said (while paraphrasing abolitionist minister Theodore Parker), “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice,” most would say we are in the long part. It has become fashionable amongst the eloquent, the empathetic, and the erudite to say that our world is in peril. I won’t wholly discount this assertion, especially while John Barron is the president, but bear with me as I briefly consider the positive aspects of our confounding timeline.

In many ways, we live in a golden age. Not only are we experiencing a time of relative prosperity, peace, and liberty in much of the world, but many of us enjoy an existence in which information (and, thus, some measure of power) is ubiquitous. Sure, we have our issues – the United States’ abdication of its place as moral and geopolitical leader of the world, for starters – and the information we consume is not always of the utmost veracity. But even still… the march of non-fake news has spurred uprisings to overthrow corrupt regimes, liberated marginalized groups, and shed light on some of the most troubling and immediate issues of our time.

Which leads me to the subject of this column: open secrets.

I am an actor. I run in some acting circles that can, at times, form Venn diagrams with larger, more famous circles. I know people who know people, I know people who become people, and I know people who are people. In talking to many of these people, for as long as I can remember, they all maintained one thing:

Kevin Spacey was a pervert.

Though I never knew the extent of his perversions, it was always whispered that he liked to take advantage of other actors. He liked his boys young, some said, and he wasn’t afraid to use his position to get what he wanted. The important matter wasn’t that he was gay – that was an open secret of an entirely benign nature – but that he was very likely a predator.

Despite these rumors, it was not until the #metoo movement unshackled thousands of brave women (and men) from the forced secrecy of past indignities that Kevin Spacey was formally accused and, to an extent, confronted with the consequences of his actions. His hit show was canceled, he was effectively blacklisted from Hollywood, and he was investigated by various authorities. His open secret became an open door through which he could be dragged, kicking and screaming, to justice.

Though Spacey’s downfall commenced just last year, it feels like it happened much longer ago, amidst a raft of other scandals involving such high-profile figures as Harvey Weinstein, R. Kelly, and, well, our current president. Aside from the fact that the latter still operates with impunity… why bring all this up again now?

Because Spacey’s is the case that first leaps to mind when I think of a growing, overdue, and enormously important trend- a trend more recently personified by the fates of three other powerful men: Robert Kraft, Michael Jackson, and Jeffrey Epstein.

Earlier this year, as you’ll no doubt remember, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft was arrested and charged with two counts of solicitation for frequenting a Florida massage parlor where trafficked women were coerced into performing sex acts for money (or, in common parlance, “giving happy endings”).

Who among us has not heard of (or – dare I ask? – received) a happy ending? It’s been joked about in popular culture for years, and it has become so ingrained in our collective consciousness that massage parlors with curtains over the windows and secretive back rooms are almost always assumed – rightly or wrongly – to provide other “services.” A few years ago, when I won a fantasy sports league, someone joked that I should spend my winnings at an establishment that online reviewers have deemed one of the best “rub & tug” places in New York City. If the person suggesting it had ever been I will not here speculate, but I’m sure he thought it less an honest suggestion than an innocent joke. As distasteful as the suggestion was, he was playing on a widely-known (and seemingly harmless) open secret.

But is it harmless? As is finally being scrutinized in the wake of the Robert Kraft debacle, through which several other high-profile men in finance (and even the boyfriend of an LPGA golfer) were exposed, a large element of this massage parlor subculture centers on human trafficking. Quite often, the women brought to these “businesses” from other countries have their movements controlled, their lives monitored, and their jobs bound to unpayable debts that keep them servicing wealthy Johns like Kraft for the rest of their lives. It’s a horrible, dehumanizing existence… but one about which many superficially know and joke. Whether they choose to look the other way or not is their business – luckily, there are many diligent human trafficking task forces that make arrests like those in this sweeping Florida sting – but for years this practice has persisted as an open secret. It was not widely exposed until one of the most powerful men in America brushed up against it… and even now, in our focus-starved culture, it may yet recede once again into the background. (Sure enough, as I update this just four months later, it already has).

Whether or not the case of the “rub & tug” maintains its capacity for public outrage, it has again exposed a through line in many of the open secrets that we as a society choose not to confront: powerful people getting away with horrible things. Shortly after Kraft’s arrest, of course, came the release of a revealing and controversial documentary about a man nicknamed (rightly, for his music at least) “The King of Pop.”

Has there been any greater modern example of an open secret than Michael Jackson’s propensity to, at the very least, spend an unsettling amount of time with children? The debate has raged on and on for years: was this a man who simply didn’t have a normal childhood and wanted to live vicariously through his young “friends,” or was this a mentally and sexually disturbed pedophile who lured innocent tykes to a literal Neverland where he could do with them as he pleased?

Certainly, with the release of said documentary, the pendulum appears to swing more towards the latter. There have now been myriad credible accusations about Jackson, and a newly resurfaced tape of his sister LaToya (from all the way back in 1993) shows her denouncing “his crimes against small, innocent children” (though she later recanted the statements).

While Jackson was alive, how many of us gave serious thought to whether he was acting inappropriately? Yes, he settled a case out of court in the 90s and was brought up on charges once (as was our friend Jeffrey Epstein, whom I’ll address shortly), but he skated. We, the public, continued to listen to his music and disregard his behavior. Certainly no one dared to raise this open secret to the level of moral outrage for many years… but, in so doing, what did we enable?

In not examining these open secrets in the court of public opinion and demanding full investigations, what else have we allowed to happen? As #metoo has shown us, we’ve permitted workplace sexual harassment and assault for generations. We’ve enabled human trafficking by reducing it to a joke. We’ve allowed powerful people – usually men – to live lives free from consequence, and even bestowed upon them a certain fear-based gravitas; no one dared cross Harvey Weinstein or Les Moonves, lest their careers be torpedoed, despite the fact that (at least in the case of the former) his culture of intimidation and abuse was a Hollywood-sized open secret.

You’ve probably noticed that all of the open secrets mentioned so far concern sex. I believe this is because sex itself has always been something of an open secret in America. We have spent decades trying to shake our puritan past, and many are still uncomfortable with a frank, open, and honest discussion of sexual health and preferences. Abstinence-only education is “stressed” in 27 states. The debate about abortion, together with the political might of the Evangelical right, can (and do) obscure any nuanced debate about contraception or premarital relations. It’s something we’re slowly confronting, but it will take time. And calling people to the carpet for using sex to gain power or hurt others is – however uncomfortable – part of that confrontation.

If it isn’t already, allow me to make plain the fundamental purpose of this column: Think about your open secrets- our open secrets. Think, as I have tried to do after the above instances have exploded into national discussions, about those things that we all know to be true but that nobody ever talks about. I’m not advocating for “witch hunts” – there’s been quite enough talk of those lately – but of mere explorations of the obvious. I can think of several as-yet unexamined cases off the top of my head. The first, to shift from the from the titillating to the mundane, is the problem of tax havens. Does anybody still talk about the Panama Papers or the Paradise Papers? Or about how a journalist who helped to uncover them was mysteriously killed by a car bomb in Malta? I actually heard someone make the argument recently that if the United States raises tax rates on the wealthy, our modern-day robber barons will simply hide more money offshore. That’s the same fundamental (and asinine) assertion as, “We can’t have tighter gun restrictions, because criminals will still find a way to get them.” The solution, to people who advance these viewpoints, is inaction. They are content living, as we have for years, with our open secrets. They imagine that the above instances (the easy reducibility of gun violence being its own open secret) do not affect them. But what if their family members were killed with legal guns? Or if they were deprived of necessary social services because of haven-driven deficits? Would they be so quick to brush these important issues under the rug, pretending they don’t know what they know that they know?

For most people, the rate at which our planet is warming is the biggest, smelliest, most egregious open secret… on the planet. Thankfully, the debate over whether or not climate change is occurring (and man-made) seems to be evaporating, as more of those who’ve stuck their heads in the hot, hot sand pass away. But the question of how best to take action remains. For all her foibles, it was not until Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez used her considerable platform to advance a Green New Deal that Americans actually started considering the sweeping, necessary policy changes that might help alleviate some of the inevitable suffering we are poised to face in the coming years. Even those who distrust the Green New Deal’s ambitious aims of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 know that they need to support something. We all need to support something… or else we’ll keep our biggest elephant in the room well-fed, kicking the can down the road until some major Kraft-like climate event occurs… and by then it might be too late.

Doping in cycling, Hollywood accounting,  soda, the Washington Redskins (and Cleveland Indians), college admissions, Scientology, Donald Trump’s mental health… these and many other subjects qualify for official Open Secret status. What do they all have in common? They have had moments of exposure, here and there, but remain – in some cases, dangerously – unresolved.

What will it take for us as a nation (and a world) to shed enough sunlight on these matters to melt them away? Two things: courage and awareness. One follows the other- it takes courage to be aware enough to confront these behaviors and the circumstances that allow them to thrive, and yet another level to hold those in power accountable. First, however, we must confront our own complicity. In this increasingly Orwellian world, we would do well to remember the author’s iconic words from 1984: “If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself.”

ADDENDUM: Concerning Epstein

As a millennial, I had always heard the name Jeffrey Epstein. Often, it was used as either a political bludgeon or evidence of the Illuminati. When I wrote this column back in March, I had little hope that Epstein would finally be brought up on charges relating to his systematic predatory behavior against scores of young women, and that those charges would (possibly) open the door for many more against those who may have aided, abetted, and willingly joined in his behavior. Epstein’s case fits the mold perfectly: A wealthy man who thinks he’s above the law, surely because he has been. Much has been made about the sweetheart deal former Trump cabinet member Alex Acosta gave Epstein in 2008, and with good reason. Epstein’s predilections were long known, as the following excerpt makes plain, and yet… and yet. No one, especially those in a position to expose his behavior, dared do so. It is in these circumstances where, yet again, the public is duty bound to step in. I know we have a lot to worry about – climate change, income inequality, superbugs – but none of that is going away. Cases like Kraft’s, Jackson’s, and Epstein’s are the easy ones. In a world of increasing abstraction, where things seem increasingly complicated, we must see the simple for what it is, and act accordingly.

From New York Magazine’s How a Predator Operated in Plain Sight:

How could this have gone on and on? Why so much silence for so many years? Why did no one tip off the authorities or issue any but what must have been the most whispery warnings to close personal friends about Epstein’s pyramid-scheme approach to abusing an apparently infinite number of teenage girls? That Bill Clinton and Trump might play dumb is understandable, if reprehensible. But Larry Summers? Alan Dershowitz? Leslie Wexner, Bill Barr, Ken Starr (!); journalists Katie Couric and George Stephanopoulos; Eva Andersson-Dubin, who founded Mount Sinai’s breast-cancer center? Not to mention their spouses and partners and the people who manage their calendars and the Harvard finance men and women accepting his millions? The whistle-blowers in the Epstein case have not been the high and mighty who can afford to hire lawyers and publicists but the victims themselves, and their families, evoking nothing more than the Catholic Church sex-abuse cases, in which grandmas and aunts spent decades writing letters and knocking fruitlessly on bishops’ doors. “What is so amazing to me is how his entire social circle knew about this and just blithely overlooked it,” says Vicki Ward, the reporter whose 2003 discovery of Epstein’s abuses she alleges were scrubbed by Vanity Fair’s then editor, Graydon Carter. Everyone who knew Epstein mentioned “the girls,” Ward told the New York Times, “but as an aside.”

[therealdragonnerdagain]

This is so true.

It's not because women are biologically inclined to be less interested or incapable. It's because we're bullied out and discouraged at an early age. It's the same way people of color are by and large denied access to a good education, then racists pull some statistics out of ther asses, citing black people as just "inferior" rather than looking at the way society is shaped and who it primarily benefits.

Anyone who's followed me since 2014 probably knows I grew up playing with Legos.

Not those pink Legos marketed at girls either. All the shit that was marketed at boys, I played with. And it never once occured to me that the sets weren't "meant" for me because I viewed it as totally normal, wanting to build things.

I always loved building things when I was a kid. Or else taking things apart. My mother would bring my sisters and I circuit boards. I remember building a telephone once and accidentally eavesdropping on my mother's conversation.

It wasn't until high school that I first learned how mean men and boys were to women who wanted to do things they had already deemed "male activities."

In high school I joined a computer class where each student was going to bulid a computer. The very first day, my teacher ridiculed me. He asked a question, and when I answered, he mimicked me in a high-pitched voice.

My friend and I were the only girls in the class, so when the teacher -- a grown-ass man -- made fun of a teenage girl's voice, everyone else laughed. I just quietly got up and left. My friend left with me, an we never went back.

I wound up taking Spanish instead. Ironically enough, the computer teacher's father taught Spanish and he was much nicer to me. I didn't have to put up with sexism and I was allowed to learn without being ridiculed. There were also more girls in the class, so I felt better being there (gee, I wonder WHY).

It was a shame. I really wanted to take a computer class but I just couldn't deal with the meanness and ridicule I faced just because I was a girl. I was already suffering the beginning of bipolar as a teen, so I just couldn't do it.

On top of that, the computer teacher who mocked me so cruelly was also my chemistry teacher, so having to put up with his shittiness in TWO classes would have been too much.

My chem/computer teacher was an all-around misogynist who spent more time complaining about his ex-wife than actually teaching us. If the boys in class sexually harassed me by making comments in the middle of class about having sex with me -- yes, this really happened -- my sexist teacher would yell at me for being angry about it, then proceed to explain away that men were always thinking about sex constantly, so telling them they weren't allowed to harass me was just denying them their freedom of expression.

Sound familiar? Yeah, my chem/computer teacher sounds like every asshole on the internet right now, who thinks being asked not to shout disgusting things at women on the street is somehow a threat to his free speech and freedom of sexual expression.

My chem/computer teacher was an older misogynist who taught all the boys in my class how to be an entire new generation of misogynists. See, when I say bigotry is something that's passed down generation after generation, it's not something I'm just making up -- it's something I have witnessed.

My chem/teacher "protected" his male students' "right" to treat me like a piece of meat, and all at the expense of a young girl's right to basic decency, respect, and the same opportunities to attend computer classes as the boys.

My uncle is an engineer (my mother brought it up once at a flea market and the white man sitting at the table laughed uproariously at her and accused her of lying about a black man actually being an engineer -- this was about five years ago and, no, it wasn't in the South) and had I followed in his foot steps, I would have faced more men like my computer teacher. It would have been an endless parade of mockery, condescension, and being told I am inferior.

As a black person who already has to deal with racism, why on earth would I want to spend my entire life dealing with pigheaded misogynists just so I can design some airplanes? When you're a minority in America, you learn pretty quick where you aren't wanted and what fields will be the most difficult for you to rise in due to your sexuality, color, and gender.

Maybe if I wasn't mentally ill, I could have pursued a career as an engineer (not that I wanted to). But I just don't have the mental fortitude to put up with that much bullshit.

Women don't gravitate away from STEM because we're biologically inclined.

Women gravitate away from STEM because men are assholes.

Men have made the world of STEM a toxic place to be for women. It's no different than video games. Or comedy. Or sports. Or any other space that is dominated by men.

The socially, economically oppressed groups in any given society are always a direct reflection of the people who have taken power.

You want answers, straight white men? Look in the mirror.

[heroesclimbfind]

One Climber’s Opinion

 In Response To: When Feminism Goes Too Far by Davita Gurian

Among the 294 people certified as rock, alpine, or ski mountaineering guides by the American Mountain Guides Association in 2010, only 26 were women. Betsy Novak, the association’s executive director, says among 60 guides certified in all three areas, just seven are women, which, she explains, is more than in other countries.[1] 

Why are women so underrepresented in climbing and mountaineering?

“The reason why there are fewer women is not in the nature of the profession,” explains Novak.

“I think it’s rooted in our own cultural history.”

And that’s the problem I have with Davita Gurian’s article, “When Feminism Goes Too Far: Are female climbers oppressed? Not really.”

Gurian supplies anecdotal evidence that she has not been oppressed as a result of her gender in climbing. In fact, she claims that a woman should “[try] voicing her fears openly to her male climbing partners, instead of harboring an internal resentment toward them.”

As a woman, climber, and feminist, I don’t harbor resentment toward my male counterparts. In fact, many stand alongside me today in combatting our misogynist cultural history, one that still favors a patriarchal society. On the eve of one of the largest demonstrations for women’s rights in U.S. history, faced with real threats to reproductive health rights and gender equality, I think it’s necessary to address the dangerous logic of Gurian’s article.

Language Matters

Let’s start with this story in Gurian’s article. The male boss of a female climber wants to call an all-female climbing night, Beta Babes, a term that the female climber finds “deeply offensive, oppressive, and demeaning.” After all, “Babe” is a diminutive term for “baby” and used either for female romantic partners, the sexualization of women, or, well, a shy Yorkshire piglet.

Gurian writes, “Sure, she’s got a right to that opinion, but please show me the harm in that term.”

Ok. Let’s discuss it. 

As it turns out, language matters.  Don’t take my word for it, Dr. Lera Boroditsky, associate professor of cognitive science at UC San Diego, dedicates her career to examining how different languages encourage different cognitive abilities.

For example, in a study comparing Mandarin speakers and English speakers, the difference in the vertical versus horizontal shape of the written language changed the way those speakers thought about time. Mandarin speakers were faster to confirm that the month of March comes earlier than the month of April after they had just seen a vertical array of objects, than after they had just seen a horizontal array of objects. The reverse was true for English speakers.

In the same way, there is evidence that gendered language reinforces traditional gender stereotypes.

In a different study, Boroditsky investigated how the gendering of objects in certain languages affects the way speakers describe those objects.[2] For example, Spanish and German speakers were asked to rate similarities between pictures (of both females and males) and pictures of objects (the names of which had opposite genders in Spanish and German). Boroditsky found that both groups rated grammatically feminine objects to be more similar to females, and grammatically masculine objects more similar to males, even though the objects had opposite genders in the two languages.  Furthermore, her research found that German speakers were more likely to use stereotypically masculine descriptions such as “hard, heavy, jagged, metal, serrated, and useful,” while Spanish speakers were more likely to use stereotypically feminine descriptions, such as “golden, intricate, little, lovely, shiny, and tiny” for the same objects according to their linguistic gender.

Although certainly more recent, these are not the first studies to argue that gendered language matters. Philosopher Douglas R. Hofstadter wrote a parody in 1986 on sexist language. In his satire, society spoke in generics based on race rather than gender. So, instead of “chairman”, people said, “chairwhite” or even “you whiteys.” After reading his work, it becomes impossible to argue that black men and women who hear “all whites are created equal,” should be expected to feel included. Hofstadter concludes in his paper[3]:

Only by substituting “white” for “man” does it become easy to see the pervasiveness of male-based generics and to recognize that using “man” for all human beings is wrong. 

So, when Gurian asked, “please show me the harm in that term,” I didn’t take it as a rhetorical question. Gendered language matters, and I’m happy to explain further how this happens. Female-gendered word “whore” is bad, but “pimp” is good. Think of all the pejorative words you know, most take a feminine gender. Now, try to think of the male ones. Even Gurian’s use of the word “sensitive” is used almost exclusively to degrade women--we are overly “sensitive". It perpetuates this stereotype that women are somehow slaves to their hormones, which was one of the earliest reasons for why it was said that women shouldn’t be allowed to vote.

Logically, it doesn’t follow that because Flash Foxy exists, we should be ok with creating Beta Babes. In fact, one solution might be, let’s rename both groups.

As gender identity is brought to the forefront of ethical and political debate, there is even more reason to be better educated on words—cisgender, transgender—as well as generics—he, she, ze—that do matter. The debate is about education, not politically-correct rhetoric or sensitivity, and by educating ourselves, women can achieve equal positions in both language and society.

Minorities matter

One of the more frightening statements in Gurian’s article is when she states, “I wrote this essay because I don’t believe that we should be making enemies and villains out of men in response to our own fear of discomfort.” Feminism does not make an enemy of men. Fighting for minority rights does not come to the detriment of the majority. It is not one or the other.

Talking about social injustice, marginalized identity, or gender oppression doesn’t make women “overly dramatic.” In climbing, is it a problem that 65 percent of women, as opposed to 29 percent of men, are uncomfortable in the gym? Does your opinion change if we replace “in the gym” with “in the workplace”?

To those women, Gurian says, “[they] might do well to begin by analyzing themselves first before demanding that everyone around them cater to their every sensitivity.” I’m going to give Gurian a pass on this part—I choose to believe she was channeling a bit of the “overly dramatic,” herself. Respondents from the Flash Foxy survey in question made it perfectly clear that while the climbing community can be wonderful and welcoming, there is still room for improvement.

Citing recognition of Lynn Hill, Beth Rodden, or Ashima Shiraishi doesn’t mean women have equal place in the climbing community. If we want to keep talking anecdotes, I have experienced sexism inside and outside the climbing gym. Both men and women have made me feel marginalized for sexist reasons on certain occasions. Sometimes it’s been hurtful, and sometimes I haven’t even noticed until it was brought to my attention. It certainly won’t make me stop climbing. Often I choose not to address it.

I prefer to talk about evidence rather than about anecdotes. Unfortunately, there is not enough empirical evidence to show that the climbing community is some sort of gender equality oasis. Statistically-speaking, it’s unlikely. So, if you believe that sexism exists in society at large, I feel it is only rational to assume it must exist to the same extent in climbing.

It is indisputable that minorities, whether via race, religion, age, disability, or gender, have been persecuted throughout American history. The fact that Gurian is 23 years old and doesn’t see the same plight, well, good for her. It likely means, all that feminist complaining—the political marches and female-focused news—have accomplished their goal of raising awareness about lingering sexism in society and, sometimes, in the sport of climbing.

Tiffany Skogstrom, setter at MetroRock Climbing Centers, said to Crux Crush[4]:

“Up until recently, climbing was considered a male-dominated sport.  Thankfully, more women are climbing strong and closing that gap.  It would be nice if the route setting demographics matched the climber demographics.” 

Sexism in rock climbing is perpetuated when women get less of a voice about route setting in the gym, when routes are deemed “girly”, when “small fingers” becomes a substitute for the more accurate “strong fingers”, or when any person—male or female—defines physical strength with male-centric words, like “burly” or “butch.”

Yes, more and more, women are gaining ground and recognition in rock climbing. But does that mean we should stop vocalizing our feelings about being marginalized at times? Absolutely not.

I am so happy that Gurian has the strength to speak out against naysayers, to feel unafraid in uncomfortable situations. However, I believe the persistence of voice and action by so-called complaining feminists is the reason she has that luxury today. Women have dedicated decades, centuries even, to earning that equality and the right to speak out without fear of professional, personal, or physical reprisal. 

In my mother’s time, there wasn’t a single woman sports broadcaster on national television. In my time, I watched multiple women boulder V14. And, I hope, in my daughter’s time, she won’t remember that sports were once separated in gender binary. But, as always, it’s important to remember how hard women worked to get here and how much farther we must go.

It is impossible for feminism to go too far when it simply refers to equal rights for all.

-Wendy

References & Reading:

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/23/sports/23guides.html

[2] Lera Boroditsky, Linguistic Relativity, in 2 Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science  917 (Lynn Nadel ed., 2003); and Janet B. Parks & Mary Ann Roberton, Development and Validation ofan Instrument to Measure Attitudes Toward SexistlNonsexist Language, 42 SEX ROLES 415, 415-16 (2000).

[3] Read the full paper, “A Person Paper on Purity in Language”, here: https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.html

[4] http://cruxcrush.com/2013/06/10/secrets-of-the-female-route-setter/

[corkcitylibraries]

Book Review: Andy Lee and Niall Kelly’s Fighter

by Dr. Sorcha Fogarty

Boxing has been around since at least 688 BC, when the ancient Greeks made it into an Olympic game, but its modern history has often been controversial. To quote Joe Frazier, the first boxer to beat Muhammad Ali, “Boxing is the only sport you can get your brain shook, your money took and your name in the undertaker book.” Many deem the sport barbaric, but it is not for this blog post to decry or defend boxing, especially having read the extraordinary story of Andy Lee.

Far from an expert on Boxing, I came across this book completely by accident, and I’m glad I did. The book was shortlisted for the An Post Irish Book Awards Bord Gáis Energy Sports Book of the Year Award upon its publication in 2018, and it also made the long list for the William Hill sports book prize. The idiom “Don’t judge a book by its cover” doesn’t apply here. Almost everything you need to know about Fighter, and about Andy Lee, can be discerned from the cover of this book. Lee is, by all accounts, victorious, as the photo clearly shows. However, there is no triumphant swagger, no showy display of supremacy. Moreover, looking closely at the cover, we see that the face of the opponent has been obscured, as Lee himself states,

 “I went out of my way to have the face changed because I didn’t want him to have to see it,” he says. “He doesn’t deserve that, it wouldn’t be right. It could easily be me lying on the floor. And this could be him writing a book about the career he went on to have. And if somebody did that to me, if someone put me on the cover like that, I’d be going mad.”

So the idea is that it’s a boxer, just a fighter who took a punch. It’s not him. That’s not that point of it. We went over the cover a lot of times. It’s a great photograph and it tells the story.

Regarding Lee’s personality, nothing could be more revealing: “If you look at me walking away, I’m not celebrating wildly or anything. I’ve been in a battle and that one punch could have finished me for the night just as it finished him. I’m just as hurt as he is – the difference is that he is on the ground.” You would be hard-pressed to find a negative description of Andy Lee. From the press to the public, he has consistently been described as a gentleman, a true role model, with the Irish sports website Pundit Arena summing him up best, 'Lee was a good fighter but he’s an even better human being.' In a business where showmen and blowhards prevail, Lee, as one critic has noted, was always the most decent guy in the room. In his case, he disproves Nietzsche who said, “He who fights too long against dragons becomes a dragon himself.”

A former Irish Olympian boxer, former world champion, freshly retired in early 2018 with a record of 35 wins from 39 pro fights, Andy Lee’s Fighter is the quintessential story of a young boy on the margins of society who made it to the top. Lee competed from 2006 to 2017, held the WBO middleweight title from 2014 to 2015, and in doing so became the first member of the travelling community to win a major world title. Lee was born in London to Irish Traveller parents in 1984 who returned to Limerick in 1998. The book shows how he had to deal with bullying when he was in school, where the other kids would sing at him, “We all live in a yellow caravan, a yellow caravan, a yellow caravan...” He left school at 13, even though he was bright enough to get into the top class when he started secondary school. His determination to stay true to himself, despite the suffocating “rules” of the Travelling Community which, among them, forbids relationships between people from the settled and travelling communities, saw him bring a settled girl home to meet his father, who had forbidden Lee to do so. Lee, however, was a formidable judge of character, and knew that his father and the settled girl, now his wife, the musician, writer and actor Maud Lee, would hit it off, and he was right.  Fighter is not just an account of a boxer’s career. It is also a love story. Lee spends much time on his relationship with Maud in the book, and it is obvious that the two share an incredibly close bond. He recalls the early days of meeting Maud,

“I know we’re from different worlds, that this isn’t how it works. I know that bright, brilliant, educated young women from South County Dublin who have the world at their feet don’t end up with a gypsy boxer from Limerick via London who left school at 13. She must know it too, but she doesn’t care. I tell her everything honestly, about my life, my heritage, my family, anything that she would want to know.”

As regards his Gypsy heritage, Lee neither defines himself by it, nor does he eschew it. As he says, “It’s not something I’ve ever really shouted about but it’s not something I ever shied away from either. I am who I am – I don’t have to be singing from the rooftops. I’m not a campaigner in any sense. I could be. But I only represent myself. Maybe I could have some impact.” Generally, Traveller kids leave education after primary school in order to learn ‘traditional skills’ at home. For boys, this means trades such as bricklaying or tree-cutting, as well as learning to do odd jobs. Meanwhile, the girls must learn how to clean to impeccable standards, as well as how to cook and to care for younger siblings. Once the eldest daughter has left school, Traveller mums take a step back and leave her in charge. Lee’s journey shows that an alternate route is possible, and this is something he did hope his book might be able to achieve, as he states in an interview,

 “And maybe it’ll be some way for a young Traveller or Gypsy to change how they think as well if they read it. Maybe they will get a sense that they have more options than they think they do in life. Because it is a very restricted life. I say it in the book – you are brought up in a world where you have two choices, you have a world of crime or a world of work from a young age. That’s basically it when you’re a kid in that world. You don’t know much beyond it.”

 Although things are changing, with more children in the Travelling community staying in school, and going on to earn degrees at University, the customs and traditions of the Travelling community are difficult to overcome, and many stay within the rigid confines of these customs.

For Lee, boxing was the route to a different life, and his family stayed firmly by his side throughout. The book describes his first workout in the Kronk Gym in Detroit, when he steps into the ring to the call of “fresh meat, fresh meat” and, respect earned, steps out to the comment that “This white boy can box”. Under the tutelage of Emanuel Steward, who trained 41 world champions throughout his career, in 2014, following 18 straight unanswered punches, Lee defeated Korobov to claim the world title, the first time since 1934 that an Irish fighter earned such a victor on US soil. The book chronicles the relationship between Lee and Steward, the years that Lee lived in the Steward family house, how the two drifted apart and then, finally, the poignant deathbed reconciliation as Steward passed away in 2012. The book gives captivating insights into the relationship between the two men. Lee learned a great deal from Steward; as Lee recounts, it seems that Steward’s mastery was in the little details. He instructed Lee how to put sellotape on his laces and protective cup so they didn’t come loose or fall down during a fight. Instead of putting Vaseline on his face, Steward told Lee to apply cocoa butter, “Everyone laughs at me when they hear that,” says Lee, “but I don’t get cut anymore.”

The book contains a host of fascinating anecdotes, glimpses into Lee’s private world, as he describes the Christmas Eve in Dublin after just signing his pro contract, with himself and Maud on George’s Street where they “stop at the ATM as the crowds rush on around us. I enter my pin code and the two of us stand, staring at the balance on the screen.” Also, when preparing for that redemptive night in Las Vegas in the ring with Korobov, Lee tells us how he constantly wrote in his notebook – law of attraction style - “I will become world champion.” His descriptions of his time in the ring are also captivating. As Lee acknowledges himself, in boxing, defeats are often much more interesting than victories. Unsurprisingly, the story of his first two defeats and the shattering impact they have on his career progression are fascinating. He showcases his resilience as he twice rebuilt his career, losing his 15th pro-fight and then the title fight against Julio Cesar Chavez Junior in El Paso. It is his win over John Jackson that forced me onto YouTube, amazed at how Lee, seemingly on course for defeat, at the mercy of Jackson, up against the ropes, comes back to deliver one of the greatest knockouts in boxing history.

Lee’s story is a compelling insight into the thoughts of a boxer who made it to the top without the need to exude brash arrogance. On 20 February 2018, Lee confirmed his retirement from boxing on Irish radio station Newstalk, on the Off The Ball sports programme, citing responsibilities as a father for why he had chosen to retire, “I got out having achieved what I wanted and having secured my future to a certain extent – not that I’m set for life or anything but I can go out for a Chinese on a Saturday and not worry about it.”

Ultimately, Fighter is intense, emotional and funny, and Lee’s humility and honesty make the book an engrossing and inspirational read. The universally acknowledged “lovely guy” most definitely refutes the common aphorism, based on a quote from 1946 by another famous sportsman, American baseball player, manager and coach Leo Durocher, “Nice guys finish last”.

 Available now on Borrowbox

Sources

https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/roles-with-the-punches-andy-lee-uncovered-1.3680689

https://www.paveepoint.ie/traveller-culture-and-identity/

https://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/arid-20320916.html

[elizabethleslie7654]

Modern Jobs And The Modern Economy

all kinds of cool jewelry and no shipping or getting mobbed t the mall

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This is part 7 of a series on modern society.

Here are the links to Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, and Part Six.

  Economies are always in flux and are always shifting. 150 years ago, there was a booming candle business alongside a roaring horse and buggy industry. Swiftly but surely these industries went the way of the cotton gin and other technologically obsolete businesses. We must not mourn for these as they are a natural shifting of life and the world, and as a result jobs and industries with honorable and well-paying jobs sprung about via the way of light bulbs and automobile factories. But as this trend has continued far more nefarious and insidious changes have occurred that go well beyond the technological advances that (primarily) the Anglosphere has brought fourth. These changes include a shift to a knowledge economy which has produced more dishonest work, along with a creeping anti-white, anti-natal, anti-traditional, and anti-religious culture within said knowledge economy. While a simple shift to a knowledge economy is something that no doubt will not be easy for any country to endure, as it is likely to stratify the population along IQ lines (as suggested is already happening by Charles Murray in Coming Apart: The State of White America) even within racial lines, there are concurrent changes which are turning a difficult time into a needlessly morbid, rancorous, and ultimately vicious cycle which will not end well.

The rise of the knowledge economy and shift away from manufacturing and other low-medium skilled jobs has already ravaged much of the nation, especially in rural areas. This is not disputed nor is it the focus of this piece. Part of this shift to a knowledge economy has occurred concurrently with a shift to hyper-competition and ultimate disdain for workers. No longer do business owners and corporation give two shits about their workers or their workforce as a whole. They only care about profits and efficiency. I would have less of a problem with this if this focus on profit was accompanied with an increase in worker pay and benefits, but such is not the case. Since 1960 worker pay has largely stagnated while worker productivity has continued to climb at near or better than historical rates. To me it seems as though the large corporations and even unwitting small business owners seem to be getting more and more out of workers for the same pay, or even less in some cases when considering inflation. In addition, many workers aren’t entirely cash poor but rather only wealthy enough to provide a minimal level of comfort with the latest 50+ inch TV, their newest phone, and their favorite sports jersey or t-shirt. Sometimes they might even be able to afford slightly more expensive amenities likes nice grills for cookouts, hot tubs, or maybe even something like a home theater. But the most important things (land, housing, cars, insurance, and investments) are not becoming easier to attain. Due to various factors life is becoming even more complicated and time consuming and less conducive to living happy, fulfilled, community and family-oriented lives. But because workers are working so hard, they often have little time or energy left to take care of more important things, such as family, church, and community. As a result, corporation get richer and hold more power while the average worker begs for jobs and time off, often so concerned about their time off that they struggle to relax during said time.

There used to be some semblance of concern for workers and the everyman by the elites and wealthy. They used to understand that while these people writ large might not be as smart, as competent, or as capable as many at the top, they were deserving of dignity and had more things to care about than the bottom line or number of hours worked. I am not saying concern for profit is evil, it is the basis of business, but rather the concern for profit at the expense of community, society, and worker well-being is certainly evil. It is valuing money over intangible goods. It is materialistic. Even worse, workers are now often berated by HR departments, largely staffed by odious and onerous women, making the lives of those who attain a semblance of success in white collars jobs a living hell via oppressive policies, constricting culture, and a fanatical persecution of anyone deemed “heretical” to the globohomo narrative. Even in non-white collar companies these oppressive HR regimes are creeping in. This adds to the worker disdain by not only passively discouraging family, community, culture, and well-being, but also actively attacks all culture opposed to said globohomo agenda. If some jobs, even white collars ones, were more fulfilling, maybe even some of the many negatives could be offset, but they aren’t.

Many modern jobs are largely busy work. Because of the profit of many companies and corporations people are hired almost out of a tautological reasoning that says because we’re making more money, we must hire more people. Anyone who has run a small business or been within the inner circle of one knows that this is not the case. If more can be done with the same people or less, so long as they are treated well and not put under an undue burden, then it will be done. You don’t hire people just to hire people because you think you need them. My point on this is not that people should be fired if their job isn’t necessary but rather that when people are put into these jobs that aren’t essential, that aren’t truly needed, then they often feel a soul-suck and a despair that is summarily harmful to them and all of those connected to them. They are treated poorly because their job is deemed unnecessary either implicitly or otherwise and as a result they are forced to “earn their keep” in a soul-crushing fashion, via performing work that is rarely often used or even looked over. This happens most in white-collar jobs but is not exclusive to them. There are jobs within manufacturing and other sectors that are given that simply own your time but require nearly no labor of you. While some may say this sounds ok, pay and no work, I highly disagree. I believe the key to a happy and fulfilled, and successful, life is that of honorable work. There is no strict requirement for what is honorable or fulfilling work. An accountant may find their work fulfilling and so long as it is done well, it is indeed honorable. But the ownership of one’s time without demands upon their work appears to me as scheduled wage slavery. The company owns your time but cares so little for you that they would rather have you do near worthless or entirely unneeded tasks rather than either firing you and allowing you to find a fulfilling job or giving you meaningful work. Because of such an environment I have no doubt said problems with the modern economy have contributed to the deaths of despair (deaths from alcohol, drugs, or suicide in the beginning of and through the midpoint of middle age) felt by the rural white working class.

I have not come across many solutions to the shift to a knowledge economy and how the effects might be mitigated for those maligned by its occurrence. However, it is fairly easy to pick out solutions for the other listed problems in this piece. First HR departments must be abolished. Ideally women would not be staffed at all in a company, as an added bonus. This negates all potential for sexual harassment claims, unless such claims are made by homosexuals, which I also discourage from having in the workplace. Second, business owners (I would also suggest corporations but they have no concern for their workers and are unlikely to have such care any time soon) should renew their concern for their workers and attempt to create environments that are conducive to family, community, and worker well-being. It’s difficult to offer many specific solutions to this problem in the scope of this piece, but it would not be difficult for small business owners to determine on their own case by case basis steps they could take to facilitate a healthier and more rewarding structure for their workers. Third, useless jobs should be abolished. This includes HR jobs, compliance jobs (and concurrently constrictive regulations), and other jobs in which the worker isn’t actually producing much work but rather just selling their time. I advocate this because when someone only sells their time and isn’t truly connected with what they do, they’re robbing the world of their gifts which could be given elsewhere. I have no allusions that all people are highly gifted and a hugely impactful force upon the world. However, something as simple as coaching your local high school (or middle school) athletics team or volunteering for some other youth or community organization would likely yield greater benefits than a soulless job, and would undoubtedly be more effective for a community when said volunteer or coach is happy with their current work and is setting an example to aspire to for current and future generations.

While there are many more things to address about the modern economy and modern jobs, I will end with this note. Our world will constantly shift (including the economy and jobs) but with roots in family and community, the rough patches and challenges can be weathered. If we keep our focus on those things beyond being the best economic units, then the changing economy and job market will be like the strong winds of a passing storm viewed from the window of a cozy home. Thunder may sound, lightning may strike, and rains may fall, but from the shelter of our friends, family, and communities it will be more like a storm which eventually passes than a flood that washes us away with it. We should control where we weather this storm from as best we can. Rather than huddling with the masses of fellow economic units during the storm and hoping our elites show favor upon us and decide to bring us in, we can choose to shelter ourselves in our own homes alongside our white brothers. There might not be as much room and the houses might not be as luxurious as those of the elites, but I would rather live and die among brothers than temporarily imbibe the fruits of disdain for my brethren, family, and way of life. Make your choice.

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[n-o-w-is-l-a-t-e-r]

Everything is Exploited for Survival Pt. 1

The Unformed child is yet to be anything: a nothingness yet to be distinguished. However, once children are formed they programmed to be obedient, nothing else. birth: you get what you paid for. violently dejected, they are then popped out the womb, torn from their non-existence and slapped on the ass to affirm their gaping alterity. They are then stuck in the marry-go- round of oppression based on their gender, race, etc. However, those of us who prove insufficient to these 'tasks' are either bruised by "discipline" (fear/violence) in turn fashioned by domination (control). or complete rejection: non-love/abandonment. However, those of us who prove insufficient to these 'tasks' are either bruised by "discipline" (fear/violence) in turn fashioned by domination (control). or complete rejection: non-love/abandonment. This rejection forces the child to confront the trauma of rejection (both from the womb and from their parents) and the emptiness/autonomy that comes with selfhood (separation) and being "human". You always here people saying "if my child turns out to be (INSERT), I (ego/superego) willingly will fuck them up". This is an example of the selfishness inscribed in child birth. In giving birth to a child you get what you "paid" for: an individual. An individual who will in turn form their own ideas and opinions. However, many parents overlook this and in turn project their own trauma/loss/abuse/desires onto the offspring while overlooking the child’s needs. People then form habits based around their lack of parents love. If a child is truly capable of learning to love/care for themselves in spite of their parents morality they become an agent of their own freedom. A person that can think for themselves are truly from any oppressors which seek to harm them. They can be sufficient in living in the here and now and accept the crux of their existential dilemma: they are truly alone. They will eventually accept their inevitable reality that they alone must die for themselves. Humans, are always cognizant of their emptiness, however, they must make a choice. Choose to endure the pain of that loneliness in creating a self (independence), which will eventually die or fall in line with convenient ideologies which entrap them. It is our choice. one must choose to be independent and accept the failures that come with it. (Cold individualism) “I exist for myself”, meaning I must take of myself to survive on my own terms. To learn about myself and love myself the way I deserved to be loved. I choose the outcomes. I grew up with such weak character. I will not be a slave to my parents morality, I will choose my own path. I must be selfish in my pursuit of my own interests. Man, in his violent dejection and inevitable demise must create stability for himself. I am learning to become a narcissist in turn I reject. In truth, I yearn nothing. I must carry myself to become who I want to be. Daddy (god/devil) controls this realm, he controls who is going to survive or not, death is the only reality. My independence is quite painful because I truly wish to be nothing. I am not fashioned by fear. Most men would call me a bitch-made. Men just want to be worshiped- to be feared. Women want love. Daddy is the disciplinarian, in order to win you must the ultimate consequence. Don't be afraid to be fluid, don't be afraid to be “crazy”. Don't deny your femininity, the very essence of freedom. Death is the only reality. White people are sadistic by nature, as they come from the “Father”. Men utilize violence for their own means. Life is difficult and I must learn to adapt to the pain of the present. Of being judged for who I appear to be (surface). White people learned to become sadistic over time through their need for survival. This eventually become a means of strategic impulse that allowed them to evolve in their intellectual capacities: distance, speed, and tracking, all traits of “logic”. This also led to their need for narcissism, their need to control the weak and vulnerable for their own needs. “White” people evolved like animals, being lowered to a base nature in order to survive. Unable to feel empathy due to their narcissistic form, they inherited a lack of empathy and an ideology reliant on conquest. They don't feel pain, they utilize to become stronger. They outsmarted death and in doing so became greedy in their pursuit of personal self interest. They heralded themselves as kings and hunted any persons with energy they deemed “weak”. They twisted their enemies, forcing them into their routine ‘form and discipline’ (control) Whites beat their enemies into submission, forcing them to function. First, they stripped the slave of any power. Then, they subject them to routine violence if they were incompetent (this is why so many black parents beat their children: learned behavior aka tradition). “Blacks” were then bible thumped, thrown a book on how to behave morally. New generations of blacks adapted this religion because they were new bloods: if they failed to adapt to this religion they were shunned, told they would be banished to “hell” for not obeying god. In turn, many blacks adapted to this system out of fear of humiliation and worse, untimely death. White men evolved to control, to conquer anything they saw fit. In time, through opposition, blacks were able to adapt to the materialistic, narcissistic ideology being conveyed through the dominant ideology. Black men were in turn moulded by the ideological facets (code switching) of masculinity projected onto men in the white patristic western society. Portrayals of western masculinity in films such as Scarface, and American Gangster assist in highlighting the behavior that POC men must take on to survive. Some even learned to master the art of exploitation within their ghettos to gain power. Utilizing violence and psychology (fear), they learned to dominate much like their oppressors. SMARTS? THE DISTORTION OF MASCULINITIES OF COLOR – PART III – RESPECT. By Karani: In a sociological study with youth of color in Oakland, Victor Rios found that youth learned to “code switch” into this performance of “acting hard” to in order to survive in the streets and specifically to resist “the violence of the state and other institutions that criminalize and punish them” (Rios, 2006: 48). The “respect as domination” modality of masculinity is based upon intimidation and maintaining a constituted power based on hierarchal social relations and is supported by patriarchy, racism, homophobia. As such, it is often embodied by the hegemonic masculinity as practiced by men involved in law enforcement, the military, and sports teams.

Utilizing violence and psychology (fear), they learned to dominate much like their oppressors. In order to live on this planet and to avoid death (nothingness) we must learn to survive. This eventually lead to their animalistic nature as we become reliant on survival. We become bent on distinction through competition (ego). In turn, we become  paranoid. Masculine paranoia is the fear of being percieved as weak.

[asylum-ireland-blog]

Why men's voices are vital in Ireland's abortion referendum

New Post has been published on http://asylumireland.ml/why-mens-voices-are-vital-in-irelands-abortion-referendum/

Why men's voices are vital in Ireland's abortion referendum

Male allies in politics, the creative scene, and all walks of Irish life are stepping up alongside women to fight the system that oppresses them

‘Ireland Unfree’ is a Dazed mini-series telling the stories of Ireland’s bold fight for abortion rights, in the run up to the monumental referendum on the eighth amendment. Stirring protest, creativity, personal politics, and vital conversation, these Irish people push for autonomy. Here, we share their journey on Dazed.

The death of Savita Halappanavar in 2012 had an earth-swallowing feel to it. Denied of the basic healthcare required to ensure her survival, a constitutional amendment deemed her life – 31 years of complex human love, colour, and learning – of the same value as a 17-week-old fetus. She died in Ireland’s University Hospital Galway in Ireland due to the complications of a septic miscarriage. Her husband, Praveen, was dutifully left to channel her lost voice and carry her legacy on his already burdened shoulders.

On Friday May 25, Irish citizens will go to the polls to determine if the controversial Eighth Amendment of the Irish Constitution, which equates the right to life of the mother to the unborn, should be removed and repealed. The amendment, which criminalised abortion in almost all cases, was brought about as a result of a 1983 referendum, a time when the Catholic Church in Ireland was still very much an arm of government. Divorce was still illegal. Contraception was a taboo. Homosexuality remained outlawed.

The Irish man, of course, has no such lack of bodily freedom. Yet, about 70 per cent of Irish women who receive abortion care in the U.K. are married or with a partner. That is, conservatively speaking, thousands of fathers and partners that the Eighth Amendment has, too, bound to secrecy and shame.

Actor and author Emmet Kirwan – who last year created the beautiful spoken-word short film Heartbreak – views the redressing of Ireland’s wrongs broadly and disputes any sense of moral responsibility on individual men. “It’s not just a binary issue of males versus females: It’s an institutional issue,” he tells me. “Whether they be governmental, health, Church – all various arms of the state. There has been an institutionalised gender bias.”

On Irish streets, in local bars, on shop corners, through headlines painted across newspapers and hashtags proliferating via social media posts – there is a bitter political divisiveness that this debate has wrought, a clearly-defined chasm that calls other political ruptures of late to mind. No wonder there have been questions of sinister outside interference akin to the Cambridge Analytica scandal. In response, micro-campaigns have popped up all over social media – necessary conversation-sparking tools.

Ger Murphy, a 35-year-old events manager from South-Dublin, decided that Irish men needed to contribute to the dialogue around abortion rights. A conversation that, without question, needed their support. In late February, he founded the Men For Repeal Facebook page – ‘balls to the 8th’ is its light-hearted but defiant URL – after some troubling conversations about male engagement. Murphy sought to, at minimum, challenge the many outspoken men on the other side of the debate.

A large subset of the Irish male population, Murphy tells me over the phone, feel this is not their vote, that this a women’s issue that has no true bearing on their existence. Outside of the reality of crisis pregnancies which routinely affect women everyday, the idea that it’s a women-only issue is misguided, disingenuous, and, frankly, outdated. In truth, indifference largely translates as pro-choice.

“Whether they be governmental, health, Church – all various arms of the state. There has been an institutionalised gender bias” – Emmet Kirwan

“There is no problem in coming out and saying there is a male aspect to this issue. The vast amount of women would agree that the men in their lives are being affected as well,” Murphy says of the messaging. “The left trips over itself sometimes trying to be too PC about these things.”

Complacency is participating in neither debate nor democratic process, and it’s something to be concerned about. Kirwan, one of the most vocal Irish artists, explains there are no excuses for liberal-minded men eschewing their right to vote in the referendum: “The kind of passive, non-participation is essentially giving the vote over to the other side. This kind of idea that you can affect change by doing nothing; it’s a logical fallacy.”

Gordon Grehan of the Transgender Equality Network also tells me that repeal is “imperative to ensuring the rights of all people who can become pregnant, including trans men and non-binary people”. He adds: “As a trans organisation, we know the importance of ensuring self-determination, bodily integrity and physical autonomy.” As previously detailed in Brian O’Flynn’s report on the pro-choice campaign’s push for inclusivity, marginalised people like trans men who can get pregnant must be included in the conversation.

I’ve listened to women’s stories they deserve better. A No vote won’t stop abortions but continues the hypocrisy, shame and stigma. A Yes vote moves us to fairer, safer, more compassionate healthcare in Ireland. It’s our responsibility to put the hand out to our women. #men4yes

— Eamon Mc Gee (@EamonMcGee) April 24, 2018

So glad to see #men4yes emerge. I’m voting yes because, as a man, there is no medical procedure unavailable to me to protect my life or my health. I want the same for women.#TáDoMhná

— Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (@AodhanORiordain) April 24, 2018

Men For Repeal, along with Lads For Choice, have thrust the conversation of male engagement directly into the national discussion with Together For Yes, the campaign in favour of repeal. Through the #menforyes hashtag, men online have told their uniquely positioned and shared stories of loss, shame, and state-sanctioned oppression. One such story, which was posted by Men For Repeal’s Facebook page earlier this month, attributed to a man named Enda, illustrates the culture of shame embedded in Irish society.

Enda’s mother – empowered by his coming-out as gay – confided in him that she had an abortion pre-marriage, but for fear of judgement, had told just Enda and one of her sisters. “She’d felt sure that my grandfather would disown her for having sex outside of marriage and he died never knowing,” Enda writes. “I remember her saying she felt as if she was damaged goods with my own father, and had been terrified of telling him in case he no longer wanted to marry her.”

Elsewhere, Murphy alludes to meme culture (check the Ireland Simpsons Fans page for some of the best) and the use of internet spaces as a shareable access point for men, more so for those that are tentative or unsure about their place in a large, fast-moving campaign. Murphy’s resourcefulness also helped him develop a video series where male musicians cover female artists.

via Ireland Simpsons Fans

Creativity in the arts has propelled much of Ireland’s political movements, and the Repeal Project is a major example. The monochromatic sweatshirt – simple, inclusive, and unisex – is boldly inscribed with ‘Repeal’, now iconic in Irish millennial culture as a statement of aesthetic defiance. Repeal founder Anna Cosgrave recently guest edited local music and culture magazine District with the ‘Men’s Issue’ of its Dublin City Guide. The issue profiles male Irish allies across sport, music, film, and politics. Dance music magazine and online community Four Four has been passionately supportive of repealing the 8th on its pages.

Dublin’s vibrant young music scene sees lyrics that continue to reflect Ireland’s bewildering reality, from DIY punk to burgeoning R&B. Rising Dublin hip-hop act, KOJAQUE, recently rapped: “Sovereign state; they’d rather see my mother bleed out than build a clinic.” Elsewhere in the fashion world, designer Richard Malone has been an outspoken supporter for repeal, taking over Selfridges’ window display to write messages of support. In a powerful open letter for Vogue, Malone describes the “infuriating and unjust treatment of women” he has witnessed at home, the misinformed, Catholic-based education about sex and abortion he and his generation received, and the social and class structures that hinder women’s right to choose. “We have to use our vote to speak for ourselves and for the generation of young people coming directly behind us,” he writes, “who remain voiceless in the votes on their future.”

Toxic masculinity is seriously affecting Irish young men’s mental health, sexuality, and attitudes towards sex, the latter manifesting itself in one of the most widely reported and divisive public trials in Irish history: the rape case involving Ulster Rugby stars Paddy Jackson and Stuart Olding.

The voice of brusque social sensibility in Ireland today, Blindboy Boatclub of Irish comedy duo Rubberbandits is in equal parts an absurdist and a realist. He’s become an unofficial spokesperson for these disenfranchised young men, men who accounted for 80 per cent of Irish suicides last year. With one of the highest percentages of teen suicide in Europe, a silent epidemic pulses through Irish society.

During a revealing 2016 interview on Ireland’s The Late Late Show, Blindboy asserted that feminism is, in fact, a remedy for male-centric mental health issues and toxic masculinity, something that rings through with this referendum and long afterwards. “I have nothing to offer a woman, I have nothing,” he says of young men’s attitudes in Limerick, his native city. “How am I supposed to provide for a woman? The fact of the matter, is that that is a patriarchal attitude that is no longer relevant to us in the 21st century.” Blindboy has become a pivotal voice in the movement; utilising social media and his increasingly popular podcast to speak to men directly. His recent book, The Gospel According to Blindboy, delves deeply into such issues – he’s a leader, and a cultural reckoning force behind the pro-choice movement.

In a more recent filmed conversation with Cillian Murphy, Blindboy and the actor rallied for men to excercise their right to vote. “Men and women are both custodians of this society…we need to go out and support women,” Cillian Murphy said.

For too long, Irish women have been defined by their struggle. Those single mothers, those women who claim asylum under Ireland’s dehumanizing Direct Provision system, women of disparate colours and backgrounds, those with varying sexual identities and disabilities: it’s a vote for all women, and now isn’t a time that men can be complacent or indifferent. May 25 gifts Irish citizens – men equally – the opportunity to right one of our nation’s great wrongs. Though cis men will never know what it is like to carry a pregnancy, men are inextricably linked to this upcoming referendum. Men have a duty to engage with, support, and amplify female voices and stories so that an experience like Savita and Praveen’s is never relived again.

, http://www.dazeddigital.com/politics/article/40058/1/why-mens-voices-are-vital-in-irelands-abortion-referendum

[razorblade-eyes]

The Pitfalls of Using Gendered Terminology in Fitness

When I first began powerlifting I was told I had to use the 20-kilogram bar for competition.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with bar sizes, in most Olympic weightlifting gyms there are two bars, the 15-kilogram bar and the 20-kilogram bar (roughly 35 and 45 pounds respectively). Women typically use the 15-kilogram bar for the clean and jerk and the snatch because, typically, they have smaller hands making it easier to grip the smaller circumference of the bar.

Because of this generalization, the 15-kilogram bar is often called the female bar. Herein lies my issue.

From the moment I started structured strength training, and had this option between bars, I just thought I was supposed to be using the 15-kilogram “female” bar because, well, I am indeed a female. When I was told I would have to switch to the larger bar (in the sport of powerlifting everyone uses the same size bar) my stomach dropped and I thought, “I have no idea how I’m going to grip that big of a bar for deadlifts.” I was already conditioned to think I couldn’t do it and I wouldn’t be successful for no other reason than a gender label we’ve put on an object. Terminology is so important.

The way we talk about strength training and how we approach certain exercises, pieces of equipment or nutrition advice should have no gender barrier.

Certainly there are some exceptions where gender is important to note (pregnancy, stress urinary incontinence during maximal lifting, etc.), but it’s when the gender becomes a label to describe something “less-than” that it becomes a problem.

Below, I delve a little deeper into this and how it transcends into even more issues — exploring all the ways it affects females in the fitness space — while also offering suggestions on how we can begin to stand up to gender labeling and connotations that limit what girls and women think they are capable of before they even have a chance to try.

Why This Is a Problem

Words matter deeply and they profoundly affect the way we show up and present ourselves to the world. Marina Salman, MS in Counseling with a Specialization in Sport and Health Psychology, says that verbal communication can construct powerful (positive and negative) meanings and symbols to any particular event or person. “Given how women have been portrayed historically with labels such as ‘weak’, ‘easy’, or ‘promiscuous’, such attitudes have prominently carried over into all fields of society, including sport and fitness. With a phrase like ‘girl push-ups’, such verbiage can cause feelings of exclusion and a decrease in self-efficacy.”

Salman, who has had extensive experience counseling a NJAA D2 women’s basketball team, elite Paralympic athletes, and high-risk school students in health and fitness says she frequently sees these narratives at play among the female teenagers with whom she works.

“There continues to be a gap of mental approaches among the genders part due to the anxiety of conforming to social norms and perspectives,” says Salman. “The overall masculinity perspective constructs the idea that the male gender approaches training and fitness as a means to become stronger and to stay fit whereas the feminine perspective instructs the female gender to focus more on the ideal body image.”

By placing gender labels on equipment and exercise, not only are we continuing to exacerbate this problem but worse, we are equating the female gender with “less than” and “easier” types of exercise.

According to Salman, this creates an inferiority complex in the female gendered athlete and exerciser and can cause a shift in behavior, mood, and performance.

Sherry Schweighardt experiences this often with the girls she coaches in gymnastics. She often has girls ask her all the time to do “girl push-ups” when they are tired or not up to the regular ones. There’s also a disparity in the types of events that are picked for men as opposed to women in the competitive aspect of the sport.

“I think the biggest problem at play here is not that girls think they are incapable but that they have to be stronger, like the boys are,” says Schweighardt. “The terminology offers some reinforcement for the idea that girls are different and although it’s not overtly portrayed as less-than, they can look over and see that it takes a lot of strength to do the boys’ events and they have to be stronger like them.”

Schweighardt, who has a doctorate in Kinesiology and Sport Psychology, says she sees her athletes as more than just gymnasts — often asking herself how she can make them mentally stronger and capable outside of their sport. She says it starts by eliminating certain vocabulary.

“This is even a bigger problem when we look at non-binary and transgender athletes,” says Schweighardt. “When we equate certain exercises or equipment to a gender, and even power with a certain gender, we are making a statement that one gender is more powerful than the other. This is a stifling complex for those who may be male identifying as female because then they ask themselves, ‘Do I really want to live like that?’”

Schweighardt urges us to look at who are in positions of power in sport. There are so many more opportunities for women since Title IX but chances are women aren’t team owners, head coaches, or athletic directors. Who is making the money? It’s not women.

Who Is Affected by This Problem?

This problem is everywhere and no one is immune to it. Terminology, and the very way we talk and communicate about gender roles in training and sport, is monumental. Schweighardt sees it largely at play with her gymnasts, Salman sees it with her basketball players, and I’ve experienced it in the niche of Olympic weightlifting and powerlifting.

Rain Bennett, filmmaker and personal trainer has seen it affect freestyle calisthenics. “The beautiful thing about calisthenics is that it breaks down socioeconomic barriers, body weight, old, young, black, white, female, gay, straight, etc. But you still have the ‘girl push-up’ terminology and I think that is detrimental to women starting in this sport.”

Bennett began to see it more as he taught group classes that were 95 percent women, often having to explain to his clients that those were modified push-ups — and not “girl push-ups” — and that everyone has to start somewhere.

“Plenty of women I know do crazy superman clap push-ups and, as we start to see more and more badass women paving the way, I think [this term] starts to disappear but we have to be adamant about not making room for it,” he says.

Hannah Newman, PhD researcher at Loughborough University in the United Kingdom, researches the culture of Strongwoman and says that many women who train in the sport are still stuck in the mindset of training to lose weight. It’s only when they start to shift their focus to what their body can do, as opposed to what it looks like, that their goals change. That’s also when you see some change or resistance in the urge to use gender labels.

“Gender labeling of equipment or exercises contributes to the concept of the ‘glass ceiling’ on women’s strength,” says Newman. “That is, more women are engaging in strength and muscle-based training than ever before, but limits are often placed on just how strong or muscular women can be before it is deemed ‘unacceptable’ — a.k.a. women can be strong, but not too strong.”

She also says this is reinforced in the use of “femininity rules” in bodybuilding. In a sport where the primary purpose is to build muscle, women can be penalized for having muscles that are “too big.”

Schweighardt sees the same type of thing in her gymnastics classes where even in the way boys and girls behave is different. Boys are generally a bit more rowdy, and the tolerance for disruptive and often rude behavior is high. Girls, on the other hand, are expected to be quiet, to listen to the rules, to stand in line, not to ask questions, and be upright and gentle about how they conduct themselves. There’s a gap in terms of what the expectations are for boys and girls and it all starts with what words come out of our mouths.

What We Can Do to Combat This Problem

“We must refuse to stay silent,” says Bennett. “But most importantly we need to get to the women who are hearing it first as opposed to the men who are saying it. We need to empower women to stand up for themselves and demand more.”

Schweighardt agrees, saying we have to set young girls up for success. “I tell my girls that if anyone is advertently (or inadvertently) taking the space I gave you or the space you gave yourself you need to claim it. Claim you strength and claim your value.”

She says women need to demand equity as opposed to equality and realize that this whole thing is a microcosm for what is going on in our world at large and it’s not unrelated to what goes on in other industries.

Newman and Salman both agree that exercises and equipment should be labeled based on ability level as opposed to gender. “Inclusive language can serve as a key starter in diminishing gender division and promote social acceptance for females in the field of sports and fitness,” says Salman. “I strongly believe that young girls and women play a key role in shifting the culture — not only to challenge discriminatory language and behaviors of their male counterparts, but also in challenging the conditioned ideas and language of their own gender.”

So…it starts with us ladies. We must demand more. Next time, what will you do when you hear someone call push-ups from your knees “girl push-ups” or the 15-kilogram bar a “female bar?”

The post The Pitfalls of Using Gendered Terminology in Fitness appeared first on Girls Gone Strong.

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