Showing posts with label Hanna White. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hanna White. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Belated final paper
I had some trouble doing this right, so here, again, is my final draft of my final paper.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Holy... god, this is complicated.
But worth a look I think.
Found this online while looking for a different chart entirely, but I'm glad I did. A mostly complete overview of the arguments for and against gay marriage, color-coded by side, and with arrows to track the direction of the debate. It is very very crowded (obviously) and biased towards the pro-equality side, but very interesting, and I think useful. (And anyway, I'm not really complaining about it being biased towards my side, now am I?) If nothing else, it's worth a look and a think just to realize how ridiculous and complicated out of proportion the whole argument becomes. When it's just a matter of equal rights.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
And, on a lighter note
This one's just kind of confusing, but I think it might be a good thing.
A recent study done surveyed the television preferences of people on the basis of their political standing, and here's an interesting fact: among typically anti-gay Republicans' favorite shows is ABC's comedy "Modern Family," which if you don't know it, features a gay couple with an adopted Vietnamese daughter among its characters.
Wait, what?
Okay, to be fair, Modern Family features a very large family made up of three separate households: the aforementioned gay couple and their daughter, a traditional American household with a loving husband and wife and three children, and an older man (the father of one of the members of the gay couple and of the wife in the traditional household) who remarried to a somewhat younger Colombian woman with a son from her first marriage. As explained to me by my sister's communication's professor (I was interviewing her about television for a school project) it presents lots of different options and lets the viewer decide which ones they like in order to appeal to a wide demographic. But still, it's interesting that a show acknowledging the presence of many alternative lifestyles makes it into the top TV picks of Republicans. What pleases me about this is the idea that the supposed best way to convince people to join a pro-gay rights stance is by them getting to know a gay person. Although fictional characters are no substitute for reality, and may not actually have any effect whatsoever, at least Republicans are getting exposed to the idea. Mitch and Cameron, the couple in question, have realistic concerns in a realistic life, and Mitch isn't even a stereotypical gay man. Maybe seeing that will help people come around to the idea that there is no such thing as a secret gay agenda.
A recent study done surveyed the television preferences of people on the basis of their political standing, and here's an interesting fact: among typically anti-gay Republicans' favorite shows is ABC's comedy "Modern Family," which if you don't know it, features a gay couple with an adopted Vietnamese daughter among its characters.
Wait, what?
Okay, to be fair, Modern Family features a very large family made up of three separate households: the aforementioned gay couple and their daughter, a traditional American household with a loving husband and wife and three children, and an older man (the father of one of the members of the gay couple and of the wife in the traditional household) who remarried to a somewhat younger Colombian woman with a son from her first marriage. As explained to me by my sister's communication's professor (I was interviewing her about television for a school project) it presents lots of different options and lets the viewer decide which ones they like in order to appeal to a wide demographic. But still, it's interesting that a show acknowledging the presence of many alternative lifestyles makes it into the top TV picks of Republicans. What pleases me about this is the idea that the supposed best way to convince people to join a pro-gay rights stance is by them getting to know a gay person. Although fictional characters are no substitute for reality, and may not actually have any effect whatsoever, at least Republicans are getting exposed to the idea. Mitch and Cameron, the couple in question, have realistic concerns in a realistic life, and Mitch isn't even a stereotypical gay man. Maybe seeing that will help people come around to the idea that there is no such thing as a secret gay agenda.
Interesting video with comments on it that make me want to punch a bear
(that saying doesn't make sense, no. I picked it up from my sister.)
Anyway, I was browsing Youtube a minute ago and found this video about the interesting prospect that two caucasian parents could have a dark-skinned child. According to the woman interviewed (and this makes sense to me) it's completely possible for this to happen, since there are a lot of genetic traits, race potentially among them, that can lie dormant for a very long time and then show up because of weird genetic stuff that happens. If it can happen with freckles, or with eye or hair color (I can vouch for eye color - my uncle and I have hazel eyes but neither of his and my mom's parents had hazel eyes, nor did his parents' parents) why not race? It's an interesting idea with interesting consequences.
However, a lot of the comments were extremely derogatory, usually along the lines of "she just slept with a black guy admit it" (note that the clip is about a FICTIONAL BOOK people). That would be annoying, but wouldn't be enough to piss me off this much. What made me want to punch a bear was the following comment, which incidentally has been voted up three times. (this is why you don't read comments on Youtube if you know what's good for you. Warning for hate speech/language.)
Really world? Really?
Edited by Prof. Buckmire
Anyway, I was browsing Youtube a minute ago and found this video about the interesting prospect that two caucasian parents could have a dark-skinned child. According to the woman interviewed (and this makes sense to me) it's completely possible for this to happen, since there are a lot of genetic traits, race potentially among them, that can lie dormant for a very long time and then show up because of weird genetic stuff that happens. If it can happen with freckles, or with eye or hair color (I can vouch for eye color - my uncle and I have hazel eyes but neither of his and my mom's parents had hazel eyes, nor did his parents' parents) why not race? It's an interesting idea with interesting consequences.
However, a lot of the comments were extremely derogatory, usually along the lines of "she just slept with a black guy admit it" (note that the clip is about a FICTIONAL BOOK people). That would be annoying, but wouldn't be enough to piss me off this much. What made me want to punch a bear was the following comment, which incidentally has been voted up three times. (this is why you don't read comments on Youtube if you know what's good for you. Warning for hate speech/language.)
What does N.A.A.C.P stand for?
N*ggers Are Always Causing Problems.
Why do n*ggers keep chickens in their back yards?
To teach their kids how to walk.
Why do police dogs lick their ass?
To get the taste of n*gger out of their mouth.
Why does Alabama have n*ggers and California have earthquakes?
California got first pick.
Did you hear that the KKK bought the movie rights to "Roots"?
They're going to play it backwards so it has a happy ending.
Really world? Really?
Edited by Prof. Buckmire
Monday, November 15, 2010
Statistics from my brain
So for those of you that had not figured this out yet, I'm a writer. I have been for a really long time, and I love creating and screwing around with worlds and making characters and stuff. A little too much, apparently, because when I recently decided to make a list of all of my active characters (as in, those I actually write about/think about with some level of frequency, who have an established story and personality) I came up with 62 of them. I have clearly deteriorated into schizophrenia.
Rather than dwell on that thought, I decided to take the opportunity to take a count of the number of characters I had that fit into different labels (race, gender/sex, and sexuality to be specific, because I didn't have the time to do this in reality, so I really don't have the time to come up with other categories). The results are as follows.
Of my 62 characters...
41 are female, 21 are male
49 are white/ethnic majorities, 13 are nonwhite/ethnic minorities (One Spanish, three Italian-American, one African, two black, one Latina, one Japanese, two who are ethnic minorities in a fantasy world you do not need explained to you.)
51 are straight, 12 are gay or "other" (Four lesbians, two bisexual, two undecided (as in I'm unsure enough about their sexual identity to not call them straight but I'm not 100% sure what they are), one asexual for all practical purposes, two generally asexual).
There is a lot of room for confusion/variation in here, if you couldn't tell from my qualifying everything, because of the factor of talking about people who do not actually exist, many of whom live in fantasy or science fiction universes. For example, white is qualified technically as any ethnic majority in this list because one of the characters I determined as 'white' is actually dark-skinned, but he lives in a universe where that doesn't actually qualify him as an ethnic minority due to the circumstances. 'Asexual for all practical purposes' comes from Lurline, a character of mine who may or may not be attracted to either/or sex emotionally, but cannot have sexual relations without endangering herself, and since she considers sex to be an integral part of a romantic relationship, she's given up on the possibility of having any sort of romantic relationship, even a celibate one. One of the 'generally asexual' characters is only thus qualified because she actually has no emotions and only a limited capacity to think on her own, being basically a soulless pawn, which invalidates the idea of sexuality entirely (and to some extent race as well, though because she is matched with a male partner gender still plays into her identity).
Still, I thought this was interesting to do. It's clear that the vast majority of my characters are white straight females, which makes some sense - writers usually put something of themselves in their characters, and even though I don't identify as 100% straight I do identify as undecided, and straight is (perhaps unfortunately) sort of a default, so if I'm making a young white woman, I probably won't project my sexuality onto her, since I don't feel very strongly about that sexuality, and she'll end up being straight. Usually if I make a character who's gay it'll be something I think about from the first that they will be gay or bisexual or whatever, but this isn't always the case, as with Axel and Ziba, those listed above as 'undecided.' However, I do try to have the identities of my characters correspond to a relatively accurate population sample, which I think I've done fairly well in, though I could certainly improve. (Not counting the very heavy female balance - I'm a woman, so it's just a lot easier for me get into the mindset of a character who is also a woman, and that's not going to change.) There isn't a lot of liminal space being occupied, though... maybe I'll try that more in the future.
Also, if the length and detail I put into describing fictional beings frightens you, uh... yeah, I don't really claim that this is a sign of sanity or health. Feel free to back away slowly the next time you see me.
Rather than dwell on that thought, I decided to take the opportunity to take a count of the number of characters I had that fit into different labels (race, gender/sex, and sexuality to be specific, because I didn't have the time to do this in reality, so I really don't have the time to come up with other categories). The results are as follows.
Of my 62 characters...
41 are female, 21 are male
49 are white/ethnic majorities, 13 are nonwhite/ethnic minorities (One Spanish, three Italian-American, one African, two black, one Latina, one Japanese, two who are ethnic minorities in a fantasy world you do not need explained to you.)
51 are straight, 12 are gay or "other" (Four lesbians, two bisexual, two undecided (as in I'm unsure enough about their sexual identity to not call them straight but I'm not 100% sure what they are), one asexual for all practical purposes, two generally asexual).
There is a lot of room for confusion/variation in here, if you couldn't tell from my qualifying everything, because of the factor of talking about people who do not actually exist, many of whom live in fantasy or science fiction universes. For example, white is qualified technically as any ethnic majority in this list because one of the characters I determined as 'white' is actually dark-skinned, but he lives in a universe where that doesn't actually qualify him as an ethnic minority due to the circumstances. 'Asexual for all practical purposes' comes from Lurline, a character of mine who may or may not be attracted to either/or sex emotionally, but cannot have sexual relations without endangering herself, and since she considers sex to be an integral part of a romantic relationship, she's given up on the possibility of having any sort of romantic relationship, even a celibate one. One of the 'generally asexual' characters is only thus qualified because she actually has no emotions and only a limited capacity to think on her own, being basically a soulless pawn, which invalidates the idea of sexuality entirely (and to some extent race as well, though because she is matched with a male partner gender still plays into her identity).
Still, I thought this was interesting to do. It's clear that the vast majority of my characters are white straight females, which makes some sense - writers usually put something of themselves in their characters, and even though I don't identify as 100% straight I do identify as undecided, and straight is (perhaps unfortunately) sort of a default, so if I'm making a young white woman, I probably won't project my sexuality onto her, since I don't feel very strongly about that sexuality, and she'll end up being straight. Usually if I make a character who's gay it'll be something I think about from the first that they will be gay or bisexual or whatever, but this isn't always the case, as with Axel and Ziba, those listed above as 'undecided.' However, I do try to have the identities of my characters correspond to a relatively accurate population sample, which I think I've done fairly well in, though I could certainly improve. (Not counting the very heavy female balance - I'm a woman, so it's just a lot easier for me get into the mindset of a character who is also a woman, and that's not going to change.) There isn't a lot of liminal space being occupied, though... maybe I'll try that more in the future.
Also, if the length and detail I put into describing fictional beings frightens you, uh... yeah, I don't really claim that this is a sign of sanity or health. Feel free to back away slowly the next time you see me.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Why I'm Not Getting Married Until Gay Marriage is Legalized
Let me forward this by pointing out that the reason is not just the possibility of me marrying a woman. I'm actually undecided in my personal sexuality, so there's a perfectly good chance of me falling in love with a young man who I could, quite legally, in any state of my choosing, enter into nuptials with. There's also the chance, which I have known for quite a while, that the person I fall in love with will not believe in the institution of marriage, (though I do,) as let's face it, I hang out with hippies. And the whole point might actually be moot, because I have no intention of getting married until I'm well into my 20s and I really really hope that by that time, gay marriage will be legal anyway. But if it isn't, and I do end up in a serious relationship with a man, and he does believe in the institution of marriage, I'm still not going to marry him until gay marriage is legalized nationally.
I haven't actually mentioned this to many people yet, thus I wanted to blog about it publicly. Honestly, the reasoning is pretty simple in my mind. As stated, I hang out with hippies, I'm really really obviously left-leaning, and I have been raised to believe in equality in all its forms. Actually, when I was very little, I didn't even get that there was something unusual about two men being together - my gay uncle gave my sister and I a children's picture book called "My Two Uncles," and I liked the book, but the fact is, I didn't need the book to inform me of how okay it was that he was romantically involved with another man... it was just kind of fact to me for as long as I can remember. If anything, I have taken that ethos far further than I think my parents expected me to, and am currently planning on going into a career as a lawyer to put my ideals into action. And another way of doing that, i.e. putting my ideals into action, for me is to refuse to get married to a man until gay marriage is legalized. As long as the situation in the United States is such that, if I were to want to marry a woman, I would not be allowed to, there is absolutely no reason why I should be able to marry a man either. In short, if you're forbidding their gay marriage, my straight marriage should be forbidden too. Incidentally, according to my friend Christine (she and my sister are the only people I've mentioned it to since deciding, since it came up in conversation,) this tactic was followed on the TV show Queer as Folk, which is hardly surprising, and reminds me that I should watch it.
So, anyway, just wanted to say that, and figured this would be a good platform to. Thoughts? Am I insane? Do you approve? Do we have better things to talk about? Well, yes to the last one, but...
I haven't actually mentioned this to many people yet, thus I wanted to blog about it publicly. Honestly, the reasoning is pretty simple in my mind. As stated, I hang out with hippies, I'm really really obviously left-leaning, and I have been raised to believe in equality in all its forms. Actually, when I was very little, I didn't even get that there was something unusual about two men being together - my gay uncle gave my sister and I a children's picture book called "My Two Uncles," and I liked the book, but the fact is, I didn't need the book to inform me of how okay it was that he was romantically involved with another man... it was just kind of fact to me for as long as I can remember. If anything, I have taken that ethos far further than I think my parents expected me to, and am currently planning on going into a career as a lawyer to put my ideals into action. And another way of doing that, i.e. putting my ideals into action, for me is to refuse to get married to a man until gay marriage is legalized. As long as the situation in the United States is such that, if I were to want to marry a woman, I would not be allowed to, there is absolutely no reason why I should be able to marry a man either. In short, if you're forbidding their gay marriage, my straight marriage should be forbidden too. Incidentally, according to my friend Christine (she and my sister are the only people I've mentioned it to since deciding, since it came up in conversation,) this tactic was followed on the TV show Queer as Folk, which is hardly surprising, and reminds me that I should watch it.
So, anyway, just wanted to say that, and figured this would be a good platform to. Thoughts? Am I insane? Do you approve? Do we have better things to talk about? Well, yes to the last one, but...
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
Homosexuality in the media part two
In which Hanna devotes an ENTIRE BLOG POST to the worship of Joss Whedon. (I can't help myself. Anyway, why the heck not?)
So I just kind of wanted to get some different opinions on this because, due to the fact that I worship Joss Whedon, I feel my point of view might be... biased. If you don't know who Joss Whedon is, he's the guy who made Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel (a spin-off of Buffy), Firefly, Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog, and most recently Dollhouse. The reason I'm blogging about him is that in every single one of those shows (except Dr. Horrible, because it was a 3 episode webseries about 45 minutes long total) there is at least one episode with GLBT themes or a homosexual character. To be specific, it's generally lesbians.
This didn't really emerge fully until season 4 of Buffy. When the boyfriend of one of the main characters (Willow) leaves Sunnydale, a few episodes later, she meets her new love interest, Tara. As the name might imply, Tara's a girl. It takes them about a year to kiss onscreen, but they have a clearly loving, compassionate relationship, and in the musical episode, Tara sings a love song to Willow that is absolutely loaded with sexual subtext. Their relationship is treated just as seriously as any of the heterosexual relationships on the show, and Willow's prominence as a character does not decrease at all as a result of her getting a girlfriend. That would be all well and good, except that Tara dies tragically at the end of the sixth season (at the hands of a misogynist serial killer. Make of that what you will.) Which would still all be pretty well and good (Buffy characters love interests have been dying and/or leaving them since season one) if it weren't for Kennedy. Introduced as a potential slayer in season 7, Kennedy is a brash, bossy, often obnoxious lesbian who makes a point of showing off just how lesbian she is (sometimes to humorous effect... e.g, another potential slayer, holding a stake, says that she loves the feeling of wood in her hand, to which Kennedy responds "Lost me there.") About halfway through the season, Kennedy and Willow start dating. Willow is sweet, shy, bookish, and not entirely over Tara's death yet. Kennedy does not seem in the least like her type. So why? It sort of seems like she just jumped on the first lesbian that came around. (Also interesting when talking about Willow is her relationship with her boyfriend Oz, the one who leaves. Though they're made out to be quite in love with each other previous to his departure, once she starts dating Tara, she pretty much becomes and out-and-out lesbian... no chance that she'd date a boy in the future. Does this paint homosexuality as a choice?)
Excluding Angel (I remember there being an episode with GLBT themes but I can't remember which so I'm just gonna skip it) we have the lesbian encounters in Firefly and Dollhouse, both of which follow a similar theme, because from a certain viewpoint, both cases are a form of glorified prostitution. In Firefly, this takes place between the Companion Inara, a main character on the show, and a female client. Companions in Firefly are sort of a cross between prostitutes and geishas, very high-class, very expensive courtesans whose services extend beyond sex, who choose their clients very carefully, and who give careful attention to the emotional and spiritual components of sex as well as the actual sexual component. Though only female Companions are seen in-show, it's likely that there are male ones as well according to many fans, and apparently, the gender of the clients doesn't matter either, judging by the episode War Stories in which the 'councilor' Inara is meeting with turns out to be a woman. Note that Inara herself is implied to be completely straight, up to and including being the love interest of the show's main character Captain Malcom Reynolds. In Dollhouse, the situation has a similar tenor. The entire premise of the show is of an underground business in Los Angeles that rents out "Actives," people whose real personalities and memories have been wiped out and replaced with literally whatever the client wants. Echo, the show's main character and an Active, is hired out at various times to be a spy, a break-in artist, a bodyguard/singer, a negotiator, an investigator, a hit man, a therapist, a mother, and most often, a romantic partner, in any form the client desires (ranging from dominatrix to schoolgirl.) And like Companions, there's more to the interaction than just sex, because Actives can be "imprinted" to be anything and anyone you want, and when there is romance involved, they will truly feel they're in love. It is implied frequently in Dollhouse that it is far from unusual to have a female client hire a female active for a romantic engagement, or have a male client hire a male active for a romantic engagement (Echo even married a female client on an engagement once, according to the episode "A Love Supreme"). Still, however, when the Actives have their real personalities restored to them, all three of the central character Actives are straight. Dollhouse also has one minor character, Mag, who is not and never has been an Active and is implied to be lesbian, but she only appears in the two season finales.
The reason I find all of this interesting is that the GLBT themes in Joss Whedon's work are all filled with "Yes, but"s. GLBT encounters in Dollhouse and Firefly are forms of prostitution in which at least one participant is straight, and in Buffy, though one of the three most central characters is a lesbian, she only becomes one halfway through the series, and in seventh season doesn't seem to care what her partner is like so long as she's a girl. Personally, I'm inclined to think that Whedon's work sends an overall positive message about GLBT issues, but I am forced to admit there's a mixed quality to it. What do you think? Are these messages a good thing overall, a bad thing overall, or somewhere in between?
So I just kind of wanted to get some different opinions on this because, due to the fact that I worship Joss Whedon, I feel my point of view might be... biased. If you don't know who Joss Whedon is, he's the guy who made Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel (a spin-off of Buffy), Firefly, Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog, and most recently Dollhouse. The reason I'm blogging about him is that in every single one of those shows (except Dr. Horrible, because it was a 3 episode webseries about 45 minutes long total) there is at least one episode with GLBT themes or a homosexual character. To be specific, it's generally lesbians.
This didn't really emerge fully until season 4 of Buffy. When the boyfriend of one of the main characters (Willow) leaves Sunnydale, a few episodes later, she meets her new love interest, Tara. As the name might imply, Tara's a girl. It takes them about a year to kiss onscreen, but they have a clearly loving, compassionate relationship, and in the musical episode, Tara sings a love song to Willow that is absolutely loaded with sexual subtext. Their relationship is treated just as seriously as any of the heterosexual relationships on the show, and Willow's prominence as a character does not decrease at all as a result of her getting a girlfriend. That would be all well and good, except that Tara dies tragically at the end of the sixth season (at the hands of a misogynist serial killer. Make of that what you will.) Which would still all be pretty well and good (Buffy characters love interests have been dying and/or leaving them since season one) if it weren't for Kennedy. Introduced as a potential slayer in season 7, Kennedy is a brash, bossy, often obnoxious lesbian who makes a point of showing off just how lesbian she is (sometimes to humorous effect... e.g, another potential slayer, holding a stake, says that she loves the feeling of wood in her hand, to which Kennedy responds "Lost me there.") About halfway through the season, Kennedy and Willow start dating. Willow is sweet, shy, bookish, and not entirely over Tara's death yet. Kennedy does not seem in the least like her type. So why? It sort of seems like she just jumped on the first lesbian that came around. (Also interesting when talking about Willow is her relationship with her boyfriend Oz, the one who leaves. Though they're made out to be quite in love with each other previous to his departure, once she starts dating Tara, she pretty much becomes and out-and-out lesbian... no chance that she'd date a boy in the future. Does this paint homosexuality as a choice?)
Excluding Angel (I remember there being an episode with GLBT themes but I can't remember which so I'm just gonna skip it) we have the lesbian encounters in Firefly and Dollhouse, both of which follow a similar theme, because from a certain viewpoint, both cases are a form of glorified prostitution. In Firefly, this takes place between the Companion Inara, a main character on the show, and a female client. Companions in Firefly are sort of a cross between prostitutes and geishas, very high-class, very expensive courtesans whose services extend beyond sex, who choose their clients very carefully, and who give careful attention to the emotional and spiritual components of sex as well as the actual sexual component. Though only female Companions are seen in-show, it's likely that there are male ones as well according to many fans, and apparently, the gender of the clients doesn't matter either, judging by the episode War Stories in which the 'councilor' Inara is meeting with turns out to be a woman. Note that Inara herself is implied to be completely straight, up to and including being the love interest of the show's main character Captain Malcom Reynolds. In Dollhouse, the situation has a similar tenor. The entire premise of the show is of an underground business in Los Angeles that rents out "Actives," people whose real personalities and memories have been wiped out and replaced with literally whatever the client wants. Echo, the show's main character and an Active, is hired out at various times to be a spy, a break-in artist, a bodyguard/singer, a negotiator, an investigator, a hit man, a therapist, a mother, and most often, a romantic partner, in any form the client desires (ranging from dominatrix to schoolgirl.) And like Companions, there's more to the interaction than just sex, because Actives can be "imprinted" to be anything and anyone you want, and when there is romance involved, they will truly feel they're in love. It is implied frequently in Dollhouse that it is far from unusual to have a female client hire a female active for a romantic engagement, or have a male client hire a male active for a romantic engagement (Echo even married a female client on an engagement once, according to the episode "A Love Supreme"). Still, however, when the Actives have their real personalities restored to them, all three of the central character Actives are straight. Dollhouse also has one minor character, Mag, who is not and never has been an Active and is implied to be lesbian, but she only appears in the two season finales.
The reason I find all of this interesting is that the GLBT themes in Joss Whedon's work are all filled with "Yes, but"s. GLBT encounters in Dollhouse and Firefly are forms of prostitution in which at least one participant is straight, and in Buffy, though one of the three most central characters is a lesbian, she only becomes one halfway through the series, and in seventh season doesn't seem to care what her partner is like so long as she's a girl. Personally, I'm inclined to think that Whedon's work sends an overall positive message about GLBT issues, but I am forced to admit there's a mixed quality to it. What do you think? Are these messages a good thing overall, a bad thing overall, or somewhere in between?
Friday, October 22, 2010
Well, since I do talk about South Park all the time...
Here are a few of the episodes of South Park that are more relevant to our course material. I mean, there are a great many more (so, so many) because if you ask me there's a good episode of South Park about everything, but these four are ones I mentioned in class or ones that particularly reminded me of our CSP. WARNING for mature content, and (just in case someone has never heard of South Park before) easily offended people should not watch these videos.
Death Camp of Tolerance: Mr. Garrison, (the boys' openly gay teacher), returns to his job at South Park elementary after having a nervous breakdown. He discovers the potential for earning thousands of dollars in a lawsuit if the school fires him for his sexual orientation, and becomes flamboyantly gay and inappropriately sexual in the classroom in an effort to cause this to happen. When Stan, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman are bothered by his actions, they are sent to the Death Camp of Tolerance to learn to accept other peoples' differences.
South Park is Gay: "Meterosexuality" becomes the new trend in South Park, with the town's straight men acting feminine in order to get girls to like them better. Mr. Garrison and the other South Park gays are affronted. Includes a "Metero Pride" parade featuring the chant "We're Here/We're not Queer/But We're Close/Get Used to It."
Cartman Sucks: A photo Cartman takes puts fellow student Butters in a compromising position and Butters' conservative Christian parents send him to a gay conversion camp.
The F-Word: A loud annoying motorcycle gang arrives in town, and the boys and their classmates call the offending motorcyclists faggots. The adults inform them that they can't say that word, it's a bad name for gay people, and the kids say that they had no idea it had anything to do with gay people. They just always associated it with being a word to make fun of conceited annoying motorcyclists.
Enjoy. (And again, do not watch if easily offended. I promise I have a soul, I just also happen to find this stuff hilarious.)
Death Camp of Tolerance: Mr. Garrison, (the boys' openly gay teacher), returns to his job at South Park elementary after having a nervous breakdown. He discovers the potential for earning thousands of dollars in a lawsuit if the school fires him for his sexual orientation, and becomes flamboyantly gay and inappropriately sexual in the classroom in an effort to cause this to happen. When Stan, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman are bothered by his actions, they are sent to the Death Camp of Tolerance to learn to accept other peoples' differences.
South Park is Gay: "Meterosexuality" becomes the new trend in South Park, with the town's straight men acting feminine in order to get girls to like them better. Mr. Garrison and the other South Park gays are affronted. Includes a "Metero Pride" parade featuring the chant "We're Here/We're not Queer/But We're Close/Get Used to It."
Cartman Sucks: A photo Cartman takes puts fellow student Butters in a compromising position and Butters' conservative Christian parents send him to a gay conversion camp.
The F-Word: A loud annoying motorcycle gang arrives in town, and the boys and their classmates call the offending motorcyclists faggots. The adults inform them that they can't say that word, it's a bad name for gay people, and the kids say that they had no idea it had anything to do with gay people. They just always associated it with being a word to make fun of conceited annoying motorcyclists.
Enjoy. (And again, do not watch if easily offended. I promise I have a soul, I just also happen to find this stuff hilarious.)
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Random excerpt from my life that I swear is GLBT related.
Yeah, if the title doesn't explain enough, basically I just had an experience yesterday and for some reason I felt like the appropriate response was to blog about it.
I'm staying with my uncle for fall break, and so I got picked up at the train station in San Luis Obispo on Saturday evening by him and a friend of his, who was driving. We were basically just engaging in polite conversation, and some news came up that his friend was surprised I hadn't heard about. I told them that I don't follow a lot of news right now, because I'm in college, except for GLBT news because I'm taking a course in it. I mentioned as an example the incident in Tricia's latest blog post about the lesbian couple being kicked out of a mall for kissing. And that's where things got kind of interesting, because my uncle's friend responded by telling a story of how he was at court for a parking ticket recently, and there were two lesbians kissing and hugging in the courtroom before the proceedings started, ending this story by saying "There's a place for it" in what was really a disapproving tone. I wanted to tell him that yes, there was a place for it and it was called wherever they wanted, but I didn't say anything about it because I barely knew the guy and I didn't want to make the rest of the drive awkward. But it bothered me, because no matter how much I try to, I really can't seem to wrap my head around people who feel that way. Why is it that two girls have less right to kiss in public than a girl and a guy? I mean, marriage rights and federal protections aside, shouldn't the LGBT community at least be afforded the ability to be in public without being openly judged by now?
Maybe I'm overreacting, but it got under my skin. I've lived most of my life in an environment where at least the right of gay and lesbian couples to exist was recognized with few people being openly bigoted or uncomfortable about it. I realize that my little corner of the world is not at all like the rest of the world, but because I was always just raised to believe that men loving men or women loving women was a totally natural phenomenon, it still shocks me when I remember that the rest of the world does not agree with me.
I'm staying with my uncle for fall break, and so I got picked up at the train station in San Luis Obispo on Saturday evening by him and a friend of his, who was driving. We were basically just engaging in polite conversation, and some news came up that his friend was surprised I hadn't heard about. I told them that I don't follow a lot of news right now, because I'm in college, except for GLBT news because I'm taking a course in it. I mentioned as an example the incident in Tricia's latest blog post about the lesbian couple being kicked out of a mall for kissing. And that's where things got kind of interesting, because my uncle's friend responded by telling a story of how he was at court for a parking ticket recently, and there were two lesbians kissing and hugging in the courtroom before the proceedings started, ending this story by saying "There's a place for it" in what was really a disapproving tone. I wanted to tell him that yes, there was a place for it and it was called wherever they wanted, but I didn't say anything about it because I barely knew the guy and I didn't want to make the rest of the drive awkward. But it bothered me, because no matter how much I try to, I really can't seem to wrap my head around people who feel that way. Why is it that two girls have less right to kiss in public than a girl and a guy? I mean, marriage rights and federal protections aside, shouldn't the LGBT community at least be afforded the ability to be in public without being openly judged by now?
Maybe I'm overreacting, but it got under my skin. I've lived most of my life in an environment where at least the right of gay and lesbian couples to exist was recognized with few people being openly bigoted or uncomfortable about it. I realize that my little corner of the world is not at all like the rest of the world, but because I was always just raised to believe that men loving men or women loving women was a totally natural phenomenon, it still shocks me when I remember that the rest of the world does not agree with me.
Friday, October 1, 2010
Disney, race, and gender
Okay, this seems kind of obvious, but I wanted to blog about it anyway.
First of all, I'd like to premise this by pointing out that (if you somehow had not figured this out yet) I consider myself a feminist. The right of all people, regardless of gender, race, sexuality, religion or whatever else, to have equal rights to do whatever they want within the limits of the law and what is sensible, is fundamental to me and along with free speech it is probably my deepest held value. But let me say also that, like many of you, I was raised on Disney movies, particularly the princess movies. And when feminists get up and arms about those movies, it bothers me.
And mind you, I do acknowledge that when you think about it, the messages sent by some of those movies by the behavior of the princesses are truly frightening. Largely, they are docile, submissive, beautiful, stereotypical girls. Take The Little Mermaid. Watching the movie as an adult, when you pay attention, the basic message looks something like this. But when I was a little girl, it was my favorite movie, and I watched it constantly. Though I liked the other movies too, Ariel the airhead was my absolute favorite, and I had a huge crush on Prince Eric. The reason I mention this is to point out that around the same time that I was enamored of The Little Mermaid, my sister and I were playing pretend with our Barbie and Ken dolls... by having Ken act like a misogynist pig, and having all of the barbies gang up and beat up on him. (Completely true story. Ken actually lost a leg at one point due to this behavior). Having our mother, father, and grandmother constantly tell us how important it was that girls stand up for themselves, the questionable messages sent by Ariel didn't even occur to me. I just liked the movie. As a child, what you see on TV and in movies can certainly influence how you think and behave. But the most important influence is going to be your parents. If little girls turn out like Snow White and Sleeping Beauty, it's not necessarily Disney's fault... it's her parents'.
My other complaint with people who vilify Disney is that it seems to me like, no matter what Disney does, they can't win with these people. Princess and the Frog has been accused by some as being racist, and Mulan has been accused by some as being sexist, usually for totally illegitimate reasons. Tiana is seen by some as not being black enough, with 'white' features but just dark skin to offset it. Her original name was Sarah, but when Disney got complaints that Sarah was a 'slave name', they changed it to Tiana. And now people complain that Tiana is too stereotypically black a name. Others have stated that judging by the about two minutes at the end of Mulan where she has returned to her home and her family, and to wearing female clothes, that Mulan forever returns to a role of docility after fighting the war. None of this makes any sense to me.
I mean, I do realize that early Disney princess films are about as sexist as they come. But really... cut them some slack. It's a story, not a political statement.
First of all, I'd like to premise this by pointing out that (if you somehow had not figured this out yet) I consider myself a feminist. The right of all people, regardless of gender, race, sexuality, religion or whatever else, to have equal rights to do whatever they want within the limits of the law and what is sensible, is fundamental to me and along with free speech it is probably my deepest held value. But let me say also that, like many of you, I was raised on Disney movies, particularly the princess movies. And when feminists get up and arms about those movies, it bothers me.
And mind you, I do acknowledge that when you think about it, the messages sent by some of those movies by the behavior of the princesses are truly frightening. Largely, they are docile, submissive, beautiful, stereotypical girls. Take The Little Mermaid. Watching the movie as an adult, when you pay attention, the basic message looks something like this. But when I was a little girl, it was my favorite movie, and I watched it constantly. Though I liked the other movies too, Ariel the airhead was my absolute favorite, and I had a huge crush on Prince Eric. The reason I mention this is to point out that around the same time that I was enamored of The Little Mermaid, my sister and I were playing pretend with our Barbie and Ken dolls... by having Ken act like a misogynist pig, and having all of the barbies gang up and beat up on him. (Completely true story. Ken actually lost a leg at one point due to this behavior). Having our mother, father, and grandmother constantly tell us how important it was that girls stand up for themselves, the questionable messages sent by Ariel didn't even occur to me. I just liked the movie. As a child, what you see on TV and in movies can certainly influence how you think and behave. But the most important influence is going to be your parents. If little girls turn out like Snow White and Sleeping Beauty, it's not necessarily Disney's fault... it's her parents'.
My other complaint with people who vilify Disney is that it seems to me like, no matter what Disney does, they can't win with these people. Princess and the Frog has been accused by some as being racist, and Mulan has been accused by some as being sexist, usually for totally illegitimate reasons. Tiana is seen by some as not being black enough, with 'white' features but just dark skin to offset it. Her original name was Sarah, but when Disney got complaints that Sarah was a 'slave name', they changed it to Tiana. And now people complain that Tiana is too stereotypically black a name. Others have stated that judging by the about two minutes at the end of Mulan where she has returned to her home and her family, and to wearing female clothes, that Mulan forever returns to a role of docility after fighting the war. None of this makes any sense to me.
I mean, I do realize that early Disney princess films are about as sexist as they come. But really... cut them some slack. It's a story, not a political statement.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
American Night: The Ballad of Juan Jose
During Wednesday's class, as we discussed breaking down the border between binary oppositions, there was a phrase that I couldn't get out of my head even though I have only ever seen it once before. But particularly in the context of Anzaldua's article about mestiza consciousness, I thought it was appropriate. "LAS FRONTERAS SON CICATRICES EN LA TIERRA" : Borders are scars on the land.
This phrase, scrawled in graffiti on the back wall of the set, is the prelude to American Night: The Ballad of Juan Jose, a play I saw at Oregon Shakespeare Festival last summer. American Night is the first of 37 (equal to the number of Shakespeare shows in rotation) plays commissioned by the festival meant to commemorate exceptional events in American history. It was created by L.A. native Richard Montoya and the improv group Culture Clash. And also of note, in my opinion, is the fact that it is the first show that OSF has ever had to add performances of in order to satisfy ticket demand. Considering that the show is running the same season as what everyone I know (who saw it) considers the best performance of Hamlet they have ever seen, this is no mean feat.
American Night focuses on the struggles of character Juan Jose, a Mexican immigrant and permanent legal alien, as he studies on the eve of his U.S. citizenship exam. Despite his best efforts, he falls asleep in the wee hours of the morning. With this premise, he falls into dreams of the highest and lowest moments of America, from the Treaty of Guadalupe, to Lewis and Clark, to Woody Guthrie and the Great Depression, culminating in a Town Hall meeting and wildly strange Japanese game show. Moving and irreverent and completely un-politically correct, the play offers an earnest look at America's past and present, and a form of patriotism unlike any other shines through.
One of the many traits I admired about the play, and one particularly relevant to the breaking down of boundaries, was its unwillingness to treat any of the groups it portrayed in an unfair light. Nobody was made a laughingstock. Certainly there were laughable characters, but still, they were treated fairly. In attending a post-play talk with Richard Montoya, this was a point he stressed, specifically citing the two Mormons who come to help Juan Jose study at the beginning of the play. I remember Montoya was adamant that they not come off as a joke, and they did not. Nor for that matter did the hippies at Woodstock or the tea baggers at the Town Hall meeting. Absurd though they might be, their humanity was not compromised.
Though I don't think Montoya is much of a social constructionist, and the phrase "Las fronteras son cicatrices en la tierra" (at the end of the play, it has been translated, as the graffiti is actually a lighting effect) clearly refers more to physical borders between countries, specifically to America and Mexico, than it does to metaphorical/theoretical boundaries, American Night clearly demonstrates a desire to treat people not as blacks, whites, Mexicans, males, females, etc., but as people. And in a basic way, this is what dissolving binary oppositions is about: seeing people on the basis of who they are, not what they are. Another poignant moment in the play, Juan's visit to a Japanese internment camp, also illustrates this idea. Along with the Japanese-Americans, Juan Jose finds a hispanic teenager who went along to the camp on the grounds that he is no more or less American than those contained there, so if the Japanese are to be sent to camps, you might as well send him as well. And along with him, there is a middle class white woman who went along because she was unable to stand the fact that no educational services had been provided for the youth of the camp by the government. Voluntarily, she teaches them herself. The solidarity exhibited by these individuals and others in the play crosses borders of race, gender, religion, and political ideology to show that none of these things defines whether or not you are an American and, in a larger context, a human being.
Anyway, here is a review of the play, and here is some information on it from OSF's own site. If you're really interested, can afford it, and have the time (as if, we're all college students) the show plays till the end of October. (More realistically, being that Culture Clash is an L.A. based group, they may perform it here some time in the future, so this is their website).
This phrase, scrawled in graffiti on the back wall of the set, is the prelude to American Night: The Ballad of Juan Jose, a play I saw at Oregon Shakespeare Festival last summer. American Night is the first of 37 (equal to the number of Shakespeare shows in rotation) plays commissioned by the festival meant to commemorate exceptional events in American history. It was created by L.A. native Richard Montoya and the improv group Culture Clash. And also of note, in my opinion, is the fact that it is the first show that OSF has ever had to add performances of in order to satisfy ticket demand. Considering that the show is running the same season as what everyone I know (who saw it) considers the best performance of Hamlet they have ever seen, this is no mean feat.
American Night focuses on the struggles of character Juan Jose, a Mexican immigrant and permanent legal alien, as he studies on the eve of his U.S. citizenship exam. Despite his best efforts, he falls asleep in the wee hours of the morning. With this premise, he falls into dreams of the highest and lowest moments of America, from the Treaty of Guadalupe, to Lewis and Clark, to Woody Guthrie and the Great Depression, culminating in a Town Hall meeting and wildly strange Japanese game show. Moving and irreverent and completely un-politically correct, the play offers an earnest look at America's past and present, and a form of patriotism unlike any other shines through.
One of the many traits I admired about the play, and one particularly relevant to the breaking down of boundaries, was its unwillingness to treat any of the groups it portrayed in an unfair light. Nobody was made a laughingstock. Certainly there were laughable characters, but still, they were treated fairly. In attending a post-play talk with Richard Montoya, this was a point he stressed, specifically citing the two Mormons who come to help Juan Jose study at the beginning of the play. I remember Montoya was adamant that they not come off as a joke, and they did not. Nor for that matter did the hippies at Woodstock or the tea baggers at the Town Hall meeting. Absurd though they might be, their humanity was not compromised.
Though I don't think Montoya is much of a social constructionist, and the phrase "Las fronteras son cicatrices en la tierra" (at the end of the play, it has been translated, as the graffiti is actually a lighting effect) clearly refers more to physical borders between countries, specifically to America and Mexico, than it does to metaphorical/theoretical boundaries, American Night clearly demonstrates a desire to treat people not as blacks, whites, Mexicans, males, females, etc., but as people. And in a basic way, this is what dissolving binary oppositions is about: seeing people on the basis of who they are, not what they are. Another poignant moment in the play, Juan's visit to a Japanese internment camp, also illustrates this idea. Along with the Japanese-Americans, Juan Jose finds a hispanic teenager who went along to the camp on the grounds that he is no more or less American than those contained there, so if the Japanese are to be sent to camps, you might as well send him as well. And along with him, there is a middle class white woman who went along because she was unable to stand the fact that no educational services had been provided for the youth of the camp by the government. Voluntarily, she teaches them herself. The solidarity exhibited by these individuals and others in the play crosses borders of race, gender, religion, and political ideology to show that none of these things defines whether or not you are an American and, in a larger context, a human being.
Anyway, here is a review of the play, and here is some information on it from OSF's own site. If you're really interested, can afford it, and have the time (as if, we're all college students) the show plays till the end of October. (More realistically, being that Culture Clash is an L.A. based group, they may perform it here some time in the future, so this is their website).
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Homosexuality in the media of different cultures
Okay, obviously, I am not the first person to ever have an opinion or a question about this subject. How homosexuality is portrayed, if it is portrayed, in popular media is a subject of constant discussion, particularly what that portrayal means about society. However, something I have always enjoyed discussing and thinking about is how that portrayal and what it means about society changes in the media of different countries. To be fair, I don't watch a lot of mainstream television, and I'm not a scholar or anything, so these opinions are completely unqualified... but I would love to hear what you guys think on the subject.
Primarily, the TV show that gets me thinking about this is the British program "Doctor Who," a long-running science fiction series dating back to the 1960s (it's sort of a British "Star Trek," in my book). All I have actually seen of "Doctor Who" is the new series, which started in 2005, so that is all my comments can be applied to. But insofar as the new series goes, something I have been extremely impressed with is the willingness of the show to feature homosexual characters and couples. This is not really any big news, since there's a good number of American shows that do the same nowadays. What impresses me about "Doctor Who" specifically is that it doesn't really make a point out of the presence of homosexuality on the show... it's just there. For example, in the first 15 seconds of this clip from the episode "Gridlock," we meet the so-called "Carsidi Sisters," in reality a married lesbian couple. The couple are not main characters and do not appear for more than 3 minutes total screen time in this single episode. This is not to say that the show's writers or the BBC are afraid of giving too major a nod to homosexuality, as seen by the example of Captain Jack Harkness, a major character for several episodes in multiple seasons as well as the star of his own spin-off show, "Torchwood," who is described multiple times as "omnisexual" - a word that takes on an even broader meaning in a science fiction context. The Carsidi Sisters, then, do not demonstrate a lack of willingness to feature homosexuality in a major role, but a lack of need. What I find impressive about them, and other characters in the show like them (there are several) is that they demonstrate homosexuality as just a part of everyday life. "Doctor Who" shows that it condones homosexuality not by making an example of having gay characters, as is in my opinion the tendency of American shows (Kurt from Glee is a good example), but by treating homosexuality casually. To me, this is in many ways a more powerful way of proving a point than featuring homosexuality deliberately. And though I'm not actually sure what the public opinion of homosexuality is like in Britain, I find that "Doctor Who" points towards something very positive.
Aside from American and British TV, the only other example of homosexuality in different countries' media that I am familiar with is in Japanese animation, or anime. This however is an example of the cultural gap not because anime reflects Japanese values about homosexuality, but because it doesn't even remotely. In many anime and manga (Japanese comic books), gay individuals and couples are common. How open the individual or couple is varies, but it's certainly there. What's odd about this is that in Japanese culture, homosexuality is not condoned at all, even frowned upon strongly. There is a complete disconnect in Japan between media and reality.
As I said, any other opinions on this subject are heartily appreciated. I'm certainly not the ultimate source of knowledge on this subject, and there are tons of holes in what I know, so if somebody knows more I would love to be corrected.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
The poster I had mentioned in class
So unfortunately, I have as of yet been unable to get a photo of this thing and upload it, as my digital camera is officially dead and I do not currently have the time/resources to go out to the nearest store and buy some batteries. However I managed to find the site selling the posters, so you can take a gander at it there if you have a burning desire to. (Planning on going shopping this weekend so once I have batteries, I can embed a photo in this blog post for those of you too lazy to click on the link and then click on the poster.) Till then, the poster I'm referring to is the image in the top right of that link.
For those of you who are not in my section of the CSP, what I'm talking about here is a poster featuring an image of a somewhat androgynous child, with a list of things boys/girls can like and do that go against their gender roles, somewhat reminiscent of the story of X. I'm quite fond of it personally, and when I saw the poster in the window of the Center for Gender Equity here on campus, I realized this is the third time I have seen said poster. The first time I don't remember too clearly, as I believe it was posted on the wall at one of the buildings I visited frequently as a child... not sure whether it was at school or some extracurricular program, I just distinctly remember the poster. The second place is in the staff office at the Portland, OR Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls, which is one of my favorite places on earth. I went there the summer of my 8th grade, freshman, and sophomore year and saw for myself what a powerful experience it provides for many young girls and teens, and I highly recommend renting the documentary about it if you have any interest whatsoever. (Incidentally, yes, that is me with my friends/band in the second photo down on the front page, from about 3 years ago.)
For those of you who are not in my section of the CSP, what I'm talking about here is a poster featuring an image of a somewhat androgynous child, with a list of things boys/girls can like and do that go against their gender roles, somewhat reminiscent of the story of X. I'm quite fond of it personally, and when I saw the poster in the window of the Center for Gender Equity here on campus, I realized this is the third time I have seen said poster. The first time I don't remember too clearly, as I believe it was posted on the wall at one of the buildings I visited frequently as a child... not sure whether it was at school or some extracurricular program, I just distinctly remember the poster. The second place is in the staff office at the Portland, OR Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls, which is one of my favorite places on earth. I went there the summer of my 8th grade, freshman, and sophomore year and saw for myself what a powerful experience it provides for many young girls and teens, and I highly recommend renting the documentary about it if you have any interest whatsoever. (Incidentally, yes, that is me with my friends/band in the second photo down on the front page, from about 3 years ago.)
Friday, September 10, 2010
A Gaythering Storm
Well this is a bit old, but its something that I enjoy personally and I figured some of you might enjoy it as well, so I wanted to share it.
Approximately 2 years ago now, when Proposition 8 was first being voted on, an ad popped up by the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) which compared gay marriage to the looming threat of a storm. The ad itself was both frightening and inadvertently humorous in how overdramatic it was, or at least it was in my opinion.
In the wake of the ad, a parody was made by a number of Hollywood celebrities, in which they talked about protecting America from the storm using a "giant gay repellent umbrella." Since then a website was created with that domain name that has some of my favorite humorous gay marriage related parodies, all in one place, and I highly recommend you check it out if that's the sort of thing that interests you.
Here's the original ad by NOM: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp76ly2_NoI&feature=player_embedded
The parody: http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/6eddb255b2/a-gaythering-storm?rel=player
And the website: http://www.giantgayrepellentumbrella.com/
I also found it interesting to note/relevant to our class the insistence of the folks at NOM to point out that they were a "rainbow coalition" in regards to race, class, gender, and religion, all pitted against a group of different sexual orientation.
Approximately 2 years ago now, when Proposition 8 was first being voted on, an ad popped up by the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) which compared gay marriage to the looming threat of a storm. The ad itself was both frightening and inadvertently humorous in how overdramatic it was, or at least it was in my opinion.
In the wake of the ad, a parody was made by a number of Hollywood celebrities, in which they talked about protecting America from the storm using a "giant gay repellent umbrella." Since then a website was created with that domain name that has some of my favorite humorous gay marriage related parodies, all in one place, and I highly recommend you check it out if that's the sort of thing that interests you.
Here's the original ad by NOM: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp76ly2_NoI&feature=player_embedded
The parody: http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/6eddb255b2/a-gaythering-storm?rel=player
And the website: http://www.giantgayrepellentumbrella.com/
I also found it interesting to note/relevant to our class the insistence of the folks at NOM to point out that they were a "rainbow coalition" in regards to race, class, gender, and religion, all pitted against a group of different sexual orientation.
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