Tracy's Final Paper, Final Version

Click to see my finalized paper:

FINAL VERSION!!

Gay Straight Guys

This is another funny video that deals with the LGBT community. In this video two gay guys are in denial about their sexual preferences. They make-out several times and but still insist that they are straight. At some point they come close to admitting their homosexuality but then they right back into denial. The video is pretty funny, check it out for yourself here.

Fighting Ignorance with Humor

Sometimes we just have to take a step back and have a good laugh about our misfortunes. This is what this video makes us do in regards to the LGBT community. This is funny clip about gay protest signs. Even if not everything’s going as well as planned we can still have a good laugh about what is being done. Also like the clip’s description reads we can be “Fighting ignorance with humor”.

LGBT Churches

Before I took this course I had no idea that there was such a thing as gay churches. In my mind religion and homosexuality were as far apart as they could be. However, once I did learn about them I was very interested and I wanted to find out more. I did some research and found out that gay churches are very much like regular churches. There is not a large difference at all. To see what I mean see this site.

The New Woman

Throughout the years the typical role of a woman has been to be a stay at home mother. However, more recently, this norm has been challenged and we’ve been seeing more and more women leaving the house to join the workforce. This is a great thing because it means more and more women are become independent and not having to rely on their husbands to support them. And while it’s a great thing that women are becoming this independent it can also be hard for them to learn how to balance work and family life. I searched online to see if there were any sites that offered any help to women who were having trouble balancing their job and family. Right away I found a very informative site.

Workingmother.com is a site especially designed for women who are working and have families. This site is meant to help women balance their family life and their work. If you know any working women with families I recommend you inform them about this site, it’s very helpful. Check it out for yourself here.

Beautiful No Matter What They Say...

There couldn’t be a video that exemplifies more the term of acceptance than this. This is Christina Aguilera’s Beautiful and it depicts how all individuals are beautiful regardless of what others think. Whether society accepts them or not doesn’t matter, like Christina says, “'Cause you are beautiful no matter what they say/Words can't bring you down, oh no/You are beautiful in every single way/Yes, words can't bring you down, oh no/So don't you bring me down today”. Check the video out!

Martin Luther King Jr. & Harvey Milk

I happened to be thinking about Martin Luther King Jr. and the way the contributed so much to the African American civil rights movement when I asked myself: who is the Martin Luther King Jr. of the gay civil rights movement? The first name that immediately popped into my mind was that of Harvey Milk. I decided to do some research on the two and see how many similarities the shared. I came upon a very interesting blog. To check it out click here.

Abolish the "N" word

Throughout the semester we have been discussing the wrongful use of the word gay to mean bad or something similar. However, a similar word that we haven’t talked about is the “N” word. To this day the “N” word is still tossed around like nothing regardless of the historical significance it has. Since we hadn’t talked about it much in class I decided to do some research on it and I found a great site with plenty of information. This is the site of an organization whose mission is to abolish the “N” word. When you first open the site you’ll see a great introduction with really strong images and phrases. It really makes you think about why we still use the “N” word. Then you go on to the main page where you can find out more about the organization, its mission, and its history. You can also join its mailing list and learn more about it. Click here to check it out.

Cooking, cleaning. And Vaginas.

This is video of a song that I casually heard the other day, and while I found it hilarious because it was so ridiculous it also shows some underlying feelings of male supremacy. This can even be seen in the highest rated comments. One of these comments is “Cooking, cleaning. And Vaginas.” This is referring to a portion of the lyrics that reads “Women are only good for three things: cooking, cleaning, and vaginas.” See it for yourself.

Dream Act: Dissected

Unless you are directly interested in politics it can be confusing keeping up with all bills going through congress. I know this for a fact because I’m always at a loss when I’m watching the news or reading the newspaper and see something dealing with the Dream Act. The Dream Act is the single most important piece of legislation to me. The Dream Act is an act that gives illegal students who meet certain requirements an opportunity to enlist in the military or go to college and in this process be set on a path to citizenship. I strongly support this act simply because I feel that if it isn’t passed a great deal more talent that our country can benefit from than has yet to be wasted, will be wasted.

However, as passionate as I am about this act I sometimes find it difficult to keep up with its journey through congress. And if I’m this disoriented about the Dream Act I can only imagine how confusing it could be to other individuals. Because of this I decided to do some research and found a very helpful site that broke down exactly what the Dream Act is. This site discusses what the purpose of this act is, what it takes to qualify for it, and what would happen if the act were passed. If you want to learn more about the Dream Act you should definitely check out this site.

How Women are Portrayed

Something that has always bothered me is the way women in the music industry have to portray themselves in order to be successful. They basically have to wear diminutive outfits, showing large amounts of skin, and depicting themselves as pieces of meat in order to sell albums. This does not only lower the credibility of said artist but also degrades what it is to be a woman. By wearing this type of attire the artist is basically telling their public that their talent isn’t sufficient enough to be successful so that they must use the help of their body. Also, by using this dress, these artists are further objectifying women more that they usually are. And if that weren’t enough, artists that wear this attire are also influencing young girls into doing dressing this way. If you haven’t seen what I’m talking about here’s a Ninel Conde video, a latin artist that exemplifies the way women in the music industry portray themselves.

Obama on Gay Civil Rights

Throughout this whole semester I had been hearing a lot about the promises our current president, Barack Obama, made to the LGBT community before he was elected. I wasn’t sure of all that he had promised so I decided to do some research. Something that I found was this very interesting clip. In it Obama speaks for gay rights and about what he plans to do for the LGBT community. I recommend you take a look at it.

La Mujer de mi Hermano

This weekend I saw a great movie, La Mujer de mi Hermano (My Brother's Wife). This movie is about a woman, Zoe, who cheats on her husband, Ignacio, with her husband’s brother, Gonzalo. Ignacio neglects her, always keeping himself busy with work and designating Saturday as the only day out of the week when they have sex. Because of this Zoe turns to his brother, who gives her sex and temporary comfort. At first Zoe is lost as to why her husband neglects so much. She believes it might have to do with the existence of another woman. However, at the end of the movie she learns that the reason of her husband’s neglect isn’t the result of the existence of another woman, but instead of another man. This is a great movie with many surprising twists and turns. I strongly recommend everyone to watch it. If you want to learn more about it, here’s the trailer.

Marriage v Civil Unions

Before I took this course I didn’t understand the difference between marriage and civil unions. I always wondered why the LGBT community was so persistent about legalizing same-sex marriage when it could just opt for civil unions. However, after taking this course I have learned that there IS a difference between marriage and civil unions.

To begin with, marriages are recognized across countries, cultures, and religions; civil unions are not. Civil unions are not recognized in all states. This means that if a couple gets a civil union in state and moves to another state, that state might not recognize the civil union. This depends on the state’s policy. Also, in a marriage a citizen can sponsor his or her spouse for immigration into the U.S. Citizens with a civil union can’t do this. Lastly, the federal government doesn’t recognize civil unions. This means that couples that get civil unions aren’t able to file joint-tax returns. They have to file individual tax returns. They’re also not are eligible for tax breaks or protections that the government provides married couples with.

These are the reasons why the LGBT community will not conform to civil unions. If you want to see a more extensive explanation on the differences between marriages and civil unions see this helpful article.

Lady Gaga at Gay Rights Rally

Lady Gaga is a very powerful advocate for the LGBT community. Since the start of her career and throughout her rise to fame she has supported the LGBT community. In this clip she is challenging Obama and his administration to fulfill the promises that they made to the LGBT community. She also promises that she will not tolerate misogynistic or homophobic behavior in the music industry at all.

Lady Gaga and the LGBT community

During the summer I attended the Lady Gaga after party in the Houston House of Blues that took place after her concert. While I was at the party I noticed that there was a large number of LGBT individuals. I then realized that Lady Gaga has a huge number of LGBT fans. This is because Lady Gaga is so accepting and respectful of the LGBT community and is a bisexual herself. She has supported the LGBT community since the birth of her career becoming one of the most important advocates for it.

In fact, Lady Gaga hosted an event back in January 16 in Atlantic City, New Jersey. This event was called Hands Up for Marriage Equality and its purpose was to support same-sex marriage to be legalized in the United States. Check out more things that she’s done in this article.

Mexico: an accepting community

I recently found out that my cousin is gay. When I first heard the news I was taken aback because I would’ve never guessed he was gay. However, after the shock subsided and I acknowledged that he was gay my feelings towards him didn’t change at all. My parents brought me up to be a person who accepts and respects everyone regardless of things like race, religion, or sexual preferences. So, I love my cousin to death and his sexual preferences don’t affect that at all.

What worried me, however, was how his family was going to respond to the news. They are a very traditional Mexican family. Because of this I assumed that they weren’t going to be accepting about his sexual preferences.

However, when I decided to do some research about the topic, what I found surprised me. Apparently the Mexican community is one of the most accepting of the LGBT community. In fact, homosexuality was never explicitly banned in Mexico. Also Mexico City now has a new definition of marriage. The new definition of marriage is the "the free uniting of two people" instead of the previous "one man and one woman. You’ll find more great information in this article.

Tracy's Final Paper

Please comment on my paper!!

Final Paper!!

Discrimination Against Black Women

As I read Free Papers by Daniel J. Wideman I realized that the piece concentrated on the issue of young black men being discriminated against. Not once was discrimination against young black women mentioned. Discrimination against black women isn’t only disregarded only in this piece but in many other places in society. Since this issue is so ignored I decided to do a bit of research and find out in what ways black women were most discriminated against and how they dealt with it. I was also curious to learn if they were more heavily discriminated against than black men because of their gender.

The most useful and informational article that I found was Black Women: The Unfinished Agenda by Cecilia A. Conrad in The American Prospect. This article explained how black women are discriminated against both because of their race and gender. Hence, even though black women have advanced so much in the fields of education they still earn less than black men, white women, and white men. The unemployment rates are also a lot higher for black women than all the previous categories mentioned. The article goes on to explain the detrimental effects of discrimination against black women. It’s a very interesting and enlightening article, I recommend everyone to read it.