Tidbits from the world on gender inequality

Sometimes being a woman sucks. And I’m not talking about biology. I’m talking about sociology.

I’m talking about having to include in my thinking about what clothes to wear my willingness to endure catcalling and street harassment because of someone else’s decision to “comment” on my appearance. I’m talking about grown-ass people telling me that they feel sorry for me because I’m 30 and single, even when I don’t feel sorry for myself (and while simultaneously congratulating my 30 and single male friends for successfully remaining “unchained”). I’m talking about my sister having to file for disability leave when her “disability” is having become a mother.

Like I said, sometimes being a woman sucks. In that vein, I’ve run across a whole bunch of engaging, informative, depressing, and refreshing gender-related stuff as of late that I thought I’d share. Check it:

The female body
The female body is constantly under attack. We’re supposed to be young and skinny (aka scrawny) but also perky and curvaceous. It’s exhausting (whether you’re trying to abide or trying to resist). But, there are some folks trying to fight back.

• The folks over at My Body Gallery have created a user generated space where women can send in images of what real women – themselves – look like. The site is not without problematic elements, however. (I, for example, see little reason to categorize my body shape as an apple, pear, banana, or hourglass or to list my height, weight, and clothing sizes. Plus, they unfortunately have an advertising problem. All the ads I've seen are for things like Victoria's Secret and shapewear. Boo!) But I appreciate the site owners’ intention. It will be interesting to see how the site grows or is used over time.
• A friend recently created the website Evolve the Aesthetic (ETA) with the intention of engaging women in the reclamation of their own beauty and encouraging the capacity of women to define for themselves the concept of beauty. The project's objective is to shift cultural ideals of beauty increasingly towards how women really look in their amazingly diverse manifestations of beauty. I expect that exciting, innovative stuff will be coming out of ETA, so keep your eyes on it.
• Ovens, an illustrator (who authors the webcomic Effort Comics) offered this gem of a tutorial on how to draw boobs and ladybits in general. Based on the representations of women we see everywhere – be it comics, advertising, video games, etc. – a whole world of folks could benefit from her instruction.
• I watched this hard-hitting documentary last week called "America the Beautiful." It originally came out in 2007, but does a really heart-wrenching job at asking the question “Is America obsessed with beauty?” And it begs a response to “Who benefits when young girls and women feel ugly?” You can watch the movie in its entirety on Hulu (with an account), through this Love Isn’t Enough blog post (where you just have to enter your birth date), or right here.  

Health care
Women’s health care has been all over the news as of late. Here’s a few things to ponder:

• Did you see Stephen Colbert's response to the Department of Health and Human Services's new policy that insurance companies must cover women’s birth control and preventative health care services (HPV vaccines, STI testing, etc.) without a co-pay? The Colbert Nation-provided tag reads: “Free birth control will wipe out the American race and instantly turn daughters into wanton harlots with insatiable sexual appetites.” I laughed. A lot.
  

  The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
  Women's Health-Nazi Plan
  www.colbertnation.com
  Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog Video Archive

  (And if are looking for an additional reason to laugh, Colbert also offered a hysterical response to Summer’s Eve’s ridiculous (and racist) new ad campaign.) 



Click to embiggen.
(Yes, I know that is not a
real word, but I like it.)

• There has also been word that women's health care costs are expensive. (Shocking, right?!) Looking at just the services that would be provided under the new legislation, here’s what we’ve got.  This fabulous info graph is courtesy of the folks at Good. What gets me about all this political arguing is that men’s health care (to the best of my knowledge) is covered by insurance companies by default while women’s health care has always been an “add on,” considered non-essential. 51% of the population has non-essential health needs. Awesome.

Economics and educational attainment

• Some utterly depressed pay gap statistics were recently reported by the Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce in their report “The College Payoff: Education, Opportunity, Lifetime Earnings” (pdf).  Here’s one of the key charts of findings.

  

  Click to embiggen.

  And in case you’re worried that you misread the notes in red (or they're just too small to read), here’s what they say:  “Women have to have a Ph.D. to make as much as men with a B.A.” and “Men with some college but no degree earn about the same as women with a Bachelor’s degree.”  That makes me feel GREAT as I work to finish my Master’s. But, as you can guess, women aren’t the only one’s losing out. People of color, too, aren’t earning as much as their white peers. The study introduction summarizes things pretty well, saying:  “The findings are stark: Women earn less at all degree levels, even when they work as much as men. On average, women who work full-time, full-year earn 25 percent less than men, even at similar education levels. At all levels of educational attainment, African Americans and Latinos earn less than Whites.”

Fairies have superpowers too, dammit!

During snack time a few weeks back, a table of my students and I got into a discussion about superpowers (meaning superhuman abilities, not countries with international world influence). One of my students was celebrating her fifth birthday and had kindly brought pudding cups for everyone, and each chocolaty treat was accompanied by a Tinkerbell napkin.

courtesy of Disney via Easy Art

One of the boys at my table (while devouring his way through the pudding cup) said, "I hate Tinkerbell. She’s stupid. Superman's so much cooler." There were mumbles of agreement from the other boys at the table and general silence, but wide-eyed attention, from the girls. Six pairs of eyes turned to me. Waiting. I said something along the lines of, "I bet Tinkerbell and Superman know each other. I mean, they both have superpowers, and how many people do you know who can fly? I bet they hang out." (And in case the truth is in question: yes, I’m that teacher; you know, the one that says stuff like this on purpose with the intention of making kids think. Though sometimes it just makes them think I’m crazy…)

courtesy of DC Comics via Comic Book Collectors

For a short moment everything stopped. Everyone was quiet. But, you could see the kids’ minds kick into high gear, imaginations at work, processing and weighing the possibilities. It was as if each was asking him- or herself the question, "Is that possible? Could Superman and Tinkerbell actually know one another?! How would that work?!"

Then one boy (the one who had already declared his fairy-hate) said rather defiantly, "No way! They aren't even in the same show!" (Ah, media culture...)

I pushed my real point – "But they have the same superpower." There was a mumbling of discordant commentary. Finally I said, "Well, Tinkerbell flies, right? I mean flying is a superpower, right? So she has superpowers. The same superpower as Superman." My words were followed by a few seconds of tense, thoughtful silence. Then one of the girls responded, using the ‘sometimes we have to remind silly adults things that everybody knows’ voice. She said, "Fairies have 'special talents.'" She didn’t overtly add “And ‘special talents’ are NOT the same as superpowers” but that was the clear message. There were nods of agreement around the table. Another boy said, “And she doesn’t even have a real cape. Superman has a real cape. She doesn’t.” I replied, “She doesn’t have a cape at all. She has wings. And she flies.”

One of my students recently attached this image of herself
as a superhero to her Valentine to the class.  Yippee!

The intention of this back and forth conversation wasn’t (necessarily) about who was going to ‘win,’ but rather about trying to push the kids to think about language in a different way. I wanted them to notice the words that they take for granted, and – without overly naming it with fancy jargon – moving them to see the gendered connotations of the words they use and the consequences of those connotations. All of the children could agree that Superman and Tinkerbell can both fly. In this situation, being able to fly is gender neutral; the kids accept examples of both males and females who can absolutely, without question, fly (at least in their imaginations and in stories). But, because of the gender socialization they have received and continue to be taught, when I say that Tinkerbell has ‘superpowers’ (a word socially marked as strongly masculine), the children have a feeling of disjuncture that they seek to alleviate – which they do by pushing back – by denying Tinkerbell’s possession of ‘superpowers’ and/or renaming her abilities as ‘special talents,’ words socially marked with a feminine connotation.

On the surface, this may seem like an innocuous, passing conversation, but to dismiss its implications so casually would be a mistake. Let me offer two similarly ‘innocent’ examples from the past few weeks:

First, a student and I were reading a children’s book about visiting other countries. The characters in the story travel by plane. We had a conversation that went like this:

Me: Would you ever like to be an airplane pilot, to fly a plane?
Her: No. [A perfectly acceptable answer.]
Me: Why?
Her: Girls can’t fly airplanes.
Me: Why not?
Her: Only boys can fly planes.

Through further conversation, it became clear that there was nothing I could say to convince her that women can, and do, indeed fly planes.  She was firm in her belief that this was not an option open to her.  (In the moment, I was so frustrated that I didn’t have a photograph or illustration showing a female pilot, but you never have those things when you need them.)

And second, on one of the recent days it was too cold to go outside to play, my student were watching a video adaption of the book Antarctic Antics: A Book of Penguin Poems by Judy Sierra and illustrated by Jose Aruego and Ariane Dewey. In one of the first poems a baby emperor penguin hatches and says, "I'm really hatched./ At last I'm free./ Hey, Dad, it's me!" My students immediately said, “That’s not the baby’s dad. That’s it’s mom,” to which I explained that male emperor penguins sit on the eggs to keep them warm 'til they hatch, so the ‘Dad’ would be the first parent a baby would see, not the ‘Mom.’ The kids were confused and somewhat resistant. As the video continued the children started seeing each penguin and shouting out, “That’s a boy. That’s a girl” – trying to identify the gender of each bird, even though the illustrations depict all of the birds as nearly identical. My students would say things like, “It’s a girl. Hear the voice?” To them it was like a playful game. To me they seemed almost frenetic in their determination to assign gender to the characters on the screen before them. It seemed intolerable and unacceptable to just not know someone's gender identity.

In all three of these examples – Superman vs. Tinkerbell, the gender of airplane pilots, and penguin genders – my students, who are four and five, have very clear ideas about acceptable gender categories and strategies for categorizing people and animals into those divisions based on appearance, other physical markers (like voice), and/or behavior. But even more so, they have concrete concepts of power attached to those gender divisions. On the whole, my students believe that Tinkerbell can’t have superpowers because she’s a girl. Only men can be airplane pilots. And it is important to be able to ‘read’ what gender category any given person or character falls into (and to my students there are only two viable categories – boy or girl). The implications of this are frightening to me. In addition to telling girls that they can only look and behave certain ways and only take on certain interests or work, the boys are being given equally clear messages, which seem to have quite a lot to do with aggression, domination, superiority, and entitlement. At the end of the day, everyone is screwed. And no one is truly free.

When I ask parents what they want or hope for their child(ren), they typically say (especially if they’re white and generally middle class or above) that they want their children to be happy and that they want their children to believe that they can be anyone or anything that they want to be. There is nothing wrong with those hopes. But, when everything about our culture – from media to books and from our schools to the socialization that takes place in our own homes – teaches kids from birth (and often before) that they can be whoever or whatever they want but only as long as they abide by very specific gender-based rules and norms, how does that make the world a more equitable place for children of all genders? How does that foster an environment where girls truly can be anything or anyone and an atmosphere where boys don’t have to be super-masculine to get their gender 'right'?

This figurine is in our classroom's
collection of pirate/castle gear.  I adore
the unshaven, pink polka-dot look!

I don’t have my own children – which is probably a good thing because I think I would be the insane parent who no other parents would want to be around and no child would want to claim.  I would likely go on tirades against pretty, pink princesses, I’d tell boys its okay to cry, and I’d be totally intolerable about all the research that talks about the ways we do our kids major disservices. But even without kids of my own, I do spend a lot of time with other peoples’ children. (Often, more time than they do.)  And it’s fairly certain that I can’t singlehandedly change the course of how those kids think about (or don’t think about) gender and power issues related to gender. But I am in the position to push buttons, to instigate dialogue, and to challenge preconceived ideas. I’m able to ask my students, “Why do girls have 'talents' and boys have 'superpowers'?” And with adults I can offer a similar challenge: “Why are extraordinary abilities for female characters considered magical and used for things like making dewdrops and flowers and flitting daintily from blossom to blossom and being careful to stay out of the path of frightening humans? And why are extra-human capabilities for male characters considered outside the realm of magic (and more often contained in the realm of science) and such characters are fierce adventurers (as well as generally violent and destructive) who engage in battle, seek revenge, and expect admiration from the poor, weak populace? No, really, help a girl out. Why is it this way? I don't understand.  And is this what we want our kids to learn about gender?”

At the end of the day, I want the world to look different. I want my students to believe that they can be airplane pilots, even the girls. And I want my students to believe that fathers are fully qualified and capable of being nurturing primary caregivers. I want me students to believe that gender is complicated and putting people in boxes can be limiting to everyone. If we feel free to be merely who we are, that’s more than enough.

And I want my students to know that fairies have superpowers.

Queering pop culture

I like Glee.  It’s my guilty pleasure and the only TV show I watch faithfully. 

And this week’s episode struck a chord with me.  To catch you up, in case you aren’t a regular watcher, Kurt Hummel is the only openly out gay student at McKinley High.  And he faces relentless bullying, overt and subtle – gay jokes and taunts, getting thrown in the dumpster, being slammed into lockers, the whole gamut.  This week’s episode in particular really highlighted the overwhelmingly oppressive darkness that results from being treated with less than your full humanity, and how sometimes even the most well-meaning friends, teachers, and family-members can’t quite get past the “Sorry you’re having a hard time, but if you’re gay, things are gonna be rough” into a place where they reject the norm of intolerance, declare it unacceptable, and live that resistance in word and deed.

This week, in the midst of feeling utterly alone, Kurt met a new ally in Blaine, an openly out student at another high school, who offers Kurt courage, hope, and assurance that change is possible and life gets better.  Plus, Blaine can SING.  (And DANG, can he sing!  We know how I have a ridiculously intense sweet spot for men’s a cappella, and the Dalton Academy Warblers bring it, singing a cover of Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream.”  I’m fairly certain this pushes my previous Glee favorite song – Lea Michele and Idina Menzel’s rendition of Lady Gaga’s "Poker Face" to number two!) 


As you may have noticed, I titled this post “Queering pop culture.”  In the realm of feminist theory and resistance, to ‘queer’ something means to change the way it’s seen, to shake the assumptions that hold social constructions in place, to deviate from what is socially understood as normal, and sometimes to even try to redefine what normal is.  For me, to queer something can be a very positive thing – it can jolt folks out of their ‘normal’ experience long enough to (sometimes, we hope) be critical about why we do what we do, who it benefits, and who it limits.  When we queer our understanding of the world, it can free up space for all people to freely be more wholly who they are.

What I like about this episode of Glee (and several others – several with Kurt’s dad come to mind), is that it (intentionally or unintentionally) has the potential to queer viewers’ ways of understanding the world (which, I believe, is a good thing).  Merely because of its willingness to place marginalized experiences, like Kurt’s battle with bullying, at the center of the public’s view, those stories can be told through the eyes of those living them rather than through the eyes of those who fit into the social norm.  (For feminist theory folks, we’re talking margin-to-center stuff here, and pushing into the power of standpoint theory.)  Listening to marginalized voices tell their own stories tends to show the deep complexities of oppression, power struggles, and lived experiences in ways that are often erased when dominant voices frame the story.  (This is the same concept often talked about in the context of history.  “The victor writes the history books.”  How is Columbus’s arrival in the Americas told differently through the eyes of native peoples?  How would understanding change if racism were talked about as not merely individual, but also historical, structural, and institutional? You get the idea.)

So, I am grateful that this piece of Kurt’s story, as told through his eyes and his experiences, (alongside and in conjunction with other stories in other places) has the potential to complicate general understanding of the human experience.  While Kurt’s story is not necessarily unique, nor the first time that such material has been on television, its presence on a popular, prime time, network television show is noteworthy and worthy of recognition.

Plus, they sing and dance! 

Even so, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out a few of the frustrations I felt in watching how Kurt’s story played out on Tuesday’s episode and how those things relate to larger concerns in society.  In the show, after Kurt sees the Warblers sing, he has a short conversation with Blaine and two other Warblers over coffee. 

First, one of the students explains that at Dalton everyone is treated the same because they have a zero tolerance harassment policy.  While I understand the impulse to suggest ‘easy’ fixes to issues of bullying, harassment, and abuse, adopting a zero tolerance policy is not enough.  To create a safe environment for all students requires the changing of minds, the disruption of prejudices and biases, and a communal commitment to holding one another accountable to treating all people with their full humanity.  And those efforts require continual work to learn how to think and act differently (because it does NOT come naturally in a society like ours built upon prejudice and inequality).  So, adopting a zero tolerance policy is not a cure-all.  It is surely a beginning step, but does not and will not create safe spaces for all students without intense, committed, and continuous work.

Second, when explaining how the school’s zero tolerance policy works, one of the students said, “Everybody gets treated the same, no matter what they are.  It's pretty simple.”  In the ideal world, it would be simple.  In the real world, it’s not.  Even in his statement, the student uses language that can feel dehumanizing.  My hope would have been that he said, “Everybody gets treated the same, no matter WHO they are.”  While this could be chalked up to a simple grammatical slip-up, it is important to be thoughtful about language use.  We want to always aim to use language that honors individuals’ full humanity, rather than reduce people to objects (WHO you are vs. WHAT you are).

Third, Blaine offers Kurt some advice.  He says, “You can refuse to be the victim. Prejudice is just ignorance, Kurt.  And you have a chance right now to teach him.”  I agree; prejudice is ignorance.  But, prejudice is often backed by power.  In our society, individuals, groups, institutions, etc. get away with homophobia, racism, sexism, and so many others, because our social systems support them.  Society is not inherently neutral.  Lines were drawn long before we showed up on the scene, and while we didn’t pick the setup, it’s been laid out for us.  Battling ignorance IS about education and about sharing information that changes the ways the world is understood, but we’re already starting on biased ground.  The battle truly is an uphill climb.  Plus, the battle is bigger than changing individuals.  It involves changing individuals and seeking to change the larger culture that places limits and restrictions on those who don’t conform to a socially built idea of ‘normal.’  So, while perhaps Blaine’s advice is accurate and appropriate for Kurt, for Glee, and for the audience, I feel the need to acknowledge some of the complexities in accomplishing what Blaine suggests.

Okay, enough of my being down on the details. 

As Emma Pillsbury would say, “Yay, Glee!”  Plus, I must offer a shout out to actors Chris Colfer (who plays Kurt Hummel) and Max Adler (who plays Dave Karofsky).  You gentlemen are amazing in your attention to detail.  You knock my socks off!

Also, if you’re interested in other pretty mainstream examples of queering pop culture, a good example is the video below.  The men of the University of Rochester's YellowJackets filmed a parody of the video to Taylor Swift’s “You Belong with Me.”  Much like Glee’s version of “Teenage Dream” could be interpreted as a musical conversation between two same-sex participants (Blaine and Kurt), the YellowJackets reimagine a song originally written about a hetero- couple in a queer context.  (The video below has Swift’s voice as audio.  If you want to hear the YellowJackets sing it, go here.)


From my perspective, the more we queer pop culture, the more space exists for everyone to feel safe and comfortable being exactly who they are.  There has been a lot of news coverage in the past few months about young people who have taken their own lives as a result of bullying focused on the victim’s sexual orientation or perceived sexual orientation.  Information from The Trevor Project tells us that suicide rates have not gone up, only the level of media attention they are receiving.  Young people all over the country, and all over the world, are feeling hopeless, voiceless, and alone.  Queering pop culture is one (of many) ways to help people feel less alone.  Seeing media representations of characters and experiences to whom and with which they can relate matters.

If you’re unfamiliar with The Trevor Project, check them out here.  Also, the It Gets Better Project, founded by writer and media pundit Dan Savage, is a space designed to give voice to experiences often pushed to the margins.  Their tag says, “Many LGBT youth can't picture what their lives might be like as openly gay adults. They can't imagine a future for themselves. So let's show them what our lives are like, let's show them what the future may hold in store for them.”  There are many great videos in their archives.  If you haven’t seen the video by Fort Worth, Texas City Councilman Joel Burns, it is especially worth watching.

And, on a final, final note, if you feel the need to hear more delicious a cappella, give this a try.  It’s the Leading Tones from The Ohio University (Ohio represent!) singing Ben Folds' "Brick."  (Did you know Ben Folds pulled together a WHOLE album of collegiate groups singing vocal arrangements of his songs?!  It's called Ben Folds Presents: University a Cappella!  Hell to the yeah!)

Peace.

Too Big for My Skin

Just wanted to bring a little attention to this spoken-word piece by Minneapolis based artist Desdamona. The beauty of women is deep and more than can be fit in any little box.


Desdamona says "Too Big for My Skin is not just a poem. It's a mind state. ... It's about positive body image, acceptance and strength. It's about finding your voice and speaking."

Video Spotlight: Barbie & Ken 101

Let's round out the month with a shout out to spoken word with a side dish of feminism.

I think Rafael Casal is the shit. His flow is sick, and his message critical. (And there I go again cross-breeding two language sets that are too often kept in separate corners.) Rafael's a talented young voice that gives thoughtful, heart-felt attention to very real issues through the fresh eyes of a generation seeking their (our) way in a mixed up world. He just came out with a hip-hop/rap LP – "As Good As Your Word" – at the end of January. And if you want to read "Barbie & Ken 101" in its final form (the piece was only about a week old in the vid) go here.



UPDATE: I recently read a short chapter written by Rafael entitled "Teaching Poetry Workshop" in Handbook of Social Justice in Education (2008) edited by Bill Ayers, Therese Quinn, and David Stovall. Good read. -- 8/2009

Video Spotlight: Roe v. Wade 35th Anniversary

March is Women's History Month, so as a little shout-out to my fellow sisters, I wanted to post up a video tied to a relevant women's issue (so many to choose between). (And, really, women's issues are everybody's issues. Just as a reminder.) So, I'm posting a video that just came out in January celebrating the 35th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, which was decided in January of 1973 (NOT all that long ago, really). With all the political talk intent on overturning Roe v. Wade today, it should be apparent the controversy and relevance this issue still holds. Put together by Naral Pro-Choice America this video speaks to the complexity of real women's lives. Women's decisions concerning choice are anything but simple and emotionless, and the video does a nice job of placing that complicated reality in the social, historical context of our world. As a woman, I want to know that my actions, my body, and my reproductive rights are MY choice, not the decision of lawmakers who know nothing about my life, my journey, or my needs. It is my responsibility to protect that right for myself, my friends, and my loved ones.

(And if you're interested in Faith Pennick's film, which is mentioned in the video, go here.)