teen advantage

for her!
Supplement Facts
Serving Size: One tablet
Amount Per Serving % Daily Value
Vitamin A
(20% as beta-carotene) 2500 IU 50%
Vitamin C 120 mg 200%
Vitamin D 800 IU 200%
Vitamin E 30 IU 100%
Vitamin K 25 mcg 31%
Thiamin (B1) 2.3 mg 153%
Riboflavin (B2) 2.6 mg 153%
Niacin 30 mg 150%
Vitamin B6 3 mg 150%
Folic Acid 400 mcg 100%
Vitamin B12 9 mcg 150%
Biotin 300 mcg 100%
Pantothenic Acid 10 mg 100%
Calcium (elemental) 300 mg 30%
Iron 18 mg 100%
Magnesium 50 mg 13%
Zinc 15 mg 100%
Selenium 20 mcg 29%
Copper 2 mg 100%
Manganese 2 mg 100%
Chromium 120 mcg 100%

for him!!
Supplement Facts
Serving Size: One tablet
Amount Per Serving % Daily Value
Vitamin A
(20% as beta-carotene) 2500 IU 50%
Vitamin C 120 mg 200%
Vitamin D 400 IU 100%
Vitamin E 30 IU 100%
Vitamin K 25 mcg 31%
Thiamin (B1) 3.75 mg 250%
Riboflavin (B2) 4.25 mg 250%
Niacin 30 mg 150%
Vitamin B6 5 mg 250%
Folic Acid 400 mcg 100%
Vitamin B12 15 mcg 250%
Biotin 300 mcg 100%
Pantothenic Acid 10 mg 100%
Calcium (elemental) 200 mg 20%
Iron 9 mg 50%
Magnesium 100 mg 25%
Zinc 15 mg 100%
Selenium 20 mcg 29%
Copper 2 mg 100%
Manganese 2 mg 100%
Chromium 120 mcg 100%

heres the deal:
for vit B she gets 200% he gets 100%
for B1 and B2, he gets 250% and she gets 153%
for B6 she gets 150% he gets 250%
for B12 she gets 150% he gets 250%
for Calcium she gets 30% he gets 20%
for Iron she gets 100% he gets 50%
for Magnesium she gets 13% he gets 25%
everything else is the same

but it is promoted for HER healthy skin and HIS healthy muscles.
"the only gender specific vitamin for your teen's needs"

how do they come up with this shit?!?!

HERES THE SITE

follow up to our class discussion

I have so much i would like to say and not evenough space in my head to put it, so humor me while i splurge.

I think its sad that representations of the GLBT community are so far and few between. take movies for example. there are MILLIONS out there, that are straight, and i can comfortably say i own over 90% of the GLBT movies, becasue if there were more than 30, i would be surprised. thats sad.

lesbians get more representation then gay men, because of our "sex appeal" to the straight male community. so when we are depicted we are totally objectified into bodies, and most times are made to be "questioning" or "bisexual" so that men feel like they have a chance with us. We are more accessable.

One one hand, i feel like the community is more in touch with our sexuality, because our sex is for pleasure more than procreation, but on the other hand we are pushed into more confusion, because of the pressure to confrom to straight standards, and the teen pregnancy rate of females that are gay is higher that that of our straight counterparts. why? trying to fit in perhaps.

On a completely unrelated topic, it is my personal belief that if you can't pleasure yourself, you have no place seeking pleasure from others. maybe thats the feminist in me, but we should not be dependant on any other person to seek any of our needs (yes sex is a need).

On another tangent, this is my rant about lesbian sex. Everyone wants to knwo what it is, and that pisses me off. They seem to think that sex is only penetration. firstly, its not. secondly, who is to say we don't penetrate? so this is the one and only time i will explain my views on a blog. I feel like those of you who see sex (gay men included) as a penis and a vagina (or asshole) and nothing more, i feel sorry for you. your sex can therefor take two minutes, center around his explosion, and utilize only one part of each of you. thats no connection. When i have sex with my girlfriend, i dont have the same closedness of my mind. I have the freedom to take my whole body and worship her whole body, and sex is not just about the "reproductive parts" but any parts that can help enhnace the feeling good experience. So yes, lesbians, once settled, have sex less than straight couples. But our sex also takes a whole lot longer because it isn;t about "his timeing" its about seeking as much pleasure as posssible for your partner. Not saying we can't have quickies, but the focus is that SHE cums, not that HE does.

thats my rant.

i could go much much longer but i need to stop procrastinating and do some homework

when objectivity is priority

Deborah Tolman's "Object lessons: Romance, Violation, and Female Adolescent Sexual Desire"

This is the dichotomy that she presents about girls and boys in life:
(notice that gender queers are not even mentioned. hmm. )

Girls
passive
More/less willing to respond
Slut or prude
Neither acceptable
love
Sexual “behavior”
Almost always “deviant”
White, middle class- asexual/under sexualized
Lower class- promiscuous/over sexualized
Rape by man to woman seen as
“she must have deserved it”
Carries into life
The oppressed
Always a dichotomy, never in the “right”

Boys
Active
Sex drive to initiate
uncontrollable and victimizing
excusable
sex
Sexual “feeling”
Almost always “good”
White middle class- sexualized
Lower class- oversexualized/asexualized
Rape by man to woman seen as
“he couldn’t help himself”
Carries into life
The oppressor
Many answers, always in the “right”

My problems with the study:

1. i don't know why she chose to interview this person for the bulk of her paper when she interviewed many more. This girl is a 17 year old female, who does support her hypothesis that she objectifies herself, says she doesn't feel pleasure, and wants some man to come wisk her away, however, this girl has never experienced her sexuality. She had one molestation experience, and obviously hasn't yet recovered from it, and you want to study her? Than this is a study on molestation and rape victims, not teenage female sexuality. big difference.

American Academcy of Experts on Tramadic Stress say about recovery from trauma

1. how do we know the questions were honest and not what the author wanted to hear or what the participant though the author wanted to hear
2. how do we know the participant even know what she was being asked- many of her questions showed deflection, is this because she understood and didn't want to talk about it, or because she didn't know what she was answering

Having said that, here are some good points:

1. “despite our constant sense of outrage at this violation (men objectifying us), we have been trained to be the best objects we can be, even at the very moment of violation (you try all the harder to fit their standards)”.This quote is so true and defiantly understated. Our culture is so ingrained that we yearn to meet standards even as we fight them. In an extreme example, my roommates, a female to male trans man we'll call Derek, changed his name and has been on hormones (T) for eight months, actively living as a man. But when his girlfriend's prom came up, he went out and bought a dress because "I never saw myself as a girl, but everyone wanted me to be so bad, and i know i should find myself wanting to wear a suit, but i feel like a princess in a dress and i feel like its just what i was meant to do. " this he told me, as he stood in the living room in a floor length purple princess ball gown, examining the length of his facial hair and discussing how soon before the dance he should shave so that he won't be stubbly while there.
2. "other stories need to be taught, figureheads need to be publicized, fantasies need to be explored for females starting at a very young age where women are not objects, that it is okay to feel desire, that they can initiate, and that it is not their job to control male's "raging hormones"" i agree that education is key, and while sexuality may seem like a taboo topic, it is not that hard to cover. When all the Disney movies show a woman who waits for her man to come rescue her, like she is helpless and incomplete without him, that is a problem! (sleeping beauty and snow white were literally half dead while waiting for their men!)

Connections to other texts

1. Christensen would defiantly argue that the texts we feed our children at a young age matter, and that the hidden scripts in them are much more powerful then we think. There need to be a multitude of scripts that speak gender other, gayness, and fem-powerment, to combat all the other things that will bombard them. Having one of each isn't enough either, because stories are just as dismissible when they are the "exception" to the rule, we need to change the rule. Males should be allowed to feel proud and empowered too, not that they should be put down, but women, gender queers, and lgbts, people of color, people with disabilities, people of different classes, need to be on an equal status level in representation.
2. the videos that we watched on puberty between males and females i think was very telling. the idea of hormones "attacking the girl while she slept" versus the male "fine tuning his newly growing muscles"they speak volumes to the passive vs. active divide that is created.
   
3. this is media literacy all the way. we know that the dominant texts aren't going to change overnight, and all of Disney's movies, and control won't be outdated that fast either, but if we can teach our children, the younger the better, what the scripts say, that other representations exist, and that its good to feel empowered then they can carry this with them for life.
   
   • on that note, we need to not be afraid to talk about sex and sexuality with our children. "the talk" shouldn't be such a taboo topic. Our country has a very publicly promiscuous and privately prudent culture, and that is one of the main reasons why women may learn to feel empowered in other areas, but not relate this back to their sexuality. Help them make the connections! This doesn't have to mean advocating for sex, but knowledge about sex is never a bad thing or a scary thing, and to tell people "just to wait" but never actually talking about it is the worst thing we could possibly do.

Time says "parents have the sex talk too little too late"
Planned Parenthood says "start talking young, and start with teachable moments!"
what to do when a child comes out to you

Lol: breaking out and breaking down

New Media Networking and Phatic Culture by Vincent Miller
Summery and Quotes:

1.Individualization
A.Focus on self talk on blogs
B.Relationships based on trust based on self disclosure, intimacy, openness
C.Increasing need for self clarification, social validation and relationship development, all formed through online social bonds
D.Obious displays of emotion to manipulate self presentation
E.Examples
a.Facebook
b.Blogs
c.Reality tv
d.Tell all talk shows

2.Social relationships
a.Continual deconstruction and reconstruction of social bonds
b.“Networking” with people only so long as to get what you want
c.Social relations primarily informational and not narrative
d.No limit to relationships

3.Posting materials
a.No context for items- all on one page at that point in time
b.No progression or connection, each piece just as important as anything else
c.Importance not only on text but pix, videos, Farmville, etc.
d.Making a profile is essentially compiling an unconnected list
e.Friends are simply a commodity to be collected but not maintained
i.Large network= more secure individual
f.All about connections- not about conversations
g.No limit to materials

4.Phatic exchange
a.Communication not intended to carry information, but to mock communicative pattern
b.To keep lines of communication open but not say substantial things
c.Human relationships dependent on/replaced by objects
d.Exchange of words is superfluous, connection to other being is significant
e.Twitter is epitome of this type of exchange
f.Personal information easy to commodify

Questions/Disagreement
1. Wouldn't texting and the text lingo be the epitome of phatic exchange? lol, lmafo, bamf, gtg, ttyl, etc. we have developeda whole systme of communication based on the need to cut everything irrespective of grammer into the smallest and least effort to produce clips to tell people what we want them to know, and then send it to them via text, wholly impersonal. I love to text, i dont think i would be connectied to most of my friends, much less my mate, without it, but i feel like text speak undermines the legitimacy of a conversation, and i hate the transgressions on grammer, even though as we speak i have committed far too many to name

2. i would argue, and correct me if this is product of society speaking, that in the society we have created for ourselves we are so busy doing trying to fit 29 hours into a 24 hour period that clips and breif interactions have become intgral to maintaining relationships that would otherwise go forgotten. and so, where the feeling i get from the article is that this is a disintigration of proper scoeity that is a social problem, i feel like it is a logical reaction to the progression of communitation in the modern-day era we have created for ourselves

Connection: the rise of "Sexting"




Connection to texts:
Raby's five discourses
i think this causes a huge connection to the "at risk" category. teens, as demonstrated by the first article, are likly to have social network pages, are likly to post things like pictures, and even when they put restrictions on who views them it can;t be that hard to find "dirt" on other people. social networking sites make a whole lot of poeple's lives, from where they are to what they like to who they are with to what they were o what their schedule is availible for a very wide audience to see, from predators to ex's to future employers to future employees, even your own children. Teens are at risk of so many things becasue their lives are more exposed than ever- and that's a very scary phenomenon.

Movie: Kids in America

Very Inspirational- if you haven't seen it, here is your chance.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwmeLPNT5pE

WATCH ON YOUTUBE BY CLICKING HERE

getting seen

Get the picture? When translation is up to the interpreter

Preface by Lauren Greenfield

Greenfield is a documentarien who tries to be a participent observer of teens in LA and at the same time try to be unbiased in her analysis when relating this to teenagers on a bigger scale. While i understand what she is trying to accomplish, I am hesitant to believe that some of her conclusions aren't biased by her own experiences as a teen in LA.

she suggests that only in LA life is rushed. "You grow up really fast when you grow up in LA. It seems like everyone is in a rush to be an adult. It's not cool to be a kid." According the the five discources reading, i believe our culture tells us that it isn't cool to be a kid anywhere in western culture, you are always striving to achive "16" "18" "21" "get married" "have babies" "have your dream job" you are always looking forward and pushing for it as hard as you can, this is not a phenomenon isolated to LA.

she also suggests that LA determines popular culture. "as the center of the entertainment industry...the experience of LA teens has inspired many popular media products" our culture does not follow LA teens specifically to determine what be the new fashion trend or if gayness will be acceptable in the next generation fo movies. the intention may not be that LA determines popular culture, but this is definatly how it reads to me.

She suggests money is more important in La then elsewhere. LA may have rich people, but the US is based on capitalism which is a machine made to center around money so its no surprise that this is central to people's minds everywhere, not just in LA.

"better to not like one another than to not know the stranger exists" this reads to me like visibility at any cost, which ties into last class. while i agree that seeing the sissy gay is better than no gay at all, visibility at any cost is like saying i am happy with tolerance, and i am not. i want acceptance- and furthur full integration. i want "you" not to see me as any different from yourself, and only then will i be content. so yes, hoo rah for visibility but i can't stop there, becasue rap exists so should we be happy that parts of balck culture are in the mainstream and stop there? no! its still perpetuating the cycle, and worse, it makes people think that we are combating racism becasie the rap songs exist. we are not combatting homophobia when all we see is sissy gay men. UGH. i could go on for hours.

"in LA...quest for noteriety has become a rite of passage" again, not just in LA this is popular culture, where i come from, in the sticks, people still dream of making a name for themselves. we have created a culture where everyone is trying to be anything but themselves becasue being who you are is never pretty enough, skinny enough, smooth enough, young enough, innocent enough, smart enough, mature enough, privilaged enough, rich enough, etc. You forget who you are in all this confusion and i would argue that most people are wandering around western culture disconnected from their true identities and their bodies. Thats a very sad concept.

Another thing that she touches on a lot is the notion of MTV and TV in general as a major popular culture distributer. While i know what she is trying to say, i have to mention that culture gets to you almost always no matter how "disconnected" you may feel, and that is the truly scary part of culture's penetration. I grew up with very little tv access (and no cable), no internet, no gaming- kids and the outdoors, but our knowledge of popular culture was just as fine tuned of the teens discribed from LA.

"Bloodbath" a positive period

Glee- i'm not enthused

This media clip was a lot to take in at once. Having never seen it before, i now understand that it is mean to be stereotypical highschool, include "all" the minorities, sing throughout, and send the message that "anyone's can be a winner". Unfortunatly, this intention is not the implication, because the LGBT community is getting slammed the whole time.

Here are my notes about the pilot:

1. glee club consists of minorities- asian, black, differently abled, female, and (gay?)

• the leads are still a white man and a white woman
• the black woman is "angry" at one point, but when challenged fades into the background again
• if they're so hooked on minorities, wheres the latino?
• the asian woman doesn't get assigned a "specialty" like all the others

2. other downfalls/stereotypes

• all females are portrayed as weak and impressionable, unless they are "two-faced", "bitchy", and "loose cannons", like the wife, the cheerleading coach, and the lead cheerleader
• the lawn guy, who is average, even ugly, ends up with a very beautiful woman
• principle called the differently abled person a "cripple"
• principle is india and is portayed as caring only about money
• footabll players lock the differently abled student in a port a potty and plan to roll it

3. building a better world, at the expense of the gay community (all differenly gender presenting and references to alternate sexuality are VERY negative)

• boy thrown in trash at beginning is (gay?) differently gendered, has a higher voice then the average boy, appriciates handbages and sweaters, the prof does nothing to stop his harrasement
• past prof of glee club protrayed in negative way, high voice, wears a lot of pink, becomes a drug dealer, is mentally unstable, appriciates thread count and pillows. has a "long distance girlfriend in san francisco" uses termonology of teenage girl "call me"
• past prof of glee club accused of having a relationship with a male student, who is obiously uncomfortable
• female lead says "im not homophobic, i have two dads!" this is the same as saying "im not racist, i have black friends!"
• football players held down their teammate and shaved off his eyebrows becasue he watched grey's anatomy
• "gaylord" and "butmuncher" are the first two insults on the signup sheet after the locker room scene
• football team painballs the male lead becasue he skipped practice to go on a fieldtrip with the glee club
• football player says "if i joined the flag team, you would beat the crap outta me"
• football players threw "peeballs" at the (gay?) kid, and nailed his furnature to the roof
• football players ask their roommate "what, are you quitting to join the homo-explosion?! (glee club)"

What i don't understand:

• what the producers of this series intended by making it
• what effect it has on teenagers that watch it

Connection: TEENAGERS ARE NOT SOME ALIEN LIFE FORM

• the prof that runs the club says "one day you guys are going to grow up and understand" (it doesnt get more condescending then that)

media clip:from the l word, that i credit as one of my favorite shows for being so positive for the glbt community, still, it is riddeld with problems like:

• it only aired because there are lesbian sex scenes every other second
• they arent true portrayls of lesbian sex, they are what straight men picture of when they think of lesbian sex
• all the women are high femmes, save a tranny boi, and an andro-dyke (shane is no butch)
• all the women are sleeping with eachother and there is mad drama
• absence of gay culture (like that there is only ONE drag queen, and she doesnt show up 'til the last season, the ONE drag king doesn't show 'til the second season)
• it spreads the idea that all lesbians are engaged in a meat market, check out every woman they see, and seek to "recruit" for our community
• WATCH HERE

a really good hip hop song

I Can Lyrics
Artist(Band):Nas Review The Song (31) Print the Lyrics



[Kids]
I know I can (I know I can)
Be what I wanna be (be what I wanna be)
If I work hard at it (If I work hard at it)
I'll be where I wanna be (I'll be where I wanna be)

[Nas]
Be, B-Boys and girls, listen up
You can be anything in the world, in God we trust
An architect, doctor, maybe an actress
But nothing comes easy it takes much practice
Like, I met a woman who's becoming a star
She was very beautiful, leaving people in awe
Singing songs, Lina Horn, but the younger version
Hung with the wrong person
Got her strung on that
Heroin, cocaine, sniffin up drugs all in her nose...
Coulda died, so young, now looks ugly and old
No fun cause now when she reaches for hugs people hold they breath
Cause she smells of corrosion and death
Watch the company you keep and the crowd you bring
Cause they came to do drugs and you came to sing
So if you gonna be the best, I'ma tell you how,
Put your hands in the air, and take a vow

[Chorus - 2x (Nas and Kids)]
I know I can (I know I can)
Be what I wanna be (be what I wanna be)
If I work hard at it (If I work hard at it)
I'll be where I wanna be (I'll be where I wanna be)

[Nas]
Be, B-Boys and girls, listen again
This is for grown looking girls who's only ten
The ones who watch videos and do what they see
As cute as can be, up in the club with fake ID
Careful, 'fore you meet a man with HIV
You can host the TV like Oprah Winfrey
Whatever you decide, be careful, some men be
Rapists, so act your age, don't pretend to be
Older than you are, give yourself time to grow
You thinking he can give you wealth, but so
Young boys, you can use a lot of help, you know
You thinkin life's all about smokin weed and ice
You don't wanna be my age and can't read and write
Begging different women for a place to sleep at night
Smart boys turn to men and do whatever they wish
If you believe you can achieve, then say it like this

[Chorus]

[Nas]
Be, be, 'fore we came to this country
We were kings and queens, never porch monkeys
There was empires in Africa called Kush
Timbuktu, where every race came to get books
To learn from black teachers who taught Greeks and Romans
Asian Arabs and gave them gold when
Gold was converted to money it all changed
Money then became empowerment for Europeans
The Persian military invaded
They heard about the gold, the teachings, and everything sacred
Africa was almost robbed naked
Slavery was money, so they began making slave ships
Egypt was the place that Alexander the Great went
He was so shocked at the mountains with black faces
Shot up they nose to impose what basically
Still goes on today, you see?
If the truth is told, the youth can grow
Then learn to survive until they gain control
Nobody says you have to be gangstas, hoes
Read more learn more, change the globe
Ghetto children, do your thing
Hold your head up, little man, you're a king
Young Princess when you get your wedding ring
Your man is saying "She's my queen"

[Chorus]

Save the music y'all, save the music y'all
Save the music y'all, save the music y'all
Save the music

Brainwashing-Out Oppression

Author: Jared Ball
Title: Hip-Hop, Mass Media and 21st Century Colonization
Hip-Hop and the Corporate Function of Colonization

my wordle

I understand that he is arguing here that all hip hop and mass media is a fabrication becasue it has been dumbed down, censored, and manipulated until we loose the messages of oppressiona and retain only "good beats" and "simplistic story lines"
"there can be no popular representation of the colonized that does not reflect a justification or omission of their colonized status". becasue the white people that buy popular culture don;t want to think about it
Even though ip-hop is popular in the black community, it is not a postive force because it does nothing to improve education or SES, just maintines the status quo.
"the lyrics comittee censor the political, not linguistic messages"
just think about hwo much swaering you hear, but you never head how education is poor in specific racialized areas or how the arrest rate is entirely unproportional, when we know such artists exist.
"encourage a behavior among the colonized which produces self-inflicted wounds that in reality result from externally-based oppression" divide and conquer method to maintaining control: set up a hirearchy and let the people go after themselves, its less work for the people at the top, lasts longer, and is more effective
"success" depends on adherance to a set of values defined by popular culture, white, straight, christian, able bodied, high class culture.


What i dont't understand:

minority elite=white men- i didnt understnad this reference. people with power in a society by definition are not a minority in an oppressive way.

"better beats" argument as opposed to music industry focusing on inspirational/meaningful/real words that depict the real reality?


connection:
- Randy on American Idol- as the seasons go on his style gets more and more prep- and more and more "white". i would argue that it helps his image to sound slighly urban but to conform to every other white stereotype thats exists

-hip hop is not much different from poetry- it is poetry, which can be used constructivly or not. but like slam poets, the more mainstream the poet, the more mainstream the jargon they preach. someone like andrea gibson is just small enough that while she get national attention she had to start as grassroots and hence is comfortable speaking out, even and uchually against the goverment and whats media's implications are for society

-heres kats:

a search

the most wonderful terrible tool you'll ever hate to love

• i would like to say before i start that i felt horribly disconnected from the article and i dont know if that is me reaching my own biases becasue i grew up with the internet, or if everyone was hit the same issue. i find this the computer is pretty self explainitory and relativly user friendly (some operating systems more then others), and that even though i resisted the typical eight-finger typing pattern, i can negotiate the computer just fine.
• Coming of Age with the Internet
  By Sally McMillan and Margaret Morrison
• This is about the introduction of the media tool the computer and its connection to the internet as a tool, rescource, toy, and communcation hub. the article states that:

1. the internet can be positive and negative - it is what you can make it out to be. you have access to so many rescources and you can learn a lot, broaden your horizons, or get in touch with poeple across the globe. on the flip side, it can reinforce stereotypes, be censored by the government, bring you to things you would rather not see/have your children see, or give you false information
2. it effects all aspects of people's lives - people can use it to better themselves, discover their identity, communicate with family/poeple far from them, in their surrounding community or in a completely online community
3. family is key in the introduction to the computer rescource - not only that the younger poeple are exposed the easier it is to learn, but also that socioeconomic status can prevent people from both education and access to rescources like the internet, even something so simple as having a dial-up connection to the internet can cause a roadblock to the vast possibilities the internet can offer
4. the younger the start the better (age/generational differences) - younger people that grow up with the computer and use it all through school are more predisposed to be good with the technology as opposed to genderations that didnt grow up withg it and then have to teach themselves or take classes to learn how to access the same rescources and understand all possibilities.
5. it creates different levels of community that can but dont have to connect - you can use the internet to create an online community with which to communicate with those around you, get to know new people (that you may or may not ever meet), and share ideas

• "most people castes their mother as technogolically inept" (11). This is one point that i have a personal difficulty with and i am wondering if you felt the same. My father is the one that types with two fingers and insists that "they" "didnt include the t" on the keyboard, or "didnt include the s" etc. My mother didn't feel like she was as competant as she wanted to be (though she knew more then me) and after a college course or two i think she's far better then i will ever hope to be.
• when it says that a "common use of the internet is to furthur reinforce ties that are created offline" (13) i cannot help but think of facebook.
• "learnign to use the internet is a coming of age ritual" (7). while i realise that the internet can be a very integral part of education, social life, and lifelong learning, i am very hesitant to call it a coming of age ritual even in our society alone. i would argue that people with a lower socioeconomic status are not necissarily "not going to grow up" if they don't use the internet young and use it though their teenage years.
• "the medium can increase power inequalities" (16) this makes me think of youtube.com, becasue anyone can post a video and those videos reflect whatever biases and beliefs that the person holds. if internect connects you to such a diverse pot of information, not all information can be inherantly literate (from a media standpoint).
• this connects to all the things we have talked about so far but also to the fact the media matters becasue we have proven that the internet can be a deeply positive or deeply negitive (or both) rescource. i would arge that this form of media alone does not matter in a life/death/success/failure situation, but that this type of media can matter rather deeply
• 
  
  

you probably can guess what my problems are with this commercial

We Are What We’re Told We Are… Or Are We?

“A Tangle of Discources” by Rebecca Raby

Upon reading this I find myself torn between two places, one part of me wanting to “come out” as still being a “teenager” (as I won’t turn 20 for another few month), and owning the fact this the article and this class both discuss a “life stage” (I hate the word “stage” with a bloody passion) that I am still technically in. At the same time I feel a strong desire to distance myself from the “them” of adolescence, making “them” the “others” just like the article talks about. I see myself as being so far beyond the “searching for myself” and “in turmoil” but this just further reinforces that the articles stereotypes of adolescence are so deeply ingrained in my head. Further, I would say that I want to distance myself also because my adolescence was not a very pleasant or enjoyable experience for me, but also because so many people would like to say I am still “searching for myself” because of my sexuality (which I will take the time to remind you is not true, you can’t “change” someone’s orientation) I also could be fighting being within the categorization because I have never liked the notion of “immaturity” placed on the collective group, and I’ve always found intentional immaturity as overrated. (Though what is immaturity anyway because WE ALL RPGRESS AT DIFFERENT RATES)
I would argue that the “struggles” we take on as teenagers are really lifelong struggles, and when we “grow up” (in one sense of this series of acts that make up “growing up”) is when we realize this, stop stressing about how “little time” we have to get to where we want to be, and start enjoying life knowing we have the rest of our lives to decide “what we want to do with our lives”, “how we should look”, “who we consider friends”, “what our future will be” or “what we want out of life”.

Double standards of dependence and independence: parents and the government set rules so that teenagers are “kept safe”, meanwhile these same people and institutions would like us to be “growing up”, “making choices”, and “being independent”. The government is trying to set in motion now that all establishments that serve alcohol be closed to the under 21 population in Rhode Island. While I do not support underage drinking, and so I understand the initial reasoning, I do not agree with this policy. Being out on my own means that the government needs to trust me, and limiting my ability to pour money into the economy by not being able to take my weekly line dancing lessons or see my favorite band play at the local bar isn’t teaching me responsibility, just giving me less places to interact with those older then me. (in text as “expectations that they should be responsible and act like adults, while being regulated as if they were irresponsible. ” 439)

I think one of the main points the article is trying to get across is that we are all different people, with different backgrounds and personalities, with different tools, and different experiences, so how could you even try to think about any life stage as a collective unit because nothing is ever that clear cut. The only similarity that I see among all teenagers, as the article points out, is that we are not treated as children, but not quite as adults, we all realize this, and it makes for an uncomfortable role determination for those in the group (teens) those out of the group (both older and younger) and those removed from the group (like media and lawmakers).

The article suggests that adolescents are “othered” to make adults feel better about their own life crises. This comes in the context that the more “crazy” and “unpredictable” you call adolescents, the more “controlled” and “rational” you are simultaneously calling adults, which we all know on so many levels isn’t true.



this connects to the class topic that teenagers are not some alien life form because of the mere fact that i am one, and we all have been at one point. we know how it feels and we undertsand the stereotypes and pressures.

it also connects to media literacy becasue we could be using positive images of teenagers to highlight that teenagers can be responsible, modivated, "good", happy, adjusted, and mature poeple, contrary to popular stereotypes.

compare that to this:

To learn the language of deception and conformity...

• Media Literacy
• I understand: That the point of media literacy is to teach as many poeple as possible to be able to "read" the messages that the media sends by way of propaganda; both to be able to make an educated analysis of its downfalls and to be able to create countermedia that breaks the norms and premotes further awareness. It is not just to find the downfalls, but the positives as well, and futher to be able to understand what is missing altogether. It is the base of the higher educational degree entitled "Media Studies". One of the main points is to not be afraid to make media work for us, so as to turn uninclusive messages or degrading ones into forcefully and positive ones.
• Dont understand: so here's a slight contradiction in thought, couldn't someone who is otherwise illiterate be media literate? i would think very easily so, becasue you dont have to know how to read and write to hear the radio, watch a movie, see a tv ad, and understand what is wrong, what is acceptable, and what is missing.
• Dont understand: how young can we start teaching media literacy? i would argue that as soon as a kid is old enough to be watching tv, listening to the radio, music, and watching movies, they should be taught media literacy.
• (view the video that i previously posted called SLIP OF THE TONGUE)
• Linda Christianen argued, as do it, that just becasue we want to critique media and create our own countermedia doesn't mean that all media is totally wrong, or that we can't enjoy the stories, shows, and charectors that we love. liking somehting and seeing it for what it is are two completely different things. Like the mulan video from last class post, and how i told you that i love the "be a man" video, even though i think its one of the worst videos disney made. my main qualms are the title "BE a MAN" suggesting that women can't do the same things men can, or that being a woman is undesireable, further added to by the song "did they send me daughters when i asked for sons", and even worse by the "i'll make a man out of you". but i love it becasue the tune is catchy and in the end the female shows all the men how it's done and climbs the pole to retrieve the arrow first.
• this also connects to the theme that "teenagers are not some alien life form" because we see teenagers all through media. like in vitamins, with one a day's Teen Advantage. or in allstate's safe driver contract. we were all teenagers, and ad companies do a lot of promotion to the teenage crowd becasue they are more apt the succum to wanting to be "cool" or "fit in" and ads can appeal to this desire.
• i really like the new commercial for cyberbullying and its effect on teenagers, and i think it shows media literacy and specifically counter media at its best, but i couldnt find it online so ill describe it: a male teen sits getting tattooed with words like "loser" and "faggot" and "dumbass" and "sissy" he gets a text and says to the artist "i guess we're doing 'idiot' next, i think i still have room on my back". and the narrator comes on and says "the things you say can have a longer impact then you think. don't cyberbully".

I DUB THIS THE BEST COMMERCIAL OF THE SUBERBOWL

I DUB THIS THE WORST COMMERCIAL OF THE SUPERBOWL

Andrea Gibson....is amazing

Andrea Gibson is a slam poet from Colorado (well Maine originally) and she is really big on social justice and equity. If you havent heard of her, consider youself entitled, and watch some vids:

This one is my favorite:


This one is where my tattoo came from:


this one deals with gender performance and conformity:



this one deals with hate:


this one deals with love:



so, the ones i have chosen to show you here deal with the GLBT community, but this is just a very small portion of what she writes on, so if you liked any or all of these, i encourage you to look into her more. She came to RIC in the fall thanks to the Rainbow Alliance, and she will be at Smith College this thursday night with Athens Boys Choir :)

Slip of the Tongue

The Accepted, the Distorted, and the Omitted

• "Unlearning the Myths that Bind Us" by Linda Christensen
• Our society uses media to knowingly and unknowingly teach poeple how to act, what to aspire to, what to desire, how to succees, who to love, etc. The childeren who view fairy tales have no filter to jugde through (no intellectual armor p. 127), so they are more sessebtable to absorb any hidden scripts they see. This can carry through to adulthood. The idea that you can be brainwashed is very painful for people to hear, because we have the notion of freedom. Some poeple think that by changing one aspect of the media (like skin tone or weight), they have changed the hidden scripts, but this just further proves that the population has been brainwashed, or simply never taught how to critique these scripts ("im not taking my kids to see walt disney until they have a black woman playing the lead role" pg 131). When you have the tool to analyze, you can apply this to all media, conversations, and situations. Media has the power to change us, but we have the power to change it as well. Furthur, critiquing media does not mean that the media is inherantly evil or wrong, or that we can't enjoy the stories for their element of entertainment.
• dont understand: "we are taught, more than anything else, how not to rebel"- so this is suggesting that since it is indoctornating us to all desire the same things and giving us only one path to get there then our personalities wont kick in and we will all become the same person, or type of person, and so we wont deviate from the norm, so noone will be different, wonder about why they are different, and rebel against the system? I don't think i buy that. I agree that it tries to teach us how not to rebel, but i don't think it suceeeds. Afterall, teenagers spend the bulk of their adolescence feeling like they are misfit and questioning normal, which i would call classic rebellion.
• This connects to the fact that Media Matters, by the very fact that we are proving that these are not cute and harmless stories floating in time and disconnected from all influence on humnaity. Walt Disney was not some guy who wrote pretty tales who accidentally happened to have reoccuring themes that are racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. Media matters because kids connect princess with desireable and princess dreams as their dreams. Black childeren are honestly hurt when they see all those princesses and none of them are black. Gay children are honestly hurt when all princesses have to fall in love someone of the opposite gender, and are hypergendered. Poor childeren are honestly hurt that happiness is fuled by consumerism (even if they cant use those words). And all childeren are hurt when they realise that the standards fairy tales set are very unrealistic and very unattainable (atleast to 99.9% of the population).
• To share: Chistinsen doesn't mention that gayness and gender ambiguity are also largly left out in popular media and fairy tale, specifically. She seems to mention this with her reference to "happiness means getting a man" and goes on to call men a "commodity". But i suggest that this is not a reference to gayness but that happiness only exits with a partner, in that a single woman cannot be happy. Furthur, it is a woman's job to make her partner happy, not to succeed ina career or reach for goals independant of him. This still horribly misleads us from even discussing the GLBT community. Mainly, that women have to be ultra feminine, men have to by hyper masculine, and that women and men should only seek eachother as an acceptable partner for life. This is omitting a huge percentage (10%) of the world population.
• Disney is one of the worst offenders of abuses to lack of gender difference and sexual orientation in their output, so i find it HIGHLY amusing that this website thinks disney is promoting a "homosexual agenda" (which is highly untrue) and further amusing that they aren;t concerned about the ways that disney is actually brainwashing their children. Click HERE to view site.
• to prove that you can like and hate something at the same time, i challenge you, as my reader, to watch this video clip- my favorite disney moment, and try to tell me the three VERY major problems i have with it.

Andrea Gibson's Titanic

When I was 13....

An entry to my blog would have looked something like this:



You are my worst nightmare. You may have eyes, but you don’t use them to see because if you did you would do something about the racist, sexist, homophobic pigs around you, but instead you watch them, and you say nothing. You may have ears, but you don’t hear with them because all these slurs go on and you say nothing, and even when you do you only say it to that one person. Revolutions don’t start with silence. Which remind me, I hate you. You are a close minded white kid. You wouldn’t know equality if it smacked you upside the head. You want to save the world, how about you save yourself first. But all you can think about is how you’re going to hell. Isn’t that what the school psychologist told you, that “its all your fault” well that must be because it is. You slut. And who do you think you’re fooling anyway? You’re no badass with your tripp pants you bought at goodwill, like your life is all difficult well believe me you have it good. Yeh, your parents are real terrible to you. So what if they’re focused your brother’s “problem” and they told you “they don’t have time to deal with your shit right now”. You should be grown up enough to take care of your own damn self. Getting straight A’s and shit like you’re so smart when really, you know you’re half-assing all those papers and you should be applying yourself not procrastinating like the dumb shit you are. I hate you more then you’ll ever know. And if you live to tomorrow to read this, I hope you realize that I love you more than anything in the world, and I know you can achieve anything you can set your mind to. I hope you some day grow to realize that you are beautiful inside and out and that no matter what has happened or will happened you can get through it. I hope you grow to find that you have a wonderful support network of chosen family and that even your given family loves you very much. And one more thing to you, self, never stop dreaming.