Final Paper!!!

   America used to be the leading country in innovation, technology, and design. The steady decline has been linked to a disparities gap in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) majors in college, graduate, and professional programs. With America’s ever growing population the underrepresented minorities are steadily becoming the majority. If this trend continues then America will quickly lose more than just the leading position in innovation, but our economy will greatly suffer and our disparities gap will continue growing, creating a torn nation.  In this paper I will discuss ways in which applying theories from feminists praxis can be applied to closing the gender and racial gap of STEM based majors. By creating new programs that focus on promoting diversity in STEM majors and focusing on retaining minority’s interests in these subjects, we will create a workforce that is more diverse and dynamic.  Developing opportunities for minorities that include financial support, research based mentorships, and by creating diversity in STEM fields will encourage students to continue with seeking higher education, thus promoting a more heterogeneous workforce. It is through this diversity and equality that our nation will grow and flourish becoming, yet again, the number one nation in innovation.

So far many of the issues raised in our capstone course on black feminism beliefs are relating to equality, underrepresentation, marginalization, discrimination, and patriarchal domination.  I can relate these themes or ideas into the previous paragraph (my abstract) in a few ways. First of all these are all the relating themes that create inequality and the divide that we see in America's workforce. The workforce has continued to be this way because of the old beliefs of our patriarchal mainly white leaders in our companies. It has taken years for Blacks and Hispanic's to be able to break into our competing workforce and a lot of this has to do with unequal education standards. Our STEM majors continue to see a marginalization between races and gender because we continue to support a system that doesn't encourage a heterogenous environment. We dehumanize and berate our fellow scientists of color and make it increasingly difficult for them to survive in our hegemonic industries. Even when we see growth from our government in terms of financial support to our minorities, we still see the issues that they deal with from colleagues and outsiders. 

The issues I have had at the beginning of this paper were finding how to connect these unrelated topics. My main issue was my own white privilege made it difficult to direct my paper on things other that statistics. Until some support from my professor I didn't even think about bringing the underlying issues of what its like to be black, female, and a STEM major. I only focused on ways of closing the gap in terms of monetary and social aspects, when it is probably more helpful to look at the treatment of minorities and their opinions.

Blockbusting Pornography

   Pornography has been a huge industry for the last few decades! Whether we like to admit it or not this industry has made millions of dollars and more and more people are feeling the stigma of Porn fade away. Some see porn as taboo, but many are loosening up to the idea that it has become so main stream that it has become a part of everyday life.
   Many people criticize porn and fail to take into account how race, gender, religion, and orientation affect the conditions in which adult porno content is viewed and shaped. Both authors Taormino and Serano talk about the exploits of porn and how many women (especially feminists) started their careers, first as activists for the feminist movement, and later found as pornographers. In some cases these transformations from fem to porn was merely a means of integrating their practices. By being able to lay claim to your own body and how it is portrayed/viewed allows for more control. A quote  from a young kindergartner in response to to her teachers protest to her "inappropriate" t-shirt is probably one of the best quotes from a rising feminist, claiming "If a woman can't decide what to do with her own body, how can she possibly be in control of the rest of her life?"  It is thinking like this that allows us to break away from ideologies that help shape mainstream society and give negative connotations on things like pornography and BDSM. How are we to even see other sexual practices, that are societally seen as harmful, shameful, or disrespectful, as normal or in a different light when we can't be in control of our own bodies? We can't begin to have objective view points instead of subjective ideas of other practices if we can't be in control of our own thoughts, acts, bodies, and desires.
  If pornography is practiced in safe form then does this help take away any more of the stigma that comes along with the act? Many mainstream and not so mainstream porno producers require safe practice from their workers. Some even go as far as requiring physical exams and blood tests to allow for the safety and ease of mind for their workers. In Taormino's book "The Feminist Porn Book: The Politics of Producing Pleasure" she talks about women starting their porn careers from getting early life experiences from their feminist practicing mothers. Many of the women who starred in pornography did so because they needed money, but did not feel bad about doing so because they quickly learned the values of knowing owning their own bodies.  Nude photo shoots sometimes developed into solo video shoots with masturbation being portrayed as art when the camera is focused on the face, but as porno when the camera is pointed at the crotch. The pay checks become fatter and their ability to perform becomes even more enhanced because of these paychecks.
  It becomes easy to see the similarities in porn and feminist movements when we start to look at how liberating the body can become a means to liberating our minds. When we realize that society doesn't control our minds and patriarchal ideologies can be broken then we see that we own our own bodies are also our own and we can do as we please with them. Working in the porn industry doesn't have to carry a stigma with it. Millions if not Billions of people view porn and do so in the comfort of their own homes . So why can't we stop making those who work in the industry feel as if their jobs aren't worth anything at all.
 

Role Play For Your Sex Life!

   Many people do not understand race play, BDSM, or other "kink community" acts and beliefs. This is mainly because many people become comfortable with the mundane and are afraid of experimenting outside of what is viewed as normal. It is even harder to understand why feminists would want to partake in any of these acts that may put them in a submissive position, even though its sexually submissive. How is it that one may want to be controlled and dominated when this is exactly what they have been fighting against?
   There are many different forms of race play that put someone in a higher dominating position. This type of interaction overlaps with BDSM and can be taken in to consideration in a similar manner. A lot of the time the bottom, or submissive person, in these relationships is usually someone that has been put in a submissive poison in the "real world". Many time people who have had to fight for equality and rights end up wanting to be placed in the same position in their sex lives because it becomes easier for them to work through their emotions. By being beat and making physical pain, which can be derived from emotional pain,  turn into pleasure, allows for some to interpret and express those emotions in ways that are very different form internally oppressing certain feelings. This, in turn, becomes a means of therapeutic intervention. It allows for people to turn pain into pleasure.
  In contrast to my earlier statements, race play can be a means to contradict the everyday hardships of life and can be a means of escaping the struggles one may have to experience. For example, black women are viewed as being "tough"  or "hard" or "strong" and by being dominated in the practice of BDSM or any type of "play" allows for a role reversal. It gives them a way to feel like they can release and not be so tough. Giving up power is sometimes exhilarating and can allow for transformation.
  Sex and penetration can become mundane and even boring for some people. Role play spices up sexual relations and makes it more dynamic. People are able to experiment with roles that are not typical to their everyday lives. This can become empowering and can help to release endorphins during role play and make for a more provocative and sensual stimulation. White privilege can become erased in race play! Black domination can be sexual subjugation! Subordination can become desirable and fantasy becomes less abstract!
 

Super Sized Sex.

    The way that we have been brought up in life has a lot to with another topic that I have already blogged about. Media has had its dirty little hands in shaping our minds since its inception. The weekly ad mags and daily tv commercials help to distort our perspectives of our neighbors and selfs.
We as Americans strive to look like supermodels and gym trainers and when we don't reach these goals we are forced to feel horrible about ourselves.
  The idea that we must feel like horrible people if we don't live up to someone else's standards seems a bit contrite, in and of itself. Lets go ahead and make someone who weighs more,  is too short, or not the right fit, feel like shit just because they don't live up to what "society" thinks is beautiful. Isn't this kind of thinking elitist and didn't it bring about the practice of eugenics and World War I? So lets take a look at how we are shaping our society and possibly raising our selves and our children into little monsters that don't respect others. Lets take a look at how we treat big bodied people and lets talk about sex!!!!!!!!!
    What is it about large bodied people that we as a society feel that is so taboo? Why does one body type alertly make us feel uncomfortable when exposed nude?  It's because of the we way we are brought up that we believe that the only way to be sexy is to be thin (and if you're a guy, tall). For Americans this seems a bit unacceptable because two thirds of all us are overweight. So that means that two thirds of us feel guilty and wrong about our own body types? Thats insane! So why don't  we  start to utilize the media, advertisement, and entertainment to our own advantage. Why don't we make ourselves feel good for once instead of blaming ourselves for eating something that we desire?  Why don't we engage in healthy sex and not feel dehumanized for it?
   In the show the Homeland their is a scene where the main character has sex with a "fat" woman. The shocking part about this is that the scene is made to seem entirely honest and that both parties are doing this with no hesitations or strings attached. I say shocking because what we see normally in scenarios such as this is what follows this scene, where the couple goes out to breakfast and gets harassed by a couple of douche bags about a rather attractive fit man and fat (yet attractive) woman being together. This is a problem with society! Where men feel that they can harass someone because they aren't what society feels is Beautiful!
   As a collective we can start to feature more "normal" and larger sized people to replace models in advertising and in movies. Yes this may put out some  models from working such hard and long work hours, but don't you think this is the ticket to resetting our societies vision of what beauty is? Can't everyday people be beautiful? Yes we can and Yes we are!

Progression comes with hard work!

  For my capstone course in black feminism and sexual politics I have begun writing a paper discussing my knowledge gained from the materials so far examined in the course. I have to explain how I can relate these concepts into everyday life and examine how feminists' beliefs can help liberate any kind of oppressed peoples. So far I have not had an issue understanding the course material and even find myself inspired by some of the readings. Where I run into any issue, is having to write the material and have the paper have a sense of "flow". The materials I have reviewed are from varying books, articles, essays, pod casts, and videos. It becomes challenging when having to keep up with these readings and on top of that write a paper that brings together all these ideas.
  I have written just about 5 pages of my paper so far and have submitted it as my rough draft. So far I have had no response, but am anticipating much work to be done on editing and correcting the paper. The advantage of having started the paper early has given me the opportunity to spend more time on corrections. Hopefully there wont be too many!! Sometimes I do tend to write/speak/think on a tangent from my original idea. I think that this is a direct effect of my ADHD.....but I digress!
  I have still not watched all of the videos that were assigned for us to watch, but I don't think that this should impeded my papers advancement too much as I already have a plethora of materials to work with. I keep coming across a similar theme between the readings and thats equality, social hegemony, and mass media portrayal! Mass media effects how people portray other people and ideas....This in turn produces a society with similar hegemonic ideologies, even though we may not actively practice in this way we may submissively and not reluctantly do so. This type of belief pushes people into corners and boxes and those outside are left hopeless and helpless allowing for easier ruling or domination. This type of practice, a type very common in US values, openly allows segregation and oppression.
  Writing this paper is forcing me to see the myriad amount of problems that oppressed people must overcome. It becomes apparent that oppression and hegemonic dominating societies creates loops of entrapment for underprivileged! It almost appears that these people are hopeless. It's very saddening when you see people struggle for something that you may already have! Either way writing this paper has opened my eyes even further and has made me more of an advocate for any kind of liberation from oppression.

Identifying your sexuality!

  In Pomosexuals, Carrol Queen talks of a man who struggles with being able to identify his sexuality. I say identify, because in her previous chapter Queen talks of loaded words, and the narrator of the essay labels his self as being a gay man: Gay being the loaded word, because he doesn't want to conform himself to the ways of other gay men, nor does he want to be like other straight men.

The narrator is torn between his sexuality and his desires for....well..... being desired!

  His first sexual encounter is with a man so he decides, for the sake of having a label, that he is gay. And for the next decade he lives as though he is interested in only men, never allowing himself to experience what it's like to be with a women. He also makes a claim about gay people complaining that homosexuality is not a choice and instead  an "orientation", further insinuating that being gay is something undesirable. It's clear that this individual, I'm sure along with many others, has issues coming to terms ,with who it is ok to be! This is one of the main problems affecting many individuals today and many of the issues stem from our distorted viewpoints due to mass media and white patriarchal christian domination! Mass media is controlled mainly by white christian males. Therefore they can portray their beliefs of race, class, gender, and sexuality onto society as the way they, themselves practice. Any other beliefs deriving from a tangent pushes the envelope and thus disrupts our conformed society. Media and entertainment allows young adults to feel the fear of being gay, lesbian, transgendered or bisexual. It shows society how "most of the people" at least portrayed in movies, are not gay, therefore gay being not-normal and thus striking fear of young people to come out and express who they truly are.
  The narrator in Queens book goes on to later explore his first female sexual encounter with a black, female prostitute. His earlier attempts at flirting with women left him feeling hopeless. He later finds that he isn't lost from not exploring his sexuality with females but finds that he yearns for something more than just a physical relationship. He wants to connect, and those connections were best met or at least understood by other men, or at least the ones who seemed like they wanted him. The feminist in him needed to make the connection. The animal in him needed to make those connections physical and the human in him just needed to for it all to come together and mean something. 

  Being able to identify oneself is important. Most importantly is being able to freely express oneself! Not having to conform to others comfort levels and being able to explore both sides or create a new path helps liberate our selfs!

SCWAMPing the movies...

After starting what seems to be a non-traditional capstone course at UDC this semester and diving right into the reading materials on black female sexuality and ideology, I've quickly realized that this course is going to be more than your standard take notes and listen to a lecture class.  I certainly agree with many of the view points raised in the first couple of readings assigned to us, especially in Leslie Grinner's piece "Bella's Choice: Deconstructing Ideology and Power in the Twilight Series".

 So in the same manner, I would like to attempt using her same philosophy in deconstructing another movie while using the same frame work that Grinner uses in deconstructing the Twilight series. 

  The movie I decided to use, was literally the very next movie I watched after reading Grinners article, Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. 

  Now for the elements that will coincide with my movie and Grinners movie, the same concept that she brought to the forefront, is the acronym SCWAMP! SCWAMP stands for Straight, Christian, White, Able-bodied, Male,Property owner. This concept points out that these are the adjectives/abilities that allow for one to get ahead in life. We also like to convey these characteristics in everyday media and onto inanimate objects to help with advancing the probability of those objects, movies, jobs, etc to become more  "successful" or "liked".

 Lets begin with the deconstruction.

Straight- The Hobbit is a widely known fantasy book turned into blockbuster. Now the idea that this is a fantasy, could have one thinking that there may be a small chance, that just maybe, one or some of the characters may exist as something other than straight men/female/dwarf/ork or whatever. If you thought that then your fantasy of seeing these types of characters in a surreal world is in and of itself...surreal! Every character in the 2 part trilogy (the 3rd hasn't been prodded into a movie yet) so far are straight. Even the elves who appear somewhat androgynous with their long hair and celestial movements are all straight. 

Christian- The themes of Christianity here are woven with fine thread through out the movie. It doesn't take a devout christian to see the underlying religious sentiments in this movie, but you do have to be aware, as we are blinded to these everyday ideas because we live in a christian society. The movie is biblical in a sense with the prophetic storyline, the fighting of demons, and the overcoming of the huge monster by the little hobbit akin to a story of David and Goliath. 

White- This one is easily seen when watching this movie along with many other main streamed movies or blockbusters. Through out the whole movie there was only one black female actress and she did not even have a line in the movie. She may have been on screen for a total of 1 minute in the whole 166 minutes of the film. 

Able-Bodied- Here we see the inflation of power to super human or super powers with many of the characters. All of the elves have amazing fighting abilities, almost never losing a battle with the Ork's that they fight through out the movie. The Dwarfs also fight with superhuman strength, even though they are smaller than average. Here the disability of being a "short person" is nothing but a personification and the disability is washed away because of the manner of the movie and it being a fantasy. Anyone in the movie that becomes disabled is left behind. Shunning aside a person who is no longer adequate and making room for those who are.

Male- Most of the characters in the movie are male. At least the major roles. This movie makes way for one female elf named Tauriel (Evangeline Lilly). She is placed in the movie simply to create a love dynamic between herself and one of the dwarfs, which of course is male. 

Property- The entire movies plot is depicted loosely upon GREED!! The whole storyline is of the dwarfs trying to get to the mountain, which is filled with gold, to be able to take back there kingdom and have power over the land they once ruled. The idea that we must obtain the most amount of riches or the best of "something" wether it is a castle or home, weapons/armor or clothes is a trending philosophy or ideology which continues to grow because we as a people allow it.  We get sucked into buying things and owing money for the things we buy. To support our spending habits we need jobs and must compete for the best jobs to be able to get the best paycheck to pay off the worst debt! Its a cyclical phenomenon that many don't question because its so mundane and habitual that there's no reason to question it until you can no longer swim above the debt pool you've made for yourself and are drowning in your inability to support yourself.