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In Tuesdays lecture I could not help but be filled with many emotions.  I have a number of friends and friend's relatives who are currently serving the country and both of my Grandfathers have been in the service. As we were talking about the virtual citizen soldier I was thinking, why do people feel the need to be a "virtual citizen soldier?" There are amazing and brave men and women who fight day in and day out for our country, so why would we mimic that? Soldiers are heroes and I do not think that playing some war video game could possibly give any "real" indication to being a solder. There are so many aspects to being in the military that are left out of the picture. Soldiers go through weeks of intense training, they are hundreds of thousands of miles away from their family, they come home with post traumatic stress disorder, they revolve their life around protecting America and it's people and some of those people want to consider themselves a "virtual citizen solder" because they are really good at sitting in front of a television playing Call of Duty? I think that is horrible! What "insight" does shooting some virtual people give to the real depths of war? War should not be used as a tool of entertainment. The media is referring to the bombs as a "tremendous light show..." Are they being serious. People are losing their lives and we are going to sit here is "shock and awe" that those are bombs taking the life of human beings? There is a clip in the movie, Black Hawk Down, that I will include the link to and I think that what the man says sums it up perfectly... Americans will never understand what it is like to be fighting for our country. So why do we try to make it entertaining?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsyVRpW4xNk

This clip takes place after an attack that lasted hours longer than expected and many many many American soldiers lost their lives.

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After today's topic of hyper masculinity I was thinking of ways that this idea was portrayed in media other than Hip Hop. I thought of Brad Paisley's "I'm Still a Guy." I decided that I would tweet out the link for the class and as I was listening to the lyrics to the song I was so shocked at how straight forward is. There was one line about men holding their girl's purses which sparked the following comment (this comment was posted 3 weeks ago, and I just happened to see it while I was scrolling):

• "Holding a woman's purse is completely emasculating. Don't do it if you're a real man. Besides, who holds her purse when she's at the mall by herself? She does. So, she's perfectly capable of holding it when she's with you. Don't be a pussy. Don't hold her purse.

I was 100% taken back by this comment! Has the media actually morphed the idea of Masculinity so much that a man is not willing to hold his girl's purse? What if masculinity was linked to being a gentleman, or just a respectful person! This YouTube user days "Don't do it if you're a real man" (meaning holding the purse). A real man? I am pretty sure that all men are real?

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      In preparation for tomorrow’s class I was reading the assigned articles and I found myself a little taken back. The idea or thought that women are not funny or that women are not as funny as men has actually never crossed my mind. In Christopher Hitchens’ article, Why Women Aren’t Funny, he says that “many women believe or were taught by their mothers, that they become threatening to men if they appear to bring” (obviously referring to the idea that humor is a sign of intelligence). I was shocked to read that. I have never had that idea or been taught that by my mother. In fact, my mother is quite a funny lady! I was wondering if I was the only one who had that reaction. Hitchens also talks about how women want a man who can make them laugh. Well duah… Who doesn’t want to be in a relationship with someone who makes me laugh? Maybe someone makes me laugh because they are funny, or because they have silly little habits, or the way that they act… Is it true that men don’t look for someone who makes them laugh? I would be very interested to hear a boy’s opinion on this?

            I also wanted to comment on what  Alessandra Stanley said in her article about how in the book of Genesis, Sarah names her son Isaac, Hebrew for laughter, because it is funny that she is with child so late in her life. If I remember correctly, which I may be wrong, but I am pretty sure that God told Sarah and Abraham to name their son Isaac (Hebrew for "he will laugh") because it was a sign of joy. 

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Listening to Jennifer Siebel Newsom speak on Wednesday I had so many thoughts running through my head. I would never consider myself to be a huge, true, committed and involved feminist but none the less, I am a woman and of course I have my own opinions and beliefs. Hearing Jennifer speak of her experiences and her accomplishments was so empowering. Her talk of her relationship with her father is really what struck me the most. I am so blessed and so lucky to have a father who believes in his daughters and his wife. He is the manager of the Radiology department at one of the hospitals in our city and it never occurred to me that he would not hire a woman or treat a woman with respect because of her gender. I am so lucky to have such a wonderful male role model who respected in such a way that I never thought that disrespecting a woman was even an option. I could never imagine having a father who did not support me and believe in me. What a strong woman Jennifer must be for breaking out of the father’s mold and becoming her own person.

Another topic that struck me as extremely interesting was her talk to “Tabloid Trash.” I am not one to get very caught up in reality television. I am not a watcher or supporter of many MTV shows or the Bachelor or shows on that genre. But my dirty secret and guilty pleasure is the Kardashian family. After thinking about the topics discussed and comparing it to the Kardashian family I have realized that Kourtney is probably the biggest feminist of the family. So even in this “tabloid trash” situation there are still potential cases of feminist. Granted, this example may be my personal form of purging the guilt for being such a lover but it was just an observation.

Overall I really enjoyed the discussion with Jennifer Siebel Newsom. She is such an amazing woman with an incredible story.

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In yesterday's class we discussed the "Fakebook" article and how embellished Facebook is becoming. I was thinking about this and how it has changed Facebook. After observing (sounds much better than “creeping on”) many of my Facebook friends I noticed who I thought was the most guilty of this “embellishing.” I think that one the common “embellishers” are mothers. I think that there are two types of mothers that do this, too. There are the mothers of the small children and the mothers of the teenagers. The mothers of the small children seem like they have to post a kabillion pictures of their “17 month old” eating pears, playing with their new toy, playing in the pool, visiting Santa Clause, taking a nap, sitting with dad, and laughing at the camera. And on top of the many pictures they have to make a Facebook status for every time their child tugs at their ear or wakes up in the middle of the night. “Maybe they have an ear infection? Any other mothers experiencing this?”  As for the mothers of teenagers… They “share” those pictures that are like “repost if you love your kids” and they make Facebook statuses about what proud parents they are because their daughter, Susie, got a 2.9 in her third semester of college! And the second type of people who do a lot of embellishing seem to be 13 and 14 year old girls. There are so many mirror pictures of young teenage girls with pounds of makeup on! They make statuses about their weekend plans and the status usually ends with “TEXT IF YA NEED ME! XOXO” I can’t say I am not guilty of being the 13 year old girl on social media, because when I was 13 it was cool to update your MySpace background once a week.

            I started to wonder why people embellish so much. It is because they are trying to prove something to other people, or maybe to themselves? Maybe those mothers are trying to prove to themselves that they are good mothers. Maybe those teenage girls are trying to show their class mates that they can fit in… And I know it seems like I am lumping every single mother and teenage girl into one category and that isn’t what I am trying to do. It was just an observation!

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As I was working on the reading for yesterday’s class, I kept in mind the question of “Why should we study popular culture?” We touched on it some in class and people had so many great reasons for studying pop culture! Some people said we should study popular culture because it is interesting and also because it is becoming more and more common in today’s worlds. One reason that I believe we should study popular culture is because it is a very sneaky form of persuasion. The reading and class discussion made me wonder… When you are at the store picking out clothes, are you picking out those clothes because you actually like them and want to wear them, or are you picking out that shirt because it looks similar to the one that Kim Kardashian wore on the new episode of “Keeping Up With The Kardashians?”

Also, in class yesterday we talked about how on television shows and movies, if a character is gay then that is the defining characteristic of that character. I was thinking about this and applying it to some shows and movies and most of them were right. Shows like “The New Normal” and “Will and Grace” portray gay characters who are defined by their sexuality. One character that I could think of that was gay but that was not defined by his sexuality was Dumbledore from Harry Potter. In the books, Dumbledore’s sexuality is never defined but J.K. Rowling has said that yes, Dumbledore is indeed gay.