Group Project: Superheroes

Group Members: Lauren Kruger-Patchin, Allyson Burger, Dylan Miller, Lauren Rich, Dana Baele

Topic: Superheroes

Argument: They've changed and it can negatively affect children.

http://youtu.be/U7YpjUCtnGU

Look at this picture

Lauren Kruger-Patchin
Look at this picture
Blog #8 - 3/14/13

I was on Pinterest, searching through all of the posts my friends pinned today. I came across a pin about food to eat and food not to eat. It linked to several websites and I began looking at them out of curiosity. I always want to eat healthy, but sometimes I have a hard time knowing what is actually healthy. Everything seems bad for you anymore...

So I clicked on a link and a video started playing. I paused it the second a picture came up, because it reminded me of class today. We talked about how women are seen for their makeup, hair, womanly curves and how men are seen as being muscular or "masculine."

I don't think this picture could have fit the female/male stereotypes any better...

Good thing Jeff has big muscles and Isabel has big boobs, right? Now we know who is a woman and who is a man... This is part of the reason we have gender stereotypes. I see stuff like this everywhere. People are brainwashed to think that muscles are how we define a man and boobs are how we define a woman.

I just wanted to share that photo with everyone.

Rape, Guns & Women - Where Are Our Hearts?

Lauren Kruger-Patchin
Blog #7: Rape, Guns & Women - Where Are Our Hearts?
3/12/13

As I've already mentioned, I am taking a women's gender studies course this semester that compliments this course very well. Today I did an assignment that I wanted to share with everyone. In class today we talked about violence and anti-gay hate crimes. Now, I want to talk about women being raped in violent attacks. This also ties in nicely to our lives because of the BSU "gunman" incident yesterday... Going to this link and watching the videos is seriously worth your time. I can't believe some of the things they said to this woman who just shared her rape story. How does society not value women more?

This was my discussion on the link from my other class...

I would like to discuss a particular article from Bust Magazine. While I found many of the articles on the website attention-getting, I found this one to be very timely with an issue concerning women - more specifically college women, like myself. And with the recent "gunman" scare at BSU, this is a hot topic.

The title: "Wanna Avoid Rape? Carry A Concealed Weapon, Says Rape Victim."

The title alone was attention grabbing. I couldn't tell if they were promoting gun use or trying to make it sound obsurd.

Rape and gun control are big issues when it comes to women's rights. With all of the mall, school, and movie theater shooting over the past year or so, gun control in general is a huge topic. So what happens if laws prevent women from carrying them on college campuses? Many college campuses already ban weapons. Ball State, obviously, is one of them... being as a huge search was held the other morning when a man was spotted with a gun.

The way I see it, people doing something bad with a gun will carry the gun whether it's allowed or not. People who could stop the crimes will only have a gun for protection if the law allows it. How does that make sense? The bad guy will have a gun either way, but if guns aren't allowed no one can stop them.

The woman in this article, Amanda, owned a firearm but did not have it with her the day she was raped. She said if she had it with her, things could have been different. When she asks, how does making her defenseless save them from a violent crime, I couldn't have agreed more. Making weapons illegal in certain places won't stop the people with bad intentions from entering those places with weapons. It only endangers those who follow the rules and need protection.

Lawmakers argue that they are trying to protect students and teachers from feeling uncomfortable by having her carry a gun to protect herself.. EXCUSE ME? You rather keep people from feeling "uncomfortable" instead of preventing a rape?! They bring statistics into it and say they aren't on her side, but if it could prevent ANY of the rapes, it's worth it. They argue that he would have turned her own gun around and used it on her... Her reply: "He already had a weapon of his own, he didn't need mine." SO POWERFUL. I feel for this woman. What a tough crowd. Where's the understanding and sympathy - even from the woman senator!

I give props to the man in the last video. He is a man standing up for this woman. It's great to see. I can't believe the woman who was arguing it!

Here is the link if anyone is interested in this article.

http://www.bust.com/wanna-avoid-rape-carry-a-concealed-gun-says-rape-victim.html

Powerful Women Don't Feel Powerful

Lauren Kruger-Patchin
Blog #6: Powerful Women Don't Feel Powerful
3/11/13

I came across this NPR story and tweeted it to #bsupop, but I wanted to talk about it on the blog as well. Before I explain it, feel free to take a look.

'Lean In': Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg Explains What's Holding Women Back

Sheryl Sandberg has a new book, which just became available today. Sandberg is a 43-year-old former Google executive with two Harvard degrees. "She was named Forbes Magazine's fifth most powerful woman in the world (after No. 1 German Chancellor Angela Merkel, No. 2 Hillary Clinton, No. 3 President of Brazil Dilma Rousseff and No. 4 CEO of PepsiCo Indira Nooyi)."

Sanberg wants to call on other women...

The quote that stuck out to me was "I was really embarrassed." I love what her assistant told her. Women should not feel insecure about becoming powerful. We need to embrace it.

Sanberg says, "When a man does a good job, everyone says, 'That's great.' When a woman does that same thing, she'll get feedback that says things like, 'Your results are good, but your peers just don't like you as much' or 'maybe you were a little aggressive.'" She says that when a men is successful they are more liked, but when women are successful they are less liked by men and women."

She explains how differently men and women are treated. This story has great examples of how this proves true. Everyone should take a few minutes to listen.

Women, take note! Don't be held back.



WE ARE MORE THAN THIS: (google image)

Is There Hope After All?

Lauren Kruger-Patchin
Is There Hope After All?
02/28/2013
Blog #5

Let's think positively today...




A few weeks ago I started a 10-week, independent study course. It is a women's gender studies course. As I read from the textbook and do the classwork, I can't stop thinking about how closely some of the topics relate to our Comm322 course. Both deal with feminism. Both deal with the way women and men are portrayed in the media. Both talk about first, second, and third waves of feminism. There are a lot of similarities between the courses; they complement each other very well, so it benefits me to be taking them at the same time.

The real reason I am bringing this up is because in the WGS course, we are assigned movies to watch that demonstrate feminist acts. Some of the movies are old and some are decently new. This got me thinking... in class we focus on how the media creates so much pressure and determines how men and women should act, but we forget to mention the movies that stand against this.



Mona Lisa Smile (2003) with Julia Roberts, Kirsten Dunst, Julia Styles and other big names, was one of the movies assigned in my WGS course. The movie is 10 years old, but uses actresses that still play roles in movies. In Mona Lisa Smile, a free-thinking art professor teaches conservative 50's Wellesley girls to question their traditional societal roles. The professor is supposed to strictly teach from a syllabus that a man made, but the students know all of the material and the professor tries to stray away from it and teach other material. This was a bold move during the 50s. The movie gives great context about that time period and shows the expected roles of men and women, but how some could fight against it. This is one example of how the media helped feminism views.

Another great example of a very recent movie release, not from my WGS course, is The Help (2011.) I personally, LOVE this movie. It brings out great emotion in the view. It's funny, sad, and encouraging all in one movie. When I think of this movie, I think of two parts: 1) Mini don't burn fried chicken, because it was hilarious and cute the way the black woman was helping and teaching the white woman how to cook for her husband; the privileged woman needed to rely on the "lesser" woman 2) When the housekeeper (black female) taught the young, white child "you is kind, you is smart, you is important" because her own parents didn't pay attention to her or properly care for her. The house keeper may not have had the education and proper English, but she was a better parent to the child than the privileged, white parents were. This movie brings up the issue of culture, race and gender in many ways. Even the white, privileged women were expected to stay home while the men worked, whether they had a housekeeper/child care or not. This movie also gives some historical context. The movie description: An aspiring author during the civil rights movement of the 1960s decides to write a book detailing the African-American maids' point of view on the white families for which they work, and the hardships they go through on a daily basis.

My point: there may be hope after all. Some parts of the media may send good messages. They show how in the past there were these huge issues of inequality that we overcame. It gives home that we could overcome the other gender role issues.

Girls vs. Boys; Men vs. Women

Girls vs. Boys; Men vs. Women
Lauren Kruger-Patchin
02/21/2013
Blog 4


With our recent articles comparing girls and boys with masculinity and other characteristics, I had several thoughts that I will share in this blog.

GIRLS VS. BOYS
Girls and Barbies/Princesses:
I was a pink-loving, barbie owning child. I would like to say that babies now are much different than babies back then... My barbies were more plan and less glamorous... I wasn't huge on the princess items, but maybe that's because there weren't a lot of them when I was younger. I actually watched the movies and understood the meanings behind the stories. Today it seems as if children know the princess before the movie and before knowing their story and what they stand for. The princess isn't about the fairy tale, it's about the dress and hair and how they look. This has created a new meaning and some problems. I grew out of that stage, but it's taking kids longer to do so, and some don't. I don't know exactly how I feel about it, other than the fact that those children sound like brats... I give props to the mom who tries keeping her child away from that, but it is scary how she still fails and the child tells her she looks like a princess... It's cute, but you don't want children growing up with the wrong message. The shows that have grown women spending crazy amounts of money to look like princesses still shocks me. I think the media and celebrities can also be at blame for glamorizing those images to women who can't afford it... but that's where your education, common sense, and responsibility needs to come in. It shows how influenced people can be by things and not put their best interest first...

 I see a different... old Barbies were more relaxed and realistic, now they are glamorized...

Boys and superheroes:
This is the topic my group and I hope to do our project on. I am looking forward to discussing it more in class. Even after reading the article, I understand the main point, but I am sure there are so many arguments on the topic. The main point I hear is that the masucilinty of superheroes today has young boys imitating them and becoming more aggressive or getting the wrong message. Superheroes back in the day made their message of helping humans more clear... Movies now show them with women, money, cool weapons killing villains... where is the line? These are "superheroes" - the people young boys look up to... Their image is much different than in comic books and older movies.

 Doing good, saving people vs. looking tough over the city...

MEN VS. WOMEN
Men in media: Men are portrayed as needing to be sexy with abs and tough... They should be really rich and be a very strong figure for women to rely on. This puts a lot of pressure on boys. They see celebrities in the media surrounding by cars, women, money and they have great bodies. This makes boys want those things and they may lead an unhealthy lifestyle to obtain them. Over the last few years we have seen more and more of this. Dr. Phil even had a show on teen male anorexia a few years back because they felt so much pressure from the media to be thin and fit.

Women in media: Women face similar issues. They should be pretty, motherly, and rely on their man. They need to be skinny as well. They take care of children. These are the typical stereotypical gender roles.

The media still portrays these roles quite often in TV shows and movies. However, in real life we are starting to break away from these roles (although the media might make it a struggle) because there are more and more single parents picking up both roles.


BABIES
The baby clothing article was very interesting... I think that baby fashion changes because fashion in general changes. If the parent's fashion is changing, than their babies will as well because they are the ones dressing them. If I had a baby right now, I know I would want to dress it up and make it look adorable... and yes, I would dress it in "gender specific" clothing because I think that is what it cute. It's not to enforce their role - they're a baby! If someone in today's world wanted to dress their baby in a neutral way, they could go with yellow or green. Those are the typical, gender neutral colors for babies. I don't think too many people read into what it means when they dress their children in certain colors. Maybe this goes back to the need to feel "cool" and go with the crowd - follow the current fashion... we dress babies the way the magazines show them looking cute. We dress them in the clothes the stores have. If we have a girl, we go to the girls section. If we have a boy, we go to the boy section. If there is fault, it should be on the designers that decide what colors/types of clothing go into those sections. I don't know if I see a big problem with parents dressing their babies in gender specific clothing, because when the child is old enough to notice and care, they can voice their opinion and tell their parents what kind of clothes they want to wear. Today's world is so different... just look around! I see girls in masculine clothing and boys in feminine clothing all of the time. It might not be widely accepted, but it's there. People are dressing all kinds of ways now... I can't even keep up with it. I'm sure some parents even make their babies into "hipster babies" and then other parents make angry blogs about it, given our hipster discussion in class... who knows! I say, dress your baby the way you want to dress your baby. Fashion will always change, but I don't think it's a bad thing to have gender specific clothing for a baby. Personally, it helps me know if the baby is a boy or girl because I can't tell most newborns apart at first glance...


CONCLUSION:
It is clear that gender roles are still separated. However, I grew up being told that women were the bigger target for enforced gender roles (being pretty, gentle, sensitive, nurturing, cooks, cleaning, taking care of children, but also expected to be skinny and beautiful...) More and more you find that boys/men are facing their own problems (masculinity, abs, muscles, toughness, money makers...)

I tweeted out this article today that was published yesterday. It was an interesting read to go along with these discussions... It examines how boys might be "the new girls" when it comes to education... It asks if boys are now facing more discrimination than girls. Could the roles be reversing?

Outside of this article I have two facts of my own that make me question whether the roles are changing... Women do not always get equal pay when performing the same job as men at the same company - it's been proven that they usually get a significant amount less. However, more women are currently seeking higher educations than men. As this happens, will more gender roles reverse in the work place as well?

Just something to think about...

"Cellphonies"

Lauren Kruger-Patchin
Blog 3
"Cellphonies"
01/28/2013

I am currently reading for tomorrow's class and couldn't help but to start laughing at the "Reach Out and Touch No One" article by Amy Harmon. I wasn't laughing because the article was bad, or dumb, but because I never thought that so many people would fake cellphone calls for one reason or another.

I, myself, have fakes a few phone calls, but I wouldn't say I do it on a regular bases. Many of the reasons that the people in the article made a fake phone call are reasons I make real phone calls. However, if I am caught at an odd time of day I might make a fake phone call for one reason or another. I can only recall several situations where I have done this, but after reading the article I can think of many situations where I should have made a fake phone call to avoid an awkward situation!

I will now question every person I see on their cellphone, wondering if they are actually talking to a real person or if they are just being a "phonie." I liked the term "cellphonie" the article used for people that fake cellphone calls.

When I go back to my Muncie house between the hours of 2am and 4am, (which I find to be the creepy hours) I always call one of my friends as I'm walking from my car to my door until I am safely locked inside. It's a safety thing. I actually call real people when I'm doing that in Muncie and it's usually the people I was just with that I call to make sure I get home safely. However, I can see why someone might fake a phone call for safety if they can't reach someone at the time.

For some reason I feel safer having my phone in my hand at night when I am walking alone from a night class. I feel like if a person sees that I am doing something on my phone, they know that I could call for help quickly or that I might be meeting someone soon. I know having my phone out isn't going to keep someone from trying to doing something to me if they want to and I'm walking alone, but it still makes me feel better. If I am in a situation where I am really feeling uncomfortable walking alone, but don't want to call and wake someone up, I keep my phone open with their number already pulled up so that I only have to hit send... after reading this article, though, I like the idea of faking a phone call, as silly as it seems. But really I just try to avoid those situations all together.

I don't think I would be the type of person to fake a phone call to avoid talking to someone, though. I would simply tell them that I am in a hurry to be somewhere and run off... I don't have the patience to pretend to talk to someone for 15 minutes while someone waits for me to end the conversation to say something, like in the article.

I still found the article very interesting and fun to read.  It was something I never thought about before. It has forever changed my view of people talking on cell phones.

My Parasocial Relationship: Jason Segel

Lauren Kruger-Patchin
Blog 2
My Parasocial Relationship: Jason Segel 
01/24/2013

One of my favorite discussions in this class so far has been about our parasocial relationships. It was very entertaining to hear the different celebrities that we all think we know so well. I have to admit, my parasocial relationship probably isn't as serious as some of the other students' parasocial relationships, but if I were to have one with a celebrity it is definitely with Jason Segel.

Second comes Leslie Knop from Parks and Rec... I love her character (but I don't follow her in anything else.) I do, however, believe I could be best friends with Leslie. But I will stick with Jason today...

I don't find Jason super sexy, but I LOVE his personality and he is all-around adorable... and I say this without ever meeting him or knowing his actual personality. The personality I'm referring to is the one he portrays in his characters. Jason is in How I Met Your Mother, the Muppets, Freaks and Geeks, The Five Year Engagement, and so much more. Basically, if it has Jason Segel in it, I love it! There hasn't been a movie or show with Jason's acting that I haven't loved.

Seriously, how does this not make you laugh? He is so goofy! The singing and dancing... it's so light hearted and fun... 

 

When I watch How I Met Your Mother, I am just laugh and find his relationship with Lilly so adorable! I love the way they interact with each other. I can picture myself having similar conversations with my friends/boyfriend.

When I watched the Five Year Engagement I was mad at him for letting himself go (with the awful beard and terrifying look he had.)

In Freaks and Geeks he is the most adorable thing! If Jason Segel sang 'Lady' to me like this I would die! It is too funny. (...it's worth watching the entire clip!)

When I'm watching something with Jason in it with my friends I constantly say "Jason is SO funny. I just love his personality..." I didn't realize I always say that until one of them pointed it out to me.

Here is another popular clip of Jason's SNL "kissing family" scene. This one throws off my parasocial relationship a bit.. leaves me a little confused. But I still find it absolutely hilarious!

 

I wouldn't say I'm creepy/stalkerish about Jason, but I do admit that he is probably my favorite actor and I do talk about his personality as if I know him.

I'll also admit that I enjoy the younger Jason Segel more than the older, current one. He has aged a bit.. so in my mind he still looks like this..

I could add in a million more wonderful clips of Jason, but I'll leave you to explore YouTube on your own!

So there you have it... my parasocial relationship with Jason Segel. If you don't find his personality hilarious and adorable after this post with the video clips, I do not understand you!

What I Think About Pop Culture

BLOG 1:

Lauren Kruger-Patchin

My thoughts on the class and pop culture

1/15/2012

What is pop culture? That is a very complex question. We will be learning about pop culture the entire semester. There are many aspects of pop culture to study. However, I can admit that after the first week in this course, I have already learned the basics of pop culture, which I did not fully understand before this course.

            Rhetoric in Popular Culture by Barry Brummett (in our course packet), explains the basics of pop culture. I learned about rhetoric, artifacts, text, index meanings, iconic meanings, symbolic meanings, cultures, and more.  I’m not going to list out what all of these things mean, because they are in our text. However, I do want to discuss how I feel about pop culture and what I look forward to in this course.

             I would describe pop culture as the things most people are doing and understand. I am very interested in learned more about pop culture and analyzing different aspects of it in different cultures. I do believe that different cultures have different pop cultures, because what is understood and popular can vary in different cultures. Let’s remember that a culture can be a lot of things.

           

            I am a part of many cultures. I am a part of the American culture, the Ball State student culture, the Christian culture, the female culture, the Grey’s Anatomy culture, the Breaking Bad culture, The Walking Dead culture, The Big Bang Theory culture, and more. Cultures can be big or small. Cultures can be as specific as what clothing you like or what shows you watch. The cultures you are a part of shape who you are as a person. 

            I hope that by the end of this course I have an even better understanding of pop culture. I want the better understanding to help me better understand the people around me who may not be in most of the cultures I’m a part of. I also look forward to discussing some of the articles in the course packet that I have seen. I think there will be some interesting topics brought up in this course and I am anxious to hear different opinions on some of the issues that will be brought up. I am a very opinionated person, but I love hearing a good debate and hearing arguments on a topic.

           I really like when we discuss celebrities and television shows in class. The Jersey Shore and Snooki references never get old. The video clips that are shown are also very helpful examples, and they are entertaining.

            My future blogs will have deeper thoughts and examples of pop culture. This first blog was rather general, just to introduce some of my pop culture thoughts. I’d like to end on this note: I love how much our class enjoys Breaking Bad.