Extra Post: Cheerleaders are lucky to just be admired

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2014/04/nfl_cheerleading_lawsuits_five_former_buffalo_jills_are_the_latest_in_a.html


above is an article I found describing the situation professional cheerleaders have faced and are still facing today. I was shocked to learn professional cheerleaders do not even make minimum wage, are not paid for their required expenses, and are even fined by their bosses when they gain weight. They are also not compensated for required appearances (such as 'sitting on the laps of important men while they ride on golf carts) and are 'auctioned off' at some events for team fundraising without receiving much if any cut from the deal. Though their practices are extremely time consuming and their job requirements demand much physical preparation. After learning that this is definitely illegal, some cheerleaders banded together to file a lawsuit, and demand living wages for their work, as cheerleaders are not involved in the labor organization of the NFL.
They claimed that they had not before done this because their coaches explained to them that the team was 'like a family' (they are encouraged to call each other sisters etc.), and that they were 'lucky to just be admired by the players and audience'. This is illegal, and obvious manipulation. They are benefiting off the sexuality and dance skills of these women, and not paying them with the excuse 'your lucky to just be admired by the men' and 'there are a million other girls willing to take your place'. What are your alls' thoughts?

Art Museum Visit

I recently paid my visit to the Saint Louis Art Museum. I wandered around every time period and genre of art, but the art from the late 1800s interested me most in regards to what we have discussed in class. For instance, in the picture I took of me at the museum I am standing next to a painting in which the male artist predicts the atrocities of WW1. If you look around the painting you will see men and animals running around a city in chaos. There were many more paintings near this one depicting the horrors of WW1 and WW2, all of which had men as the main subjects and were painted by male artists. I wandered to the next room where the paintings were from the same time period, but had a light-hearted more aesthetic purpose. All of these paintings had naked women laying on beds with care free expressions. What I took from this was that women are not supposed to be seen as suffering, or used to tell a story that one can empathize with, but instead are supposed to be what calms the chaos. They seemed to be objects only used to soothe the suffering of men. This of course implies that women will not be looking at these paintings, only men, and therefore women do not need to be in the photographs that are ment to be empathized with because how could a man empathize with a women's pain? The women will instead be used to soothe the all male audience. This is seen today through the sexualization in commercials I feel. For instance, when Hardies has women eating their burgers seductively it just sends the message to me that they only believe men are their customers, or the customers they want. Yes, men are sometimes sexualized in commercials, but i think only 'female specific' things. Its just some food for thought, and shows how this theme can still be seen today.

Pregnancy

http://thoughtcatalog.com/jamie-berube/2014/02/you-shouldnt-need-a-reason-for-not-having-kids/#rtZhDz9DIwYd32Hh.01

I did this as my show and tell, but thought of posting it on the blog because I think this is a problem that every women has to face after certain number of years of marriage. I feel like the society expects something out of a women throughout their life. I strongly disagree that there is a certain age for a girl to get married and then they should start thinking of having a baby 2 or 3 years after marriage. I don't understand that why the society cares about when a couple starts their family. This article does a beautiful job of describing a situation of what a women is asked after 6 years of marriage and her reaction. It also shows the cause and effect of how a women can be affected by these questions. Another fact that it mentioned was that no one should be concerned about asking these questions unless its your husband, immediate family, or best friend for 14 years. I hope that people learn from this article that you don't know what the women is going through and it is none of their business to comment on her personal life.

Academic Mentoring Bias

http://www.npr.org/2014/04/22/305814367/evidence-of-racial-gender-biases-found-in-faculty-mentoring

As university students, I think that we all like to believe that every professor is equally invested in all student success without any bias.  However, this study shows that this is not the case, at least in the top universities in the country.  This reminded me a good deal about the study with the resumes that Ina was talking about in class.  Despite the fact that the resumes were the same, white males' were always moved to the top of the stack and African American males' were discarded.  In a similar way, the white males were reached out to by the professors in this study and those from minority backgrounds were ignored.  I think that this really shows that even if we are fighting against organizational inequality, we also have to look at informal inequality.  If marginalized groups are not receiving mentoring, then they will have much less chance of success.

Slur Blog Post

http://www.policymic.com/articles/88101/inspiring-duke-photo-project-calls-out-the-casual-slurs-we-use-every-day
http://www.upworthy.com/some-words-are-up-to-no-good-even-if-they-seem-harmless-think-its-time-to-get-rid-of-these?g=2&c=tvr1

         I saw this photo series today and thought that it tied in really well with our conversation about the use of derogatory terms today in class. The project is very similar to the project that the DLC put on her at SLU, and I think that it does a good job of outlining why the use of any of these slurs is inherently wrong. My favorite is on the second link and it says that she doesn't use the phrase "man-up", because the strongest people I know have cried in front of me regardless of their age, gender or sex.
       This is something that we haven't covered yet in class, but I think that the movie probably addresses it at some point. Society says that men aren't supposed to cry, but at the same time if they do in a rare moment of vulnerability they are often applauded for it. The issue of crying being a feminine thing to do and something that is a sign of weakness typically only hurts women. Hillary Clinton in the past has received a lot of back lash for crying in public addresses before, but when Obama has cried in speeches it has gained him public support.

Additional Post: Ban Bossy Movement

A part of Sheryl Sandberg's goals with her Lean-In book was to start a conversation about these issues and to also raise awareness that women's inequality in the workplace is still a big issue. Along with the book, there has followed a movement and her website helps promote women in leadership roles. In conjunction with this she has also started a Ban Bossy Movement aimed at young girls. It's an effort to help girls view leading as something more positive. She created this movement with the Girl Scouts and wants to promote it to young girls. There are a series of posters with facts about just how young women are taught that their voice is less important. I was surprised by some of the facts on the posters, especially one that talks about how statistically young girls are paid less for household chores. I think that this demonstrates why it is so for women especially to negotiate for a higher salary, when from a young age we're told our work is worth less.

Lean In

In another class I wrote a paper about Sheryl Sandberg's book Lean In. Sandberg is the Chief Operating Officer for Facebook, and wrote a book about issues relating to women in the work place. The books title comes form Sandberg’s desire for more women to “lean-into” their careers. Her book is controversial, because she thinks that many women do not go full-force in their career fields and “lean-back” oftentimes because of their plans for families in the future. At first I agreed with critiques that maybe she was being too harsh, but after thinking about it this is definitely something that I’ve witnessed myself too. The valedictorian of my high school received a full-ride scholarship to a 4-year university and her parents said that if she went there they’d pay for medical school. A year into college she changed her major, because she thought being a doctor would be too hard since she also wanted a family. This is just one example, but I think that oftentimes today this still does happen, because women if they do decide to pursue both career and family, are going to end up working two shifts not just one. Sandberg makes the argument that until we have equality in the workplace and in the home that women will never feel truly comfortable choosing to pursue both careers and family.