BLOG 10- Final Week

This week since this is the final week, I thought I would reflect on the whole class in general.  As a male, this class brought me issues that I had never thought of before.  I always thought all the topics were just a women’s lib movement, rather than a justified feminism movement.  It brought issues like sexism and other oppressions to the forefront of my thinking–I really did not know these things existed for females.  Growing up with a very sexist father, I learned gender–play with tractors, sister’s play with dolls, I worked in the yard, my sister’s did the dishes and cleaned house.  I feel like my oldest sister took this gender playing very harshly and some of the attitudes portrayed by my father have continually offended her.  She did not agree with the way my father treated my mother, even though their behavior was a standard practice for their time, but, this shows how far the feminist movement has moved.  I believe the females of today would not stand to be treated the way my mother was often treated.  Even though women have a ways to go in the wage equity movement, women have been able to achieve many other rights in the feminist movement.  This feminism and the active movement thereof have changed women’s futures.  Although the path is still long, I believe the movement has been positive.  I watch television shows differently, I read articles differently, and I am more aware of the feminist situation.  All in all, I believe this class has been a positive for me.  I have grown as an individual with my beliefs and interactions.  Who would have thought you can get all of this out of an internet class!?

Week 9

I read an article this week on the internet about the world’s best country for women.  It was a very interesting article.  Can you guess which country is best for women?  I was surprised, it was Switzerland.  The United States was a dismal 17th place, one above Costa Rica.  This was a shocker!  Switzerland ranked high because it is a country that starts young anti-sexism awareness training.  The training begins in kindergarten.  Male toddlers are encouraged to play with dolls and females are encouraged to play with toy tractors.  This all adds up to flexible gender roles for later in life.  Switzerland is proud that their women drive busses and the men push baby carriages.  The Swedish men do more housework than any other place in the world–average of 24 hours per week.  In Sweden the ultimate female takes home an average of $22,000 per year.  An American woman takes home $29,000 per year.  Even with this statistic, Swedish women are fanatical about paying their fair share on dates.  This causes the Swedish men to be painfully slow at making a first romantic move.  This sets up the Swiss women to be the sexual aggressor.  According to the article, this has an advantage because Swiss women can date 3 or 4 men at a time with no stigma about how many sexual partners they participate with.  All of these things permeate the life of women in Sweden.  Women sports get as much t.v. time as men and public toilets are unisex (minimizes long lines for women’s bathrooms).  According to the article this leads to hot and heavy encounters behind locked doors.  The Swedish have even developed the first female friendly car.  The wage gap is Sweden’s biggest problem of inequality.  I found this article really interesting, I guess maybe because it all relates to our class.  I guess more women should consider living in Sweden.

Blog 8

I want to discuss my wife’s experience at breaking into a male dominated upper management position.  My wife has it a glass ceiling.  She is a school teacher who recently got her master’s degree in administration.   First, she applied for a principal’s job where she is currently teaching, she interviewed for the job and didn’t get the job.  Second, she interviewed for an assistant principal’s job, but she was overqualified.  The things they were looking for in the assistant principal’s job, she technically has been doing for eight years, but she didn’t get hired.  The school hired a male, young teacher.  Since the denial of these jobs, she has also applied in other school corps.  She can’t even get an interview for those jobs.  She is a very qualified individual and is disheartened when she doesn’t get an interview.  Maybe if I show her this chapter’s readings about the glass ceiling it will help her understand the disadvantages that she is facing trying to break into a male dominated field.  I feel that if she can keep pursuing her career advancement, she will one day accomplish her goal.  It will be hard for her to keep a positive attitude.  It is hard to basically not get a job in a male dominated field just because you are a female; although, a person feels they are very experienced and qualified to do the job.  The trend is that eventually the male dominated jobs will open up to women.  My wife and other women deserve a chance exspecially when they are qualified.  They deserve a change in supervision roles and the compensation that goes with the role.  I know I feel women should have an equal chance to move up the ladder.

Week 7

Today, I heard on the news that a famous talk show host was taking all of Tiger Woods’ mistresses and trying to enter them into a bikini contest.  I thought this might be an interesting topic for discussion.  This talk show host obviously wants to exploit the whole Tiger Woods disaster by using the sexuality of these women to increase the shows ratings.  I did not hear whether all the girls agreed to participate, I suppose it will come down to the dollar amount given to them for participating.  This all goes back to the fact that Tiger Woods has an addiction to sex.  What was interesting is that the commentator interviewed Tiger’s girlfriend from when he went to Stanford as an undergrad.  She actually dated Tiger for a year and a half.  She said that he was a very faithful boyfriend and she had no issues with infidelity.  I guess the key word is–girlfriend, boyfriend not wife, husband.  She actually broke up with Tiger when he went pro.  She did not want to put her life on hold to follow him around the pro circuit.  She stated that she would have never guessed that Tiger would have such a need for sex.  She wondered if it was the money that changed who he was.  Isn’t it interesting how sexuality and money are so tightly linked in the media and advertising.  In Tiger’s case he has managed to destroy a family and many other women’s lives.  Why did he choose to get married if this was how he wanted to conduct himself?  He didn’t need to get married to increase his showmanship as a golfer, so why did he?  I don’t know, I just think the whole media business is always exploiting sexuality and women.  What do you all think?