Not Your Average Response

Super Reads!

2013-10-21T06:01:00.001-07:00

http://news.yahoo.com/oops-etruscan-warrior-prince-really-princess-112810200.html

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/10/10/lybrido-pill-cure-asexuality-women-destroying-society/

2013-01-28T05:44:00.003-08:00

For Sci-fi (adult or teen) novelists or writers of any kind of young adult novel: Check out the 13th (free!) “Dear Lucky Agent” Contest on the GLA blog @ http://tinyurl.com/a8msdw2

2012-10-10T11:05:00.000-07:00

CELEBRATE THE INTERNATIONAL DAY OF THE GIRL!

http://dayofthegirl.org/about/

2012-09-17T10:28:00.004-07:00

122 Student,
Read the op. ed.
http://ideas.time.com/2012/09/11/is-it-really-the-end-of-men/?iid=op-main-lede

Then view Melissa Harris-Perry's presentation of the topic, personal opinion, and her panelist's thoughts at:
http://ideas.time.com/2012/09/11/is-it-really-the-end-of-men/?iid=op-main-lede
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46979745/vp/49052311#49052311

Then, create a well-organized, personal experience evidence supported response. Post your response on the blog for extra credit.
Dr. B.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46979745/vp/49052172#49052172

Caught in a Loophole

2012-09-11T11:01:00.002-07:00

10 a.m. Saturday August 4, 2012

“Don’t forget, it’s tax-free weekend!” my mother hollered over her shoulder as she headed out of our house on Saturday, August 4^th.

My heart began to race, my palms became wet with sweat as, in my mind, I began rearranging my family’s whole weekend so that my husband and I could get to the stores before everything we needed was stripped from the shelves: shoes and clothes for our ever-growing nine and eighteen year old boys, sheets for our oldest son’s new bed in his first apartment, and something, anything else on the tax-free approved list we might need or be able to sneak into the cart: new pencils, pens, paper, folders, crayons, pens, erasers, printer ribbon, and the list goes on. Maybe I could even load up on some new work clothes for myself and my husband whose field-boots were looking worse for wear these days.

Use to be, I didn’t pay much attention to this money-saving holiday. It wasn’t as though the savings didn’t matter, but, well, they didn’t matter so much or enough for me to give over a whole weekend (or even a few hours) to shopping in order to save what, for many of us, may only amount to a few dollars. I don’t enjoy shopping , no matter what shape it takes – grocery or clothes or furniture or home décor; I simply do not relish traipsing through stores looking around for things I need and sometimes don’t.

But this year, like last year, like the year before, things are different and, while I may not be saving the date on my calendar, I am willing to forgo a day at the beach to get the savings I can from these state-sanctioned tax-free moments in time. Frankly, every little bit counts to just about every single one of us. From the single beaten and battered penny found in a parking lot to the $13.50 +/- saved in taxes by shopping on a tax-free weekend, the money we can save matters and the money all of us can save on all of our taxes matters even more.

This is why understanding the issue of taxation this election should be of paramount importance to all of us. Surprisingly, however, many have no idea what this issue is about or what our presidential candidates propose doing to make a difference in our lives via our taxes. It’s a downright dirty shame that this issue is so muddy, so little understood by so very many voters.

But for many Americans the lack of lucidity surrounding this issue is no different from the lack of clarity surrounding any of the other issues up for grabs in November and on the table come January. And this is the real travesty.

Truly, those of us voting in this year’s presidential election for the next person to run our country for the next four years should know, inside and out, the issues the candidates for this position plan to address when in office and what they plan to do regarding those topics. For every single one of the issues on the table this election season affects every single one of us. None of us is exempt from the effects of these decisions.

So, if when asked about the election you find yourself saying, “I don’t follow politics” or “I don’t know all the issues, I’m only concerned with . . . fill in the blank,” or “My vote doesn’t matter, so I’m not voting,” or any other answer that makes it clear you do not have enough information to make an informed decision, then be proactive in getting yourself educated about the upcoming election. Here’s how to start:

http://2012election.procon.org/

http://www.presidentialelection.com/Political_Issues/

http://www.smartvoter.org/voter/search.html

Then, my dear 122 students, we can have a discussion.

Happy learning,

Dr. B.

On Religion: God and Me

2012-07-23T08:54:00.000-07:00

Across our line of vision, a pair of deer appears in the road. They stop to watch us coming at them. We stand still . . . waiting. We and they hold silent. Then, effortlessly, they clear the berm, push airborne over the edge of the lake, and disappear across the soybean field into the distance. The dog looks to me for assurance. Her raised brows question, “Good to go?” I nod and we move on. In my head, I say, “Thank you, God, for the dog and the deer this morning.”

It’s odd that I offer this prayer of gratitude, for in truth, I am not a religious person. I have a hard time accepting as real, as truth, that of which my reasoning, scientific, research-oriented mind typically needs tangible proof. And yet, on the rare blue morning when the deer appear, the idea of God seems logical, rational, and absolute. There can be no doubt, in moments like that, so simple, that something created the deer, the dog, and me. We are incredibly complicated beings; there can be no way, in my mind, that we just arrived without something working in the process of creation. Boom and we were here?

My problem with religion has always been a matter of two things: the prolific male definition of God (and the results of that: male dominated societies and, in some cases, the exclusion of female clergy) and the way of organized religions to use the prescriptions of their faith to condemn nonbelievers and to justify violence and oppression both of those within their faith and of those outside it. These beliefs and their adjoining behaviors have been why I have kept religion at arms-length for so long.

It is ironic that my new-found confidence in my questioning kind of “faithfulness” is due, in large part, to the Vatican, a bastion, in my opinion, of patriarchal and judgmental religious doctrine. If not for the Vatican’s assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, I would not have had the chance to listen to Sister Pat Farrell speak (in an interview on NPR’s Fresh Air program last week) on the idea of God as a genderless, but no less magnificent creator who welcomes our wonder and does not rank us according to sex, race, class, or sexuality (etc.). Her idea of God emphasized a unity, permitted query, and gave women equal value and place in the church.

This struck home with me. My heart left the Catholic Church years ago when, despite my great desire to serve the church, I was told I could not be an “Alter Server” because I was a girl. Now, this was before canon 230, and I was only seven, so who knows where my desire to serve would have gone, but I do recall the emotions that followed my rejection based on sex. First, I was ashamed for having been born a girl, an emotion no girl should have to wrestle. Then I became angry – how dare the church reject me for being a girl? Did not the church teach me that I was special simply because I was female and had the awesome God-granted ability to procreate? How did all of this hypocritical thinking come together? I could not make sense of it and I still can’t. But Sister Farrell’s words last week gave comfort; she helped me understand that I was never alone in my belief that God (not a man) created all of us with the same value – in an image of wonder and that is reason enough to believe that I (like all women) are worthy of being teachers of all faiths and worth being heard.

For over ten years now, I have been talking with my sons about God and teaching them that the wonder of faith is, well, just that, wonder. That is, faith is both believing and questioning. In her interview on Fresh Air last week, Sister Farrell also articulated what has been the way of spirituality in my life. She wondered if you can be faithful and still question, can both religious leaders and their followers “raise questions openly and search for truth freely, with very complex and swiftly changing issues in our day?” To this, her answer, my answer is we should, we must if we want God in our lives. If we want faithfulness to be a positive guide for the next generation, there must be room for wonder.

For some, any kind of religious questioning negates faith. For others, any kind of doubt in science negates reason. Neither is true.

I question the popular notions of God and, yet, I am profoundly faithful. I condemn religious teachings that oppress and persecute and, yet, I am intensely spiritual. I believe in something larger than myself and yet I seek reason and, sometimes, proof -- like the dog and me walking and the deer crossing.

Dr. B.

Not so funny after all.

2012-07-17T08:42:00.000-07:00

Hi 121 Students,
I did not truly respond to the "rape" joke issue because I had not seen the routine mentioned. I have since gone to view it and to read and listen to the controversy surrounding it.

My stance is completely in line with that given by Jessica Valenti (great feminist author of "The Purity Myth" among other great reads) as provided in many medias over the weekend. Listen to her speak here on my favorite weekend political show, Melissa Harris Perry.

Here is the clip of Valenti and Perry addressing comedians and rape and, in particular, why Tosh's routine about rape, really and truly, well, wasn't funny and, in many ways, this kind of "rape" humor is dangerous.

Do watch the whole things -- after Valenti comedians speak for themselves about rape jokes and the Tosh issue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vmc7aBG8d4

WATCH THE WHOLE THING.

View the clip here or on my blog http://notyouraveragekbk.blogspot.com/
and post your response on the blog as well for extra credit.

I look forward to your thoughts.
Dr. B.

2012-07-10T11:58:00.002-07:00

English 121 Extra Credit: Media Influence.

Students: Read one of the following articles on the media's influence in our lives and, in particular, on our perceptions of gender, race, age, and beauty:

http://www.udel.edu/comm245/readings/GenderedMedia.pdf
http://syndicate.missouri.edu/resources/behm-morawitz/Media_Images_Effects.pdf
any article on the pages listed here: http://www.medialiteracy.com/representation_in_media.htm

Post your responses to what you read. Consider your own studies into the media this week via your TV viewing assignment for your next essays.

I look forward to reading your work.
Dr. B.

Hello... any mommy home?

2012-05-10T10:38:00.001-07:00

Celebrating “No-Mom”Day:

A few years ago, when my youngest was, well, much younger, I found myself seething over a Mother’s Day article in the local paper. Spread out on the kitchen table was the female conflict of the day: On Mother’s Day which would you rather do – stay home with your family or spend the day alone, free of responsibility (for once) and focused solely on self (GASP!)? The survey results reported that a slight majority of mothers wanted to stay home with their families and the language and undertone in describing those that wanted a day to themselves made it very clear this was the wrong choice.

Boy, did I feel lousy. I wanted the day off. I longed to get away from them all and go . . . oh, who cares where, I just wanted to get my pat on the back for being mom and then pretend for a moment I wasn’t.

Funny, how that so rarely happens for women who are mothers. Until a few years ago, this had always been true in my husband’s family. Use to be on Mother’s Day that my husband’s mother, my sisters-in-law, and all the other females in the family in attendance, mothers or not, would gather in my mother-in-law’s kitchen and cook up a Mother’s Day feast. Aprons on, we would work while the male members of the family watched television and chatted in the living room.

We would serve up the celebratory vitals, wipe our brows, and perch on the edge of our seats, hoping to get in a mouthful or two between the needs of others. In other words, for the mothers in this family, Mother’s Day was much like every other day: it started with “home” work and working for others and ended with the same. I mean someone had to clean up that feast and it never was the fathers (save for my husband).

It didn’t seem right to me. It still doesn’t and, yet, despite the many “pamper Mom” for Mother’s Day specials for spa retreats or beauty packages, most mothers are not being pampered or pampering themselves on Mother’s Day. And many mothers get mad at even the suggestion that they do.

On that Mother’s Day a few years ago, after reading that article pitting mother against mother, I turned to my husband in protest, prepared to defend my position. He, without a word, took the baby from my arms and said to me: “Go.”

And I did.

I gathered my keys and purse and drove, alone, down the road. I spent the afternoon shopping for a swimsuit – by myself. Anyone who has shopped for clothes with a baby or toddler in tow knows what a mess that is. But being by yourself to shop, even if, like me, you don’t really enjoy clothes shopping, is, truly, well, bliss.

I returned home early that evening just in time to eat the pizza my husband had picked up, to kiss my already fed and diapered and ready for bed baby, and to revel in the fact that all was well with my family despite the fact that there was no mom on Mother’s Day in our house that year.
I’ve done something like this again every year on Mother’s Day and it suits me. No guilt about it because how a mother celebrates Mother's Day should be her choice. Perhaps like those involved in "No Mother's Day" you will choose to disappear to make a point about the hypocrisy of our lip-service respect and value for mothers globally; perhaps you want to snuggle on the couch with your kids. Me, this Mother’s Day: thrift store shopping with my mom. Happy Day!

Ahhh, finally, some progress!

2012-05-09T10:48:00.002-07:00

Students,

How do these articles relate to the beauty ideal issue raised in Morrison's novel The Bluest Eye?

How has the ideal changed since the setting of the novel? Is the effect on girls different? How is race a factor now?

Do some research into these discussions, read a few more blogs and/or articles. Share what you find, comment on it, post, post, post!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/30/julia-bluhm-seventeen-petition_n_1464445.html?ref=teen&ir=Teen#s801224

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/05/hillary-clinton-au-naturale-does-the-secretary-of-state-care-about-her-appearance/

Yeah, Baby, We've Come A Long Way!

2012-04-24T07:32:00.000-07:00

In class the other night, a student mentioned the "fact" that women are the majority and have surpassed men in terms of the numbers of them receiving higher-ed degrees.Yep, we've come a long way, Baby!

However, the sad fact is that when I was doing my MA at ECU in 1990, women made 72 cents on the dollar in comparison to men -- same credentials, same job, same experience - same, same, same. Today, we make 77 cents on the dollar in comparison to men. Twenty plus years.

A long way . . . really?

Unequal pay for equal work is a reality in our society and a quick look at legislation tells us not much is being done about it. But a great deal is being done to roll things back to a time when the idea of women working outside the home, let alone receiving equal pay for equal work was, quite simply, ludicrous. If we truly address this for what it is -- discrimination --, what is at stake?

The status-quo, the good-ole boys’ network, the paternalistic powers that be? Certainly.

Yes, women are moving ahead. But instead of the response being, "Awesome, look at the progress! Now, let's encourage men and women to work more closely together to create a better, even more egalitarian world for the next generation," the response from many men is, "Now what do we do? " They wonder "What becomes of men if women are, in fact, just like men in fundamentally important ways: financially independent, capable of caring for themselves, autonomous sexual agents, self-defined, and powerful. How to stop this?"

You see, many men define themselves in opposition to all things woman. That is, a man is what a woman is not -- strong not weak, physical not emotional, logical not intuitive, sexual not reproductive. And it's this "I'm a man because I'm not a woman" way of being that is truly at the root of the battle of the sexes and, perhaps, more significantly at the root of the battle between women today.

What happens when a woman begins to utilize all aspects of self to her advantage, when she becomes both "man and woman?" She becomes an adversary to the men described above, a danger and a threat to their sense of self, their very being in the world, their purpose.

When we understand that some men feel in danger of losing their self-defined role in the world-- then we can see what all this "war on women" stuff is designed to do.

The contraceptive/abortion/personhood issues are not really about sexuality or reproduction or sacred motherhood. These issues are a smokescreen for economics. How to keep women out of the economy and make it impossible for them to be equal players in the economy of the nation, i.e. sharing the world of men-- equally contributing to the economy at large and in the home? Well, and the answer is so simple --make "women" about the body and only the body -- define women according to their reproductive systems and make that definition stand alone. If this becomes the case again (and we are well on our way to it) then it will be not only immoral but illegal for women to do anything but use those reproductive systems for God-granted purposes and use them to their fullest extent as dictated by the body governing over them.

If it is impossible to prevent pregnancy or to end it -- then the vast majority of women agreeing to non-condom (condoms are not up for debate) sexual intercourse with fertile men will find themselves "mothers" sooner or later, which will take them out of the workforce in some way and put them back in the home where their "work" is given no monetary value and only lip service value in the culture at large. Recall, if they are defined as uteri then we have to protect that uteri at all costs, which will mean laws in the workplace or that prevent women from that dangerous workplace and the world at large and protecting women from themselves and others in an effort to protect their potential person-producing bodies.
See, there will be no place safe other than the home and even there woman will need to be watched over, protected from herself and others -- the big bad world -- by men who are back to being men (read: not women) in order to ensure the uteri remains viable and productive.

Sounds crazy, huh? It shouldn't. We are sending large bodies of people over to the Middle East where they can witness first-hand and study for long periods of time how the above "Taliban-like" arrangement works. Surely, this knowledge is not disdained by all of those who view it? Surely, a few of our Ted Nugent-like "crazies" are wearing military uniforms and chatting up the benefits of the Burqa. The stratospherically high number of sexual assaults on women in the military should suggest there are quite a few within that body who view a woman's place and/purpose as somewhere/something other than "in" the public serving the nation with something other than her uterus or vagina.

My post about the "new girl sport" as women competing against women in a game of "who is doing the right thing, leading the most noble life, making the most valuable contribution, use of self, service to others, whatever" was meant to show that this is part of the plan for us: we battle each other over and direct our attention to the issue of "our role" and turn our attention away from the issue of equality. In addition, when we aren't battling other women over who is doing the "right, best, most noble" job, we are in competition with them over who looks the best, has the biggest purse, flashiest shoes, dress, makeup, car." In other words, we are focused on beating each other and not on how to work together to forge a new world where men and women are valued equally for, well, every aspect of self and life.

Watch the new TJMAXX and KOHL’S and ROSS commercials. Yep, women are doing battle with other women. And the sport of choice at the moment, according to the insidious media, is . . . SHOPPING! Kohl's even has female sports figures in their commercials chatting up the "power" of shopping. And women are buying this and buying to win at this new sport. The problem is this, too, is a farce. We are chowing down on the idea that the more we buy the higher on the rung we go. Except what are climbing up to? And to buy takes money and since we don't really "have" the money ourselves (i.e. no money in "home" work and unequal pay in the workforce), we have to find a way to get it. The fastest way to that is not by working individually to get better, equal paying jobs, or working together to "fight" the system that refuses to put its money where its mouth is when it comes to work in the home. The fastest way to get the money for that designer purse is by beating each other to get the man who has that money already in his wallet – i.e. "The Bachelor."

There are a plethora of messages telling us how to engage in this battle and win. And women -- girls -- are buying into this power via shopping via money via who has the guy with the money idea.

Recently, a long-time "girl" friend (believe it or not!) shared with me a lunch table discussion among her 13-year old daughter and friends. It revealed the mindset they are incorporating into their self-ideas. And we should listen. When one girl mentioned that she couldn't wait to get her dream job (a pediatrician) and make her own money and buy her own home and car and things, her friends chimed in -- all five of them -- with: "Why would you waste your time on all that? I'm just going to find a rich man and marry him and use his money. That's my plan. I don't have to work so hard to get that."

Many say, "Oh, out of the mouths of babes" and then write off what they hear out of those mouths when it doesn't suit them. But we should pay attention. If this is what the next generation of young women are learning about how to get ahead, then, yes, we are truly in a dark place and we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Sure, instead of introducing your daughter to the world of science or engineering via the measuring cups and baking soda found in the kitchen, read her Sleeping Beauty or Cinderella yet again. Instead of buying her a pair of jeans and sending her outside to build a fort or play in the dirt, dress her up in a frothy miniskirt and too-pink t-shirt with "I shop therefore I am" emblazoned across her prepubescent chest and take her to a "spa party," or "princess theme-park," or the local "Hello, Kitty" shop.
And, by all means, don't be surprised or disappointed when she starts looking for that prince with a glass slipper and bypasses your suggestion that she go to college for something more than the Mrs. degree her suffragette great-grandmother disdained entirely to make it possible for her to have that sweet, sweet choice.

Keep it coming!

The War on Women?

2012-04-17T07:13:00.005-07:00

FORGET AUGUSTA: THE NEW GIRL SPORT

by Karen Beardslee Kwasny, Ph.D.

In the last few weeks, the political discussion has been on, no, not the war on women, but, once more, that age-old topic, the role of women.

Once more, I find myself truly mystified by the willfulness of women to engage in this discussion and disparage each other in the process.

And this issue – women disparaging each other -- should be our focus.

This is where we must begin in order to move forward. Women must stop buying into the idea that the only way of relating to other women is through a competition over incredibly trivial things and fleeting aspects our lives. Only when we stop doing this will there be the potential of progress on the equality front and the possibility of equal value for all our choices.

For the past twenty years or more, images of women competing with each other have become more prevalent. Now, this idea of women as foes instead of friends -- in constant battle over who looks best, who has the man’s eye, who has the best clothes or purse or shoes or hair or breasts -- is the norm.

Notice, we are not competing over what matters and what could really serve to help us make a difference in our social and political positioning: our intellect. We do not say, "Wow, she's so smart! Check out herdegree(s), her job, her bank account, her house (you know, the one she bought via her own resolve and mental and financial resources).

The ideal fed to girls is “womanhood via beating out other women for fashion goddess or sexual object or perfect mother-wife.” It's such a shame. For, trust, despite the various problems with the women’s movement of the mid-20^thcentury, women were, at least, moving in the direction of each other 50 years ago.

That female coalescing was, understandably, quite threatening to the power structure, which had some frayed ends at the time thanks to the few inroads of the various achievements of the Civil Rights Movement. That power structure, fractured as it may have been, very quickly regrouped to figure out how best to divide our troops. They reengaged with one common goal: regain full political power and maintain economic might. Locked and loaded, they set to work and because we were momentarily satisfied with our plate of cookies, we ignored the insidious underground movement against us. Susan Faludi called it a “backlash” in her book of the same title and truly, it was. Bummer, it worked.

Of course, the powers that were (and still “be”) knew well that the best weapon against women was, well, other women. As well, they had the means to set that battle in motion, for they had and have primary control of the media and the money to use it.

Watch your television, skim your magazines, surf the web, scan the billboards and the subliminal (actually not so subliminal anymore) messages are quite obvious: a woman’s “job” is in the home as wife, mother, cook, cleaner, nurse, and servant – there to ensure the health and well-being of others, including that husband-child who is more like another dependent than a true helping partner. If, if, she is depicted in the world outside the home, she is almost invariably shopping, eating, checking her hair or makeup or body, or serving beer to men at the bar. She is mindless to the market she is and buys in to.

In those places, not only is she not engaging and/or illustrating her intellect beyond the superficial absorption in self, but she is also little more than fashion icon and sexual object (take a look at the “naughty librarian Pearl Vision commercial today or Donald Trump’s program). In addition, whether at home or out in the “real” world, she is always, always either alone or when with other women, competing over some issue underlying their moment together, be it weight, house maintenance, floral fragrances, fashion, hair, men, or childcare.

And we (women and men, girls and boys) sit and watch and absorb and model from the time we are very young until much later in life when many of us start realizing where this has taken us – at war with each other and getting nowhere fast.

Truly, and sad to admit, women themselves (ourselves) are responsible for mirroring these images and seeking the prize they suggest we will get when we do. And, certainly, we are responsible for setting our girls (and boys, but that’s another piece) up to continue perpetuating this extremely limited (and dangerously so) view of women (and men): think, “Spa days with Mom,” hair and nail excursions with the daughter, princess parties, spike-heel shoes for toddlers, miniskirts for first-graders, and everything in Pepto-Bismol pink, pink, pink, pink, and pinker!

They learn: do this and you will achieve . . . !!! . . . ? ? ?

It’s really unclear what that prize is: the approval of those who prefer women pretty, pink, submissive and subservient? What is the reward for achieving this spoon-fed feminine ideal, for coloring ourselves all-pink and within the lines?

This is never clear.

However, it is clear that our goal must not be intellectual, or economic, or political. It must not be critical to our value as human beings in the world, autonomous, real, thinking people with so much to offer besides our service to others in body and act.

Yes, we buy into this newly reconfigured feminine ideal and we help our girls (and boys) buy into the idea that if women beat out other women in their successful rendering of the “pink role,” they somehow achieve feminine nobility.

Women, we are responsible for shouldering the load of family and home while ignoring our responsibility to each other and equality, for not critically analyzing our culture, for not seeing through this farce, for not working together, diligently, to bring it down and pull ourselves up

Only, only, when women value each other's choices (childlessness, marriage, the single-life, motherhood, career, home, whatever!), each other's priceless wonderful minds (not purses and shoes, Fiestaware and men), will we begin to chip away at the wall we helped create between our oppression today and the possibility of our equality tomorrow.

Women's Work

2012-04-14T09:16:00.000-07:00

Hello All,
View Melissa Harris-Perry Sat. 10-12 4/14 -- in particular the end portions of the program discussing women's issues. Please view all aspects of these discussions. Post your thoughts relating her discussion to our Atwood readings.
View my new post as well.
Good luck, Dr. B.
This link is published before the program will be available on MSNBC. http://mhpshow.msnbc.msn.com/

KBK's response to Bruni, Morning Joe, the like . . .

2012-04-03T08:54:00.002-07:00

Argh! Here we go again, inculcating another generation with the misnomer that males want sex for enjoyment and females seek sex for emotional fulfillment. In the long run, this dichotomy is the root cause of the mess in the bedroom and the increased distress in relationships between men and women.

It is likely surprising to many that most men and women do not subscribe to these limiting definitions of male and female sexuality. The problem is, for young guys in particular, that every TV show, commercial, movie , or billboard tells them over and over again that to be even so much as a little bothered by this one-dimensional view of male sexuality is a huge check mark against the very core of a guy’s masculinity.

Truly it is bothersome that we continue to use the word "natural" when we discuss these “gendered” differences in sexual attitudes. Neither behavior toward sex is particularly natural to either sex. Over time, these attitudes toward sex are learned and ingrained in our genes as our genes are mutable and respond and shape themselves according to the input they receive. If the input to genes is constantly -- from one century to the next -- the same set of messages, our behaviors will remain the same. This is why the insistence on the same message to young people -- that guys and gals seek sex for the same old different reasons -- is so dangerous. Why in the world would we not begin to send a different message and start working to create behaviors in both sexes that emphasize the positivity of emotional connection and physical gratification in sex?

The problem stems from the positive emphasis on casual, "no strings attached," "male" sex vs. the negative spin attached to the "emotional neediness" of "female" sex. One of the reasons women of all ages have been moving to "male" sexual behavior has much to do with the fact that "male" sexual behavior is applauded in our culture (think stud) and held as a standard of behavior one should strive to emulate because somehow it is a better way of experiencing sex – for the total focus is on personal pleasure.

The "female" way of viewing sex is seen as, well, just so "female." And, so, any emotional connection sought with sex is, I would argue, devalued because it has for centuries been "feminized." And as with any aspect of our culture that becomes associated with the feminine, emotional sex -- read female sex -- has been blacklisted and denigrated and girls are, thus, increasingly disassociating from it and seeking male sex, which is held to them as the standard of positive sexuality!

Being like men, sexually or otherwise, should not be the goal for young women. For our outdated idea of what it means to be a man (hypersexualized provider protector) is a way of being from which we all suffer. For even men will argue the great extent to which conditioning (and much of it negative – read Michael Kimmel) shapes what it means to “be a man” and the huge amount of conditioning it takes to create a man. So much overt and, to a great degree, negative conditioning work suggests to me this is NOT a natural way of being either, nor is it desirable.

Sure sexual pleasure is wonderful, but sex is one-dimensional if that is all we seek from it. No doubt, when pleasure is derived from both the physical and the mental, well, it is multidimensional pleasure. Thus, wouldn’t a goal that emphasizes both aspects of sex be a better standard to set and teach our children to work toward? It seems to me it would be.

It is time we stood up, all of us, for our emotional selves and insist our gendered views of sexuality change for the benefit of all -- in the bedroom or out of it.

2012-04-03T08:43:00.000-07:00

Today on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Frank Bruni discussed his Sunday April 1 article in the New York Times reviewing and addressing the HBO new series "Girls" and how it illuminates the issues of male and female sexuality, pornography, and communication.
Bruni's article and the "Morning Joe" roundtable discussion can be viewed here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036789/vp/46937507#46937507

Please review my post here on the blog, review the links below, and post your own thoughts. Do apply all to our readings this week: Lessing, Roethke, Atwood.
Bruni's article in the NYTimes http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/01/opinion/sunday/bruni-the-bleaker-sex.html?scp=3&sq=bruni&st=cse

Bruni's op-ed blog page covering his NYT story: http://bruni.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/31/naked-in-new-york/#postComment
Read the comments below, especially those from Azreal and Beard.

As well, watch Melissa Harris-Perry video spots from her recent Saturday and Sunday programs and post your responses to the issues you feel relate to our readings. Discuss how they do and what you think.
http://mhpshow.msnbc.msn.com/