week 6 response- Ashley

I agree with you. I think in today's world there are a lot of families with single parents and those children grow up just fine. I also agree it is important to have both a male a female influence. But just because you have a father and a mother does not mean you are automatically going grow up to be a "real man" as she put it. It also does not mean that they will influence that child in a positive way. It all depends on if the child embodies the values and morals that will help them throughout their lives to become a well rounded person. My boyfriend grew up without a Dad and he is a hard working, kind man. I think it all depends on who you surround yourself with and if they are a positive influence or not. Whether they are male or female does not necessarily make a difference.

week 6 blog

I went to a party this weekend with a couple of friends. My friend ended up making out with a guy. All of the girls were calling the girl a slut but no one commented on the guy's role. I asked people if they thought the guy did anything wrong and they said they think it was the girl's responsibility to control herself because guys cannot help themselves. I found that very interesting. There is always a stigma that follows a girl around if she kisses a lot of men but men do not carry that same stigma if they kiss a lot of women. I do not think that it is necessary to blame anyone in particular or if we do place blame, blame both parties. I think that women and men can make their own decisions and who are we to judge them? What do we expect when our whole culture and all of the media we see daily contains a lot of sexual content?

week 5- response

Danielle- That is very interesting to think about. I think that with animals that is just how things are. With elephants it is the female who is the head of the family but with lions it is the male who usually takes that role. It is very natural for them and you would think that there would be fights for the head of the family between the males and females but there is not. It is just accepted as their way of life. But with humans it is much more difficult to say which sex should be head of the family. For animals it is just based on survival, but for us we have a lot that factors into it. For example, the lion pride is not arguing over who should make the decisions by who makes the most money. It is their survival instinct but for humans there is much more too it. I think it is an interesting point to consider because maybe we make it more complicated than it needs to be!

week 5 eureka moment

I am an Elementary Education Major at Rider and one thing caught my attention in the classes I have taken over the years. There were almost no male students. The only time I have had a class with a male student was in the first education class I took and that was because his major was in Middle School Education and we had not been separated yet. I always wondered why we do not see male teachers in the younger grades. Is it because society has deemed teaching younger kids as "women's work"? Or is it because men are simply not interested in teaching younger children in general? My opinion is that society has made Elementary Education a woman's territory. I think men see this profession as not manly enough for them. I have seen male gym teachers or male health teachers in the younger grades, however I have seen less than a handful of male teachers in Elementary Schools. It is interesting to me that society would not think anything of a male being a High School teacher, but there is a stigma attached to being an Elementary School teacher.

reply Week 4-sarah

I think that parents think that because we are women we are somehow less capable of handling ourselves in the real world. This happened to me and my sister as well on a few different occasions. While we appreciate the fact that they are worried about us and care about our well being it is frustrating to hear them say they do not think we are capable as being independent as our male siblings. My brother always had a later curfew and was able to do certain things I did not even bother asking to do. I do not think it is always a bad thing because it means we have caring parents but I do understand where you are coming from.

Reply Week 4-Danielle J

That is so interesting that you will be immersed in such a different culture. I think we are lucky that in America we are able to have the freedoms that we do as women. I think it is something that we should not take for granted. I would love to be able to see a culture that is so different from ours. We have a lot of stereotypes about how things are in middle-eastern countries and sometimes I think that maybe the women there do not know what they are missing because that is the life they are accustomed to. It will be interesting to hear about your experiences on your trip.

Week 4 eureka moment

This week was my little sister's prom and she is graduating soon. She is 18 years old and wanted to go stay over someone's beach house for a few days after the prom. Many kids do this after prom to celebrate and have a few days to party. My parents told her she could not go. This was weird to me because my brother and I were both allowed to go. As her big sister I was trying to help her persuade my Mom into letting her go. I asked my Mom why she had said no and she said it was because my sister was a girl and was immature for her age. I asked her what she meant by that and she said that she had let my brother go because he was a boy and knew that if he got into trouble he could handle himself. I was allowed to go because I was much more assertive than my sister is now. I thought this was interesting because I am also much more assertive that my brother, and to be honest do not know if he would have handled himself all that well, but because he was a boy my Mom assumed he would be fine. I think my Mom's view of men being capable and women being weaker is common in parents. I think they feel less of a need to protect males because they are supposed be able to protect themselves. Also, if you have a female daughter with those somewhat "masculine" qualities, as my Mom claims I do, then you feel less of a need to protect them too. I felt bad for my sister because my Mom was not letting her go simply because she is not assertive enough. Eventually I convinced my Mom that was not fair because she will never learn to be on her own if you don't let her experience it and my sister is currently at the beach! :-)

week 3 response

Ashley,
I agree with you in terms of this class. I think it has really made me think about things in a way I would not have previously. It is funny how we just assume that boys should want to wear one thing are girls should want to wear another. When in fact, most children just want to wear what is comfortable or what their friends are wearing regardless of whether or not it is more masculine or feminine. It is also nice to see parents not over-reacting to things like that. I think parents shape their child's views about gender. It is great to hear that parents are allowing kids to make choices and wear what they want without over analyzing the situation. Hopefully, these kids will be more open and educated when it comes to gender issues when they grow older.

week 3 eureka moment

I work at a restaurant as a server. I have worked in restaurants before but this one is much smaller and family owned. The staff is very close because there are not that many people who work there and it is a great work environment. However, the other day one of the bus people pointed out something interesting to me. There are two girls and three boys who work there as bus people. Usually we will have two bus people on a night shift. One of the bus girls and I were talking and she was laughing because all of the bus boy's that work there think she can't do anything. She was saying that when it is her and another bud boy on a shift she was yelling at one of them because she was bringing plates out and they tried to take them from her saying they will bring it out for her. She also said that another time she was bringing a knife out to a table and the bus boy offered to bring it for her. They always make sure she is not too overwhelmed and treat her in a childish manner.

She did not take offense to it and she has since started to tell them that she can do things. They were just trying to be helpful and did not even notice they were treating her that way when she told them. It is interesting because they were so used to helping out their mom's or sisters that they just assumed she needed help. This image of women being incompetent in the workplace is common among males. It is interesting how even though our employer hired them both to do the same job, the males feel that they are more capable of doing it. I hope this interaction showed the boys who work there that women are just as capable to do the job correctly as they are.