Gendered World Views (Fall 2016, Section 9)

To start off, I really enjoyed your article because this is recurring problem that happens in our society. I think it would be interesting if you were to view the ethical issues behind this problem. I think many might approach the issue by saying it follows the ethical frameworks of utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is an approach that focuses on the outcome of the action and not the action itself. It promotes the greatest good for the greatest number. In this case, many people around the world get to be entertained by reading interesting news while there is only one person who gets hurt because the information that people are reading about them is false. Therefore, many people might see it as ethical.

I believe that the ethical framework that needs to be followed in this context is virtue ethics because its promotes dishonesty. The people who write and publicize the false information do it for entertainment and publicity, while being aware of the fact that this will most likely hurt the celebrity. Some may argue that virtue ethics also incorporates the self and that the motive behind their actions was to create happiness for themselves. Therefore, this shows that we can not all agree on the most important virtue.

In my opinion, the morally correct thing to do would be to publicize truthful facts about their lives. This way, they are honest while creating entertainment and publicity.

What put things into perspective for me was when ‘jam20’, the author of the article, ending it off by connecting to the reader. Jam20 mentions how the at hand issue of rape should not be taken lightly by highlighting the fact that the victim could very well be someone that is in close relation to you.

Young women, for the longest time have more largely been the victims of rape. As mentioned in the article, “1 in 5 women and 1 in 6 men are sexually assaulted during their time on college campus”. This relevant statistic demonstrates how common this aggressive action is becoming. This reoccurring issue falls under the topic which is that of rape culture. Rape culture is a term created by American feminists in the 1970’s. It can be defined as “a complex set of beliefs that encourages male sexual aggression and supports violence against women” , “A rape culture condones physical and emotional terrorism against women as the norm” by Women Against Violence Against Women. The article speaks about an event concerning a male athlete, Brock Turner, raping Emily Doe at a frat party. The reasoning behind his decision which allowed him to think that doing so would be acceptable, was that the female was under the influence of alcohol. As Turner, along with many men who are overwhelmed with hormones and wish to conform to the man box, which tells men to be aggressive and to be hyper sexual, he committed the act of rape. Often, the victim is blamed, the perpetrators are pitied and the frequency of the crime is denied, which is exactly what happened regarding Turner’s case. Since turner went to a prestigious college, and was a promising athlete, his sentence for physically and mentally abusing Doe was simply a sentence of 6 months. Since he had such a luxurious future ahead of him, apparently it didn’t seem fair to punish him severely for ruining someone else’s life.

Turner, like most men probably didn't realize the severity of committing such an aggressive offence. Often an excuse for committing such a crime is blamed on the fact that the girl was intoxicated, or that she wasn’t wearing much clothing. Automatically, the man interpret these hidden messages as if she wants to engage with them. By assuming so and acting upon their assumptions when clear consent isn't given, is essentially rape. The act of rape negatively impacts both members involved. The girl with suffer from being physically damaged and be emotionally scared leaving her with scaring, petrifying images along with memories in her mind forever. For the man, if the women has the courage to report the offence, he will be doing jail time. When women are seen as objects to the male eye, they do not get the respect they deserve and they have to pay the consequences.

Instead of going to school in fear of being raped, students should go to school and be taught about it, bringing the subject to their attention and raising awareness. Seeing how many college rape incidents go unnoticed or students have trouble identifying it since they don't want to be seen as a so called snitch, being better educated on the subject may lead to a promising reduction of the event’s occurrence. That being said, I would encourage you to read the following article.

sources:
Susan Ervin-Tripp THE LOS,ANGELES TIMES. (1986, Dec 30). Education could help abolish rape. Toronto Star Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/435529617?accountid=41233

The discussion on white people privileges is very interesting. Privileges can be based on race like is exposed in the article, but also can be related to gender, sexual orientation, religion class and many other aspects that differentiate an individual from other. When individuals lack this privileges they suffer discrimination or oppression from “the superior groups”. The overlap of these different systems of inequality such as racism, sexism, homophobia and other is call intersectionality. In gender class we learn that the intersection of different types of discrimination only helps one to reinforce the other, and it can be very oppressive to visible minorities in our society. For example, if we analyze the intersection between race and gender can be noticed that although women are more discriminated than men; black women suffer a more severe type of discrimination. If we add sexual orientation to the equation, we see that if the black woman is also lesbian she will be in a more disadvantage position. Intersectionality proves that every individual suffer their own king of discrimination. Also shows that visible minorities cannot be include in one big group because the peculiarities of different individuals in the group would made them suffer different kinds of oppression. Race, sex, gender, and many other characteristics of the human body and of our personality are not choose by the individual; instead they are given by nature. Discriminating and oppressing someone for been different when they cannot control it is not ethical. Society needs to learn respect and acceptance of every individual.

http://www.tolerance.org/article/racism-and-white-privilege

Thank you for bringing in some male perspective into the world of eating disorders and insecurities. I find it interesting to see social platforms such as the starting to acknowledge that eating disorders do not have a gender. It’s important be aware that the social pressures women are faced with are much more severe however, the pressure on men is still undeniably there. The ideal “greek” body you speak of actually has a name; Adonis. This hegemonic masculine body ideal rules the western world. Standing at 6 feet tall approximately 200 pounds with broad muscular shoulders and proportional long legs, his gleaming smile capable of swaying any girl surrounded by a clean shaven chiseled jaw covered with sun kissed skin makes him the envy of every man that does not meet these standards.

Now, realistically this figure is almost unattainable by men who do not spend their entire day working to achieve and maintain this look, leaving many with psychological feelings of incompetence or failure. These feelings stem from the inability to conform to the physical aspects of the man box. This also plays a huge role when examining why man men seldom seek help when face with these eating disorders. What makes all this worse is that those who embody this figure tend to be rewarded politically, socially and economically, more than those who do not. Despite being aware of this social construct of ideal masculinity, we are the ones that enforce it though advertisement and rewards.

Here’s an article of some of the body pressures boys are faced with in today’s society and unhealthy measure they are taking to keep up with this ideal body figure. While reading this keep in mind that this is something that women have been struggling with for a very long time and despite it being very real in men as well, that men and women do not experience it on the same level.

http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/03/body-image-pressure-in...