Author: sawyer.212

Karate Kid- Text Review

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Twelve year old Dre (played by Jaden Smith) is forced to move to China because of his mothers career. Because of this, he is thrown into a whole new culture and way of life that he does not know much about. He quickly encounters the school bullies, and to learn some karate skills to protect himself, he finds a friend and coach in the maintenance man (who also happens to be a karate master) named Mr. Han (played by Jackie Chan). Dre learns so much about Chinese culture from Mr. Han, including the importance of non verbal communication and social norms that are very prevalent in China. Dre is also portrayed as hard headed and stubborn, which prohibits him from originally seeing the beauties and wonders of his new home. Mr. Han even says to Dre at one point, “You only see with your eyes. You are easy to fool”. This can be explained by the fact that Dre never really put much thought into the culture he was now in the middle of; he only judged it based on what he could see while living in America. While learning the practice of patience and open-mindedness from Mr. Han, he eventually opens up to his new culture and begins to appreciate it more. He learns traditional Asian culture and rituals, such as meditation, cupping, and of course, taekwondo. I think this plays into our class because Dre already had preconceived notions about China which prohibited him from seeing another culture without judgement. People always judge from the outside looking in without actually giving a new culture or activity a shot. That is also why so many races and cultures in this world are subject to criticism, stereotypes, and “single stories”. 

 

Yo, is this sexist?

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Hi everybody! Welcome to my column where I will today be discussing an issue that affects everybody; whether they want to admit it or not. This topic is sexism. Sexism is one of the most prevalent issues in society that dates back thousands of years. It is still very much alive today in so many aspects of our world. The word sexism is defined as “discrimination based on sex or gender or the belief that men are superior to women”. Since there are so many different situations and places where sexism takes place, I am going to talk about multiple situations that are sexist; some obvious and some not so obvious, to really open your eyes on the sexism that takes place all around us every single day. 

 

The biggest issue with sexism is that while a lot of people partake in being sexist consciously, there are also a lot of people who may partake in sexist actions or make sexist comments subconsciously. This is due to the fact that sexism has been ingrained in people’s brains for years and has been made to seem “normal”, so some may not even know that what they are saying or even thinking is sexist. For example, when a male professional may be seen as speaking “passionately”, a woman professional doing or saying the same exact things could be described as “bossy”, or even “bitchy”. In a study done by New York Times, people are much more likely to listen to male authority figures because they subconsciously associate deep voices with authority; yeah, I know, absolutely ridiculous. So now the question arises; should women try to sound more masculine to be taken seriously? If your answer to this question is yes, I’m asking you kindly to say that out loud to see how it sounds. Did you say it? Did you hear how extremely sexist you sounded? This situation quite literally aligns with the actual definition of sexism; in this case, men are superior to women authoritatively, so instead of people thinking “Hey, maybe we should just respect women in positions of authority the same way we do with men”, people are saying, “Well, if women in positions of authority acted or sounded manlier I would respect them more”. 

 

Another example of subconscious sexism I’m going to talk about is something that I am sure a lot of women reading this can say that they either personally experienced, or have seen it happen to others. This is school dress code. Most high schools had some type of dress code policy, consisting of essentially the same rules about the appropriateness of clothing that the students were allowed to wear. From what I have personally heard from school officials over the years while discussing dress code, was that the dress code was put into place so that no students would be distracted from learning. But, oddly enough, throughout four years of high school I watched a countless number of women be sent to the principles for their clothing, some forced to change into raggedy old T-shirts, and some even told to go home because their outfit “wasn’t appropriate” (talk about disrupting the learning process); but I never once saw one of my male classmates be sent to the office for their clothing options. Is this sexist? The obvious answer is yes. Teachers would see a woman wearing a tank top that didn’t look like it fit the “two finger rule” (ugh) and automatically deem it as inappropriate and distracting, when a ton of guys wore literal string strap tank tops to school without even receiving a second look from teachers. If a man in my class cannot focus on his work because my shoulder is showing, then he needs to be the one having a discussion with an adult instead of the girl trying to be comfortable and learn. This stems from an even deeper systemic issue of men not being held accountable for their actions or thoughts because it’s a “woman’s fault” that they are acting or thinking that certain way. It also comes from the internal subconscious thought (I say this lightly, because there are most definitely people who do this consciously) that women are sexual objects and nothing more than that. How dare women not cover up in long sleeves and coats when it’s 80 degrees out! Below is a poster made by a 15 year old high school student whose school banned women from wearing leggings. She points out that the same type of clothing for men is deemed as “perfectly okay”, but for women it is distracting. She explains that this dress code promotes rape culture, which is what I was touching on earlier when I said that dress codes align with the idea that women are sexual objects.

Sexism is also extremely prevalent in the workplace. Even though gender-based pay discrimination has been illegal since the year of 1963, it is still a very wide spread practice. It is a statistically proven fact that women are still paid less than men; in 2021 so far, women are making 82 cents to every dollar a man makes (which is up one whole cent from last year!). There are ways that jobs can discriminate against women without it being obvious so that they cannot get in trouble with the law. These include punishing or threatening the jobs of women who must take time off for things that do not affect men as much, such as childbirth. While there used to be an argument that women were paid less because they were “less educated” (women enrollment in colleges and universities used to be much lower), that can no longer be used.  Women now statistically receive more college degrees than men, and currently make up more than 56% of college students nationwide. Yet they still continue to earn considerably less than men. In addition to earning less than their male counterparts, there are countless other ways that women can be discriminated against in the workplace. These include things like discrimination during hiring, not being put up for promotions that you are qualified for, getting laid off before a man when they do the job just as well, not receiving the same benefits, stereotypes due to their sex, and sexual harassment. In a survey conducted by Pew Research center, four-in-ten working women (42%) in the United States say they have faced discrimination on the job because of their gender. They experienced things like earning less than male counterparts for doing the same job, being looked over for important assignments, or being treated as if they were incompetent. According to Forbes, if we continue at the rate we are going now, the pay gap will not close until the year 2059. 

 

The final example of sexism I am going to be talking about is something that should outrage everybody in my opinion. This is the inequality of the roles between men and women in the home. Women, who work the same long and grueling work days as their husbands, come home to a whole other job; childcare and cleaning. Women doing most of the work at home may seem like a very outdated, old fashioned notion, but the belief that these things are a womens job is still very alive today; which is sexism at its finest. Research shows that even though many women fully support the idea of equal parenting, they also feel pressures from family, friends, and others to be the primary caretaker of their kids and keeper of their homes. For some cases, women with children may feel the pressure to keep the home clean and the children taken care of because that is what their own mother did while raising them. Many people, just as they do with gender inequality in the workplace, decide to turn a blind eye and act like women are “over exaggerating” when it comes to this situation (again, sexism). But this is not an exaggeration. In the US, on average, the time mothers spend on childcare is twice as much as is expended by fathers: 15 hours a week compared to 7 hours. Also, in a Harvard Business Review article about Harvard Business School graduates, they found that over 75% of the men interviewed believed their wife would take on most of the responsibility of the role as caregiver (…. yeah, I’m thinking the same thing). This ties in to what I talked about in the beginning of our discussion; sexism has been ingrained or embedded into our brains for so long that that is what people just simply expect. We have seen women being the ones who cook, clean, and take care of the children for so long that people expect that to just be the way of life. We’ve seen it in TV shows, movies, other media outlets, and the worst part is most of us have seen this in real life. I have seen countless situations, including some friends and family, where the woman of the house does all of the work while the man sits on his ass. Is this sexist? Yes. Believing that all of these things are the jobs of a woman is extremely harmful to society. This leads to so many other things that I can’t even get into today, like absentee/unnurturing fathers and extremely burned out mothers. 

 

If I had to relate this back to one thing I have learned in my Comparative Studies course, it would be that the sexism in our world is trying to fit women into a box; it is trying to force us women to have a single story. For so long, women were seen as nothing but someone who had a man’s babies and someone who cooked and cleaned. I am so grateful that women in history decided to stand up to this because we actually have come a long way. As a female who grew up as an athlete, my own grandma always told me how cool it was that girls could now play sports. She explained to me that when she grew up, no women were allowed to play sports because that was a “mans thing”. Not only do we now have female athletes in every single sport, we now have female doctors, lawyers, scientists, politicians, etc. Even though we have made this progress, the fight for gender equality is SO far from over. I encourage everybody who read my column to stop and think of all of the examples of sexism I explained to you, and I also encourage you to look within yourself to identify either the sexism you have experienced personally or the sexism you have presented somebody else with. The fight to end sexism is something that needs everybody’s support.

 

                Work Cited

 

https://www.dictionary.com/e/misogyny-vs-sexism/

 

https://www.coe.int/en/web/human-rights-channel/stop-sexism

 

https://hips-hearstapps-com.cdn.ampproject.org/i/s/hips.hearstapps.com/sev.h-cdn.co/assets/15/22/768×1228/gallery-1432675054-tumblr-no3mypsqgg1rljbyfo2-1280.png?resize=640:*

 

https://www.courant.com/opinion/op-ed/hc-op-fresh-talk-talbot-dress-code-0314-20200314-gw7n7sxy45cflktlsuh5njqenu-story.html

 

https://florinroebig.com/workplace-discrimination-women/

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/janetnapolitano/2018/09/04/women-earn-more-college-degrees-and-men-still-earn-more-money/?sh=3a379e5639f1

 

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/businessreview/2019/01/14/gender-inequality-at-work-and-at-home-a-double-whammy-for-women/

 

The killing of Trayvon Martin

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For my third entry for my Diary of Systemic Injustices, I am going to talk about a social injustice regarding race. This specific incident is the one that really opened my eyes to racism. I remember watching the trial, feeling sick to my stomach at just 13 years old. I feel like this was a tremendous turning point in our country, and people began to really realize the inequality that was at hand. The case I am talking about is the shooting death of 17 year old Trayvon Martin.

 

 (Picture of Trayvon Martin that went viral and was used to bring awareness to his death)

 

Trayvon Martin was fatally shot while walking home from the corner store by a man named George Zimmerman. Zimmerman was known around his community for trying to patrol like a neighborhood watch would, even though authority officials had told him plenty of times that he had no right to do so and that he needed to stop. According to police reports, every incident he ever called to report involved a black person. The night of the shooting, Zimmerman called the police to report somebody “suspicious” walking through his neighborhood. Seconds after the call, neighbors report hearing gunshots. Zimmerman claimed he thought Trayvon was armed and dangerous; he was a black male with his hood up, and had something in his hand that “resembled a weapon” to Zimmerman. This “weapon” was actually a bag of Skittles and an Arizona Iced Tea. 

 

 

(Photos of Trayvon’s actual purchases being used in court)

 

 

Zimmerman was initially charged with second degree murder, but was acquitted of all charges when he claimed self defense in court. This trial was viewed by millions, and the outcome caused an uproar all over the country. How can a grown man fatally shoot a 17 year old kid and get away with it? The sad reality is that this case was heavily influenced by Trayvon’s race. If he were to be a white kid walking down the street, Zimmerman would have most likely not even called the police or confronted him. Since the trial, Zimmerman has been reported to have made multiple jokes surrounding the incident, showing basically no remorse for ending the life of a 17 year old. He even auctioned off the gun he used to shoot Trayvon Martin. This was described as “a victory lap on a dead boy’s grave,”.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/may/18/george-zimmerman-sells-gun-trayvon-martin

 

Something I can relate this back to from our class is the idea of a single story. It is pretty clear that George Zimmerman profiled Trayvon Martin because of his race. Because Trayvon was black, Zimmerman automatically assumed he was partaking in suspicious behavior when he was doing a completely normal task. In court, it has been said that Zimmerman’s lawyers tried to portray Trayvon as a “thug”, bringing up past school suspensions and use of marijuana, as if that somehow justifies his murder. Why are black people seen as more dangerous or threatening when doing things that every other race does? Because for racists in America, that is what they want black peoples “single story” to be. They’re nothing but trouble. Dangerous. Thugs. This is how many people in America truly think; which is terrifying. What is even more terrifying is seeing how embedded it is in our criminal justice system. Systemic racism is so embedded into every aspect of our society that it led to the court system failing this poor 17 year old kid. Zimmerman’s team wanted people to believe that Zimmerman genuinely feared for his life because of what a “bad kid” Trayvon was. And ultimately, the court believed him.

 

Work cited:

https://www.cnn.com/2012/04/23/justice/florida-zimmerman-timeline/index.html

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jun/11/george-zimmerman-trial-scary-black-man

https://www.cnn.com/2013/07/14/us/zimmerman-why-this-verdict/index.html

 

The History of Partition- Interpreter of Maladies

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Partition means the action or state of dividing or being divided into parts; especially with reference to a country with separate areas of government.

The Partition of India was something that occurred in 1947. On August 15th, 1947, Pakistan was created; leading to the split of what was then known as “British India” to become two separate countries now known as India and Pakistan. It was split into two countries whose borders were decided upon by the religious groups that were most prominent in the areas. The division of the country led to the displacement of millions of people. Many people fled their homes in fear of violence once they were suddenly in a new country. Many people became homeless overnight, and others had to decide whether they were willing to change their religion to stay where they now were living.

Although the Partition was originally conceived to prevent sectarian violence between the countries people, it instead sparked violence between religions, specifically Hindus and Muslims, and let to an even further division and dislike of each other. The Partition triggered riots, mass casualties, and a huge wave of migration due to people fleeing their countries. Millions of people moved to what they hoped would be a safer place for them and their families to live. It is estimated that between fourteen and sixteen million people were displaced, traveling by foot or train. Estimates of the number of deaths caused by this Partition range between 200,000 and 1,000,000. Not only were people killed in riots, etc., they were also killed by diseases that ravaged through refugee camps. Another crime that was very prominent during this time was the rape and abduction of women; it is estimated that this happened to around 100,00 women.

This violence was due to people having their religious identity and territory ripped away from them. It is also due to the fact that Britain was reluctant to use its troops to maintain law and order, so it was able to continue to be completely out of hand; instead of people putting a stop to it.

 

Sources:

 

https://theconversation.com/how-the-partition-of-india-happened-and-why-its-effects-are-still-felt-today-81766

https://www.gradesaver.com/interpreter-of-maladies/study-guide/the-partition-of-india-1947