Me again

I seem to have a lot to say all of a sudden.  After last week's discussion and article, I just wanted to call everyone's attention to the "news" (reported yesterday) that boys are not innately better at math (gasp!).  It seems that girls and boys are doing equally well on standardized math tests - take that author whose name I've already forgotten!!

That being said, the same is not true of Minnesota.  According to the Star Tribune, while Minnesotan girls and boys perform at the same level on standardized math tests through the eighth grade, by the time they reach eleventh grade girls fall behind.

I fail at computers...

Okay, here's the actual website:

http://www.feminist.org/sports/titleIXfactsheet.asp

Women in Athletics

I'm currently procrastinating from studying for the GRE.  Lucky for me, I am able to justify my procrastination by catching up on my news, etc.  Since the article we read a couple weeks ago about Title IX was a little old, I thought you guys might find this website interesting.  This specific page has a few facts about Title IX and there are links to other pages that give more information on the law and its history.  

The fact I found most provocative? "Title IX compliance has been driven by law suits and the threats of law suits.  Although the law states that schools that violate TItle IX will lose their federal funding, in thirty years no school has ever lost federal funding for not complying with Title IX."  Hmm... just some food for thought.

Speaking of body image...

My aunt sent me this (don't ask me where she found it, she sends me tons of weird stuff--she's pretty cool) and I thought it was pertinent to our discussion a couple of weeks ago. I was pretty speechless when I first saw it. And I can't believe that she hasn't had ANY health issues due to her corset. Her intestines and stomach are like IN her uterus. UGH. Anyway, thought you'd like to see it. ENJOY!! Here is the link.

Local Legal Issues That Ties In To Our Most Recent Discussion

Hey, all.

The Star Tribune is the middle of a three-part series about the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP), a program  that is under fire because it costs a lot of tax money and has yet to release anyone who has been "civilly comitted" to the program.

Check it out at www.startribune.com/offenders

 

The new articles post

Hello friends!

The focus of this week's essay is how our culture encourages sexually violent attitudes in young men. We will take some time to look criticaly at classic media from our youth prior to breaking into small groups. It really is amazing to take a feminist lens to things that you enjoyed as a kid... Should you have some fun examples of old T.V. shows, comic books, or video games you are encouraged to bring them but anecdotes are also acceptable :-D

The article is short but I think it will provide ample fodder for good conversation.

Love!

DZ

New article!!!

This week we are continuing our focus on the media. We have one new article and the half hour long video from last week which Katie linked below. The article talks about the current female body archetype and the industries that push that archetype. I love the quote at the beginning so I thought I'd transcribe it for everyone:

"To men a man is but a mind. Who cares what face he carries or what he wears? But woman's body is the woman."

- Ambrose Bierce

Love, love, love, DZ

A link!

I found this site about singles rights while reading Bust magazine and I thought it was pretty interesting. I never knew there was a line of activism that was pro-singles. That's pretty neat.

Killing Us Sofly 3

Because there were only three of us at the meeting today, and it is a pretty important and eye-opening topic, I thought I would post the link to the video: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1993368502337678412&q=killing+us+softly+3&ei=7zY6SMX4H6Gm4QKU_cjoAw
I'm sure we'll refer to this video next time, so you should watch it. And if you are so inspired, you can bring an ad as well.

Guess what?! You don't have to read this Sunday.

We're going to mix it up a little bit this week. Instead of reading and then discussing the articles in our meeting tomorrow, we're going to bring in advertisements and watch a movie in our meeting tomorrow.

The movie is "Killing Us Softly 3" and it was created by Jean Kilborne. Some of you may have heard about it before. It deals with the portrayal of women in the media, but specifically within advertisements and what they mean for our society. So thinking on that same page, it would be great if you guys could bring in a few advertisements yourselves and we could discuss them after the movie. I've found that designer clothing advertisements are the most offensive...just to start you off. And household cleaning supplies...You get the point. So anyway, see you tomorrow!!!

Oh, and Derek won't be there...he's off scampering in the woods somewhere...so you'll have to deal with just me. Hopefully that won't be too horrible for you guys.