Christensen: Unlearning the Myths That Blind Us Quotes

“If I want my students to wrestle with the social text of novels, news, or history books, they need the tools to critique media that encourage or legitimate social inequality” (127).

  and

“True death equals a generation living by rules and attitudes they never questioned and producing more children who do the same” (129).

These two quotes really stuck out to me and seemed to be about similar things. If people are not informed about this conditioning being done to children nothing can be done to stop it. Students should not just retain information, they should be able to question it and fight it if necessary. In order for the action to change, people need to feel strongly enough about it to change it. Personally, I would want my students to be able to fight for something they believe in, so it would be my job to not only teach them to do so but to give them to necessary tools to be able to analyze the text that they are given.

“We are not only taught certain styles of violence, the latest fashions, and sex roles by TV, movies, magazines, and comic strips: we are also taught how to succeed, how to love, how to buy, how to conquer, how we forget the past and suppress the future” (128).

This quote shows the affects that media can have on children at an early age. They are taught all of these aspects without even realizing it. Their parents think that they are just watching a movie but in reality they are getting more of an education on the world that they do in schools or at home with their families or friends. Children are taught these societal values and then act upon them without realizing where they come from. Some are harmful and some are good. I did an entire psychology presentation on dolls (specifically Barbie) and their effect children. The results were astounding. Mothers found notes in their daughters’ rooms on how they could keep thin and have the ideal Barbie image. A lot of what the children are learning is aspects of SCWAAMP. Straightness, Whiteness, and able-bodiedness, 

A not that a mother found in her seven year old daughter's bedroom next to her Barbie dream house

  

“I don't want students to believe that change can be bought at the mall, nor do I want them thinking that the pinnacle of a woman's life is an "I do" that supposedly leads them to a "happily ever after." I don't want my female students to see their "sisters" as competition (or that scarce and wonderful commodity _ men” (133).

In every fairy tale and Disney princess movie that I can think of, it’s about a girl getting a guy, even if it’s not the mail story line. Women are taught at a young age that they are to get married and have children. Even if they have a career and another life, it is expected that all women are to love children and want to start a family with their “only reason for existence”-her husband. Sisters in these tales never seem to get along-up until Frozen was released in 2013. There is no sibling competitions in this movie, but prior to that there was much rivalries between siblings-especially step siblings. The evil step mother is also a major role. It teaches children that if a parent was to remarry, their stepmother will be evil and horrible. There are many misconceptions about life in Disney films and fairy tales. I actually took the Grimm and Glitter first year seminar and we did a lot of comparing and contrasting with original Grimm tales and Disney's take on them. We also noticed all of the common themes within the tales. It was a great class to take.

Reading this I remembered that a Cinderella was made with primarily dark skinned characters and it was my absolute favorite movie when I was little and I remember thinking that something was different about it, but it never really "bothered" me and I didn't put too much thought into it,

Safe Spaces: Reflection Questions

I definitely connected this reading to SCWAAMP. The first bullet in SCWAAMP is Straightness. Personally I always grew up thinking a man and a women are the only people that get together. Not because I didn’t believe it was right, but because I was never exposed to anything else because of SCWAAMP. The only books that I read were heterosexual love stories. The typical family was only on TV. Now there are shows like The Fosters and Modern Family that are open about the LGBT community.

For my blog post I decided to answer the first set of questions that were included in the piece. I thought these questions were very important for the reader to answer in their minds in order to connect to the piece rather than just reading it.
My old high school recently became very involved in LGBT equality because there were many bullying incidents. The administration had a no tolerance policy, but it wasn’t until recently that sexual orientation was put in bold. Now I have three openly gay friends and multiple gay family members. I am totally comfortable with those of the LGBT community.

What messages did you receive about the LGBT community when you were in school? Did you ever question these messages? Do you talk to the youth in your life about what they are learning in the LGBT community in your curriculum?
Growing up, people used to throw around derogatory terms that are directed at the gay community like they were nothing. This always made me very uncomfortable. I heard it constantly in the hallways. Whenever any of my friends said it I would correct them and pretty much flip out on them. But in school I never heard much about the LGBT community until middle school when one of my friends came out to me and my eyes really opened to how the world reacts. Once I went into high school a group of students started an equality group. This was unfortunately constantly made fun of by a prominent group in my school who were with lack of a better term complete and utter jerks. Children in my life are not educated much in school about the LGBT community. I know they are at home, so I do not need to step in but I believe that the children in my life are more accepting of it than the adults are and I think that's sad.

What do you know about the gay civil rights movement (Stonewall, for example?)
I honestly do not know anything at all about the gay rights movement. I feel pretty awful about that and I’m going to definitely research it. I think that says a lot about the school system. The only movement that I learned about were the women’s rights movements (only in college) and the civil rights movement (since elementary school). I feel that this is an important topic to discuss in schools and I am surprised that it was not discussed with me before.

Rodriguez: Aria Quotes

“I easily noted the difference between classroom language and the language of home” (34).
This quote reminded me of our class discussions on language. Not necessarily the actual language that is spoken, but the tone of voice (for example) and different ways home and school are diverse. While reading this quote I connected it to Delpit. Though this is not necessarily a matter of race, if there is a separation of something between home and school, the child is easily confused. It’s like Rodriguez mentions, it really is “two worlds” (34). There needs to be a connection for the sake of the student, but the sacrifices of the child really need to be taken into consideration.

“We remained a loving family, bur one greatly changed. No longer so close; no longer bound tight by the pleasing and troubling knowledge of our public separateness”(36).
This really shows the sacrifices that people make in order to assimilate in America. Yes, they get the privileges of being seen as English speaking American, but they lose their family bonds. They do not feel the same when they are at home. Their identity is gone. This honestly breaks my heart. I feel like Rodriguez felt very lost as a child and I could never picture going through something like this. If this ever happened to me I really don’t know what I would do.

“So they do not realize that while one suffers a diminished sense of private individuality by becoming assimilated into public society, such assimilation makes possible the achievement of public individuality” (39).
Rodriguez ends his piece with this powerful quote. What he is saying is though there are many sacrifices, it is worth it to be successful in America. I personally see a problem with this. I think private individuality is one of the most important things that you have in life. There is only one you. You don't get another one. You do not want to lose yourself and what you stand for for money. I totally understand where he is coming from with this, I do. Wow. Now that I am typing this I realize that I am probably only saying these things because I've never had to go through it, and I never will. I really don't know what I would do in the situation, because I an English speaking American--therefore I have privilege over someone who does not speak English. It is easy for me to say "don't lose yourself" when I don't have to make the choice.
This also connects to SCWAAMP. One of the As in SCWAAMP stands for American-ness. This is very prevalent in this piece. He and his family needed to assimilate in terms of language to be successful in America. 

I also found this video that really resonated with me and really shows the importance of bilingual education.

Point to bring up in class: I know many people have strong opinions such as “you come into our country, you learn our language!” What are your opinions on this matter? Do you believe that Rodriguez’s teachers did the right thing in going to the house and asking his parents to speak English at home? I think it is a hard thing. Yes, there needs to be a bind between home and school…but at what cost?

I would also like to make the point that there is NO official language of the United States. 

McIntosh: White Privilege Quotes

“I think whites are carefully taught not to recognize white privilege, as males are taught not to recognize male privilege” (1). 

I agree with this quote 100%. This quote also reminds me of one of Delpit’s five aspects of power, which is those who are in power are least aware of its existence. Those of the white population and males are not aware of their privilege because it is their daily life. For example a student in our class said that he did not get a job because he had long hair. In this situation people who had short hair are privileged. His competitors were not aware that they were getting the job because they had short hair and he did not. He then inferred that the reason he was not receiving jobs was because he had long hair. Once he cut his hair, he acquired a job right away. Though this is not an example of race or gender, it qualifies under the recognition of privilege.

“19. If a traffic cop pulls me over, or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven't been singled out because of my race” (3).

This was pulled out of the list of things that white people have that people of color do not have. This particular item on the list reminded me of a video that I saw on the internet. White people do not have to worry when they are driving that a police officer is going to stop them and harass them, or really be anything but help to them. People of color do not have that luxury or privilege of driving down the street at night, or even during the day, without that fear. This video angered me, because growing up I did not notice how much of a racial divide we have in this country. I did not know that darker skinned people were targeted as much as they are. This article is very eye opening.

"Since racism, sexism, and heterosexism are not the same, the advantages associated with them should not be seen as the same" (5).
I agree with this quote as well. What McIntosh is saying here is since all of these issues are from totally different ends of the spectrum, they can not be resolved in the same way. It is going to take a long time to change the outlook in society and the privileges people receive. These problems need to be tackles separately, but with the same amount of force, because they are all equally important. Racism should not be changed in the same manor that heterosexism should be changed. There are so many factors that go into changing the way society functions. It reminds me of "can't we all just get along?" in the Johnson piece we read a couple of weeks ago. It really is not as simple as it sounds, there are so many different reasons why we unfortunately cannot (or will not) do that.

Point to bring up in class: It really bothers me when people say society is messed up. I agree, it totally is. But the thing is: WE ARE SOCIETY. People really need to use their voices so the ignorant people who believe that privilege is okay are overridden. It's easy to say "oh that's so wrong that should change" but it's another thing to do something about it!