For my final blog I have to write about a BIG “funny” that happened the other day.

I had not had a chance yet to watch the movie “Crash” until this week, so I ran in and rented a few movies for the kids and us, that one included. Well, my mom is staying with us through Crhistmas and was bored and thought she would watch that one while we were all gone, she knew why I had rented it so she put it in.  Well, I had inadvertently picked up the wrong “Crash.”  I had not ever seen either of the movie but the one I picked up was with Holly Hunter and James Spader.  She was watching in horror as she all she was seeing was people causing accidents and all of these people having sex!  After I got home she had mentioned she watched my movie and when I asked her how it was she explained it was nothing more than car crashes and sex, and I asked what the plot was and she said there really wasn’t one other than who could have sex the most!  I had no idea until I went back to the discussion board and saw comments that read, “I loved this movie,” “this movie was the best I had ever seen!”  We were laughing uncontrolably at the comments when we realized I had picked up the wrong one! 

My mom is 72 years old and has been widowed for 22 years—I don’t think she has ever seen anything quite like that before:)  What a way to end my women’s studies class—we all had a good laugh on that one!!!

I found this reading to be quite surprising and quite a nice relief to know that there are men that are concerned for the safety of women.    Feminism is miscontrued, at least I had a different perpective before the class as I do now, it is not just all about making women an equal to men.    Everyone needs to be enlightened on the subject so more people can be aware and more open to discussing women issues.  One major growing issue among women is that they are are being mistreated to the extent of rape and for men to be out there trying to help is a relief. 

I know this is not a quick fix by any means but to have men supporting women now will only help influence and others will follow! 

Unequal is right!!!  I am apauled by this reading this week and terribly surprised how others countries and other cultures still treat women.  What surprised me the most is that it just isn’t the choice of the man to treat his wife in such a terrible way it is that it is the law or written in Acts for these countries that they are suppose to be this way to their wife.  Not just a stranger but their wife!!! 

Women in the US have come so far, why is it that these other countries are so blatant with female discrimination?  There are laws that require the women to “obey”  their husband,  have licit sex, get his permission for simple things and discriminate based on sex for their right to vote and even put laws and limits on women from receiving inheritance or having their own property.

I find all of this to be so archaeic and in humane.  I wish that all of the women in the US who find that they have it rough and tough knew about this, they might actually quit complaining so much about trivial issues!!

I don’t even know where to begin with all of the comments I have from this!  I will say I LOVE Tobey Keith but this video is quite disturbing to say the least and a side of him that I don’t like to see.  I have heard this song so many times on the radio but now I will always see this video in my head and I will not hesitate to turn the station! 

He thinks he is shutting her out and locking her in the basement and doesn’t hesitate to say all of the things he wants to say to her, especially the hateful things and even attacks her own mother but as he realizes he is so stupid and builds this wall around himself he tries to apologize so he can get out.  She realizes at the same time and walks away and leaves him there without a word, just as he would have done had he built it correctly. 

Bothered by this video, YES!  He seems like  such a good man, he loves his country and supports the troops and then makes a video like this to degrade women.  I just don’t get it!

I am not really sure if the question I have is right for this assignment but I thought I could use another perspective on this.

I have a 12 year old boy and an almost 8 year old girl and a really good friend that lives in Houston who is gay.  My kids really enjoy him and his wonderful sense of humor.  Since he lives in Houston we don’t see him too often but often enough for the kids to start asking questions.  Obviously the kids have never been told and I am not sure when or how to tell them and will it really make a difference to them?  He lives with his best friend who is a female so it isn’t a question about who he lives with, they don’t even ever see him with another man but the topic comes up during conversation.

So I guess the question would be, do I come right out and tell them or just the older child or  let it go like without explaining?   

Thank you for any insight on this!

This week’s readings would get a whole different response depending on who you asked the loaded question.  Ask the man and the women of the house who does the housework and if each individual pulls their own weight and you would conflicting anwers. 

Men really do just expect that the woman takes care of the housekeeping duties, not any more.   In this day and age when both parents work outside the home, the housekeeping duties are being shared between husband and wife, the men just need some coaching though–they don’t totally “get it!”

 When I was a kid and my mom was home the majority of the time, yes it was her “job” and as we got a little older I did  have chores but that is because I got an allowance–I had to do something to earn the money!  Times have changed, a lot of us even hire someone to come in and do the house cleaning for us, that was not even considered when we were kids. 

This reading will really be obsolete in the near future as men continue to realize that to run the house it has to be a shared position!

I have read a lot of the writing the girl has done and I have to say it is interesting to read from her perspective.  I have to start by saying I am a Bush supporter and that may not set well with many other people but I feel that it is not his fault and all things have lead up to this and he just happens to be the one that is having to take care of this horrible mess.  Had we not have been attacked by the terrorists then Bush wouldn’t be the bad guy! And is he really the bad guy, how did this all happen?  I think his predecessors helped this all occur.

Anyhow, her writing is interesting and sad ad she lives in Iraq and has seen first hand the horror of a life there.  Like she has stated that before the war in Baghdad people could live anywhere and never think twice about wh or what their neighbors were, and not a care about someone else’s religion.  Now her family has to leave their country, their home that they have known and have  been comfortable with.  Now they have to decide what they can take with them, what personal items will be able to go.  Can they take the things they can’t replace; the photos, toys books or CD’s and what kind of clothes can they take–winter or summer–and the big question for this family is–Will we ever come back?

The press never helps any situation!  They take whatever sells and they run with it–they take whatever  a witness may say they saw as a whole truth or not but either way the truth is more than likely misconstrued in some way!

I am sorry for this girl and her family and I know she has very ill feelings for President Bush and the war.  She feels that Iraq is a country at the hands of the American government.  She feels the government is blind to what the Iraqi’s need or want and that they just don’t care and why is there all of this senseless death and dying?  I think she needs to first ask why are the military there and why are they risking their young lives for another country?  I think it is contrary to what she believes—I think that  the only reason we are there is because the American government does care and want to make the world safer and show the terrorists that this is not going to happen to us again!

First I will start by saying I am VERY naive and not well informed at all about the goings on in other countries, I seldomly watch the news and am not abreast on current affairs at all except what I hear on the radio, and believe me The Wolf doesn’t tell me much!  With that said I will say I was quite bothered with the readings in the Penguin Book this week about “Son Preference”.  In some countries if a girl is detected during a prenatal exam then in most cases the baby is aborted.  Also, a female infanticide is commom is some places with girl infants being killed shortly after a delivery.  Even if these babies live longer than a few days they are terribly neglected, they aren’t fed properly, they don’t receive the attention from their mother or even a physician for that matter.    How can anyone put a “value” on their child any more than another one.  How can this be possible for a mother to do this to their flesh and blood?  I understand that many cultures are not like our own but this is still a human life, where is the bond and love a mother has for their child, girl or boy?  I have to wonder if they do away with all of these baby girls who will be around in 20-30 years to be birthing the next generation of boys for these terrible countries?  Maybe this will put a halt to any growth in population in these horrible countries!  (just my 2 cents on a subject I know very little about!)

I only have a few things to say about this reading and the first is that I find it very sad that women think they need to refine themselves with such a cosmetic surgery.  I think that we are all made differently and that is one area that doesn’t need changing! Does doing this to themselves make them feel better and raise their self esteem, then maybe a tatoo or a piercing would take care of that.  I think it is silly!  In a nut shell if women are doing this to themselves to impress men, it isn’t necessary; men are easy to please!  On the flip side of that, if there are some women who have disfigurements or have been sexually molested to the point of major trauma then that is completely different but just to do this for the sheer pleasure of displaying themselves to men for a career then again I say it is ridiculous and silly!!

I have found I have enjoyed watching the movies that have been asigned for our class, so far I hadn’t seen any of them prior to this.  Although, this last movie, Saving Face, was not one that I thoroughly enjoyed but certainly learned from.   This movie shows what role family culture can play in one’s life.   The daughter, Wil, is a young aspiring physician who is also a lesbian, who falls in love with her boss’s daughter.  The two girls are torn between their attraction and their families to do the right thing.  Both girls want it all but can’t do it all.  Wil’s mother, 48 and unmarried, comes up pregnant and her father completely banished her from their home.  She moves in with Wil and tries to take over, which is funny to watch how they interact now with such different lives as well as with her daughter’s habits and friends.  This movie took so many “wrongs” and tried to make them right.  The love affair of the mother with a younger man was frowned upon so much that she was going to marry another man just to save her relationship with her father as well as his reputation in his own community.   But at the end she was able to happily unite with him and still be in good graces with everyone else.  Wil and Viv have a quiet lesbian relationship but once their families find out it seems that Wil is still a little afraid to tell her mother.  It takes time but she tells her and gets the response that she expected and Wil’s boss also finds out that they have a realtionship and he tells her how she is getting in between Viv and her success.  Also, another happy outcome for these two girls as it happens that their family are the ones to get them back together, they would rather see them happy in their lesbian relationship.    The father/grandfather finally begins to come around more after the sudden death of his wife–he sees what is important to his family. 

I have to be honest and say that I did not like having to watch the girls together.  They could have left out the intimate parts and then the movie would have been a good one!