Today's media, tv, and movies do send messages (aka hidden curriculum) of how our society should be. It's so sick and tiring how American media keeps encouraging the wrong ideas of what makes a woman and objectifying her. Next time you go see a movie, ask yourself (this idea came from my classmate John who got it from somewhere else): How many women are in it? Normal movies only will have about one female character who may be the sexy main character or just a supporting character. If there are women in the film, do they have actual conversations? Do they talk about men? Conversations normally follow stereotypical female topics such as shopping and men.
In my adolescent development class, we only meet once a week for three hour class sessions. We have to rely on Moodle to converse digitally to each other. We have some interesting deep conversations sometimes meaning people keep going back and add to the conversation. Where does the word "queer" came from? Well, my classmate Gayle describe herself as a queer woman as she post her views on gender identity. I asked her why she use that word to describe her gender and sexual orientation identities. In my knowledge bank from what I learned here and there, I thought "queer" has been used as a derogatory term for homosexual people. In the olden times, queer meant strange, weird or different. It seems to me that in the 20th century, some people in our society uses it to hurt gay men. Now here is what Gayle explain to me:
There are many different ways of self identification in the gay community, I choose to use the term queer to identify myself in the community because it most accurately describes many facets of my gender and sexual identity. There is more that is odd about me than just the fact that I tend to fall in love with women. Queer carries a much broader connotation and extends beyond sexuality and gender. There are well over 20 identifying terms which are used frequently in the gay community to self describe. Never assume that someone will identify as any one of these terms. Just ask them how they self identify. this goes back to the introduction methodology I described. Ask questions like "how do you want me to refer to your gender?" or "what terms do you use to describe your sexual orientation?' asking the question will allow the other person to think about their own identity and give them the space to try on different definitions and ideas about themselves in a safe and productive way. Personally, I am not offended by the term "gay" it just doesn't fit me.Basically, each person in the Gay-Lesbian-Transgender (GLBT) community has over twenty terms. Hey, I didn't know any of this before. At my high school, there was the Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) but most of my peers didn't join. The only people in that club where the GLBT and their straight friends. Growing up, I didn't know anyone as part of the GLBT community. It was when I went off to college that I will randomly will meet (usually classes) who are part of GLBT community. Once, I had a lesbian as one of my roommates when I lived on campus during my senior college year for only one term. Please don't ask me about the roommate situation since I haven't completely process the experience and I'm not comfortable sharing this to people that isn't in my inner circle.
Anyways, I want to share this information to the general public because what Gayle said makes sense. We do live in a society where most people are heterosexuals and we are biased toward this majority. To straight people, next time you meet someone with a different gender or sexual orientation, ask a clarifying question like these:
1. How do you want me to refer to your gender?
2. What terms do you use to describe your sexual orientation?
My final thought for this blog entry is that we need to communicate with each other and tolerate differences. Sometimes we may not agree with someone's views but we shouldn't fight over that. Life is too short for fighting! Let me finish off this with Bowling For Soup's High School Never Ends which was shared by John. Interesting, isn't it? If you work with or parents of young people, it's important to teach them critical skills so they can use it to challenge some of media's or society's values. You can't challenge every socially constructed definition on things all the time since you won't be able to do anything. Though, we can teach the young the skills they need to figure out their identities and encourage them to be social changers. I wish everyone could take the adolescent development class I am taking right now. It's so informative.
