Unrealistic Fantasy Post #1

Most women that you run into will tell you how much they love the Bachelorette! Well I'm here to tell you I'm not that girl. The show finds a woman who is desperately searching for love and a couple dozen men who are so charmingly trying to sweep her off her feet. The bachelorette has an insane amount of men chasing after one girl and in what world would that ever happen? The reason women love this show is because they fantasize about being that one lucky girl who goes on luxurious dates and gets all the attention in the world. What normal relationship is like this? Every relationship faces its own challenges such as stress, money, and communication problems but in this t.v show and the current issue is who is going to get a rose and be a step closer to winning the girl. There is so much uneeded drama in this t.v. series, its out of control! At the end of the show when the girl finally chooses the lucky guy they usually end up having issues after the season is over because it's a completely different life being a couple off the screen. Where is the money to go on all the dates? Where is the all the attention? After the season is over they go under the radar!  Anyone who is a contestant on that show can't be serious about finding true love! Many men, NOT ALL, but some are very competitive, so once the game has been won, will his passion for her fade? The show looks like a testosterone competition to see who can make it furthest! I'm not trying to hate on The Bachelorette, I'm just trying to prove how this "reality show" is nothing like reality! The relationship they’re trying to portray is not an actual relationship in real life and puts women in this funk that this show is a desirable demonstration of how relationships can be! It’s just not healthy!

-Sorry this is late, I was having issues with my e-mail account! 

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Posting Assignment #3 (due Sunday 10/2, 11:59 P.M.; comment by 11:59 Monday, 10/3) Body Practices in Everyday Life

Find an example of a body practice from your everyday life (things you do or people around you do, images of bodies and practices and so on). Describe it (if it's an image, post the image, if it's a video, link to it) and explain what it does and how it does it.  Think: 'rhetoric'—how culture 'argues' us into subjectivity. Write in terms of our work, of course; things like: intelligible bodies, body practices, docile bodies, choice / agency (Leppert, 212-13; 243), 'pursuit(s) without a terminus' (Bordo, 166), constitutive power, 'other-oriented emotional economy' (Bordo, 171), praxis, and so on. 

'Manorexia'--from Lor Yang via Robin

Making a positive change out of Iseblle Cora in Italy was a great thing, but the real problem is in the US.  I see that there are lots and lots of models (both male and female) that are advertised who are in shape, sexy, hot, etc.  Anorexia is just not a female thing.  Anorexia is seen in male also and classified as "Manorexia".  There's a video on youtube about Jeremy Gillitzer, a model who was fit and decided to later died at the age of 38 due to anorexia (link provided below).  This video is very much related to Isabelle but instead in the US.  So what's the message?  Anorexia is not just a female health hazard, but also seen in male at times.  It is influenced by the media and this is the main source/cause of anorexia.  The media's exceptation of how someone should look like. 

Here's the link.   

Alcohol use through the eyes of Howard Becker

Although many distinct differences exist between alcohol and marijuana use such as addiction and fatality rates, how one comes to enjoy alcohol use and in some cases become dependent on alcohol are very similar in my opinion.

Becker's thesis seemed to be that to enjoy marijuana use, or in this case the use of any substance or activity, one must first learn to use it and enjoy it. This is done by associating with people who also engage in these activities. I think this also applies to alcohol use. I remember my first time drinking it was with a few close friends, with there parents booze, and i remember coughing from the burn in my throat after the first pull. But through my continued association with people who drink, which is almost guaranteed these days, taught me first of all how to drink in a way that didn't hurt and secondly to enjoy the feelings of impairment as well as other aspects of the feeling.

But is there actually a specific drinking culture? the answer is at one level or another of course! Different alcohols are even associated with different types of people, from the girly flavored vodkas to the manly whiskys. Alcohol has become so pervasive in our culture as americans that Budweiser can claim its "Americas Beer" and almost all domestic brands in some form or another have linked themselves to american patriotism. So one must ask themselves, is the mass consumption of alcohol in america a product of its historical presence in america and its link to american pride as a whole? or is it as Becker would say, a behavior that must be learned and eventually enjoyed through association with others? I personally think that because of the massive amount of people who consume in america, it has become a part of american culture, and therefor it is very easy to learn to enjoy the activity of drinking through association.

Beer and Football

To begin with apologies for the late post, i wasn't able to post to the blog earlier due to some technical troubles. So this is my post for the first blog entry, sorry for the confusion.

Both objects portrayed in this commercial are ingrained in contemporary american culture, forcing the average american to consume thousands if not millions of messages about each throughout the year. The image clearly is attempting to link football and beer, which is no surprise because of the masculine undertones of both, generally speaking. By linking the two of these they make this link even more present and convincing, making it seem that to not consume both Sunday night football and beer is not masculine. Not to mention, unpatriotic. The red, white, and blue on the Coors light can emphasizes the position that both beer and football are patriotic. I mean whats more american than enjoying a cold beer on the 4th of july or a rugged sport like football. Through the link of images with similar connotations and extreme popularity, the use of color, and the cultural importance of both the NFL and Coors light, both objects are consumed by millions of people within are culture, this of course is regulated by an agency banning certain signs and symbols on television at different times. In this case the image (advertisement) was produced by a company to promote the further consumption of there product by associating it with football and patriotism. This is all accomplished through presenting the product/object/image in the advertisement and context of a super bowl. And last but not least this all impacts are identity as a whole since we live in america we obviously want to be patriotic and iv grown up watching football so therefor i must consume more Coors!

Sex Appeal...Not Only for the Use of Men

Susan Bordo explains the physical appearance and attraction of women in today’s culture.  This blog is a statement that the same goes for the appearance of males in today’s society.  Abercrombie and Fitch ads are essentially the same as Victoria Secret ads.  They both target crowds by the appearance of the actors in the pictures.  While Victoria Secret ads use gorgeous women with giant breasts and tiny waists to promote “sexy” lingerie, Abercrombie and Fitch use’s younger women and men with “ideal” bodies and appearances to promote teen clothing.  In the particular photo posted, this ad appeals to women in a sense of soft core porn.  Many women, even myself, are drawn towards this ad on an attraction level.  This man has extremely defined figures such as abs and other muscles.  He is wearing low rise unbuttoned pants in order to drawn in women.  The advertisers target is to attract young women and lure them into their store along with males to purchase items that will attract girls if worn.  This advertisement portrays men in a sense that all people care about is appearance and sex appeal.  People are so focused on their bodies and appearance that they forget who they are and try to become someone they are not.  Everything is mainly centered around physical appearance.  The ideal bodies for men are portrayed as strong, defined, toned, and muscular.  This directly correlates with Susan Bordo’s visions of the female appearance.  The advertisement is showing men of all ages exactly what the perfect body should look like and what attracts girls. Back in the olden days, men never wore low rise pants that showed off their figure, but due to the uprising in sexual appeals from the media, men and boys of all ages have been influenced to wear more provocative clothing to help boost their sex appeal.  This has led men to become ashamed of their bodies and attempt to change themselves by any means possible.  Its advertisements like these that from bad habits such as eating disorders, depression, and anxiety because it forces people to attempt to become the “perfect” person.  No one accepts themselves for who they are and advertisements are there to provide a guide to perfection.  Advertisements such as this one for Abercrombie and Fitch, have helped shape the way for new trends and pathways. 

Social Construction: Sexuality

As Susan Bordo explains, female bodies have now become docile bodies-bodies whose forces and energies are habituated to external regulation, subjection, transformation, and "improvement". I think that one of the most insidious ways that women's bodies have become docile bodies is in the idea of sexuality and the amount of 'management' and things we attend to in order to facilitate that idea. An good example of this 'docile body' behavior where things about our physical bodies are managed and done TO US instead OF US could be seen in the practice of brazilian waxing. This is a huge aspect of bodily management for a sexual woman in today's society. The idea that in order to be coded sexually feminine you have to attend to your pubic hair is a really odd concept. The code implied is that to be feminine is to be infantilized and stripped of adult womanhood. And this is all done to our bodies in an effort to transform ourselves into what is deemed an appropriate sexual identity. Not only is this idea spread throughout communities through magazines, movies, television shows but it has not seeped into our cultural habits and rituals to the point that waxers are probably the only people who will never lose their jobs as long as we are a vain society.

WARNING: offensive but honest!

I think that Becker made an insightful distinction in his article by specifying that his article was discussing smoking pot for pleasure. I think that the addictive discussion isn't to most relevant to the purpose of the article. Marijuana isn't addictive. End of story.

It seems like several members of our blog community have not experienced smoking pot, but I'll go ahead and say, I have! And enjoy partaking on a regular basis. It was especially interesting to me to read Becker's article and remember my very first experience using, biking to a spot behind my old elementary school in the middle of a circle of pine trees. My friends had all smoke before, so of course they brought all the supplies and the guiding advice. Throughout the process, I ended up swallowing a good amount of the smoke, and for hours following I burped up little puffs. I felt like a dragon, and my friends thought it was so funny and still make me feel like a success.

In retrospect, I now know that each of those aspects (my guides, my environment, my faux paus and the encouragement I received) were so crucial in my appreciation of the practice. I was a body, and the factors of my social environment were necessary to shape me. I know that my nature inclined me to try smoking, as I'm generally an adventuresome and risk taking girl. But I don't know that I would have sought out the experience without the encouragement and facilitation of my friends, showing me that nurture certainly played a part.

My roommate doesn't smoke and doesn't allow her boyfriend to smoke. She has tried it before, but has a really adverse attitude about it now. After reading this article, I wonder if one of those crucial pieces of the social construction was missing from her first times. Maybe she feels that it makes her sick or she wasn't shown the proper technique so she didn't feel anything at all! It makes me wonder if she could still be guided into enjoying the act.

Apologies for the honest and upfront nature of this post! I hope this gives a little insight to any of those who haven't smoked! Comrades who have, hope you enjoyed!

D.A.R.E: Drug and Resistance Education

From the time that I was old enough to have "drugs" in my vocabulary I have been taught to conceive drugs as bad thing. In my personal experience in elementary school we had a D.A.R.E program specifically for the purpose of educating us about the harms of drugs and drug use. This, from what I understand, or something similar is used throughout Minnesota. It is socially accepted in our culture to try and influence kids into taking a position on the subject of drugs. At that age we are "forced" to take and act on the premise that drugs are bad.

How is it than that people do marijuana if our bodies were taught to portray them as bad and harmful, as objects that only bring pain and hardship not pleasure? Why would anyone want to attempt to put such a substance into their body? Howard Becker puts it perfectly in that it has to be "learned". It can be related to almost any subculture of our modern day society. If you join a recreational sport for the first time you are going to be hesitant, you'll learn the hierarchy of the team that is separate from society before making any bold moves. A new marijuana user will be taught how to perceive being high by those who have already learned or by a preconceived perception that being "high" is enjoyable.

What then makes a user continue to smoke after he/she has "learned" how to? For one I believe it is partially just because we as humans are creatures of habit. This can be shown very simply by where someone sits in a classroom. On the first day of class where ever someone sits is most likely where he or she will sit the next few days and even entire semester. I know because i'm guilty of doing it. But I also believe that it is because smoking is addictive, not in the chemical sense that without THC the user would not be able to function normally and go into withdrawal but that the user gets a sense of familiarity when partaking in the action. Eventually it becomes a body practice in which the user is doing it in an almost unconscious state similar to but maybe not as extreme as always turning a light off when leaving a room. It is an action that you perform but you don't conscientiously tell yourself to do it.

Decriminalizing drugs

Think about why anyone would be opposed to decriminalizing drugs. Logically, there aren't a lot of reasons why you shouldn't. The drug use could be monitored, contained, made safer, made easier to get help for, and could even lead to a new source of revenue. Cultural studies gives us the perfect opportunity to explain why so many people are opposed to decriminalizing drugs.

Tobacco is shown to cause more deaths, each year, via second hand smoke alone, than every "hard" drug combined. So, why are people okay with tobacco, but not cocaine? Cultural studies shows us that those in power have constructed society to view cocaine as deadly and tobacco as simply harmful, despite the facts. However, in the subculture that participates in cocaine use, the social construction is that cocaine is pleasurable and can be used in the same manner that tobacco is. Becker's article on becoming a pot user supports this claim as well. Becker explains that people would not become pot users if it was not a pleasurable experience. However, Becker further shows that for many people the only way that using pot is a pleasurable experience is to have those who are pot users socially construct that experience for them. Social construction plays an enormous part into how society views drug use and if a majority in society reversed the current social construction then more people would be willing to consider decriminalizing drugs.

Politics also play a major role in why the majority of society is against decriminalizing drugs because not only do those that hold political power have a large hand in social construction, they are also attempting to advance their own ideas over those without power. Those who use these "hard" drugs are considered to be pushing the norms outside of the hegemony. Since they are without power, they have little to no say in the social construction and have even less of an opportunity to advance their ideas. Becker's article also addresses this idea of politics through the subculture of pot users. If those first time pot users were not exposed to the regular pot users, then Becker said that they would most likely not become regular pot users. However, since the regular pot users were there to advance their ideas and use their power to make a social construction, the first time pot users were far more likely to become one of those regular pot users. When you take Becker's idea of politics and apply it to non-drug users, you see that non-drug users manipulate facts to advance their ideas about "hard" drug use onto the rest of society, who do not know the facts about "hard" drug use.

If it were not for the social construction that has convinced our society that "hard" drugs are extremely bad and dangerous and the politics that allow the majority of society to advance those views, then people would be able to look at the issue of decriminalizing drugs through a much less biased lens because they would look at the facts themselves instead of relying on our culture to show them what to think.

Marijuana Culture

I don't smoke weed. I know lots of people that do, and I'm sure I could if I wanted to. But I never have, and don't plan to in the near future.

However, there are thousands of people that do, on a very regular basis. This has caused many people to ask - why? Why do so many people smoke, and what leads people to do it?

In my opinion, smoking weed and being high creates a separate culture of people. Culture is defined (roughly) as "a group of people and who they are, what they make, how they understand and create their reality." Thus marijuana creates it's own culture - those who smoke on a daily basis. They have their own schedule and habits, their own activities, and their own lifestyles.

There are many signs and objects that create this culture. It seems pointless to explain them all, but I'll mention a few - the drug itself, joints, bongs, the "marijuana plant emblem," and many more. These are all things that you would know about if you were a part of the culture, but would be clueless about if you were not.

Because I don't smoke, I am not a part of the "Marijuana Culture." Not because I wouldn't be accepted or because I can't; but simply because I don't smoke.

Howard Becker makes some interesting observations in his article about "Becoming a Marijuana User." His main point, however, is that to become a marijuana user, you must become a part of the culture and learn the rules to really enjoy the drug. He argues that the drug itself is not addictive, but the social experience of smoking with others, and being a part of the culture, can be addictive.

Therefore, it's not the actual drug that causes so many people to smoke marijuana on a daily basis. It's the desire to be a part of the marijuana culture - to know the lingo, feel accepted, and have others to experience the drug with. It's the desire to be a part of a new culture or community. The actual drug has little to do with the "addiction."

Wait....you're not a size 00?? Smh.

I must say that previous to reading Bordo’s article I didn’t completely see my body to be a medium of culture-like she put it. I like to think I’m a stylish girl and I would love to say that my style stems from the creative juices I have brewing in my brain-but alas, I cannot. Truth of the matter is, what I wear, what I buy and what I put on my face is predetermined by the products that I see all around me. I really like the term that Bordo uses in her article to describe women and their bodies- their “docile bodies.” If I were asked to define this and explain it, it would be rather difficult without a scenario. So here one goes- a girl of age 13 is entering that stage where what she wears, how she looks and what her body looks like is of importance, because everyone knows that’s how she will get that cute boy in the blue polo to notice her. So she picks up a magazine or goes online or watches tv only to find thousands and thousands of ads of gorgeous women- like the one’s you see above- dictating to her what she should look like. And if she doesn’t look like this, well then that boy in the blue polo just won’t look at her. Because the boy in the blue polo is also exposed to these same images and so he gets it in his head that this is what is “hot” or “sexy” and so now he has preconceived notions of what he is looking for in a girl. Bordon says it best when she says that the female body, now becoming the docile body, is subjected to all this “external regulation” and made to concur with whatever is needed or accepted of it at the given age and time. It’s not fair? True but society isn’t fair now is it? And besides- we are all guilty of this sort of subconscious regulation. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t compare myself to some girl somewhere. And the funny thing is I do it without realizing it, and then I stop and think to myself- wow, I’m doing it again. It’s a rough cycle that I put myself through and up until now I always thought to myself that I being the independent woman that I claim to be- dressed, acted, spoke, hated, loved, etc. the things I do because I chose to. It’s my decision and that’s that. Now taking a second look at it I see that really is not the case. This kind of scares me a bit though because it really shows that I like many other women, am easily led to believe that I should look a certain way-big breasted, small waisted, slightly curved in the thighs, and with long beautiful legs. Ummm newsflash I don’t look like that. And another newsflash- I don’t know many girls who have ALL of those features. So why, oh why then do I still compare myself to those girls if I know that they very well may have flaws like I do? What is it that makes me and the hordes of other females do this? Is it really the millions of ads that come out every month to share with me how it is I should be? A sort of brainwashing? Or something more? Who know’s truly what the answer is? All I know is that it shouldn’t be this way, but it is. And will be for a long while unfortunately. However-to tie my photo in-there is some type of movement within this “females should look like this” spectrum. It seems that there is a realization ,finally, that not all females look like that. The cool thing now is to share and advertise different women of different looks and shapes and sizes. This new advertising method is quite interesting indeed because although its refreshing to see that I’m not a freak and my abnormally large hips (in my mind at least) aren’t that abnormal after all, these images are still competing with the images of the sex-goddesses of Victoria’s Secret and women who are top models. It seems that the market is changing to incorporate a more global perspective on what women really look like. I notice however that although this may be the case there is still a desperate-ness in females to attain the “perfect image,” hence my inability to stop comparing myself to others. It’s as if our own images aren’t correct or acceptable to ourselves because it’s been engrained in their minds and our bodies for so long, that it really is not.