Sunday, October 16, 2016

Christensen

For the Christensen reading, I chose to do an extended comments post on Bianca’s blog. After reading the text, I was really interested to hear what everyone else had to say.


I liked how Bianca’s post had a focus on both being taught not to rebel and upholding the standards of beauty taught to us by the media and our society. The quote about not rebelling reminded me of this quote that my Contemporary Issues teacher had posted on his wall in high school:

It's a little blurry, so in case you can't see it, it says "Got to work; get married; have some kids; pay your taxes; pay your bills; watch your TV; follow fashion; act normal; obey the law; and repeat after me: I am free."


As for the comments about beauty, I appreciated that Bianca highlighted the fact that, in our media, a part of being beautiful is being white. This means that no matter what people of color do to “make themselves beautiful,” they will never win. The emphasis was also not just on pale skin, but on big eyes, as well, which is reflected in the countless Youtube tutorials teaching young Asian girls to use makeup to make their eyes appear bigger and rounder. Furthermore,it is so frustrating that two of the most notable depictions of beauty are thin waists and delicate limbs. Girls use products like “waist trainers” and wraps and keep up dangerous diets because the ideal woman is apparently only thin, not healthy, and definitely not stronger than a man.

Also, regardless of what is considered beautiful, why is it so important for girls and women to be pretty to begin with? There is so much more emphasis placed on the appearances of women, to the point where it overshadows their other qualities and abilities. Here is a poem that I was reminded of when I read both the text and Bianca’s post. It’s short and worth the very quick read!

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