Activist

I am not real sure if this is the type of “activist” role we are supposed to be reflecting on, but I am going to give it a shot anyway.  During my senior year of high school, I can remember standing in the courtyard behind the cafeteria enjoying my lunch break while talking with some friends.  There was a group of guys not far from where we were all chatting.  Suddenly the group grew larger and I could see they were forming a circle around a big senior football jock and a smaller fellow, I think he was a sophomore, who looked terrified.  The football guy kept throwing his arms around and swearing at the top of his lungs.  I could not stand by and watch this poor kid get bullied, so I went over to the large group of kids.  I listened to what the jock was yelling (something about how the other kid needs to learn respect and watch where he’s going) and calmly walked into the middle of the circle.  By this point, my heart was racing and everyone had turned to look at me.  I walked up to the jock and whispered in his ear that he had to give respect to get respect and that if he didn’t walk away he would lose all of the respect of his classmates for beating up on someone who was half of his size and obviously did not stand a chance in a fight.  Luckily for me, the jock looked me in the eye and walked away.  I have never felt better about myself for standing for someone who was being treated unfairly.  I did not know the sophomore boy before then, but it did not matter.  I felt like I had to take a stand even if no one else would.

Universalize vs Eliminate

While scanning through a blog on female privilege (http://www.feministcritics.org/blog/2008/06/08/female-privilege/), I came across one that really stood out to me, “My role in my child’s life is generally seen as more important than the child’s father’s role.”  I am not a big fan of this.  I believe that the role of the mother and father should be equal in the child’s life.  I do understand that the role of the mother being greater is coming from the fact that the mother, of course, is the one that carried the child for nine months and gave birth.  One must realize, though, that it took the father and the mother to have the child, so therefore I believe the father’s role should be given more weight.  This, in turn, would cause the mother’s privilege of having the most important role in her child’s life to be eliminated.  I am okay with this.  I am okay with sharing responsibility, care, and the importance of our role in our child’s life.  Although, please realize that I am saying this while I currently do not have a child.  Maybe once I do, my opinion on this matter will change but for now I strongly believe that both the father and the mother are equally important to their child and should be treated as such.

Show and Tell post 1

The whole idea of how each and every one of us is privileged in one way or another really intrigued me.  I never thought about just how many privileges I have and how I take just about all of them for granted.  In Gianpiero Petriglieri’s blog “Privilege: A User’s Guide” (located at http://blogs.hbr.org/hbsfaculty/2012/01/privilege-a-users-guide.html), he states, “I have a wonderful family and good friends.”  I never once considered having a family and friends to be a privilege, but it truly is.  Having family and friends is a precious gift that can be taken from us in an instant either by death or simply because distance severs the relationship between you and the ones you love.  There are many people in the world who are all alone.  They have no family to run to when they need help or want to celebrate a holiday or special occasion.  They have no friends to call when they need a shoulder to cry on or someone to go out and have fun with. 

Petriglieri also states, “I am healthy, educated and well-travelled.”  I also have not thought about health and education as a privilege.  It is a privilege that I was able to graduate high school and to attend this university and hopefully go on to grad school.  These opportunities will allow me to better my life in the future and provide a better home environment for my own family where my children will have the same opportunities I had.  

Also in Petriglieri’s blog, he mentions that he feels ashamed of his privileges.  There are certain instances where I realized I have been privileged in a certain way and I, too, feel ashamed because I can see how others who do not have the same privileges as me are treated unfairly.  Some of the privileges that we have are out of our control.  I cannot control that I was born a white female and therefore have certain privileges that someone not of the same race or gender as me does not have and vice versa.

Petriglieri says that we should recognize our privileges, accept its price, forget where it came from, and to use it well and wisely.  By “accept its price”, he means to recognize what it will take to make the most out of that privilege.  He explains the reason to “forget where it came from” as, “When you spend your life trying to prove that you deserved your privilege, or trying to hoard and protect it, you waste it.”  You can use privilege well by using the power it gives you to shape norms and make a change which will in turn expand the privilege to others.  From reading his blog, I have realized that I am truly blessed and privileged and I need to make the most of the opportunities given to me, as should everyone else with their own privileges.

Hegemony

Why do we stand in line? Why do we wait patiently for our turn to get into the football games, to buy a drink at the concession stand, or wait in a turning lane at a red light?  Is it because it is the right thing to do?  In reality, there is no law stating that we must be patient and wait on everyone else in front of us to get what they needed before we are allowed to get what we want.  We do it because that is just the way it is supposed to be.  It is the way that we were raised and brought up.  We were taught to wait our turn because eventually it will be our turn.  You will not get arrested for skipping in line, although you might get roughed up a bit by the people you did skip or pulled out of line and sent to the back by an officer, but ultimately it is not a so called crime.  We are okay with waiting in line because we know that it would be very rare for the people running the show to run out of what we want.  What if that was not the case? What if it was first come first serve and once they ran out, they were out?  People would be a lot less willing to sit and wait, especially if the product was something perishable such as food or water. Things would get hectic if that were the case.  So in order to portray that there is some type of control in our lives, we sit in live patiently waiting to get what we ultimately want.   

Privilege

One privilege that I have never really thought about is having to worry about fitting into classroom seats or onto rollercoaster rides.  The seats at LSU are extremely close together and the aisles are very narrow.  One of my guy friends is not overweight but is a burly guy so when he ties to sit in the classroom he has to squeeze himself into the seat. 

I remember when I went on my first rollercoaster ride when I was about 10 years old.  I did not want to go without my dad.  We got all the way to end of the line and it was finally our turn to board the ride.  We stand in place and weight for the attendant to strap us in.  The attendant hooked me in first and then went to my dad.  The safety harness would not latch and my dad was asked to step off of the ride.  This broke my heart.  I could not understand why my dad could not come with me.

Kitchen Duty

I hate doing the dishes.  Every single night, I find myself in front of the kitchen sink with my hands plunged into soapy water.  Being raised in a traditional southern home, I have grown use to our nightly routine.  First, my mom and I cook supper.  Second, we serve my dad and brothers and ourselves last.  Third, after everyone is finished eating, we pick up all of the plates, cups, and silverware and store the leftovers.  After that, my brothers and my dad proceed to the living room to lie on the couch and watch TV while my mom and I hit the kitchen sink to knock out the dishes.  I have always envied how my brothers got to just lounge about after supper, not having to worry about the chore of cleaning up.  I can understand cleaning up after a toddler or someone who is incapable of doing so, but they are grown men and I am positive that they are able to rinse their plates and slip them into the dishwasher.  It really is that simple; I promise.  It takes a total of maybe five seconds to do.  If I can go outside and do “men’s work” like cutting grass and chopping firewood, then they should be able to do “women’s work” and put up their own dishes.