Reproductive Choice

I think reproductive choice/reproductive rights are very important to women. It is more than the right to have an abortion; it is the right to safe and affordable birth control methods, access to reproductive health care and the right against forced sterilization. Most of the time people think of reproductive choice as the right to have an abortion, but they aren’t looking at the whole picture. It’s much more than that. It involves the ability to plan out reproduction. If a woman doesn’t want to be pregnant but is sexually active then she should have access to affordable birth control methods and health care. This means that there will be fewer abortions since women have access to other ways to prevent pregnancy. It is important to understand that reproductive choice involves having choices in all stages of your life. It can be used to prevent pregnancies, to help get pregnant, and to make sure women always has access to reproductive health care. The problem is that most people think of it as only the right to have an abortion so they don’t support reproductive choice if they are against abortions. People need to understand that its more than that and that it deserves government funding to ensure that everyone (no matter what race and socioeconomic background) has access to reproductive options.

Poverty Stimulation

How did the overall exercise portray the hardships of low-income living for women and children in the United States?

The poverty stimulation should me how hard it is for low-income women and their children. The public agencies have money available to help, but there is a lot of red tape. It also takes vital time out of the women’s day to go to these different agencies to get help. After work the women usually have to help their children since the children are no longer in school and these low-income families can’t afford to pay for extra help or tutors. So it’s difficult for them to do everything they need to do without any additional help. These women are very stressed out in their day-to-day life just trying to make enough to pay the bills, get food, and care for their children. Little things, like the kids getting sick, now become a big deal since they don’t have insurance and the women might have to take time off of work to care for their children. These low-income families have little options even with the help of government agencies. It’s probably very difficult for the children too. They only have one parent and that parent is working long hours just to get by and probably has limited time for her children. With little supervision and help with school the children aren’t likely to be doing well in school. This is a repeating cycle in which the kids have a strong possibility of growing up and having to deal with the same things.

Explaining Occupational Segregation

It would rational to assume that occupational segregation decreases the wages of women relative to men through the fields and jobs women choose and the ones women are restricted from through gender socialization. It is illegal to pay men and women different wages for comparable jobs, but through segregation of labor markets men have a disproportionate amount of the jobs that require more skills and talent leading to higher wages for men. This is not done on purpose by most employers, employers are just use to men holding certain jobs and can sometimes be blind to the possibility of women doing the job. This applies to not only college graduate women, but all women in the labor force.
Through segregation women are restricted to a smaller amount of jobs. Barbara R. Bergmann, a professor of economics, uses an example of a Pink tribe and Blue tribe of the same talent, energy and luck that collect berries on an island. If the tribes spilt the island equally than each gatherer would bring back the same amount of berries. But if the Blue tribe is able to get a disproportionately larger share of the island than the Pink tribe then the workers from the Blue tribe would collect a larger amount of berries on average than the Pink tribe. Over time the Pink tribe will exploit their land trying to collect the same amount of berries as before. Their yields per-person will then be less than before causing the Pink tribe to have lower productivity than the Blue tribe. No one is telling the Pink tribe that they are getting less berries than the Blue tribe because they are Pink, but because of the rules that are in place. In Bergmann’s example, the berries a person gathers is his or her income. Since the Pink tribe has less territory to pick from their income is lower since they are less productive. In this example it is not because of a difference in human capital, but rather that certain workers are confined to lower productivity jobs. The Blue tribe does not have innate superior talents that give them more income, but they get more income because of segregation.

Western Feminism

When discussing Western Feminism in class it reminded me of Christian missionaries who went over the other countries to teach them about Christianity. The missionaries wanted to spread their message and increase the amount of Christians.
In India, missionaries came over to spread their message and they ran into Hinduism. Since Christianity and other Semitic religions have a certain structure to how they are run, the missionaries imposed this on Hinduism. Christianity has a holy book, a place or worship, and a Priest. So the missionaries looked at Hinduism through that lens. They changed the entire structure of Hinduism and how we view it today. For example the Vedas are the holy book, but most Hindus in India have never even heard of them or read them. It is very different from what the Bible is to Christians. But the problem with the missionaries was that they did not realize what they were doing; they were never taught a different way to see religion. This is a problem with Western Feminism also. We try to imagine what life is like in third-world countries but we can’t understand it and see their point of view unless we go there and live it. Western Feminist, like the Christian missionaries, are bringing their background and culture into societies that don’t think the same way we do. We are shaped by how we live and through our society that it is hard to see and understand how women in third-world countries think. That’s why I think dialogues are very important. Although it’s not as progressive as Western Feminism, it is needed before there can be change. Women all over the world need to understand each other before we can work together to help each other.

Gay and Lesbian Equality

Madison Equality came to speak about being gay/lesbian in general and at JMU. It was very interesting to hear their point of view. From the readings and their personal stories I have become aware that much has changed and people have become more open, but being gay still isn’t widely accepted as normal. From their stories it seems that coming out in high school was a lot more difficult because their friend base was a lot smaller. They lost a few friends and in general had trouble finding friends like them. In college it seems that they are more comfortable with their sexuality and sexual identity.
Now at JMU I think students are more open to homosexual couples. I think its easier for people to come out as gay and be open with being gay in college settings because its much more liberal. Groups like Madison Equality are doing a great job at bridging the gap between stereotypes and reality. I hope that people are slowly over time becoming more open and accepting of gay people. So that when we are old folks gay couples will be as accepted as straight couples. Now much of the young it open, but the older folks are still stuck in their ways. I hope this changes and that we all don’t grow up and become ignorant to change and stuck in our ways.

Privilege

When I worked at a country club I got to see a lot of class-based privilege. As one of the workers I wasn’t in the same class level as the members. And I was made it realize it everyday when I had to cater to the member’s every wants. The high-income members run the show since they elect the management, and if there are enough complaints from them you are fired. But because of their superior class status to all the employees who worked there they took advantage of us all the time. I worked as a hostess and there was one couple with an elementary school aged girl. The couple would want to eat in the nicer part of the restaurant that was 18 and up and had a dress code. So they would and they would leave their daughter at the hostess stand with me while they ate. They acted like it was part of my job, never compensated me for babysitting and never said thank you. Stuff like this happens all the time at the country club because the members feel like it was their right to do so. They feel that they are paying to belong here so they can do as they please. I felt powerless. I could not complain to the management because they will not stand up to the members. It is a bad system that I don’t support. It’s almost as if the members are living in a mini-bubble when they come there. They can do as they please, act however they want and they aren’t punished. I guess that’s how it works when you have money.

Romance and Relationships

In relationships women are pushing more for equality. We are breaking the traditional relationship norm of the active male asking out the passive female. Now women are asking men out, not ordering salads, and splitting the bill. But as pro-active as women have become, we still aren’t there yet. Now it is normal to split the bill, but it is still normal for the guy to pay, and it would be abnormal for the woman to pay for it all.
Women ask men out, but it is usually more rare and a big deal. I’ve asked guys out or made the first move and whenever I tell my friends about it they are slightly shocked because apparently I’m suppose to sit back and wait for Prince Charming. This happened recently and a week later my friend said I inspired her to ask out her crush. But we shouldn’t need inspiration. We shouldn’t feel like asking a guy out is a crazy notion. It should be normal by now. Men should ask out women. Women should ask out men. No one needs to wait for the other to make the first move.
Maybe we are stuck in traditional relationships because we have grown up watching Disney princess movies. This idea of what relationships should be like has been taught to us at such a young age that we feel like this is how it has to be. I guess at some point everyone has to realize that real life isn’t a movie, but how long will it take us?