Watch the video:

…Besides the obvious sexual stereotyping, the normalization of being “tough” (tough enough to throw a car over a bridge) and the women being seen as weak… this is just unhealthy crappy food.

The men refuse to eat healthy foods because that’s just for chicks. In one of the ads in this set there is even an appearance of a Hummer that displays manly behavior and validates one of the men as being a real man.

This promotes unhealthy eating habits and stupid gender stereotypes. The last thing that men need nailed into their brains is that eating a greasy 1000 calorie hunk of disgusting meat validates them as a man. The excuse of those who made the ads as quoted in Consumer Reports was “We feel comfortable that consumers will not make diet choices based on seeing a 30 second humorous commercial” … Well, I hate to tell you this, but that’s what ads are for.

Whether this is meant to be funny or over looked you have to consider the facts. 30% of Americans are clinically obese while 38% of them have some form of cardiovascular disease. A whopping 71% of American men are over weight. Considering statistics like that, it might not be such a horrible idea to put the Burger King away and chow down on some carrot sticks. Forget what “other men” might think of you and consider your health and your body.

…First it was Columbine, then Virginia Tech. What’s next?With unthinkable atrocities occurring these days with increasing frequency and
intensity, we must ask ourselves, what’s changed in our culture that allows such
needless and senseless tragedies to occur?To put it simply: People imitate pop culture and pop culture lacks morals and now pop culture has come home to roost.

This is not to say that everyone who sees a violent film will act out violently but
it is undeniable that the stars we emulate and the films we watch can have strong influence on us.

One solution to this problem is for moral Americans to take back the movie industry for the good of our nation and our youth, the future leaders of our nation.

So, what does it take for Hollywood to “repent” and start producing decent movies once again? Money. They need to see clean-cut films turn a profit. And that cannot happen unless decent people turn out to see decent films when they are released.

This was an e-mail that I got from a Mr. Tim Bueler. His solution to the Virginia Tech shooting is to start producing Christian movies, because you know - the movie Passion of the Christ had all of what? 20 minutes without violence? Oh, but he was dying for our sins. Right. Sorry.

My guess is that the VT shooter actually didn’t watch a whole lot of movies - but the sounds of things, he did a whole lot of nothing but school work before the massacre.

The definition of what a “man” is isn’t really ever discussed - but I really don’t think that the usual culprits of stereotyping, body image and personality were a factor here. Generally speaking men seek power through the use of a gun and taking the life of other people. In this case, I don’t think the violet behavior was spawned from “immoral” television or being tormented through all of high school for being a loser. It sounds more like it was his childhood that fucked him up.

I guess that’s why I’ve always been such a supporter of planned parenthood - in the sense that people are ready for the child, have been taught how to raise the child and feel emotionally stable enough to bring another person into the world.

Anyway - more christian movies aren’t going to stop school shootings. Christians kill too. And christian morals teach people to hate others who are not like them.

Edit: And actually, if you watch his video of his manifesto - there is already quite a bit of religion at the forefront of his mind.

On: Geography, Vaginas, Men, The Environment, Gender Studies and Moving Across the Country! WOO!

There is a ton of stuff floating around the ’sphere that I’ve totally been missing out on - but I can’t seem to sit myself down for long enough to write about all of it. …Exams are over (well I have one more, but its on Canadian Geography. Ha.) but the radio is bustin’ my butt.

However - that hasn’t stopped my head from spinning. READY!?

Read on!

Read the rest of this entry »

And I have one really fantastic reason as to why and a few pretty pathetic ones. The good reason is that next week is Fun Drive at the station. It’s an entire week devoted to all us DJs saying “send up money, please!” and it takes a TON of preparation. I have to do 18 hours of programming on the 16th, so I’ve been busting my butt to try and find people to fill slots and trying to decide how I’m going to raise a ton of money in about 3 or 4 days.

The pathetic reasons… My facebook wall just got loaded with messages from people who I actually want to talk to, not just send a wimpy “hey, I’m good” facebook message back. So I’ve been calling and e-mailing them. Also… I’ve got the Sims up and running on my computer again. I have about 3 families that I’m pretty addicted to playing right now… and that gets pretty time consuming. I played today for at least 7 hours. So pathetic, I’m aware.

Yesterday I did get an essay done about Chinatown. I think I’ll edit it a little bit and post it, because I got pretty pissed off while writing it. Tomorrow I *plan* on writing a post about my experience with a couple girls who have eating disorders… The *plan* is to do that at work tomorrow since Kathleen has planned the show yet again for Women on Air, but somethings the plan just doesn’t work out - but I’ll try.

Thursday I’m pretty much open… but I want to attempt to write a paper for my Geography of Canada class. It isn’t due for about 2 or 3 more weeks, but I’ll be booked solid next week, so it’ll be nice to be able to chill the following week and not worry about papers and such.

So to make up for my lack of posting I will direct you toward really REALLY good reads - amidst all my planning, gaming and sleeping I read these posts. Wooo.

 A post on porno!

A post on gender and stereotyping!

A post on male feminists!

A post on crazy christians!

Communist Mario!? merci to salt.

A lot of these topics I’d really like to weigh in on, so hopefully I’ll be able to do that very soon… I obviously have strong opinions on all the opinion pieces that I linked to - it’s just a matter of staying awake long enough to type them all out.

on that note…i tip my hat and bid thee farewell for the evening.

Someone e-mailed me a really good question… They asked me "what exactly do you mean when you say ‘hegemonic’ masculinities?"

Really quickly I’ll just explain what that basically means. The term hegemony was coined by this fella Antonio Gramsci. It is when a particular social group holds power or dominates another group. In the context I use it in, it is perpetuating stereotypes and constantly reaffirming ones position in society through status, wealth and power. It is constantly pushed by the media and creates a status quo which is always displayed in school, businesses, politics, the military… etc.

The mass media gives the watcher no contorl over "social norms"… the watcher is thus not a citizen, it is a consumer. And that’s all that matters. But this means that people are governed by the rules and principles set forth by the big media organizations whom press these stereotypes or ‘hegemonic characteristics’ into our minds.

This is done with race, very often. A black man is often seen as ‘the other’, because he is a threat to the white mans power and the ‘white mans women’. Ever since the end of slavery there has been a fear of the African Americans taking economic control away from the white guys. So you get these stereotypes that black men are irrational, stupid and only good for basketball and music and that they’re trying to take the white woman away from the white man.

These are all historically rooted in slavery, especially the notion that blacks are less intelligent and more musical than whites. They slaves weren’t taught how to read - so they sang to express their thoughts and feelings. They were basically forced to be stupid and musical - so keeping that characteristic in check today is incredibly racist, but is done to give the white guy superiority and domination over the black man.

Also, porn magazines like Hustler give us the impression that the black man is violently taking away the white woman. Their cartoons sport white women being brutally fucked by black men. The women have bleeding and throbbing cunts, and the black man (usually with very ape like features) has a giant cock that he is throwing around. The white man, on the other hand, is always small and impotent. He has to fuck chickens or buy white women from a black pimp. This is enforcing the idea that the black man is going to take away from the white man something that was perviously his for free. It is instilling fear of the black into the white which helps to enforce stereotypes.

I got a little side tracked, but basically when I say something like "hegemonic masculinities" I mean the dominant stereotypical characteristics that are portrayed around what it takes to be a ‘real man’. White, agressive, non-emotional, rational and knows how to work a gun. If you’re not these things - you are ‘the other’.

So there, a very long clarification for termonology used in posts past.