10 things in the media

Television: Race
Grey’s Anatomy: Thursday (re-run) 2/26 8:00 P.M.
Dr. Yang is talking about how hard she has worked to become a doctor while overcoming her race and gander alike. I chose race because she is one of the only Japanese women on display in any show I have watched.

Television Movie: Gender
Flirting with forty: Monday feb 23 5:00 P.M.
This is a lifetime movie of a forty year old woman who is put down and divorced by her husband because she is looking old. Then she meets a younger man who helps her discover her inner, younger side but accepts her for her age.

Magazine: Gender
People Magazine: Octo-mom (all weekly magazines)
This is a story of a woman who is being accused of being obsessed with being pregnant and overly emotional because she is a single mom.

Televison commercial: Gender
Mr. Clean commercial’s on all the time
It says that the product is a “ladies man” and that is putting women down by saying you are the housewives.

Television: Race
Jon and Kate Plus Eight Sunday 2/22 8:00 P.M.
Kate talks about how a lot of people ask her all the time are you mad that your kids got your husbands genes and not yours? Asks her to discuss it

Film: Gender
Iron Jawed Angels Tuesday 2/23 at 6:00 P.M.
For one of my women’s studies classes I had to watch this movie and it is all about women trying to gain their rights. It portrays these women as weak and immobile, but we find out at the end just how big of an impact they make.

Experience: Race
Wednesday 2/24 at 3:00 P.M.
For my class, we are doing a survey on why African American women are at a higher risk of cancer than white women. When we gave the survey out to African American women, some of them got offended because we were trying to understand. One girl said “You wont ever understand because you are white.”

Cosmopolitan Magazine: Gender
This month (I read it on Tuesday 2/23 at around 1 p.m.
The first ad I encountered was a woman with barely any clothes on and a man standing over her looking down on her. This is a clear indication that the man is better than her and he is not just physically looking down at her.

Personal Experience: Race
Thursday 2/26 4:00 p.m.
Also for my campaigns class, we were asked to contact the president of the Pan-Hellenic society for African American women. When we contacted her, she asked us why we just wanted to survey black women? It was a shock to us that she was asking a question like that and we really didn’t know a good way to respond. There was definitely a barrier.

TV show: Wife Swap
Wednesday 2/25 6:00 pm.
There was a situation where a white women went into a black family and she had a cookie jar that was supposed to represent “mama.” The white woman mocked it because it basically represented that all she was good for was cooking. So it could be a racial or a gender issue.




After doing this assignment, I was surprised at how much stereotypes exist on all of the shows, stations and magazines that I read and watch. I was equally surprised to notice how oblivious I was to them. They are all around me and yet, I fail to notice. When I had to face that social problem from my campaigns research study, it was hard to accept that these women didn’t want to partake because they felt offended they were being asked by a white woman. It was completely shocking and awakening at the same time. I found out that people don’t always want to talk about their race because I could use it against them. These images and actions shows on TV and in magazines really are hurting our society by making it seem like these things are ok. Last time I checked women of color and not of color have the same rights and women in general have the same rights as men.


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I recommend all women watch the movie Iron Jawed Angels. Its amazing!!