Out of Character

Earlier today I was at Borders perusing through the magazines with a good friend and I stumbled upon the feminist magazine entitled bitch. I had read this magazine before, but not on a regular basis. I decided to pick it up and have a look. Its interesting that a feminist magazine uses the derogatory term for female and in a sense reclaims it and makes it something positive or at least... useful.

Generally it is uncharacteristic of me to pay attention to gender issues. Not to say that I care not at all, but I do not really care enough to think about them on a daily basis, or really frequently at all. It just does not concern me that much.

I found myself lately however contemplating gender roles regarding sexual relationships and thus found myself compelled to read this article in bitch magazine entitled, "After an orgasmless generation, was 2009 the year hip hop reinvented sex? (or at least noticed that two people can get off during it?)."

The article discusses how rap and hip hop music has historically portrayed women as sex objects and merely receptacles. The beginning of the article quotes, "Bitches ain't shit but hoes and tricks lick on these nuts and such the dick, and get the fuck out after you're done. Girl your legs keep shakin' you know I'm proud lookin' in your lovely face scream my name, you do it so loud."

Generally, I'm all about gender roles...like they don't bother me terribly as they do some women. But something about sexual inequality really frankly ticks me off. Because I think all too often, this sexual inequality can morph into sexual violence and I do think that is an issue worth addressing.

The article leaves you with:

Ideally, treating women respectfully shouldn't have to be a conscious business decision, but

in an industry that's selling first and foremost, an image, this particular one-- women getting off and men wanting them to-- is a big step forward. Like the more misogynist music before it, the recent bump in songs about doing right by the ladies sets up a self- reinforcing paradigm of what men should want and what women should get.

Absolutely...

The way african american music culture has treated women has always troubled me. And I'm happy to see some changes.

But for now, I'll get back in the kitchen and do something cooking and cleaning.

Lessons Learned and Messages Received

To be frank I have better days. I have had much better days than today.

I stood and looked at myself in the mirror and thought, "how did my life get to this point? how did my decisions make the paths that they have lately?"

Some of the decisions made and behaviors developed as of late are good and wonderful, others are self-destructive.

Today was a necessary reality check. Some lessons have to be learned the hard way.

Character building, no? I feel like my character has been pretty well built. I feel like my character is a fortress at this point. Physical pain, however is more difficult for me to cope with than emotional pain. Mind as fortress; body as delicate flower.

Oh New College, do I have some haterade for you.

This evening as my good friend Leila Shooshani and I ventured our way onto campus to do some friendly upperclassman lurking, I once again pondered the truly bizarre nature of the place that for whatever... unknown reason I chose to go to college.

Every year during the first freshman dorm meetings where the RAs babble about... whatever, a group of upperclassmen streak through all three Pei courtyards. I guess a lot of people are aware of this tradition before it occurs. As a 17 year old college freshman I was not cognizant of this event. Over 30 naked people jumping literally right over me was quite a new experience for me. The whole time I was hoping that no one would fall while they were jumping over my head.

Three years later, as I stood in the 2nd court of Pei with Lei, I found myself having similar thoughts of what the hell is going on in this school. This place is still very strange to me, and I've never quite gotten rid of my initial skepticism of the happenings here that many confuse as culture. Perhaps the group of 700 plus socially inept, yet mostly brilliant students do possess a culture, but it is for sure not one that I entirely understand or enjoy.

I just don't get it. As time passes, and I've had more opportunities to interact with other college students of the more mainstream tradition, the more I realize I don't fit here. Maybe I like social norms. Shit, maybe I even like gender roles on occasion, like wednesday afternoons. I don't want to be intellectual all the time. I don't want to be around counterculture all the time. I need something different something more....

I'm trying to view my time here as a period of anecdote collection and character building. A lot of people having a hard time believing this place exists. Tonight I found myself wondering the same thing.

Not that New College of Florida has been altogether useless, I have met some really wonderful people here. The list is short though.

Even though this summer had its annoying people and bad moments, It was for sure the best summer of my life. And I hope the people who were there that made it that way and impacted me and my life know it.

And to think I almost didn't go to Madison. How less rich my life would be.