Understanding "Others"

           I thought that the Narayan piece was very interesting and it really triggered the question for how we understand these foreign cultures. It was interesting that she had a hard time gaining acceptance from American women when comparing dowry-murders to domestic violence. When she first said that even I thought that it seemed like a strange comparison but after she went into more explanation it seemed to be a really good example. One thing that really stood out to me was the idea that because these women are killed by a fire our culture has a hard time finding that relatable since guns seem to be the method of choice. But both these deaths comes from domestic violence. However, because Americans don't understand the Indian culture the deaths by fire tend to be looked at in a more exotic nature.

          I also find that the way women look at domestic violence and the way Indian women look at domestic violence to be very interesting. In America the domestic violence that leads to death tends not to be look at as much as it is in Indian culture. Both having their main focus for solutions in different places as well. In America we have the shelters and other programs to help women, but I found it fascinating that Indian women explained that their State doesn't help women in the same way. While women from here suggest that they just start shelters or have more welfare just shows how much ignorance there is about the other world cultures.

We can take this ignorance and expand it from the issue of women's rights to just other international issues, problems, policy, cultures and how little we know and understand these cultures can have a drastic effect on our foreign policy or support issues. For example the Kony 2012 was a movement because of a video seen around the internet but yet this was not a new issue, nor was the video exactly telling the truth. There is a very lazy and complacent attitude about understanding "others".

Are we better?

What I love about political theory is that it is constantly giving me new perspectives on how to look at almost everything in our past, present and future.  For me, Narayan's article offered just that. I found that I couldn't help but agree with almost all her arguments and the evidence she supported them with was done very well. It made me think (once again here I am going back to my paper) about my paper, Okin and many of the things we touched on in class that day on multiculturalism. We see ourselves in Western societies as setting the example for other countries, particularly in the form of women's rights and protection. Our culture is more humanitarian, better developed, superior. Sometimes I have to wonder, especially after reading her piece, do we really have that much more? "Death by domestic violence in the US seems to be numerically as significant a social problem as dowry murders in India." As Narayan argues, Western societies see acts like dowry murder as horrifying and nothing like we see here in the US. "Burning a woman to death in the Indian context is no more exotic than shooting her to death in the US context." I feel like her argument is right, we are really just often times doing the same thing to women here in the US as they do in countries in India but just under different contexts. Women are dying from domestic violence in all countries, including the US. Are these cultures really in different than ours? Narayan does not believe so, and I can't help but kind of agree with her.

Dowry Murder

I was really struck by the Narayan article, which essentially explains how domestic violence in the United States and dowry-related burnings in India are not easily reconciled. This if for several reasons, but the one that suprised me the most was that women (or more broadly society in general) assign a certain cultural significance to the matter in which the act was carried out. Dowry murder is for some reason more easily explained as "death by culture", as women in the United States do not understand it as fatal domestic violence. Although the author points out that these types of murder are generally preceded by events that Americans would more typically define as domestic violence, the fact that they die by burning is somehow viewed as exotic. Fire, however, is not chosen as a culturally specific weapon but for its abillity to conceal forensics. Claiming the use of fire is culturally specific would be the equivalent of stating that fatal shootings in domestic violence are a uniquely American phenomenon, and as such can be explained away by "culture". I appreciated the article, because I had never thought of the ways in which violence towards women is justified (for lack of a better word) by culture when it more closely aligned with patriarchy. Which is almost universal. Therefore, we should be less focused on the ways in which women are abused and killed than on the social institutions that more or less allow it to occur under the cover of culture.

One of the ideas that was touched upon was in the Sontag article about the "culture of spectacle." (pg. 265) Sontag discusses in her article that it is quite possible that our "culture of spectacle" has numbed us to images of violence and we react with detachment and apathy. Though Sontag doesn't fully outline the "culture of spectacle," I extracted that this is the way in which our culture has saturated itself with constant violent images and stories through the news media as well as the way in which violence is used as a form of entertainment. Sontag talked about how we are drawn to such spectacles, yet we are also repulsed by this desire (pg. 264). This is an interesting thought because of the increasing popularity of violent entertainment that include movies (Saw, Hostel, anything Quentin Tarantino) and video games. If anything, I would say that Sontag is incorrect for the most part in saying that images of violence make us feel more compelled to take action. I think that in most cases, people are detached: They don't know the people and to care about every single instance of violence one hears or reads about in the news would be an extremely heavy burden to carry. I understand that Sontag is trying to defend those who make these images and she is trying to stress how important these images are, and I agree that they are important but this "culture of spectacle" has made us feel apathetic to violence. I am not sure if most people allow themselves to be "haunted" by these images. Violence as entertainment may be a large part of why a "culture of spectacle" exists, but it is alongside these very real images of violence around the world. It is becoming increasingly difficult for me to distinguish what is entertainment in the news and what part of it is genuinely trying to get people to care about these cases of violence. Often, it seems as though the news media capitalizes on the fact that people are drawn by violence--and the most extreme of cases--to sell papers or entice viewers. I am not thinking that we should immerse ourselves in solving every issue of violence we hear about, I am only suggesting that it is highly disturbing that we have turned human suffering into something we entertain ourselves with and respond to lightly in many cases. On page 272, Sontag says "we now have a vast repository of images that make it harder to maintain this kind of moral defectiveness." I would argue that this has forced most to become more detached. It also seems that there is much more evidence to say that our moral defectiveness has increased because of our use of violence as entertainment. 

Just FYI -- World Issues Forum: "Is Internet a vector of freedom or an instrument of repression? Lessons from the Arab Spring, China, Mexico, the USA"

Shirley Osterhaus Sent: Friday, May 18, 2012 7:25 AM To: ; Attachments: 5-23.pdf‎ (238 KB‎)[Open as Web Page]

We are delighted to have Delphine Halgand, Washington DC Director of Reporters without Border, as our final speaker for the Spring World Issues Forum.  Please help spread the word on this important topic: “Is internet a vector of freedom or an instrument of repression? Lessons from the Arab Spring, China, Mexico, the USA.” Wednesday, May 23, Noon-1:20pm, Fairhaven College Auditorium                                      7:00-9:00 AW 210 (Sponsored by AS Social Issues Resource Center) The fight for online freedom of expression is more essential than ever. The Arab Spring has clearly shown that the Internet is a vehicle for freedom. In countries where the traditional media are controlled by the government, the only independent news and information are to be found on the Internet, which has become a forum for discussion and a refuge for those who want to express their views freely. However, governments are realizing this and are trying to control the Internet and stepping up surveillance of Internet users. Netizens are being targeted by government reprisals. More than 120 of them are currently detained for expressing their views freely online, mainly in China, Iran and Vietnam. (Co-sponsors:  Fairhaven College and Reporters without Borders)

Reading assignments for the next two weeks...

[FYI -- I changed the syllabus even a little bit more. I took off the Moallem and added the Scarry and Sontag. Let me know if you have any questions]

Week 9— Culture, Freedom, and Gender

5/22, Tuesday

--Uma Narayan,”Cross-Cultural Connections, Border Crossings, and “Death by Culture” in Dislocating Cultures (1997), pp. 83-96. ON ELECTRONIC COURSE RESERVE

--Saba Mahmood, “Feminism, democracy, and empire : Islam and the war of terror ” ON ELECTRONIC COURSE RESERVE

--Susan Sontag, “War and Photography” ON ELECTRONIC COURSE RESERVE

--Elaine Scarry, Chapter 1, “The Structure of Torture: The Conversion of Real Pain into the Fiction of Power,” in The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World, 1985, 27-59 ON ELECTRONIC COURSE RESERVE

--Minoo Moallem “Transnationalism, Feminism and Fundamentalism”, in Women, gender, religion: a reader, Elizabeth Anne Castelli, Rosamond C. Rodman

Week 10—Power and Politics

5/29, Tuesday

– rough draft due

--peer reviews

--student paper meetings in class

self-empowerment

I was definitely taken aback when I started reading Laura Mamo's article. Do it yourself artificial insemination? I had not idea that used to be such a simple process. It also then amazed me then when she went on to explain how the process had changed and continued to over the years. Esther, in the beginning was self-empowered, able to attempt to conceive on her own. Just a little later, she is a patient with a 'condition' of infertility. She was no longer able to conceive on her terms, and she loses a part of her power. Is it good that she had to go to the clinics to get the sperm that was once so easily accessed? Although I am no doctor and cannot speak medically about the potential reasonings as to why this changed (which I am inclined to think there really aren't a whole lot), it makes me think of just another way that men are trying to control women's bodies. I feel like when we take away rights like these, we are taking away women's control of their own bodies, their own lives. I think of the many people in WEstern societies who criticize other more conservative, religious countries for their lack of rights for women and I think- are we a whole lot better in some ways? Obviously, yes women do have a lot more opportunity and rights here. But still ultimately there are so many ways, like this issue of artificial insemination, abortion, contraception, that take away self-empowerment of women and make them seem like second-class citizens, incapable of making their own decisions about their own bodies.

Organize on the basis of Motherhood?

I thought the idea of women being able to mobilize strictly on a basis of shared gender experiences (motherhood, in particular) was an interesting one. Ruddick essentially argues that maternal thinking is the antithesis to violence, and therefore should be investigated as it pertains to nonviolence in politics. Coincidentally, one of the student panels I attended last Tuesday for the PSA conference referenced a similar phenomenon currently unfolding in Japan. The "mothers of Fukushima" are a group of women who have used their status as mothers to protest in a way that would ordinarily be seen as more threatening by the state. They essentially make their arguments against the dangers of nucler reactors from their platform as mothers, as nuclear disastors (radiation poisoning, be it through air, water, soil, ect..) statistically effect them more than adult men. However, at some point you have to ask what is the cost of uniting as mothers. Although its wonderful that women have found a political voice in the patriarchal society, it essentially discounts women who can't have children, who don't want children, identify themselves as lesbians, and so on. Therefore in even being able to voice their opinions they are reaffirming the only gender roles that the government finds favorable enough to be used in protest. It's hard to say whether its worth having a voice as this cost, and whether these women are not complacent in their male defined roles as they recognize and intentionally use the fact that as mothers they are treated differently in society...or if organizing themselves soley on the basis of motherhood actually limits what they will be able to accomplish in the long run.

Motherhood and Sexual Beings

What I got from a few of the readings is that being a mother or being able to conceive is power for a woman. But I don't think that being a mother is everything and a woman shouldn't base her worth over it. Some women really want to have kids while others don't...either option is fine but there is power in both choices. It is an awful position to be in when you want to have a child but aren't able. But the fact that we can do artificial insemination and other such procedures should be empowering that you can overcome that obstacle. I think that women who find power in being a mother is great it isn't something that we should look down on as a weakness or something. But it just isn't the only thing. 

Women should be looked at as owning their bodies. I know Petchesky,  brings up that it make women seem like property if its looked upon that way. But the thing is, is that we do own our bodies. Just like a man own's his body. I think it is strange how there is a double lens of how we view words as applied to women and the same words applied to a man. I accept that there is a disparity in those regards and I think that that is one of the biggest problems facing women in their battles. 

On a different note I thought that this was pretty interesting from Spiraling Discourses... : 

      "Still, the campaigns around "women's human rights" have generally flourished- that is, gained the widest acceptance- when they parade the worst horrors (sexual violence, genital mutilation, forced pregnancy or forced abortions, sexual trafficking, etc.) and therefore capitalize on the image of women as victims....Does this victimizing tendency sometimes evade, or even mirror, more than it directly confronts fundamentalist images of women?" 

I think that is something I would like to talk about in class and hear what everyone's opinion is. 

From empowerment to patients

What I found interesting in the Mamo article was the transition of Esther from self-empowered to a patient. It was a different approach to women being empowered or dis-empowered in relation to their fertility. Most of what we hear is the right to control our reproductive system through birth control and abortion and feeling empowered through being able to use those methods. In Esther's story, her self-empowerment dissipated when she was unable to conceive. What this meant to me is that women are empowered in their ability to either bring life or not bring life into the world. With Esther, she was transformed into a patient and couldn't conceive a child in her own home by herself. She had turned to the clinics and was willing to be turned into a patient because she was desperate to bear a child. She left the conceiving up to the doctors and lost her empowerment. This brought to mind the idea that when women are left with little to no option for birth control, they are essentially becoming patients like Esther, only they are patients of the state. The state limits the methods of birth control and thus forces women into the designation of patient. I had never thought about reproductive rights in this respect before. I had not given much thought to the idea that women who could not have children would feel less empowered when turning to doctors to make them pregnant.

For kicks and giggles

While I'm at it... here is a funny or die video that I thought was funny for reproductive rights

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/87be7156f5/republicans-get-in-my-vagina

"Mistake of Letting Women Vote"

Oh boy. This is all this man makes me say. Here is an article I just came across you may be interested in reading.

Topics: fox news ♦ Jesse Lee Peterson ♦ Peterson

Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, a Fox News contributor, tea party activist and personal friend of Sean Hannity’s said in a sermon recently published to YouTube that America’s greatest mistake was allowing women the right to vote, adding that back in “the good old days, men knew that women are crazy and they knew how to deal with them.”

In the video, published to YouTube in March, Peterson explains that he believes women simply can’t handle “anything,” and that in his experience, “You walk up to them with a issue, they freak out right away. They go nuts. They get mad. They get upset, just like that. They have no patience because it’s not in their nature. They don’t have love. They don’t have love.”

Despite his statements being online for more than a month, Hannity welcomed Peterson on his show last Tuesday to castigate the Obama administration over “taking credit” for the Osama bin Laden assassination — but the segment didn’t exactly go as planned.

In his March sermon, Peterson adds thatSandra Fluke, a Georgetown Law student who recently spoke to a House Democratic hearing on contraception coverage, was actually revealing “all the sex” college students are having. “It’s really all about maintaining the freedom to kill babies in the womb,” he says. “Women are now degraded. Women have no shame.”

At roughly 8:30 into his 12-minute sermon, he doubles down, amazingly, saying that he believes America went wrong when it gave women the right to vote.

“I think that one of the greatest mistakes America made was to allow women the opportunity to vote,” Peterson says. “We should’ve never turned this over to women. And these women are voting in the wrong people. They’re voting in people who are evil who agrees with them who’re gonna take us down this pathway of destruction.”

“And this probably was the reason they didn’t allow women to vote when men were men. Because men in the good old days understood the nature of the woman,” he adds. “They were not afraid to deal with it. And they understood that, you let them take over, this is what would happen.”

Peterson, founder of the conservative religious group Brotherhood Organization of A New Destiny (BOND), appeared on the Fox News Channel on May 1, more than a month after giving his controversial sermon. Fox News host Kirsten Powers even confronted Peterson about his “mysogynistic” speech and challenged Hannity to repudiate it, but the Republican opinion host did not, and instead gave Peterson a platform to denounce “liberal, women policies.”

That may not be a surprise, however: Hannity has hosted Peterson numerous times and even serves on BOND’s advisory board. “BOND continues to fight the good fight standing for the values of God, family, and country, and are deserving of our support,” he said, according to the group.

Speaking to Peterson on May 1, Powers protested his appearance on Hannity’s show, explaining that she was “hijacking” it because “I didn’t know I was going to be on with him.” She then accused him of “using God’s word to teach misogyny.”

“I don’t know if you noticed or not, but the liberal Democrat womens are calling themselves whores,” Peterson replied. “They came out with their so called group of women who are within the Democrat party, and they are admitting that they’re whores and they are saying that they are proud of it. I’m okay with that, I just don’t want to pay for it.”

“I have a responsibility to tell the truth,” he added “You’re on the side of lies. Why shouldn’t I be on the side of truth? And it’s the truth that’s gonna make us free. Somebody gotta tell the truth, so I’m going to tell the truth.”

That “truth,” it would seem, isn’t just about liberal women, or even women in general. Peterson made headlines in January after telling a Huffington Post reporter that he would like to see black people put “back on the plantation so they would understand the ethic of working… They need a good hard education on what it is to work.” On his website, Peterson has published an open letter to Attorney General Eric Holder that advocates the arrest of New Black Panthers members.

In another post, he explains what he calls “the end of one-sided defense,” in which Peterson insists that men should re-take the right to physically strike women. “While I certainly do not sanction men attacking women, neither is it right for men to allow themselves to be beaten by a woman,” he wrote. “It’s time for men to re-assert their right to self defense.”

Peterson has also been on the leading edge of racially-motivated Republican attacks on Planned Parenthood, alleging at a press conference in 2008 that the group is responsible for killing “over 1,500 black babies” every day.

Neither Peterson nor a Fox News spokesperson responded to requests for comment.

(H/T: RH Reality Check)

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/05/07/fox-news-contributor-laments-mistake-of-letting-women-vote/