Open Thread

7 Responses to Open Thread

1. Karen L says:

   February 16, 2012 at 3:37 pm

   After rereading Renee Martin’s 2011 post about Valentine’s Day (http://www.womanist-musings.com/2011/02/motherhood-and-my-valentines-failure.html), I resolved to discuss with my 4-y.o. the Valentine cards he received, expecting lots of hetero-normativity and gender performance messages (read: Princesses TM) plus some consumerism. So I planned ahead two questions:
   1 – Why do all the cards with pairs of people have one boy and one girl?
   2 – Why are all the girls wearing dresses? What does that have to do with love/Valentine’s day? (okay three questions)
   And then, to my surprise, NONE of his cards had a boy-girl pair. In fact, the only pairs were Pooh and Piglet (both supposedly male) and Tigger and Eyeore (also both supposedly male). and NONE of the cards had girls in dresses. The only human girl was fishing and wearing red overalls.
   So, I did come up with: Why do you think that most of the cards that were bought (lots were hand-made) have characters or products on them?
2. K says:

   February 18, 2012 at 9:29 am

   I’m wondering about the Morgan Freeman anti-black-history-month meme that’s going around Facebook. I like & support black history month for a variety of reasons, just as I like and support women’s history month, and LGBT month (disclaimer: I’m a white lesbian).

   When asked how to end racism if not through efforts like black history month, Freeman replied, “Stop talking about it.” I couldn’t disagree more.

   So my question is twofold: one, is Morgan Freeman right? and two, as a white woman, am I allowed to disagree with him?

   Thanks!
3. E says:

   February 21, 2012 at 4:06 pm

   I was looking up some local YMCA programs for J (t-ball, etc.) and saw in their program guide “Indian Guides and Princesses” WTF? Looked into it and the national Y (finally) dropped this program about a decade ago because it’s racist. So I sent an email to the SC Y director, asking why they are continuing a program that was discontinued by their parent organization. He replied that he’d love to sit and talk with me about the program and how it looks and functions. Think I’ll ask the national Y why they allow it to continue.
4. Julia says:

   February 21, 2012 at 4:59 pm

   Oh boy, E. Buckle your seatbelt for an “it’s not really racist or sexist” argument. Uck.
5. E says:

   February 21, 2012 at 9:34 pm

   I’m a South Carolina native. I’ve heard that lots of times. But if the national Y dropped it because of the offensive, stereotypical portrayal of Native Americans (yes, yes, even though it was meant to be positive), then why does it still continue in some locations? I see the Ys in Greenville (a very white Republican bastion) have switched to the national’s Adventure Guides, and the Charleston Y (also very Republican) have dropped the Indian in favor of “Y-Guides” though they still use “tribe” as an organizational designation.

   Also I hate the gender separation in the old program – guides vs princesses.
6. mary says:

   February 22, 2012 at 11:09 am

   Had a lovely weekend in the big city of Seattle. I always love visiting a big city with my kids because of the diversity that we see. In fact my husband, who is white, momentarily lost sight of me and the boys at IKEA, mainly due to the fact that for once we were not the only people of color in the store! Ha! Being in a culturally diverse city is like wearing a warm blanket to me, I am not just standing there naked-my brown skin on display for EVERYONE to notice….I simply blend in. Back to the other side of the state, where we live. So not diverse.
   My children and I attended a “Fat Tuesday Jazz Mass” last night. I love our church, however last night, I was incredibly aware of just how “alone” the 3 of us are, quite often. In the congregation of 200-300 people last night, I looked out into a vast sea of white faces, all very friendly of course. A boy on the way home said, “Mom, there are so many more brown people that live in Seattle…..” The other boy then piped up, “yah, we are like the only ones at church tonight.” And this is why our surroundings bum me out…because my kids now notice and they actually lament the fact that our hometown is not very diverse.
7. kate m says:

   February 26, 2012 at 8:56 pm

   @K – Interesting questions. I at once agree and disagree with both you and Morgan Freeman on this issue. Like you, I absolutely disagree with Freeman that the way to end racism is to “stop talking about it.” I think we need to be talking about it more. For this reason, I’m also not a huge fan of Black History Month (or any other “history months”). It’s not that I think they’re necessarily harmful; it’s just that I think they are not nearly enough, and that their continuing presence, particularly in our schools, serves as an opt-out for the much more vital project of developing truly inclusive curricula throughout the entire year.