Over the past years Halloween costumes have gotten more and more extreme and creative. The costume that has caused some controversy is the pregnant nun costume. Many people find it humorous while some get offended because it deals with religion. What’s your take?
A Mexican edition Playboy was decided to be published for a December issue. They thought it would be great to have the model Maria Florencia Onori pose as the Virgin Mary, but instead caused such a big controversy. Do you think that this is just an act of Renaissance, as stated from Playboy? Or do you think that Playboy should have known the mother of god should have not been shown this way?
In "Thinking About Sex, or Not" Pamela Paul showcases a study called “Sex on the Brain?: An Examination of Frequency of Sexual Cognitions as a Function of Gender, Erotophilia, and Social Desirability,” by Terri D. Fisher, Zachary T. Moore and Mary-Jo Pittenger, The Journal of Sex Research 
In the article "Senegal Curbs a Bloody Rite for Girls and Women", Celia W. Dugger relays the story of a movement. Over 5000 Senegalese villages have abandoned the practice of female genital cutting. Far from the success stemming from white, Western funds and values, the wave has been largely an educational one, spurred by inter-village linkages and facilitated by organizations such as Tostan, which funds runs the educational program.
There are many videos on youtube criticizing the methods of advertisement industries and their portrayals of woman. They all try to show the sexuality that is prevalent through the media, and the effect it has on the audience. One video in particular chose a set of provocative, but demeaning advertisements, and coupled them with statistics about sexual assault. After several of these, a quote by Oscar Wilde appears on screen, stating “Life imitates art far more than art imitates life.” This quote totally changes the viewers perspective on everything they just saw. At first you saw the add portraying two pale, gaunt young women with heavy black eye makeup, dressed in fancy stylish dresses, snorting lines of white powder that has been arranged in the form of a cute tank-top, and you think “it is disgusting that advertisements take advantage of that culture to sell clothes.” But after reading Oscars quote, you start to wonder how much of that culture exists because of advertisements that glorify it. how do we separate the two? Is it possible to tell weather culture is influenced more by the adds we see, or if the adds we see are influenced more by culture? There are two adds depicted which both portray women with bodies that are simply physically impossible (one depicted above). One shows nothing more than a topples anorexic photographed from the back, with her fingers wrapping around her stomach and appearing on the left side of her spine, caressing the bones which shoot through her back. The only thing visible in the background is a toilet bowl, and she appears to be sitting on the ground. The word, obsession is printed at the top, and “for women” at the bottom. While I imagine this must be sexy to someone, to me it appears disgusting. Are these ads imitating what society has deemed appealing, or are they telling society what should be appealing. Do most people who view it think the same thing I did. “Well that’s kinda gross, but she must be sexy because it’s on an advertisement.” do we actually develop attraction for our selves, or does society just make the decision for us?
In the video why men and women cant be friends, two young film makers set out to answer the question can men and women really be just friends. The do this by interviewing people at the Utah state university library. The video starts off with the interviewer asking several attractive young women if men and women can be just friends. They all confidently answer yes, and the film soon switches to a series of men struggling with they question. Some of them giggle or scoff, some of them attempt to rationalize there feelings, but the answer they give is ultimately no. The general consensus amongst them men was that they can not control who they are attracted to, and while their behavior may remain friendly, they’re desires do not. Out of the fellows interviewed, one seemed to really convey the point well, in both language and tone. He explains,” I mean were all men, so of cores were going to have those feelings... And we can be content with just friendship… and we can be silent, regarding those feelings, but were gonna have them.” The long pauses between phases, His uncomfortable mannerisms, and the matter-of-factness in his voice all perfectly represent the essence of how it feels to hide intimate feelings for a good friend. The discrepancy in answers between men and woman first appears to point to the conclusion that women like to believe their male friends have the best intentions, and the girls underestimate their true feelings. The interviewer then begins to ask the girls if they have ay close guy friends right now, and if they think he is interested in them romantically, or at least would take advantage of an opportunity to sleep with them. Most of the girls barely miss a beat before saying, “well… yeah”, or “of cores.” They are not at all disillusioned to the fact that their male “friends” desire them sexually, they just have learned to put up with it. ‘learned to put up with it’ is not really accurate. For they do not view it as a burden or as strange, that is simply built into their understanding of friendship with a man. The true difference is that men and women seem to view the concept of “friendship” with someone from the opposite sex as differently. For men, intimate feelings change the nature of the relationship: a world of repressed love and suffering in silence does not equate to friendship. But for women, the two are not mutually exclusive. Maybe it is because for the average women, most of her male friends want the relationship to be intimate, and if she were to reject every one of their friendships, she would have no male friends, and this causes the two concepts to blend together in her psyche. Women and men simply understand the meaning of friendship differently. What do you think, can men and women be friends?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_lh5fR4DMA
Summary: Paving the way for the Disney “princess” culture, Andy Mooney, Disney Consumer Product’s chairman, saw little girls generically dressed as princesses at a “Disney on Ice” show and was inspired to produce a new identity (Johnson 1). In 2000, he oversaw the Disney Consumer Products’ project, which focused on Disney Princesses, a recently growing franchise with $4 billion in worldwide retail sales (Disney Consumer Product 1). All of the Disney’s princesses—Ariel, Belle, Cinderella, Jasmine, Mulan, Pocahontas, Rapunzel, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, and Tiana—are banded “together in a comprehensive collection of fantasy-based girls’ entertainment and products called the Disney Princess brand” (Disney Consumer Product 1) Now, that same group has everything from costumes and toys to bedspreads and home ornaments. Disney’s ultimate marketing strategy is to target their prime customers: girls.
Analysis: All the princesses, save for the aberrant few, have to some extent sold themselves in order to obtain the happy ending. In the end of every Disney princess movie, the girl must end with her counterpart. This gender distinction and joining are substantiated on a moral desire to preserve heterosexuality, a social construction founded on marriage—union with the opposite gender. Thus, the female and her fiancé’s performativity to the roles of the princess and prince respectively additionally stresses heterosexuality as a predefined social “normalcy.” So these girls are encouraged to buy princess bridal gowns through marketing strategies that exploit their childhood fantasies (Disney Bridal). The girls are becoming the wrong kind of princesses, ones who persist in the traditional feminine roles that give way to men and their values due to an ever-growing base of consumers. At least the girls have created their own mark: the Disney princess syndrome (Johnson 1). Disney has successfully influenced the girls to drive their parents to buy their products all in the ambition of raising their total revenue. While the girls may dress, look, and on the surface act like princesses, they fail to recognize that there is no special difference among their homogenized identity—a typical, consumer-orientated princess fanatic.
ScienceDaily (Nov. 15, 2011) — In 1972, Sweden became the first country in the world to legislate healthcare for transsexualism within the state-financed healthcare system. In an international perspective, this was considered to be radical. It was expected that the life situation of people in the transsexual group would improve, now that state-financed healthcare was available for this group. A thesis published at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, however, describes this care as an oppressive gender-conservative system that causes suffering for transsexual persons.
"Those who qualify for gender-corrective measures also known as sex reassignment treatment, become legally acknowledged as the gender in which they recognise themselves. But a prerequisite for this is that they lose something: namely the possibility of having biological children, since the law states that a transsexual person must be sterilised (sterile) ," says ethnologist Signe Bremer. Her thesis describes studies of autobiographical blogs and in-depth interviews with people at various stages of gender-corrective care.
"Waiting is sometimes experienced as being nearly impossible to bear," says Signe Bremer.
Her thesis shows that the physical bodies that transsexual persons wish to correct, play an important role in the assessments made by the psychiatric system about who is considered to be suitable for gender correction. A transsexual woman who demonstrates visible beard stubble, for example, may receive negative comments, while a transsexual man with a muscular body and flat chest may receive compliments. In summary, a "suitable" body can be described as a body that health care staff consider compatible with that gender that the transsexual person recognise him/her-self.
"The investigations seem to be based on the belief that a good life as a legally recognised woman or man goes hand in hand with a person's ability to blend in. The investigators fail to realise that every person has, in fact, a unique appearance. Furthermore, I have shown that it is often the investigating personnel, and not the transsexual person, who emphasises the importance of being able to blend in, just as any 'normal' woman or man," says Signe Bremer.
According to accurate gender corrective health care logic, people's bodies should be unequivocally materialised as one or the other sex. A woman should, for example, not have a penis and a man should not be able to get pregnant. Signe Bremer's results show not only that a similar way of thinking is prevalent within the group of transsexual persons, but also that transsexual people exercise resistance against the heteronormative principles of the healthcare system. Far from all transsexual women, for example, feel the aversion to a penis that medical practitioners maintain as prerequisites for 'authentic' transsexualism. Many transsexual men are also critical to the requirement that the uterus must be surgically removed.
"The gender investigation tends to focus heavily on the genitals. One of the transsexual women I interviewed did not express sufficient rejection of her sexual organ, and the investigation was delayed because of this," says Signe Bremer.
Signe Bremer is critical to the common perception of transsexualism as synonymous with the experience of being born in the wrong body.
"We live in a society that is dominated by the idea that there are only two types of people -- feminine women who are born with a vagina and masculine men who are born with a penis. Healthcare for transsexual persons is a part of society, and this idea therefore also characterises the conditions required for gender-corrective measures. The work presented in my thesis shows that this often has serious consequences for the life of an individual," says Signe Bremer.
Trans specific health care is part of society, consequently the same gender norms and beliefs characterizes prevailing conditions for gender correction. My thesis shows that this often has severe consequences for individual persons' lives, says Signe Bremer.
ScienceDaily (Nov. 16, 2011) — Aging and health issues facing lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender baby boomers have been largely ignored by services, policies and research. These seniors face higher rates of disability, physical and mental distress and a lack of access to services, according to the first study on aging and health in these communities.
The study, released Nov. 16 and led by Karen Fredriksen-Goldsen and colleagues at the University of Washington's School of Social Work, indicates that prevention and intervention strategies must be developed to address the unique needs of these seniors, whose numbers are expected to double to more than 4 million by 2030.
She presented some of the study's key findings last week during a congressional briefing.
The study highlights how these adults have unique circumstances, such as fear of discrimination and often the lack of children to help them. Senior housing, transportation, legal services, support groups and social events were the most commonly cited services needed in the LGBT community, according to the study.
Fredriksen-Goldsen and her co-authors surveyed 2,560 lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender adults aged 50-95 across the United States. The researchers found that the study participants had greater rates of disability, depression and loneliness and increased likeliness to smoke and binge-drink compared with heterosexuals of similar ages.
Those seniors are also at greater risk for social isolation, which is "linked to poor mental and physical health, cognitive impairment, chronic illness and premature death," Fredriksen-Goldsen said. Study participants were more likely to live alone and less likely to be partnered or married than heterosexuals, which may result in less social support and financial security as they age.
Histories of victimization and discrimination because of sexual orientation or gender identity also contribute to poor health. The study showed that 80 percent had been victimized at least once during their lifetimes, including verbal and physical assaults, threats of physical violence and being "outed," and damaged property. Twenty-one percent of respondents said they were fired from a job because of their perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. Nearly four out of 10 had considered suicide at some point.
Twenty-one percent of those surveyed did not tell their doctors about their sexual orientation or gender identity out of fear of receiving inferior health care or being turned away for services, which 13 percent of respondents had endured. As one respondent, a 67-year-old gay man, put it, "I was advised by my primary care doctor to not get my HIV tested there, but rather do it anonymously, because he knew they were discriminating."
Lack of openness about sexuality "prevents discussions about sexual health, risk of breast or prostate cancer, hepatitis, HIV risk, hormone therapy or other risk factors," Fredriksen-Goldsen said.
The good news? "LGBT older adults are resilient and living their lives and building their communities," Fredriksen-Goldsen said. Of the study's respondents, 91 percent reported using wellness activities such as meditation and 82 percent said they regularly exercised. Nearly all -- 90 percent -- felt good about belonging to their communities. And 38 percent stated that they attended spiritual or religious services, indicating a promising social outlet.
Social connections are key, the study noted because, unlike their heterosexual counterparts, most lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender seniors rely heavily on partners and friends of similar age to provide assistance as they age. While social ties are critical, there may be limits to the ability of those older adults to "provide care over the long-term, especially if decision-making is required for the older adult receiving care," Fredriksen-Goldsen said.
The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Institute on Aging.
I stumbled onto a video of 5, 7 year olds performing an incredibly provocative dance to the song “single ladies” by Beyonce. At first glance, one is simply disgusted to see such young girls dressed in such a scandals way. As they start to dance, that feeling is overpowered by a sense of how incredibly talented these miniature people are. They are fantastically trained and talented dancers, and they execute their moves with grace and synchrony. They are passionate and attack the dance full heartedly. As the dance continues, there is more booty shaking, and dropping it to the floor. You are overwhelmed at how effectively these young girls can communicate sexuality, and you begin feeling guilty for even momentarily being impressed. My last blog post was on the horrifying spectacle that is child beauty pageants, and while this is of a similar flavor, it mad me question my original thoughts. My question becomes, to what extent do these children understand the connotations of the moves they execute. And if they do not understand, does that mean they are not harmed by it. Children learn many actions, but they only learn their significance from adults. If the children do not understand sexuality and that what they are doing is sexual, then how can they be objectified? If they think they are just dancing, and pulling the difficult moves that they have been taught, then who’s to say it is harmful. In fact, our disgustful judgments potentially say more about societies views of sexuality and perversion. Am I perverted because I was unable to see their dance as nothing more than a dance, and my mind could not help to add sexuality to people that did not intend to portray it? What does that say about my conception of sexuality?
