Consumerism and Values

In the article The New Politics of Consumption, Schor puts and emphasis on finding out what drives consumers to look upward and compete with their social reference group for luxury. In the movie Click, with Adam Sandler, we see an example of a father dealing with the social pressures of providing his two kids with the best life possible. He tries to convince himself that his family can be content with their modest living and tries not to let the the snobby little boy next door bragging about his dads new sports car bother him. However, the father gets his values confused. We get a flash forward image of a wealthy yet workaholic father who has barely been in his children's lives in order to get them what they want. This turned out to be worse for the families well being- the kids have all the status, fashionable clothes, and things they want yet there is no longer any sense of a caring family . The presence of the father and family in the children's lives ended up being the best solution to their well-being. I realized from this movie, that continued pursuit of a luxurious lifestyle is a life of stress with a loss of family time and community. The family next door will always be raising the bar and price with the latest technology. This also has to do with the old Levittown "keeping up with the Joneses" concept Schor mentions. We just can't let these social pressures bother us into believing that social standing comes from what we consume. Of course its easier said than done.

Targeting Gays, but in a Good Way.

In Advertising and the Political Economy of Lesbian/Gay Identity, Fejes explores the connection between gay rights in society and gay rights in consumerism. Fejes recognizes how the gay male community has been identified as valuable consumers “because of their more attractive income profile.” I have personally noticed a deficiency in advertisements projected towards lesbian, but I could actually think of a substantial amount of ads directed at gay males. In this Levi’s jeans commercial, the viewer is basically to understand that if you put on a pair of their jeans, you will instantly attract or obtain a man. This is done through helping the targeted consumer, a gay male, relate to the man pulling on the pair of Levi’s. What I found to be so interesting about this commercial is that not only is it marketing to gay men, but it also has another version where the man putting on the jeans is straight, therefore attracting a woman instead. Because the same advertising campaign has two different versions, one to attract gay males and one to attract straight males, Levi’s clearly recognizes the gay male community as an equal market. However, they also acknowledge that it is indeed a completely separate market as well by catering to their specific interests.

Homosexuality in Advertising

Similar to other classmates, in reading “Advertising and the Political Economy of Lesbian/Gay Identity” I had specific advertisements and television shows immediate pop in my head. Will & Grace, a show that had been filmed from 1998-2006 (and still plays on lifetime) is one of the most famous shows for advertising stereotypical gay men. Ironically, while this show was in its peak, the strongest debates about gay/lesbian marriage was occurring in our country, but the show was still receiving good reviews. This show accurately supports Feje’s argument about how it seems gay men contribute to our economy more than lesbians. This specific show stresses on only one side of homosexuality and in doing this, portrays the gay men in this show mainly being obsessed with fashion and having money to spend it on.

Another instance that popped in my head related to Feje’s article again, but related to the lesbian side of homosexuality. Gay advertisements and instances on tv

are much more common to think of when hearing homosexual advertisement, but in on particular episode of Sex and the City, a “lesbian group” of friends (a group of 6 lesbians who are extremely successful) are portrayed as an intimidating group of women "powerful lesbians" who play a significant role in the economy. These women are portrayed as loving the most expensive art and classy, subtle designer suits and footwear. I thought this was an important episode to relate back to the article, because in most instances in our society, lesbians are not portrayed as successful sophisticated women-and this is one instance that relates to a small portion of the lesbian statistic of playing a role in our economy.

From the G word to the L word.

In "Advertising and the political economy of lesbian/gay identity," Fejes points out that some years back- many corporations were extremely reluctant to be associated with anything that was seen as being homosexual. Whereas today there are many open media advertisements or shows promote homosexuality, sort of like a brand.
Showtime, broadcasted a very popular series called "The L Word(2004-2009)," it portrays the lifes of a group of Lesbian and their lives, families and lovers in a trendy LA area in Hollywood. The opening credits celebrate these lesbians , an example of the lyrics-"Women who long, love, lust.. Women who give. This is the way It’s the way that we live." Many people (not just lesbians) watched this series through interest to learn how lesbians supposedly "live". To be gay has almost become a trend, as Fejes identifies, "as a group they were seen as more cutting edge" (216). Another close link to this point is the song I kissed a girl"-Katy Perry, it almost justifies that it's trendy and fun to be Gay, which totally blows aware previous beliefs.

After reading “Advertising and the Political Economy of Lesbian/Gay Identity” by Fred Fejes I immediately had a flash back to a Pepsi television ad that was only aired for a few days. It was not only promoting Pepsi, but also it was also promoting homosexuality as a bad thing. In the television commercial, after talking over the plan to pick up what the men thought was going to be a woman at the bar, the man in the middle walked past a few women straight to the end of the bar to a homosexual man. Both of his friends were very surprised because they obviously did not know he was gay. They had a look on their face as if it was a bad thing that their friend was gay. This goes completely against what Fejes was writing about. This ad uses homosexuality but in a negative way. This ad would probably be offensive to the homosexual community. The ads Fejes wrote about on the other hand, showed a homosexual male or female like in the Pepsi ad, but in those ads the men and women were portrayed ad as sexy models.

Extreme Home Consumerism

The entire time I was reading The New Politics of Consumption I drew very strong parallels between her argument about the current state of consumerism to the show Extreme Home Makeover. The show advertising itself as a humanitarian project that takes people out of awful living conditions and gives them beautiful new homes. In reality the show is pretty sickening. It supports an unattainable lifestyle for the impoverished and downtrodden. It sells this lifestyle to every person who watches the show for the tears and smiles. The whole time it sells a basically unattainable home to the viewership as the only thing that will make people happy. Juliet Schor would argue that in order to get people to move away from this hyper consumerism would be to change the social parameters of consumerism.

Advertising and Homosexuality

The reading Advertising and the Political Economy of Lesbian/Gay Identity, by Fred Fejes, brought to attention some connections between consumerism and gay rights. I had never really made the connection between the influence gay men had in the consumer market and their progress towards equality. It makes complete sense to me now. When advertisers realized large the potential market of gay men in regards to things like the fashion industry and travel industry, they began to optimize on the possible money maker. By advertising and creating a market for gay demographics, the image of homosexuality began to change. Through advertisements and marketing opinions and views of homosexuality began to be seen in a more positive light. I find it ironic how the progression of gay equality moved faster through their role as consumers and as a large advertising target (pg. 213). I found an Image I feel relates to the issue brought to attention by this article. When the fashion industry began to realize the potential profit of marketing to gays, a few designers got around the early social problems by utilizing "gay window advertising" (214). I feel this image is filled with gay subtext.

Homosexuality Sells?

While reading "Advertising and the Political Economy of Lesbian/Gay Identity" I kept going back to the same thought that although gays and lesbians aren't legally allowed to get married in most states in the U.S., their culture has been targeted by advertisements in the media for about twenty years. " It seemed so wrong to me and yet so American all at the same time...corporations just want money from the gays because "...they are now being portrayed as young, healthy, fun to be with, and having a lot of disposable income." (Fejes 217) Basically, corporations and the media equate gay men with large dollar signs. "As a group they were seen as far more 'cutting edge', more likely to spend money on new products." (Fejes 216) I found this advertisement for Abercrombie and Fitch, which is so obviously targeted to the male gay community. His positioning, body language and his nudity all appeal to gay men. I thought that it was interesting that a company would so blatantly advertise to the gay community.

Gay and Lesbian Utopia

The beginning of this ad for Blackberry Messenger shows two gay men who own a trendy furniture store. This is the Gay Utopia that Fejes talks about in his conclusion. The two males look to be very fashionable and successful. They are the advertising stereotype of the better than average income, white, highly educated gay male. It was interesting how Fejes brought up studies of how Ga and Lesbian people were not necessarily richer, but that they had more disposable income. In the state of Florida you can have a foster child and be a gay couple. However you cannot adopt kids. This is an odd paradox. It also points out that most homosexual couples or people do not have or cannot have families. Thereby giving them the extra income to be able to go on trips and spend money on high brand liquor and fashionable clothes. The reality of it all is that, as Fejes states, this stereotype i really a Utopia. Most gay and lesbian people live in a world of misunderstanding and hatred. Gay liberties and rights as a social class argument is the defining fight of our generation. There is only a closet to come out of because we have built one.

the new politics of consumption/gay lesbian

The first piece of work by Juliet Schor was about consumer culture and the public sphere of consumption and "the new consumerism," which is the extent to which people base their perceptions and purchasing patterns off of. If income is the key to well being, and an estimated 15% of people are satisfied with leading a middle class comfortable life. This is also a contributer of why the savings rate has dramatically decreased within the last twenty to thirty years. This is all due to structural changes including the decline of the economy, the increasing role of mass media and etc, which pressures and penalizes people who cannot meet the standard expectations. I have attached an image from MTV Cribs, a television show that is very popular and it is something that everyone wants, yet very few will ever actually achieve their status. The picture is actually from TEEN cribs, an even longer shot, which is so unrealistic, and half of these kids blow their money by the time they reach their mid twenties, just because of lack of money management and investing. I learned about the decompression zone in this add, which is the section at the entrance of a store where the store owners market their best work and most desirable material because people are 30% more likely to flock to those. Another thing is that a person's well being is all relative to the standard norm, or the well-being of their peers. All things said and done, consumption practices are the rout of maintaining the levels of power and inequality that make our world the way it is, which the author calls her "positional treadmill."

The second reading, "Advertising and the Political Economy of Lesbian/Gay Identity, was short and covered topics and statistics that I was already aware of. It basically just said that gay men contribute to the economy more than lesbians in their fashion spending and are considered more equal because of their more attractive income profile. Gay men really care about their appearance and will spend more money on expensive designer clothes, opposed to lesbians who generally spend less on their looks and go for the more ragged, dirty, boyish look and spend less money on their hair by chopping it off or constantly gelling it. Laumann breaks down homosexuality into three categories: desire, identity, and behavior. I have included an image that is very self explanitory and appropriate for this article. It represents the stereotypical gay man and targets them as readers in these magazines where they publish their adds, such as in GQ, a magazine for men, not necessarily gay men, but in the reading they mention the use of "Gay window advertising" in mainstream men's fashion magazines which is an approach of constructing ads that will be of taste to a gay man but will be gone unnoticed by a straight reader.

Confessions of a Shopaholic

While reading “The New Politics of Consumption” I immediately thought of the stereotypical consumer; one who buys in excess without the need for the actual products themselves. As a society we tend to evade the idea that we shop to fill a void. Many people shop to gain a short-lived high until this wears off, and one begins to want the next “new” item. This idea and continuing cycle is well represented in the film “Confessions of a Shopaholic”. The film goes along the path of a young woman who clearly has an unhealthy obsession with buying. They have even named her as being someone with a “shopaholic” issue, likening this problem to that of alcoholism or drugs. Social critics in this article however suggest that “the good life…could be achieved by attaining comfortable, middle-class standard of living.” (184). This idea is implemented throughout society as to be successful one should simply be happy, however the path of consumers may suggest otherwise. Our society as a whole creates a world filled with the idea that without the “newest” product we cannot obtain happiness. This relates to the numerous issues surrounding the effects of media and advertisement messages, both obvious and subliminal, that are accepted by consumers. If we are constantly “told” that we will not be accepted if we do not fulfill our material wants, then maybe this issue isn’t shopping too much, but rather why we consume. The reasoning behind it is much more psychological than anything else, a disease where we are cycled into thinking how society wants us to, rather than for ourselves. The main character of “Confessions of a Shopaholic” realizes this truth as she accepts that her need to consume isn’t a product of her own thoughts but rather the ideas our culture has created.

The New Politics of Consumption and Banksy

Banksy is a graffiti artist in the United Kingdom that takes stabs at things like war, political agenda, and consumerism. I felt that the following image adequately embodies the principles discussed by Juliet Schor in The New Politics of Consumerism.



I related this picture to the quote “Income (the solution) leads to the consumption practices that exacerbate and reproduce class and social inequalities, resulting in – and perhaps even worsening – an unequal distribution of income. (Page 184)” Here we can see an obvious example of poor distribution of wealth, when a young boy is working to make money by becoming personal transportation for the obviously gluttonous wealthy. These fat and happy people are enjoying being above everyday human practices like walking, at the expense of the poor. These people in the rickshaw represent the tiny percentage of people that own the majority of the country’s wealth. This couple that represent said people, thrive off of the consumerist nature of the poor, who are trying to “keep up with the Smiths.” Just like Schor mentions that more and more housewives are entering the workforce to have the income available, this child represents the element of family that is lost to consumerism.

Shark-Like Domination

“Since the mid-1980’s, major media companies had been engaged in a feeding frenzy, swallowing up other media firms to form ever-larger conglomerates."

Croteau and Hoynes use this imagery in the very beginning of their text. Immediately I thought of a media-food chain, where it was “natural” for a bigger company to consume a smaller one. I found the large media giants to be like sharks, considering that sharks are at the top of the aquatic food chain. In nature, there isn’t a controlling force that mediates who can eat whom, much like the how the media giants had little restriction on which companies they may absorb after the elimination of financial interest and syndication laws and the 1996 Telecommunications Act. Additionally, sharks have a symbiotic relationship with remora fish, as the two become a team. Remora fish eat the bacteria off of sharks, providing food for the remora and a healthy clean exterior for the shark. There is a comparison easily made between the remora-shark relationship and the synergism between the small companies and the media giants. Croteau and Hoynes say, “Synergy refers to the dynamic where components of a company work together to produce benefits that would be impossible for a single, separately operated unit of the company.”

Media Giants in the Form of Twins

This week’s topic, specifically Croteau and Hoyne’s “The New Media Giants”, explores the fact that many large companies wish to expand and buy more to have greater power in the industry. This made me think of an example of expanding power through advertizing that revolves around the infamous Olsen twins. Love them or hate them they both have marketed themselves from birth, resulting in their multi-million dollar corporations. They have milked their image for everything its worth, from dolls, movies, television, CD’s, Dualstar Pictures, Clothing Lines, Perfume, and even play station games. They have worked hard to preserve their image in front of the screen and even now most of the revenue they make is from behind the scenes. They have begun designing clothes that are affordable and usually appear in stores like JC Penny or Macys. By marketing themselves at such young age they have enabled themselves and their companies to grow astronomically over time. This reminded me of other mass companies that buy out smaller companies to gain more power in the industry but the only difference here is that one is a company and the other is the image of two young girls. I would think that this business world would take a large toll on the lives of these twins because everything they do is watched closely. We also mentioned in class how each company isn’t linked to a specific person so it is a different process to sue, the Olsen twins however are directly linked to their companies and all the blame goes directly to them if they are to be sued. Overall, I find it disturbing to think that these girls have been used for profit from birth.

video for giants blog

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41hiuvKfxOs

this is the video to my blog- it didn't post before for some reason.

The New Media Giants

This video is appropriate for the first reading "The New Media Giants", because Comcast Cable is the largest cable corperation in the United States and I especially like this one because my dad is the former CFO and EVP of Comcast. He started working for Comcast in 1991 when he was the president of Storer Cable in Miami, (where he met my mom.) The owners and CEO of Comcast kept wanting him to go up to Philly to work at the headquarters and he didn't want to move because he liked Miami and it was cold up North. He tells me they offered him so much money for him at the time it was silly for him to say no. He has been in retirement since January 2006, and I have enjoyed spending time with him it is nice to have him around the house back home. The article reflects on Viacom and CBS's record-setting mergance worth 38 million dollars, which was done with the intent to maximize sales and put their company in the right place to outdue their competitors by making production more efficient. It mentions other trades and purchases such as when General Electric bought the company of the owners of NBC, and when Microsoft started to invest money in Comcast and other media companies. Every Christmas when i was younger, Fox Family Channel would send me and my brothers gifts with their logo such as CD Players, gameboys, etc. I remember about 10 years ago when my dad still worked for Comcast, he told me about this deal that his company was thinking about buying Disney. It never ended up happening, but in the years before he left, Comcast bought At&t and has owned them ever since. They now own lots of companies and venues such as the Wachovia center in Philly where the Flyers and Eagles play and I love going to games there :) I learned about synergy which is when different parts of the company work together to form a larger entity, and that National Amusements bought Viacom for 3.4 billion, but continued to call their company Viacom. I didn't really think about the power of Media Giants before this class, but now i can analyze things from a different perspective. There are two types of integration- vertical, and horizontal, and the difference is that horizontal involves sharing and dealing with different types of media products and vertical integration only deals with distribuiting, exhibiting, and selling a single kind of product. Before this article, i didn't realize that MTV had the most viewers out of all networks in the world, and that Nickelodeon provides programming to over 100 countries, in different languages-- wow, that's a lot!

Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes

While reading The New Media Giants by Croteau and Hoynes, I was surprised to learn that major media companies have been buying out smaller companies to form larger conglomerates since the 1980s. (page 21) It's scary to think that most TV channels, magazines, newspapers and movie studios are all owned by the same five corporations, and that we really don't have much say in what is broadcasted to us. It's even scarier to think that we play a role in keeping these businesses afloat by tuning into specific TV channels, buying from certain stores or listening to particular radio stations. This line of thinking relates to an episode of South Park from season 8 called "Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes". In the episode, a Wall-Mart opens in South Park, creating jobs for everyone, one-stop shopping and best of all, bargain prices on items store-wide. But soon enough the citizens of South Park are addicted to shopping at Wall-Mart, and all of the local-owned stores in the town are closing because everyone is shopping at Wall-Mart. Stan, Kenny, Cartman and Kyle travel to Wall-Mart headquarters to figure out how to destroy the Wall-Mart, which they successfully do, but the end scene from the episode implies that the cycle of growing conglomerates buying out smaller companies is never-ending.

Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes
Tags: SOUTH
PARKmore...

Now that's trendy..

Grossberg pays a lot of attention to the argument Cultural Studies and Political Economy are "interrelated".
When reading this article I also saw "self production of culture- the practices by which people come..to represent themselves". We're not all one person cloned, we're individuals with idea's so spit on the current trend and act like individuals. Whether that be in a political sense with who we vote for or whether that be only wearing Crocs because they're in fashion. We're forever pretty much lied to into thinking that one idea is right and when someone sells you an idea, you too sell it to others and that's the way these trends start, thus the throwing of the true phrase "Cultural Dupes". Hopefully one day we'll get past all this.

This ad is on of many for a phone company that was trying to break into the big phone market. Alltel had a creative and slightly funny ad campaign. The interesting thing about this ad in particular and the series of ads collectively, is that as they were airing Cingular was being bought by AT&T. It was in the news for a few days, but went relatively unnoticed in regular everyday life. The article in the textbook talks about how this happens. Big business will buy and sell and trade their smaller parts or whole companies. Al of tis process goes relatively unnoticed. In this ad, the guy who is representing Cingular has an AT&T patch under his Cingular patch. A small sign that the company is changing hands.

Fordism

This quote came from Henry Ford. Ford was the famed designer of the assembly line. It churned out cars at an amazingly fast rate for the time. Grossberg's article talks about how cultural studies may pay too much attention to consumption and not as much on production. Any economics professor will tell you that supply and demand go hand in hand. Grossberg might have had a point that cultural studies might want to look at production as well. Ford's opinion was largely driven solely on production, but he was a successful business man to say the least. Now we know that production shapes consumption while consumption shapes production. It might lead to the question of which came first?

A Media Giant

The article titled "The New Media Giants- Changing Media Structure", by Croteau and Hoynes, discusses the media industry. It discusses Viacom's merger with CBS as an example of how a few Media companies have come to control the majority of the industry. The article explains how the deregulation of the Media industry, has led to monopolies and domination of the media by huge companies. It is also mentioned how television is dominated by 4 major companies (36). One of these companies is Disney. I find Disney to be a great example of Media domination. Although it is not the largest Media giant, It's size is something I have noticed. When I hear the brand Disney I think of animated movies and child/tween programs. Some of the Disney owned brands seem surprising to me, such as ESPN. It wasn't until I found this video on youtube that I understood the sheer size of the Disney corporation. This video portrays how large a media compony can be. It is a good example of how a large percentage of the industry can be monopolized and controlled by a single entity. Not only does this "Media Giant" control a large portion of the television industry, but they have also expanded to other markets. Some examples include fashion, electronics, toy, and gaming manufacturing.

I have mixed feelings after reading Lawrence Grossberg's "Cultural Studies Vs. Political Economy: Is Anybody else Bored with this Debate?" Grossberg thinks that the debate between Cultural Studies and Political Economy is boring. I can agree with him on that after reading his article because I thought the article was boring with the facts he was writing about. The first thing I thought about after reading this article was the Presidential election between Obama and McCain. My thought is that no one is right. Their views may be different on such topics, but in the end it will all work out. In this Mini Clip game the winner is determined by who has the best people for persuading a population in a certain part of the country. This is how a political candidate wins in the real world, by bullshitting them into thinking that the other candidate is wrong or stupid. It feels never ending and it has gotten to the point where it too is boring.

McCain Vs Obama Risk it all and use superior tactics to win the Presidential Election

Play this free game now!!

A Glimmer Of Hope

The article by Croteau and Hoynes very good and spot on, in my opinion. Their discussion of Viacom was particularly interesting to me, however, because of my love for a "channel" called Adult Swim.

Adult Swim comes on after Cartoon Network from 10 pm to 6 am Eastern time. It only airs at these times due to the safe harbor laws, but mainly because it is a very new station (started in 2001 [same year this article was written]) and is trying to work its way up to get its own channel. Most people know of Adult Swim primarily for showing Family Guy, which is its highest rated show. Adult Swim factors into this article in two very big ways. Croteau and Hoynes focus mostly on Viacom in the piece and Viacom is a sort of rival of Adult Swim (a Time Warner based company). A perfect example is found in the show Futurama. Adult Swim had the rights to Futurama and managed to inspire a "comeback" in popularity of the show. Unfortunately, the newfound popularity of the show also caught the attention of Viacom and in 2009, the rights to Futurama went up for sale. Viacom outbid Adult Swim on their second highest rated show and now Futurama can be found on Comedy Central. This loss greatly hurt Adult Swim.

The other key connection between AS and the article has to do with the creative loss found in these major companies. Although Adult Swim is a part of Turner (TBS, TNT, etc.), it is one of the only television networks that puts out completely original, fresh shows. I feel that if Croteau and Hoynes had written this article yesterday, they would have mentioned AS as a glimmer of hope that creativity is not dead within television. As an example, I included this clip from the end of an episode of Moral Orel. The show only lasted three seasons, but the third season (which this clip is from) was one of the most thought-provoking, psychological pieces of work I have ever found on TV. I highly, highly recommend that everyone in the class check out the Adult Swim original shows. There is something for everybody.

Women Read Romance-week 3

The Article "Women Read The Romance" by Janice A. Radway, discusses the role of romance novels and the reasons women read them. One of the main points made in the article is the use of romance novels as an escape for women. Many of the women interviewed in the text describe these stories as an outlet to escape from the reality of their lives. The article mentions how romance novels can cause women to have unrealistic expectations. After reading the same happy endings time after time, fantasy might translate into a women's sense of reality.These fantasies have been translated across movie screens as well. Happy endings and true love are present in countless films. It also seems that stereotypical "love scenes" repeat throughout many movies. For example, there are countless movies were lovers "kiss in the rain". This can be one aspect of that romantic moment portrayed in romance novels and dreamed about by numerous women. That romantic moment is usually when a big gesture is done, by a man, to prove his love to the leading lady. After this gesture they promptly ride off into the sunset to enjoy their happily ever after. In the movie "A Cinderella Story" this unrealistic moment occurs. Although I feel most women know the line between fantasy and reality, watching scenes like this leads them to hold onto hope that something that "magical" might happen in their lives. Here is a youtube video of the kiss scene in "A Cinderella Story".

What About Funny Guys and Assholes?

I found a glaring disparity in Janice Radway's article about what the Smithton women envisioned as the perfect man from romance novels. On online polls and articles about women's taste in men, the overwhelmingly most important thing women look for is a sense of humor. This is just an example, and I know it's not at the top but sense of humor is always a major player in women's desire in a man, and I thought it was interesting these romance novels don't consider it a huge element. Not only sense of humor, but what about women who love assholes? Do romance novels cater to a certain group of women who don't seek assholes? Here is an extreme internet version of an asshole:


Yes this video is meant to make you laugh, but the many stereotypes highlighted in this farce are extreme descriptions of real attitudes that can land a man a women. It could just be the age demographics, or some other variable, but do you disagree women like assholes and funny guys?

The Four Agreements: The Dream

As I read through Janice A. Radway's "Women Read the Romance", her section on page 69 stating reasons as to why women read romance novels, struck me with a memory of a friend involving a book he once told me of. The book is called 'The Four Agreements,' written by Don Miguel Ruiz. The statements on page 69, talk about women reading these novels to "escape" the reality of their lives or "dream" that it is their life. To quote Don Miguel Ruiz, "Every human has his or her personal dream, and just like the society dream, it is often ruled by fear. The same fears manifest in different ways for each person. All of humanity is searching for truth, justice, and beauty. We don’t see the truth because we are blind. What blinds us are all those false beliefs we have in our mind. We have the need to be right and to make others wrong. Our beliefs set us up for suffering. We create an image of how we should be in order to be accepted by everybody. We create this image, but this image is not real. We are never going to be perfect from this point of view. Not being perfect, we reject ourselves. We are not good enough for ourselves because we don’t fit with our own image of perfection. We feel false, frustrated, and dishonest. The result is that we feel unauthentic and wear social masks to keep others from noticing this. We are so afraid that somebody else will notice that we
are not what we pretend to be. We judge others according tour image of perfection as well, and they naturally fall short of our expectations."
Don Miguel Ruiz is so concise with his wording, it was hard to not copy the whole book here. Alas, he takes the act of living in a reality and jots it down turning it into romance novel. This shows how there are steps further to the aspect of our lives current state. Retreating to a false reality we set up in own minds is no safer than that of a the points in the short story expressed inside the book.

Week 3

Women Read the Romance is a short article about an interview the writer had with a bookstore employee who advertises romance novels. Women asked why they read these kind of books and they all said something along the lines of because it helps them escape, because it gives them hope, and so on. Unsurprisingly, 65% of the romance market is under the age of 40. That is basically all, in a nutshell.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3G3fILPQAU
This is a trailor of the movie "The Notebook" and i think it is relevant and appropriate in this connection because it is pure fantasy and stuff like that doesn't happen in real life, atleast not my life.

Cathartic Confessions or Emancipatory Texts is a piece of writing on the public sphere of rape and discussions on the Oprah show. The audience is mostly women and together they give voice to their pain and experiences that for some of them is the first time they discuss their problems in public. Oprah Winfrey was highest paid entertainer in the United States, in 1996 and she helps people solve their problems and feel better about them selves by having her guests identify their problem, confront their inconsistencies, and then solve the problem at hand with her experts who are mainly women, as thoroughly as possible, while getting the audience involved. Oprah has a method of making private matters socially pertinent and she reaches out and helps her guests on the show. She makes a point that a big reason for rape is a lack of communication or misunderstanding.
I posted this picture of the robots because I thought it was cute and it is supposed to be a psychiatrist and it's patient.

here is my image- i tried 18 times to upload it and even watched your tutorial and it would not work.

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Word count: 221

In todays society all we think about is "getting away." We love to let go of whatever is going on in life and escape reality for the time being. In Radway's writing she states that women read romances to shortly escape from their lives and from reality. This is seen when she states, "When asked why they read romances, the Smithton women are overwhelmingly cite escape or relaxation as their goal." (68) With our society today people are always rushing around and always busy making it difficult to escape from our everyday lives. 



I feel like this picture expresses the American lifestyle. So busy and challenging that sometimes you need to just run away from everything. The line at the bottom "Its always good to escape those pesky random battles," somewhat explains life. Not always can you get away from troubles in life but when you have time alone to "forget the rest," its a big weight off your shoulders. The "pesky random battles," are similar to the obstacles we face in life everyday. Escaping reality weather it be reading a romance, watching tv, playing a sport, or going the the gym, for that short period of time during the day there is that freedom feeling, to escape everything bad in your life, is indescribable. 

Escape, He's Just Not That Into You.

In "Women Read the Romance" by Janice A. Radway, a lady in her group points out "We read books so we won't cry". In romances these women seem to not only escape from the daily routines of their lives but find an ideal man who gives the love and attention that they have learned not to expect.
In the movie, "He's just not into you" Nine ladies look to attain their romantic ideals, usually troubled by the differing ideals and desires of their chosen partner. This movie ties in very well to Radways idea's and findings as these women are searching for their perfect man. Like the men admired by Radway's group the male stereotypes shown are strong, independent, and intelligent. Some of these guys pay little attention to the women but they still chase, longing to be loved back. How does that work? The fact is women long for security and romantic story love in a partner as we see in this clip. So they escape through their books to find this.

Escape to Fairy Tale

In the Radway reading, the Smithton interview group is demographically similar the the 25-44 age group of romance novel readers. These readers admit that the books they read are "little more than fantasies or fairy tales that always end happily"(Radway 69). They serve as an escape to the pressures of daily life and to fill the lack of nurture. Although the perspective audience for Taylor Swift video's are preteens and teens, I can't help but notice how many moms were present at the Taylor Swift concert I want to last June. Looking at this, it is easier to recognize that the Smithton group would enjoy the occasional romance novel; even if it does serve as an escape to a world the recognize as fairy tale.

This doesn't go to say that Taylor's typical audience of preteen age girls don't have their own issues to escape from. Lets not forget middle school awkward stages, braces, the pressure's of fitting in, and stressing out over whether Jimmy will ask you to dance in the upcoming spring fling. All girls can use a fairy tale once in awhile for a little hope or happiness. When you look at Taylor's music video, Love Story, you see the textbook fairy tale scenes of forbidden love and walking through forests at night and holding hands with a handsome and masculine, yet nurturing, young man. Every woman's and preteen girls dream right? Lets not forget that in this technological age, romance movies and music videos are taking the place of the classic romance novel.

Expectations vs. Reality

In this modern day of age the notions of “true love” and “happy endings” are prevalent. Even at a young age we are introduced to Disney’s Cinderella, where the conflicts are always resolved by a generally handsome prince in some form or another. Aside from the rare cases such as “Shrek”, the beast usually turns into an attractive man who ultimately saves the damsel in distress. This idea of chivalrous strong men and weak dainty woman has been played out through the ages as the “normal” fairytale and desire. At a young age we have been programmed with the idea that woman are to be saved and should therefore always be waiting for her prince charming to arrive. Janice Radway explains that this patriarchal idea is something that has been assumed about the woman reading romance novels. The statistics look at the fact that the subject surrounds this patriarchal idea, rather than representing what women are actually taking away from reading these novels. By the time we as a society are reading romance novels we have gained a lot more experience with reality and the world past our original “happy ending” time warp. This idea of reality is better represented in the film “500 Days of Summer” where the main character is introduced to the reality or lack of fairytale endings in his relationships. Women know that in life prince charming rarely arrives in the same manner and perfection as romance novels and by reading them we are not clouded into thinking so. Radway states that many believe that literary readings are the result of a complex; however I believe that the complex doesn’t revolve around the fact that fairytales aren’t true, but rather that from birth society has programmed us to think otherwise. That’s one reason why I found “500 Days of Summer” extremely refreshing because it represents a modern take on romance, and most often the disappointment of failed expectations. This YouTube video gives an overall view of the film and emphasizes how the romantic novel’s stereotypical roles are opposite; instead the man chases the woman.

Shedding the burqa

Many American women feel that Iraqi women feel this way about burqas. That they just want to shed the image and be in the light. Maybe through the social exchange of an Oprah-esq show would help them "come out". American culture sees it as a prison that we should save them from. As in the romance novels, they need to escape to see the outside world, to escape from their reality and see a place where women are treated better. We would like to give them a vehicle to see what is "better" not in the sense of being loved, but in being treated in general. This image speaks to an inferred silent protest, that American women especially, seem to be seeing and hearing.

Radway and Unforgivable

I believe that this youtube video embodies, with comedy, stereotype, and exaggeration, many of the main points of Radway’s “Women Read the Romance.”

We see in this video a man in a singular relationship with a woman. We see this man rely on his girlfriend (wife as related to the text) by staying at her house. The women in the house are watching “The Legend of Bagger Vance,” a romance film in which two of the main characters, Junnah and Adele, fall in love before WW1 and then rekindle their romance long after the war. By watching this film, these women can escape into a virtual reality where “the people do not resemble the people and occurrences they must deal with in their daily lives,” and the men are respectful, contrasting their “reality” of man in this video. This video is an obvious (and exaggerated) portrayal of the stereotypical view of male sexuality, which was implied to the males of the “real world” that Radway describes as the husbands of these romance readers. With the male’s obvious lack of appreciation for his girlfriend in the video, we can see where she would feel the same lack of appreciation as Dot does when she describes her husband’s questioning of her day in Radway’s book. Finally, with a stretch of comparability, we can see Radways point “If she is depleted by her efforts to care for others, she is nonetheless expected to restore and sustain herself well,” through the male video character’s almost expectation that his girlfriend wouldn’t bleed when hit over the head with a gun.

Escaping from the Real World

The movie, Twilight, has become a phenomenon among women of many ages. It truly is a “chick flick” because it was designed to appeal and aim towards the female audience. One of the film’s main characters is a very attractive man who has what many women believe to be an amazing body. When watching the film many women dream of escaping into the film from everyday life.
This is very similar to Janice A. Radway’s “Women Read the Romance” in that from the women surveyed in the community of Smithton, many of them have the same views on escaping everyday life. In the survey women were “asked why they read romances” (Radway, 68). Almost all of them answered “escape or relaxation as their goal” from the many motherly duties they have complete (68).
Almost all women live a very stressful live, especially mothers. Mothers have a very large role to play in raising a family. A large amount of these Mothers can become very stressed and wish they could flee from their daily lives for a short period of the day. (I can relate to this after living in a family of four kids). Whether it is watching the movie Twilight or reading a Romance novel, every woman has her own way of “escaping” from reality into a different world.

Not Much To Say...

To me, the readings for this week seemed fairly straight-forward and did not bring up many points of discussion. There was, however, one aspect of the Radway piece that bothered me. Radway had a clear feminist stance concerning the entire issue, but she failed to ever consider the other sides of things. For example, she mentions that "the Smithton women overwhelmingly cite escape or relaxation as their goal [for reading]." (Radway 68) I would contend that both women and men read with the intent of "escaping" reality. Also, she mentions the idea that the patriarchal system established back then (1983) is a probable cause for the escapist mentalities of these women. This could most certainly be true, but could it not be true for men as well? This may have been a very roundabout and confusing way of saying it, but my essential complaint is that Radway loses legitimacy by failing to take multiple points of view into account, especially considering that other angles could bolster her argument.

This article made me think of Paul Rudd's character in I Love You, Man because the character is sensitive, nurturing, and extremely close with his wife, but the issue is that he does not have any male friends to do "dude stuff" with. Even though she essentially has this almost perfect man (although a little on the "soft" side), she still desires him to fill the basic gender roles expected of men.

I hope this first entry is at least somewhat close to what the blog posts are supposed to be.

Sex and the City

Sex and the City follows Carrie Bradshaw and her three best friends, all single thirty-something women looking for love in New York City. In the series finale, Carrie's longtime love interest, Mr. Big, shows up in Paris, acting as her knight in shining armor, Prince Charming and savior all rolled into one. He whisks her away from her current boyfriend back to New York where they can be together. Carrie's strong feminine character succumbs to society’s pressure for women to be married and nurture others. Unmarried women are seen as a “cat lady” or a “spinster” where as an unmarried man is a “playboy” or “bachelor”. In "Women Read the Romance" by Janice A. Radway, she states that "...women have been taught to believe that men must be their sole source of pleasure." (Radway, 71) Radway argues that in romance novels when a man expresses his love for a woman, "...she is gently caressed, carefully protected, and verbally praised with words of love." (Radway, 73) Sex and the City is similar to a romance novel in the sense that the main characters are looking for love and "the One". Readers of romance novels prefer a plot where "[the heroine is attended to] by a man who reassures her of her special status and unique identity." (Radway, 71) Mr. Big is definitely attending to Carrie in this clip from the series finale, which shows her falling into his arms and breaking into tears at the sight of him.