Meeting #11

Skin Bleaching

We watched the Tyra Banks' Episode of Black Women Bleaching their skin where there were 6 different women that described their reasoning for bleaching their skin. Most of the women have been bleaching their skin for multiple years.

Comments:
- 3 out of the 6 women were bleaching because of men and stated that they've experienced men wanting lighter skin women so they'd like to lighten there skin
- These women have low self esteem and it has nothing to do with how society views them
- Some of the women talked about the attention they got from now being lighter but back in school
when they were younger they didn't get the same attention as the light skin girls, but was it all about your shade of skin. Was the women heavy weight, was it the way the dark skinned girls were portrayed maybe as skanky or not skanky enough?
- Black No More by George S. Schuyler was a book that reminded someone of this topic
- The fact that we have so many different ways to change ourselves (surgeries, creams) that people don't have to love themselves anymore


Then we watched a part of a documentary A Girl Like Me
In the documentary it showed a study that they also used during the Brown vs. Education case in which they had black kids choose between a white baby doll and a black baby doll, stating which one is better. 19 out of the 21 kids choose the white doll.


- Some of us were only allowed to play with black dolls when they were younger
- Back in the day there weren't too many black dolls
- Someone was excited when the middle complexion doll, Teresa came out
- There was even a little boy in the video that preferred a white doll 
- It's a start
- Kids should be taught that both black dolls and white dolls are beautiful and good so that they can still play with both
- These parents as well may not have been educated like we're being educated now about these things so that when we have our kids we'll teach them but the kids in these video may not have that

Meeting #10

Act like a lady but think like a man


"Nothing on this planet can compare with a woman’s love—it is kind and compassionate, patient and nurturing, generous and sweet and unconditional. Pure. If you are her man, she will walk on water and through a mountain for you, too, no matter how you’ve acted out, no matter what crazy thing you’ve done, no matter the time or demand. If you are her man, she will talk to you until there just aren’t any more words left to say, encourage you when you’re at rock bottom and think there just isn’t any way out, hold you in her arms when you’re sick, and laugh with you when you’re up. And if you’re her man and that woman loves you—I mean really loves you?—she will shine you up when you’re dusty, encourage you when you’re down, defend you even when she’s not so sure you were right, and hang on your every word, even when you’re not saying anything worth listening to. And no matter what you do, no matter how many times her friends say you’re no good, no matter how many times you slam the door on the relationship, she will give you her very best and then some, and keep right on trying to win over your heart, even when you act like everything she’s done to convince you she’s The One just isn’t good enough.
That’s a woman’s love—it stands the test of time, logic, and all circumstance.
...
Well, I’m here to tell you that expecting that kind of love— that perfection—from a man is unrealistic. That’s right, I said it—it’s not gonna happen, no way, no how. Because a man’s
love isn’t like a woman’s love."


"Women can go over it again and again in their minds, finding all kinds of deficiencies in themselves-"I didn't do this right," "I wasn't good enough," "I didn't love him the way I should," "she came in here and outperformed me"-but the fact still remeinas that he didn't have any business cheating. So women need to realease themselves from the blame of a cheating man's actions-just do that for yourselves. Because holding on to that baggage can be paralyzing; it can cripple you and keep you from performing in your next encounter. You simply cannot drive forward if you're focused on what's happening in the rearview mirror."— Steve Harvey


Comments:

- Men are dumb, they just fuck up, its part of their biology

- Men don't put their emotion on the forefront

- Why do women go above and beyond, but men say they give they all but they're men?

- I was mad and empowered at the same time. Women may address the men after they have cheated and acknowledge that they had no business cheating however, we sometimes go back and think what did we do wrong? what can i do better? what did she have that I dont? But we cant do that because looking back to the previous text we have the ability to do sooo much and a man cant. I have all these qualities and any man would be lucky to receive it so me sitting around wondering what I could of done might be a waste of time.



Clip of Tyra Banks Show "Excuses for Men"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUVBgBThRcg


Comments

- The excuse of "I'm a man" is tired and old

- If we are in a relationship we should strive to understand each other and be on the same page with one another

- I have expectations for myself but for guys I dont: "Just surprise me"

- Im afraid to get married, we have visualized our weddings but a marriage is something entirely different

Meeting #9

Keri Hilson's The Way you love me vs. Raheem's Devaughn's She's Single

Keri Hilson
The Way You Love Me


 Raheem Devaughn
She's Single

After viewing both of these videos you could wonder how people reacted to them. With Keri Hilson's video where she is acting out of character and has written this explicit song even though she admits to knowing her audience are girls, yet she also stated in the same interview that this song isn't for girls. We're not too sure where Keri is going with this one. Then we get to Raheem Devaughn's video which alot of people had no problem with. Raheem Devaughn's reasoning behind the video was to show that women are on the same level as men now, and just as men have been going out and cheating for some time now, women can do the same thing.

Comments made:
- I used to view Keri Hilson as someone who never went to that level and I was proud of her for that but now she's right along with all the rest of the artists that put their bodies' out there.
- Why would Keri ever do something like this if she knows who her audience is and clearly they're going to buy this album that includes the song even if a couple of the words are changed, the idea behind it is still the same.
- Its crazy that Keri Hilson can put something like this out and get so much heat about it yet when Raheem Devaughn puts out a porno, he gets a slap on the back for it
- The whole issue on the double standard

Meeting #8

For Colored Girls Recap

We spoke about the colors that each girls represents and wears that color throughout the movie.
Picture of the girls

We also spoke about how Tyler Perry represented the men and women in the story. Some people felt that Perry represented a lot of different type of men and women, while some others thought that he still was only representing the stereotypical African American men and women.

We all did agree that the actresses in this movie did a magnificent job playing the roles that they did and that they fully did commit to their roles. He couldn't have picked a better cast.

We talked about how things played into each other such as when the women is washing her children's blood off the sidewalk as the girl who had just had an abortion runs through.

As well as how all these women connect in a crazy way through this one building.

Add your own thoughts to the movie.

Meeting #7

Who is a Women of Color? Thoughts on Biracial Women that hate one of their races

Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vrrkdaDCR0&feature=related

Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gm7jVfA4ypU&feature=related

Comments:
- Every women is a women of color
- The story that stood out the must was the girl who identified as white but appeared as a women of color yet degraded the whole race. She runs around with a confederate flag at an event but she ignores the story behind that flag and the race that was burned because of that flag. She also had a picture where she was making fun of the KKK and viewed it as a joke when that was something serious. She pretty much ignored a history of African Americans that have worked through these struggles to be where they are today.
- The only girl that seemed that she had a somewhat logical explanation was the girl that expressed she only identified with one side because she didn't know her other side of the family

Meeting #6

Difference between Latinas and Hispanics, & how they're represented in the media

Meeting #5

Undercover Brothers/ Homosexual Males

Meeting #4

Mama's Boys

Part 1:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsBH30b41es

Part 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWlj31yu6Vs&feature=related

Comments:
- No man should be that attached to his mother
- The mother is crossing the line with her relationship with the son. Mothers are supposed to nuture and teach their sons, then let them go and live their own lives.
- Its wrong that the boy is so attached to his  mother that when his sick he sleeps in his mother's bed
- The mother is very disrespectful to the boy's wife because she can't provide to him in the way that the mother does because she isn't her
- The man says he wants to be different than his father because his father wasn't in her life but in a way is doing the same thing by running off to his mother instead of taking care of his wife and child

Meeting #3

Why successful Black women can't find a man

http://straightfromthea.com/2010/04/22/why-cant-successful-black-women-find-a-man-video/

We looked at the link above and watched the two clips on the page that describe the view of Hill Harper, Jacque Reid, Sherri Shepherd, and Jimi Izrael.  

Comments:

Meeting #2

Comparing Nicki Minaj, Trina, & Lil Kim

We started the conversation with people just commenting on these people and photos.

Some of the comments were:
-Trina hasn't changed one bit and is still talking about the same things that she was talking about when she first came out (money, men, and sex)
-Nicki Minaj talks about she doesn't want to portray sex in the same manner as female artists before her yet she still has provocative music and pictures that says the opposite
-Lil Kim has been talking about sex when she came out and she's real

Then there was a question posed of how do these women allow students on campus to make a perception of us. Some of the comments were:
-Students on campus view us in the same way that they view these artists
-When students see black women on campus they think they can dance just as women in the media do
-From the music they hear (example: my neck, my back) white men think they don't have to do much to get in the pants of a black women