Pounding out frustrations

WARNING: This post may be very lengthy and is not suited for young children. It will be solely comprised of ramblings regarding this person's lovely sociology class. Proceed at your own risk! (Don't feel like you need to read this, perhaps only if you are realllly bored.)

Since I think better after I have pounded out everything in my head, I will proceed to write a run down of today's class and add my own frustrations to the mix. It may be very unorganized! :)

Today in sociology class the chapter we started is entitled "Women: The oppressed Majority." When I first heard that title, red flags immediately came up, as I am sure you were likewise.

I confess that this chapter is the only chapter I have read so far, and at first glance I was horrified. I began hastily compiling questions I had about the chapter and its contents in preparation for today.

We first briefly discussed women as being the minority and having obvious biological differences and that women are discriminated against because their responsibilities are disproportionately related to housework and child care as compared with men.

Just to make sure that we were on the same page, I asked this question, If gender roles refer to expected behavior and sexism emphasizes either male or female superiority, then are gender roles sexist?

To this question she answered in the negative and said that gender roles are not sexist and that basic gender differences will always exist and than men and women should not be more superior than the other.

This answer I applauded and agreed with her 100%. Because men's and women's differences complement eachother if allowed and are typically opposites of eachother for a reason!

The traditional patriarchal system of men being the leaders and women being generally under the men. At this point, I asked the question "If men are generally in leadership roles, and women are generally under them, than does that mean the women are less valuable than men?"

Before I continue, my class does not have a physical teacher in the room and all we have are microphones and a television to watch our teacher. Today, of all days, we were having technical difficulties, and my microphone had a terrible echo, and we were unable to hear any of the other students talk in their microphones. So I had to repeat myself quite a bit to get her to understand me at all!

Now back to the question I asked. She said that it was not value that was the problem, that it was importance. That the patriarchal system made men more important than women and thus discriminated against women. She said that this has changed a little but that in most ethnicities, men are considered superior to women.

Then we moved on to the five properties of women as a subordinate group in America today for which we are required to memorize and know for the final. yay!! You know kinda like marching orders. :)

And these are...

1. Women experience unequal treatment.

2. Women have physical and cultural characteristics that distinguish them from the dominant group - men.

3. Membership in the subordinate group is involuntary.

4. Women are aware of the their subordinate status and have a sense of solidarity.

5.Women are not forced to marry, yet many feel their subordinate status is defined by marriage.

Sadly, the first one is true especially within the workforce. Women that receive the same schooling and are given the same job as men, are paid less than men. Some of the latest statistics shows that women receive 79 cents on every dollar than men receive.

The second one I agree with, if three words were removed. (The dominant group) Is that really true that many women perceive themselves as inferior to the opposite sex? And if so, why? And how can they understand that men are not superior to women, and that although they are leaders and heads of the house traditionally, they are held accountable from a higher standard and have no business mistreating women? Yes, I know that is a loaded question, but it is one I struggle with.

Sadly, the third one is also true of many subordinate groups. But in my opinion, subordinate groups should not exist and as long as moral guidelines are not crossed, all people should be treated equally since we are commanded by God to love everyone, even our enemies!

I say moral guidelines because sexual orientation is not an ethnicity or a subordinate group. Homosexuals, transsexuals, and bisexuals still need to be loved, but we do not need to treat them equally as we would treat traditional marriage. To allow such perversions would be equivalent to removing to removing the definition of marriage altogether. In essence, we must love the person, but hate their sin. This is another thing that I wrestle with everyday.

The fourth one I completely reject. I agree that women may be aware of their subordinate status, but why should they call it subordinate? Women are not subordinate except in regards to job opportunites and employment. I pity the men that treat their women as subordinate to themselves. If they do not receive punishment here, they will receive it in the next life!

The fifth property is very confusing to me. If women are not forced to marry, and they don't want to be treated as subordinate, then why do they marry in the first place? Unfortunately, society today does not frown upon fornication, and teen pregnancy is very high in this country. So maybe the answer to my question is that they don't marry unless they have to in order to avoid being subordinate to their husbands. If this is the case, than I feel very sorry for these many women that do not understand "the truth that sets them free" and my heart cries out to them.

At the same time, part of me knows that God gave most women the desire to nurture young children and the desire to maintain a house. And so, that is also a reason that women want to marry even though they are not technically forced to generally speaking.

The last few minutes of class today was spent discussing a curious word called Androgyny. (Pronounces An-drog-any) This is defined as the view that there are few differences between the sexes, and that other than the most obvious physical differences, "cultural conditioning" is the only thing that divides the sexes.

To quote the textbook, "The typical women can sew better than the typical man, but the latter can toss a ball further than the former. These are group differences. Certainly, many women outthrow many men, and many men outsew many women, but society expects women to excel at sewing, and men to excel at throwing. The differences in those abilities result from cultural conditioning.... Removing the barriers to equal opportunity would eventually eliminate institutional discrimination. Theoretically, men and women would sew and throw a ball equally well."

When I first read this, it really made me laugh my head off, that someone could actually believe it. But today, I found out that my professor sincerely believes it. She actually wants androgyny to become reality! I asked my professor the following question. "Isn't androgyny equivalent to removing gender roles altogether?" She answered affirmatively without a second thought. She even mentioned that we are closer than ever before with new technology. Apparently Oprah announced that the first guy ever was in labor and gave birth to a child! I have been informed that this is unbelievable for a reason! It was not a man, it was a transsexual women who was very messed up!

Another student asked whether androgyny would destroy morals. She said that yes it would, and then because we were running out of class time prevented any further questions. I was soo close. My next question, would have been, "Would the destruction of morals produce equality?"

But class was soon over, and I won't get another chance until possibly Monday. I did however, write a short paper that challenged the very foundations of this class. I challenged tolerance and equality and basically implied that this class is essentially worthless in a broken world. I just found out a few minutes ago, that I got an A on that paper.

To sum up that paper, I basically proved that complete equality and absolute tolerance was absolutely impossible in this world. While I could go and explain that whole paper, I figure that 1,391 is enough words in one blog post.

So without further ado... So long all!