jojobean wrote:
It all depends what circles you hang out in. My brother is a redneck and alot of his friends and friend's parrents dictate everything a woman is allowed to do or not do, including what kind of make-up she can wear and how to cut her hair because a woman is seen as a part of a man's image to others. A woman here has no prestege by her own merit, but whom she is married to. This is not spoken, but a deeply ingrained unspoken rule that puts a glass ceiling above single women. Being lesbian often gets one told "waste of good p****" and in some cases raped to "prove to her that she will like it" and being a gay guy can come with physical risks to his health or life...a few years ago, a gay man was killed coming out of a gay bar and the court gave the killers a really light sentance.
There is alot about the south that goes on deep below the surface. Many will play a role of civility in public and then let their true culture come out where no "outsiders" are looking.
You know, though, I've noticed what you said about a woman's success being hinged on who she's married to in major Hollywood movies. I don't think that's just a southern thing. I was watching "Just Go With It" (the newest Adam Sandler movie where he pretends to be married to pick up women) and this movie was just rife with that kind of sexism. When the table are turned and the female character decides to lie to impress her old college buddy, she does so not by embellishing her own job as assistant to Sandler's character, but by embellishing SANDLER's job as her fake husband. And as the movie progresses, the woman she's trying to impress does the exact same thing.
And it's not like it's just this one movie, it's every movie you watch today. They try to dress it up and make it look nice, saying that it's not sexism, it's romance, because it's romantic that a woman's life is never complete without a husband and kids and that mere financial and career success is never enough. And I do accept that there is some validity to that argument. We do a a society in general put a high value on romance as the ultimate happiness. But I think where the movie-makers run into trouble/sexism is that more women in movies have to give up their careers to attain happiness while men are more likely to be able to achieve both.
So really, I think that form of sexism exists in all levels of our society, and it's just regionally that you see it get stronger or weaker.
And, man... I know you can hear about all that stuff (rape/violence/murder) happening on TV, but it's really hard for me to wrap my head around the concept that it could still be happening in my own backyard. But then, I have a hard time believing that ANYONE could do those kinds of things to ANYONE... If the world were as nice of a place a I think it is, it'd be a much better place to live. : (
as far as the backyard goes, alot of this kind of thing goes unreported in the news because the southern media does not want to rock the boat and start a riot of us gays marching to gov. deals office or something like that, so they just push it under the rug and do some report about southern hospitality.
20 Jun 2011, 6:59 am
