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Reflection 6

The article “Radical Heterosexuality” by Naomi Wolf pointed out some good points that are still exist in some societies. As she explained that radical heterosexuals must be conscious at all time, I also agree on that. Sometimes we, the women, create the confusions what we really mean, or what we really expect from the men who are involved in our life. We have to be careful about the choices that we make in a daily basis in front of those men. We are constantly giving them the clue of how we would like to be treated by them. When we talk about feminism, we have to make sure that we don’t give them the idea that we are against men. A feminist woman can have weakness with the mindset of a strong feminist, she doesn’t have to be strong at all times. She should feel the comfort to talk about her weakness to other feminists. I also know that some societies are harder on the women, who call themselves feminist, those societies would treat other women differently because they didn’t mention their perception. I guess it is our responsibility to be clear what we mean by feminist and not to be hard on ourselves.

She also talked about how the relationship should be between a man and a woman. But we don’t see the man we love, are behaving as we expect. However, we are ready to behave how they expect us to behave. Most of the time women forgive men expecting that they would change them to be with us. The reality is different. It doesn’t mean that a man loves a woman when he keeps coming back. That man loves the power he has over the woman, he knows the woman will take him back. Otherwise, he will choose the next woman that he can control. Growing up in a Bengali Muslim family, I have seen many women being ready to do anything for the men that they love. They would sacrifice everything for the men even if they are abusive. Maybe they have brought up in a way that they would tolerate anything to save their marriage, or maybe they feel good about themselves by doing such things for the men. I think those women have lack of awareness, education and the support from their family and friends. I see many women feel the shame to talk about the problems that they are facing with their husband. I can clearly see the guilt in some women's face when they are in their period, like they did something wrong. Their husbands don’t treat them with love and affection, they treat those women like they have a disease which is why they can't touch them, what if they get that too. Also, some men suggest their wives to hide the bad things they have done. They are like I am your man; you should represent me well so people will respect you more. I see this all the time in my community and I feel bad for both the man and the woman. They both don’t know what they are doing to themselves and what they are teaching to their children.

I know a girl who got bad result in high school, and she was scared to show the report card to her parents. She knew her father was an angry man who abuses her mother. Anyway, after seeing the report card, he brutally hit his daughter and continuously slapped her. The next day, when her friend saw the red marks and cut on her body, he suggested her to call the police, so she did. Then the police arrested her father, and took him to the jail. The sad thing was that her mother was forcing her to take out the report. The girl was telling her mother that she doesn't feel safe in her own home. But still her mother was trying hard to convince her for the withdrawal. Then the girl told the police that she doesn't feel safe with her own parents, and she doesn’t want to live with them. Then the police call the social worker to help her. Last I heard that an Arabic family has adopted her. This happened last year in queens. A mother couldn’t save herself from the domestic violence, but when the daughter reported about her father, the mother didn’t support her daughter. It is very sad that it is happening in front of our eyes. Women should support each other when they face any kind of difficulty.

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Reflection 5

The article “Masked Racism: Reflections on the Prison Industrial Complex” by Angela Davis was very informative and talks about the inside of the prison system briefly. I didn’t know many things about the prisons, the prison people and their lifestyle before reading this article. It was very surprising for me that prisons were becoming more important to the U.S. economy. The author said, “Prison do not disappear problems, they disappear human beings”. I completely agree with her after knowing how women, especially the black women have been treated in prison. Victimization of the women in prison are unimaginable. When most of the perpetrators are staff members, nobody is going to believe those helpless women who have been sexually violated. They are already in a bad position for doing something wrong, staying away from the society, sometimes from the children, not having a normal life, but at least prison should be a safe place for women. Besides giving them the punishments that they deserved, prison should not take away the right of being an individual.

Prisons were built to solve problems which involved crimes that were happening as a result of the existence of racism, sexism, hate crimes, class and ethnicity difference in the society. However, people from the law enforcement mostly targets poor, immigrant, and racially marginalized communities. Davis also mentioned that 70% of the imprisoned population were people of color, and the number of black women were increasing in the jail. She also said that five times as many black men were in prison as in four-year colleges and universities. That was very shocking, that the U.S. system were reserving prisons for the people of color. On the other hand, education was only reserved for certain group of people. A country can never imagine progress, and success of the nation excluding certain minority groups, people of color, people of different race and class. Also, law enforcement should not target the black high school kids because it somehow influences them to do the bad things. It is obvious if a person continuously gets treated as bad person, he or she won't hesitate later on to do something bad, or the person's life ends up doing something bad. That is the sad reality.  

Davis brought up many issues for the prisoners in the article. One of them was how many companies have been using prison labor without giving them any facilities like the regular workers gets. Those companies are IBM, Motorola, Texas Instruments, Microsoft, and Nordstrom. I use products of those companies, but I didn’t know the bitter truth about those companies. She mentioned that Maryland prisoners inspect glass bottles and jars used by Revlon, and prisoners make lingerie for Victoria’s Secret. Big companies are getting bigger and bigger by using the prison labor, where prison workers didn’t even get proper healthcare services, unemployment insurance and workers compensation to pay. What earth we are living on! This is injustice to those people. Big companies try to hide their cruelty by donating a big amount to the charitable organizations to get public appreciation. However, they should do something to provide the prisoners a healthy environment and give them the right pay so that they can support their kids who are outside of the prison.          

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Reflection 4

It's been five years that I came into this country with many dreams. I was not able to do many things in my home country a man could do. I was hoping that America would provide me all the opportunities to be able to do something and prove myself that I am as capable of as a man. I am no less than a man. I was not so familiar with the American culture, so as with all the famous people. As I am getting college education here, I get to know the history of the people who have worked so hard to make the lives of their next generation so easy that they don’t get to face the difficulties that they have faced. I am very grateful to those who have spoken up and made the difference. Women's positions in this country are better than those who are living in developing countries. However, it's not there yet where women get treated equal as men in many fields, and when those women of color, race and class get treated really badly, we can't say that America is a great country of all.  

I was in shock after knowing the police report from the incident when Chris Brown beat his girlfriend Rihanna. There are many stories like that which have never been told because either the perpetrators are very powerful that they can cover anything from the world, or the victim has a mindset that the perpetrator has done so much for her that she should accept any kind of behavior in returns. This is very sad that we let those famous offenders get away with anything very easily. Moreover, if a girl is in an abusive relationship, and faces sexual violence from her boyfriend, the police tells her that it was her fault to get so close to that boy before he even investigates the case. It takes a lot of courage to talk about an abusive relationship or sexual violence about her love one who used to treat her like a princess or queen. Then there is the process of proving the assault, it is very hard. When a girl or woman say something, trust her.    

The article “Dear Young Ladies Who Love Chris Brown So Much They Would Let Him Beat Them” by Roxane Gay claims that it is the culture which has treated women so poorly long enough that suffering abuse to receive celebrity attention seems like a fair and reasonable trade. This is very disgusting when some women represent themselves as worthless. She talked about many incidents where many famous, infamous, not at all famous people were involved in abusing women. She even included her own suffering in an abusive relationship. It is true we; the women are somehow in some point become very susceptible to those men to tolerate their violent behaviors. We rarely talk about the abusive relationship we are in, maybe we are sacred. This needs to change, women need to talk about it more and stand against any wrongdoers that come on their way of living. We are no less than men, we can also be as famous as men. We just need to be more determined, focused and work hard towards our dream. If we don’t do the right thing for ourselves, who is going to do that! The answer is nobody, but ourselves.    

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Reflection 3

The film “She’s Beautiful When She’s angry” was very informative and they portrayed every detail about the women's liberation movement clearly. It was very surprising for me because I thought America always gives women their right and they are very strict about that comparing to other developing countries. After watching the film, now I know the struggles of the women in this country and they are still fighting for their right in many fields. It has shown the early conscious-raising sessions which broke down the isolation of women as mothers and homemakers. It also showed how women were encouraged to take control of their reproductive health. Women have done countless rallies and demonstrations to demand equal pay, day care, safer contraceptives, access to abortion, freedom from violence and sexual harassment. There are still many women in this country, who don’t know how to raise their voice, especially the immigrants. They don’t even know how to say the truth and they are scared to tell the truth.

There are many feminists who are making progress, but they are not successful. White women are more privileged than women of color. When the feminists want equal rights for men and women, white women put themselves first. Even the police and laws are very strict for the white women comparing to the women of color. In the film, it was called the movement for black rights where black women had to fight for their own rights as if they were different than the white women. It is very sad that till now women of color get treated differently than the white women. Black men also treated the black women badly. Then we can imagine the women of different ethnicity, and class who have just arrived to their dream country with the hope of getting their rights. The cases are even worse for them to be solved.

Also, there are many women who like to be controlled by men. They don’t even like the feminist women. When some women fight for the safety of their own body, some other women would judge them and criticize them. It has been really controversial if a woman wants abortion and when is the right time to do so. They say women are killing the tiny human when she should have the right to choose what to do. I saw women telling the doctors to save the child life first if there is any complication. Then how could some people blame the women as killer. My aunt suddenly got pregnant and she got very sick. When she went to the doctors, it was too late to do the abortion. She didn’t have a choice, but still she was judged for thinking about abortion in unhealthy situation. Her husband was very upset, he said that he has enough money to afford another child. He never gave a thought about his wife's health. My aunt didn’t even know how to speak up in front of her husband. She stays silent in front of him, she still thinks that it is very disrespectful to speak up in front the husband.  

There are many stories that we don’t know because we are not able to give those women support, comfort and mostly information. Domestic violence is still happening. In some society women are scared of getting ashamed of speaking the truth about their husband. Other women would suggest her to stay quiet and tolerate that. Woman’s love and support are more important to another woman when it comes to women's power whether it's for black or white. Women should often talk about this matter and be there for other women when they need help.  

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Reflection 2

After reading “The Humiliating Practice of Sex-Testing Female Athletes” article from The New York Times magazine by Ruth Padawer, I feel very sad, and angry. What if I was there at her place! How would I survive! I have grown up in Bangladesh, which is the neighbor country of India. So far, I have known from my childhood that Intersex people were not accepted in the society of that region because they were not normal. If the parents knew that they were having a baby whose sex wasn’t clear in the ultrasound, they would tell the doctor to kill the baby before the delivery. But, in village area, parents got to know that after the delivery because they didn’t have the ability to go to a doctor. So, they gave that child to the intersex community after birth, who are known as “Hijra” in Bangladesh. The society would bully the parents like the child was the result of their sins until they could have a normal child. It was a shame to be the parents of an intersex child. Some husband divorced their wives because they gave birth to the intersex child. There were many superstitions which lead many people's life to an end. When I was in fifth grade, I was told by the older if I saw any ‘hijra’, I shouldn’t go near them. When I asked why, they told me that they were the bad people, who are cursed by the God. Now I know it was not true.  

Also, I have heard a real story from my friends when I was in high school, there were a brother and a sister, living in an apartment like the so-called normal people's life in Bangladesh. They were hiding the fact that they were intersex people because they didn’t want to live with the hijra’s whose life was very difficult. After six months, the owner of that building figured out that they were intersex people. So, he informed the ‘hijra’ community, and they forcefully took them to live with them like ‘hijras’. It was very scary that those brother and sister couldn’t choose to live a normal life. ‘What if I was a hijra!’ this thought was on my mind for couple of months! I knew the answer too that the society would throw me into a miserable life. There were no rules and regulations by the law during that time in Bangladesh. Now, people talk about it like its normal because of the social media, internet and there are laws to protect their rights. However, intersex people are still not seen in every field like others around the world.  

 However, Dutee Chand was a normal child, and she suffered a lot just because of having high level of testosterone. Like Ruth described, to evaluate the effects of high testosterone, the international athletic association’s protocol involved measuring and palpating the clitoris, vagina and labia, as well as evaluating breast size and pubic hair scored on an illustrated five-

grade scale, which is very humiliating and insulting for an individual, especially for a woman. The athlete should be in competitions based on their body size, ability and strength, not based on their sex. Her story has been told, so many people are aware of that. There must be many stories like hers in different fields, which have not been told. We should be kind to every human kind, and give them the comfort to share whatever they are going through. This is not going to change in a day because it's happening for many years in male-dominating societies. I think we need to talk more about this matter, so that many people would be aware of this matter. Then we would be able to see the change.  

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Reflection 1 - Gender Education

Growing up in a typical Bengali family, I have seen how male and female were treated so differently. If a baby girl was born with dark-skinned color, I have seen worries in her parents' eyes. On the other hand, if it’s a boy, there has been many celebrations and the parents look so happy even if he is dark-skinned. Also, fair-skinned baby girl will be told to be soft, kind and get ready to learn how to take care of the family. As a result, she can become a good housewife whose purpose should be pleasing her husband, giving birth to children and taking care of them. The reason is the society has always seen the girl as burden and the boy as life-saver.

Some parents think education is more important for boys than the girls. If parents have to choose between their girl or boy to be educated, they would choose their boy. My mother told me that she was a good student and wanted to finish her education to get a job. Her parents wanted to educate only their sons because they didn’t have enough money to send all of their kids to school. She has to drop out of school because her parents couldn’t pay her tuition bill. Since then she promised to herself that she will spend money on her kids equally. So, she always has been encouraging me to finish my study, get a job and get married. She has invested so much on me so that she can see me somewhere that she wanted to be.  

Though my mother is always on my side, my two brothers has always been the apples of my father's eyes. My father would do anything for his son's happiness. On the other hand, he has always been critical about me. He doesn’t even like me to wear jeans and go outside because his society will look at me in a bad way. The men in my family have always told me to learn cooking because I am a girl, and I have to cook after I get married. I found that really irritating, but my mother would support what I want to do. Moreover, my father expects that his sons will take care of him when he will retire. He doesn’t expect anything from me, and I feel sad for that. Sometimes I think he won't accept it if I want to do something for him. I badly want to prove my father wrong, so I want to take care of my parents in their old days.  

I found the Psychology of Women class very interesting and its very important to me. I want to change the perspective of my family members. Gender Education by Matlin has point out the issues that we often see in the girls' and boys' children of our family. Also, I see the clothing company always makes the pockets of girls pants so small than the boy's pockets. Girls barely can fit their money bag in the pocket. It is now time that we, the women take a step to solve this issue and the men should support that too. Also, we see pink and blue color preferences told by the society between girls and boys though both are my favorite color. Like my mother has always been protective about her girl child, I think both parents should give importance to their daughters as they do for their sons. Parents should treat their kids equally, and they should be aware of the toys that they choose for their girls and boys.