Media..

"The means of communication, as radio and television, newspapers, and magazines, that reach or influence people widely" that's how http://www.dictionary.com/ defines the word "media".

My question is this: why do we let the media affect our daily lives so much? Why do we allow children to view media that encourage inappropriate things such as sex, violence, and anorexia?

These are advertisements for the ever popular Abercrombie & Fitch clothing store. They are obviously sexual, so why do we allow pre-teen girls to read nonsense magazines with ads like this one? Could this possibly relate to date rape and teen pregnancy?

My next point is violence. Our country is becoming more and more violent as a whole. Why, you might ask. Take a look around. Check out your kids' video games. What about the television shows and movies they watch? Even the books the read. Children do as they see, not as they're told, so if your son is playing the video game "Bully,"

you can expect him to start acting violently towards his friends.

This brings us to the subject of anorexia. Eating disorders used to be more limited to young women in fields such as ballet and modeling, but in recent years it's become much more widespread.

The reason for this growth is partly peer pressure, but mostly the media. They print photos of overly thin models and actresses.

Since girls look up to these women, they do what they have to so they can be just like their idol.

Not to mention the advertisements with sickly women posing for a clothing line or make up product.

(this image is of model Ana Carolina Reston who died of anorexia)

There's also the huge influence coming from music. It reaches into the subjects of sex and violence deeply.

"Smack that, all on the floor.

Smack that, give me some more.

Smack that,

'till you get sore."

--Akon, "Smack That."

"Hey, bitch,

wait'll you see my dick.

Wait'll you see my dick.

Hey, bitch.

I'm 'a beat that pussy up."

--Ying Tang Twins, "Wait (The Whisper Song)."

Those are just a few examples of the incredibly disrespectful and sexist songs out there today. Though, there are still some that show some regard to women, such as "Your Body is a Wonderland" by John Mayer.

"You tell me where to go and

Though I might leave to find it

I'll never let your head hit the bed

Without my hand behind it

you want love?

We'll make it

Swimming a deep sea

Of blankets

Take all your big plans

And break 'em

This is bound to be a while"

Though these lyrics are about sex, it shows John Mayer's respect for a women and her body, opposed to this:

"Work the pole, I got the bank roll

Imma say that I prefer them no clothes

I'm into that, I love women exposed"

--T-pain, "Low"

"Who wanna spaz out?

Crunchtime, blow ya abs out

Leave you in the fetal position, witcha ass out"

--Fat Joe, "Murder Rap"

"But I'ma chase 'em to the end of the Earth

Cause I'm a motherfuckin' rider

You can see the pain in my face

Got no problem exchangin' the hate"

--Fat Joe, "Bust at You"

Not only are the last lyrics violent, they just make "Fat Joe" sound incredibly dumb. Though his name does that already.

I don't have a solid solution, but I'd say that limiting what our kids see and hear might be a good place to start...lets at least TRY to save the next generation.

My Angel

This is something I wrote last year, and I thought I'd post it.



5/27/07
It was May 22 and I was in the front seat of my mom’s car as we drove home from my dad’s house.
“What’s the point, anyway?” I think to myself. “No one would miss me if I suddenly disappeared, so why not just die?” I lay my head against the window and close my eyes. I think about all the things that are going wrong in my life, forgetting about the hundreds of good things.
I begin thinking about my options.
“Well, you could runaway…” I reply to myself harshly, “you don’t have anywhere to go.” I sigh and start thinking of suicide.
Finally I realize what I’m doing and I pray.
“God, help me out here. I need something to brighten my day.”

A few minutes later my mom decides to take a nap at a McDonald’s in Delaware. I go into the restroom and as I’m washing my hands a little girl comes out of one of the stalls. She gets some soap on her hands, turns on the water, looks at me and gives me a smile.
By the time I finished washing my hands, she was already drying hers. I walked up to the other air dryer and press the button. Nothing happens. I sigh and think sarcastic thoughts about the dryer inside my head.

I look at the little girl. She returns a glance and says, “You can use mine,” with a smile that would make anyone feel better. So, I thank her with a half-smile and start drying my hands. I noticed that her hands were still a little wet so I offer her dryer back to her. She says thanks and steps away when she finishes.

The little girl just stood there and looked at me as I rubbed my hands together under the warm air. As she stands observing me, I notice her outfit: she’s wearing a bright red cowgirl hat; a light blue flower print tank top; a green, pink, and white striped skirt; tennis shoes and white socks. I smile because she probably picked out her outfit herself.

Then, this amazing little girl gave me the most heartwarming smile I’ve ever seen, right before she walked out of the restroom.

She may have been young, no older than eight, I would imagine, but she saved me from something that no one else could. She’s an angel to me.

Interpretation of a Prediction

I can remember last summer when the Jehovah Witnesses came to Toledo, where my dad lives. My dad and his family attend a strict Lutheran church and so, of course, they felt the need to hand out an article about how Jehovah Witnesses aren't real Christians and that they're evil and this and that. I just recently read the article.

Jehovah Witnesses don't believe in hell...but they do believe that when Jesus Christ returns, exactly 144,000 people will be saved and sent to heaven. The rest will be abolished. This is different from Lutherans because they believe that on Judgement Day, a select few people will go to heaven with Jesus, and the rest will be eternally punished in hell. Personally, I disagree with both view points.

It is written in the article that the founder of Jehovah Witnesses, Charles Taze Russel, predicted that Jesus would return in 1914, but most believe that this never happened. I'd like to point out that Mahatma Gandhi was alive and active during this time.

Does Gandhi really differ from Jesus Christ all that much? They both believed in peace, love, and non-violence. They both had a HUGE impact on their community, their culture, and the entire world. They both believed deeply in a higher power, and they both drew their reasoning and energy from that power.

Who's to say that this prediction of Christ's return wasn't about Gandhi? Maybe Charles Taze Russel meant that someone would see the world in the same way that Jesus did. He may not have even known that Gandhi was the prophet he spoke of...it is possible that Russel heard something from God that he was meant to spread to those he knew and he didn't fully understand it. That wouldn't be the first time that has happened.

Thats just a thought I had the other day and wanted to share. :)

hate the sin, love the sinner - Gandhi

i object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent. - Gandhi

victory attained by violence is tantamount to a defeat, for it is momentary. -Gandhi

Dance

So, I'm a dancer. Well, I was anyway. I did ballet. Not the petty competition school, pay two-hundred-dollars-for-an-ugly-sequeny-costume-I'll-only-wear-once kind of thing. I'm talking hardcore, seven days a week, several hours a day, dance till your feet bleed kind of ballet. I was serious about it. All I wanted to do was dance.


I had some problems though. I wasn't thin enough. I'm not now and never have been, though I wasn't ever actually "fat." I'm 5'5 and weigh 120lbs. Not bad, right? Well, when I was a dancer it was. I needed to be no more than 110lbs to be close to thin enough. Or so they said.


Not only was I too fat to dance, as my dad told me in those exact words (that's a whole nother story), I wasn't good. In fact, I sucked. Bad. I couldn't dance. I wasn't as flexible as I needed to be (even though I worked REALLY hard for it...I slept in the splits for pete's sake), I wasn't as strong as I needed to be, my feet weren't as nice as they needed to be. I just couldn't do it.


But those weren't my only problems.

The owner and instructor of the school was really hard on us, whether we wanted to be professional dancers or not, he made us work our butts off. He was constently telling us we weren't good enough and that we weren't doing it right. Everyday he yelled more and more. It go to the point of physical abuse. He hit one of my classmates...we'll call her Jess...and he hit her hard. So hard that it left a mark. It was a small rehearsal so not many people were there, about eight. And so my instructor..Bob...wrote it off as an accident. He said that HER leg "flew up and hit his hand." B.S., I know. No one would listen to me.

So I decided to leave. Physical abuse is where I draw the line. After eight years of dancing and putting everything I had into it, all of my time and money, after all the blood, sweat, and tears, I had to let it go. There weren't any schools besides my own that were good enough to send their students on to be professionals, and I obviously wasn't good enough to make it anywhere else. I gave it all up. All of my hopes and dreams. My entire life, gone. In an instant.


That was a year and a half ago. For almost a year I cried myself to sleep basically every night. I put on a fake smile and pretended like it was all okay. I was over it. "It's just ballet." I would say with a slight laugh. People actually believed me.


Then I met Andrew, who is now my boyfriend. Because of him, I stopped crying myself to sleep every night. He helped me forget all of my pain and be happy. That only lasted for so long. Finally I got comfortable with him and let him into my heart completely. Thats when I realized, I'm not over it. I never was, he just helped me see that there is still good in my life.


I still tell everyone that I'm over it, that I don't care. That what Bob did didn't break my heart. That all of the comments about me not being thin enough didn't make me anorexic (although I'm healthy now). That all of the words spoken meant to hurt me, didn't. No one but Andrew knows that my heart is broken.


Until now. Anyone who reads this blog will know, and I'm glad.

Blogs..

Well, I've always thought blogging was a neat idea, but I've never been real successful with continuing to write.

So here I am, trying it once again.

I've been wondering, whats the facination with posting your personal thoughts and feelings on the internet? Maybe its the same thing as keeping a journal, but public. Maybe people want all their friends to know what they're feeling and the things they've experienced, but don't want to actually talk about it. I certainly know that feeling. It's possible that some people use blogs as a way to get published, and get their name out there as a writer.

Or maybe people are like me. Maybe they created a blog so that they can express every single feeling, but none of their friends will know about it. I have a journal, but sometimes that isn't enough, you know? Every now and then I need a little feedback, some encouragement from someone that I don't know. Sometimes thats more of a comfort than someone close saying the same thing.

Don't ask me why, I'm not a psychologist, but it makes sense in my head some how.