The Every Child Matters Education Fund has an interactive map that allows you to click on a state and see where it ranks in terms of several indicators of child well-being.
Showing posts with label reproduction/abortion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label reproduction/abortion. Show all posts
Thomas Beatie, The Pregnant Man, In The Public Sphere
Thomas is a female-to-male transgendered man without "bottom" surgery. He is legally a man and legally married to his wife, Nancy. He stopped taking testosterone and was artifically inseminated. He is now about six months pregnant:
I'm not sure what to make, sociologically, of the attention that Thomas' pregnancy is receiving in the mass media, but it is ripe for analysis. Below I've collected a bunch of different takes from various media outlets. I'd love to hear what ya'll think.
CNN:
Fox News:
On David Letterman:
MSNBC:
More MSNBC:
The Oprah Promo:
The Beginning of the Oprah Special:
Sperm In Space; Or Sperm Wars
Apparently, if you use Viagra, your ejaculation will be so powerful that you will shoot sperm into space to aggressively penetrate Planet Egg:
This ad was made by a firm in China. Found thanks to copyranter.
Mock Magazine Covers (And One Ad)
I thought these might be useful for making explicit some current cultural trends--I think things like the focus on pregnant celebrities' bodies are more obviously absurd when they're made so apparent.
Making fun of our obsession with celebrity pregnancies:
What the male version of a teen mag might look like:
Production, Consumption, And Reproduction
This post is dedicated to my pregnant friends. You should buy this t-shirt.
In class this week my students and I are talking about the triple threat of production, consumption, and reproduction that characterizes modern capitalism. I use the cultural imperative that women have and raise babies (reproduction) and be beautiful and sexy while doing it (consumption), all of which is paid for by someone who is busy earning money at a job (production). Below are some of the images I use.
Be beautiful while pregnant (images from A Pea in the Pod and covergirls Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera):
Running in high heels while in the third trimester? Why, of course!
Get your body back as soon as possible (as demonstrated by Gwen Stefani and Tori Spelling):
If you're not sure how, buy some books (all the better)!
Resort to suspicious drugs if you need to:
Or get a Mommy Makeover. Extensive cosmetic surgery, that is:
Recommended by Parenting Magazine!
Comics For Contraception
The image below is the cover of a comic book designed to teach adults about birth control (it seems to have been published in 1956 and again in 1962). Find it all online here.
Found here via copyranter.
"Your Body": Men Are People And Women Are Women
Today Gwen and I went to the by now well-known Bodies exhibit that displays preserved human cadavers, purportedly so we can learn more about the human body (and give up smoking).
As we went in we joked about how there probably wouldn't be any female bodies until the part on reproduction. We were royally pissed off to discover that we were right. This is a great illustration of the way in which men are neutral and women deviants from the standard (that is, men are people and women are women). The first 8 or so bodies were all male and all in action doing masculine things. Here are pictures from the exhibit in Las Vegas:
The first female body we encountered (there were only two out of more than a dozen) stood immediately outside the fetal development hall and alongside the dissections of the genitals and reproductive organs.* Not only was this the first female, she was arranged not in action, but in a pose for the male gaze. She was standing with her hands on her hips, with her breasts and hips thrust forward, and on her tip toes as if she were wearing high heels.
We couldn't find any pictures of her on the web (and we weren't allowed to take any), but we did find this female cadaver from another exhibit. Notice how she is both pregnant (fulfilling her biological destiny) and positioned like a pin up (fulfilling her role as sexual object for men):
(Via getreligion)
After all of this, to piss us off further, the last body (male) had a sign over it that said "Your Body" because, of course, the male body is just the neutral human body that represents us all.
So, in addition to marginalizing the female body, they gendered both male and female bodies. Male bodies are on the move, but female bodies are good for only two things: babies and sexual provocation.
* As we entered the fetal development hall there was a sign that warned people that they should take a second and think about whether they wanted to see the fetuses, while assuring us that all of them died of natural causes (that is, not abortion). I think it's bizarre that we're supposed to find these fetal bodies disturbing, but not the bodies of people who lived lives and loved others and were loved and all that good stuff. There is something weird about the priorities here, as if the fetuses were somehow more human than the adults. Also, while we were looking at the deformed fetuses, a woman standing next to us said that all teenagers should have to see the deformed fetuses because "that's what gonna happen" if they start having sex.
U.S. Fertility Rate Reaches Replacement Level
These two figures display the U.S. birth rate over time. They accompanied a New York Times article discussing the fact that the U.S. birth rate reached replacement level for the first time in 35 years. Interestingly, the article suggests it has something to do with the recent rise in home ownership.
World Statistics
Click here for a "world clock" (by http://www.poodwaddle.com/) that constantly updates the total number of, well, lots of stuff: births, abortions, deaths of different types, prisoners, marriages, divorces, extinct species, gallons of oil pumped, and computers, cars, and bicycles built. You can choose to display it by how much has happened in the last year, month, day, or even from a moment, like right... now.
Thanks, Mom!
Following Positions To Their Logical Conclusions
Click here for a fascinating 7 minute video in which a man interviews pro-life activists and asks: "If abortion was illegal, should women who have abortions go to jail?"
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