Heterosexuality... the norm!

Through out all of our years, since we are born most of the people are being taught that women are attractive to men, and men are attractive to women. That’s the norm, so basically if you don’t fall in one of these two categories then you’re not normal. Something is wrong with you. Most of the people think that heterosexuality is the norm, when they are not even informed of all the other concepts that exist out there. All they know is about heterosexuality being the norm, and homosexuality being the wrong thing to do, and when I say homosexuality they only refer to gay men and lesbians, but they skip all these other terms that we have learned about (bisexual, transsexual, metro sexual, transvestites, transgendered, etc). People have the wrong perception about this and this is why the majority of films will show a negative aspect when showing people that consider themselves as one of these categories.

The movie "But I’m A Cheerleader" surprised me a lot. I think this was the first movie that I watch that really shows what life is about for gay and lesbian people in this case, and how they fight for the right to be together. At the beginning we can see how Megan is lost in her gender identity thinking that she is a heterosexual person, but then actually believing that she’s not when everyone starts telling her that she needs to admit that she’s lesbian. At the end she ends up realizing that this actually was her real identity. I think the movie makes its points very clear. Such is that fact of showing at the camp how girls and boys need to behave according with the norm (heterosexuality). As we learned earlier in class according to the norm boys should like blue, be strong, brave, watch sports, involve in activities like chopping wood, etc, while girls should like pink and they should take care of the house, the family, do the cleaning and cooking. Watching the movie is funny to see how the teenagers in the camp are being taught to learn all of these procedures, but then thinking about reality these kinds of organizations really exist and the rules and ways of living are much harsher than what is reflected in the movie. Even though the movie tries to she that heterosexuality is the right thing, by the end of the movie we see how Megan and Graham end up being together. I think this gave gay and lesbian people the motivation to fight for their right to love whoever they want and for other to come out of the closet.

By these days now we see more movies that portray homosexuality and some of all the other concepts, but cinema still fails at the attempt of really showing them as what reality is about. It looks like for cinema and for the rest of most of the people heterosexuality will continue to be norm.

It's not a disability!!

Many people have the wrong idea about disability. They are not well informed about what disability is about. They get the wrong assumptions about people. As we have mentioned in class when we talk about disabled people we think of helpless people, who are not able to function the same way as the rest of the people that have temporarily able bodies. The truth is that we have so much to learn from all these people. It even makes me think that the people who have the disability it’s us (the people with temporarily able bodies) and not them. I accept that I have learned so much throughout the quarter, and I’ve also learned many things about disability from these last weeks.

Last year I took sign language classes and since the beginning of my education here at Shoreline, they have been my favorite classes. I learned that being deaf is not a disability, but a whole different culture. Just like Hispanic culture, or any other culture we have also the Deaf Culture and there is so much we could learn from each other, but we have the wrong assumptions about people. Probably we could say that some people put deaf people under the obsessive avenger category. They see deaf people as violent, monstrous, and scary. Other put them under the sweet innocent category. They see them as dependent and dump. Some even are afraid to get too close to them, as if deafness could be contagious. This ASL class really opened my mind. I learned to respect Deaf Culture, to admire it and even it gave me the feeling of be part of it. I even consider deaf people smarter than the rest. The way they communicate it’s just impressive. They’re full of expressions and full of life.

I want to end with this video that a friend sent me to my e-mail some time ago. I have to admit that it really touched me, I cried a lot and the same time it opened my eyes. A lesson that I learned from watching this is that you are what you believe, so always think positive about yourself and never let other people put you down. You can find the video in youtube. The video is like a short movie (reflexion) called The Butterfly Circus. The story focuses on Will the main character. Will has no limbs and he works for a circus, but the circus’ show consists of making fun of disabled people or in other words they call it “weird or abnormal” people. Will has heard good things about The Butterfly Circus so he moves with them. Soon, again he feels like he’s worthless and helpless and that with no limbs he cannot do anything. Then he discovers that he is not the only one that has suffered. All the actors that work for The Butterfly Circus come from different backgrounds. Some women were sexually abused, others had alcohol problems, others were homeless, etc, but they left that life and decided to unite and start bringing happiness and smiles to others people’s lives by joining the circus. This teaches us that we should never give up. Another interesting thing that I noticed was how the owner of The Butterfly Circus is a Hispanic guy (Mendez), and how people from all different backgrounds are united in the movie (blacks, whites, and hispanics). At the end of the movie we see how Will becomes famous and he discovers all the talents he has, and if Will can do that we can do it too. Will has not a disability. On the contrary he has the ability to do so many things like the rest of us and even does things that not even us are able to do.

Please watch both parts!!

Sad to say... money can buy happiness!!

Sometimes or better said most of the time it seems to be that money is the main cause of our problems, but at the same time many people think that is the only solution to them. We have been raised in a society where most people believe that money is the main thing you need to be a successful person in life. In other words, you have money, then you can have anything you want. As we read in the article “Class in America” I can’t believe how these myths like believing that America is a classless society can exist when we clearly can see the differences of social classes all over the country. We can see people in each of the different classes (poor/working/middle/wealthy) even though most of the people will identity themselves as being in the middle class.

Focusing a little bit on the upper class, there are some people that probably have worked hard enough to get where they are now and all the money they have is because they have earned it, but what doesn’t seem fair is that there are many people out there that are suffering, and trying hard to survive while there are wealthy people that all the money they have hasn’t cost them nothing at all. As we mentioned in class, they are born in wealthy families. They went to the best schools and they had everything they wanted. They gained so much without having to give anything in return. Many times is hard to see how a lot of these people will not even appreciate what they have. Mostly for the people who are not in the wealthy class points of life come when they think that we live in an unfair world where life seems to play more harsh for people that don’t deserve it.

But how strong is the power of money? Well, as I mentioned before for most people money seems to be the answer to everything, money can buy happiness, and its power it’s so strong that it can even make you blind until the point where you will refuse to the love of your loved ones, you will ignore the sacrifice that they have made for you, you could even come to the point of being embarrassed of having to hang out with someone from a lower class than yours.

The movie that I want to use for this example is "Spanglish".Even though this movie focuses more on the idea that two people from two different cultures, with two different languages can fall in love, there are so many other different concepts brought up in this movie. Deborah who was laid off from his managerial position is force to manage her house now. She is married to John who owns an upscale bistro in LA. They might not be that wealthy, but for sure they gave a lot of money. Bernice is Deborah’s daughter. Deborah hires Flor, a Mexican immigrant to be the housekeeper. Here we have this stereotype of Mexicans being represented as a lower socio economic class from whites. Christina is Flor’s daughter, and she is about the same age as Deborah’s daughter. Deborah has been always telling her daughter that she’s is over weighted and that she doesn’t have a nice body, so when she sees Christina, a “beautiful” girl, she sees her as the daughter she always wanted to have, and here is when it comes the main point I want to make. Deborah starts buying Christina a whole bunch of stuff, new fancy clothes, jewelry; she takes her to the beauty salon, and wants to put her in one of the best schools. Christina starts to find happiness in money; she starts to get this idea that money can give her anything she wants that she forgets all the sacrifice that her mom Flor has made for her. She forgets that the main thing that overpasses everything is her mom’s love. Money has made her so happy that she even wants to stay to live with Deborah for the rest of her life even if her mom has to leave. Here we can see that for money many people will do anything they can, even if that involves refusing to their loved ones.

As our book America on Film says: “Occasionally a Hollywood movie will sound the idea that wealth corrupts, or “that money cannot buy happiness”” and this movie is not an exception. Sad to say; Yes, for many people money can buy happiness and even worst there’s nothing much we can do for those who are in the poor/underclass. Thanks God for those who are not materialistic and are content with what they have. Thanks God for those who are able to find happiness with or without any money.