The Abortion Divide was a tough film to watch. My mom revealed to me some years ago that she was forced to have an abortion while I was in high school. She found out that a medical condition could potentially threaten her life if she decided to go through with having her baby. I had another friend whose mom was candid about an abortion she had after being raped by an unknown assailant. I could only imagine the position either of them found themselves in as they contemplated having the procedure. This film does a really fantastic job of capturing the tough and deeply personal choices that some women make when they seek out an abortion. Rebecca Mercier, OB-GYN for the clinic featured in the film said “Every kind of woman gets abortions: women who are young, women who are old; women of all races; women of all religions; women who it’s their first pregnancy, women with lots of children; women who never thought that they would be seeking an abortion.” This topic is not limited to a specific social group and affects women from all walks of life. 

I really enjoyed how the film showed both sides of the argument. The anti-abortion protestors were constantly present and served as a continuous reminder of how serious this conflict is. I read that Dr. George Isajiw was featured in the original production and his opinion remained unchanged after all these years. Even with all the dialogue that’s been hard and the advances in technology, he still believes abortion is wrong. However, there were also patients who shared some really personal scenarios that led them to have the procedure done. I think patient Shaharra’s reasoning, that she was unable to financially support a child, is one that I’ve heard other women mention before. I would same I’m pro-choice. I’ve seen first-hand how pregnancy can change a woman’s body in irreversible ways. I’ve witnessed couples struggling to provide for their child. Do I think adults should be more responsible when choosing to be intimate? Absolutely. But ultimately, it should be up to the woman to decide what she’d like to do with her body. My classmate, Hillary, posted a snapshot that encompasses how I feel about abortion. Additionally, I liked Sadiras choice of a snapshot which gives a visual depiction of the powers that be playing tug of war with a woman’s body.

With these things in mind, I thought John Oliver did a wonderful job at poking fun at Hobby Lobby’s bout with the Supreme Court. I don’t think businesses should have the same rights as a person. This just opens the door for people to have another way to discriminate against one another. A corporation shouldn’t be able to pick and choose what laws apply to them. We would essentially be creating mini dictatorships in the form of business entities. My favorite line was when Oliver stated, “If you really want to be treated like a person, corporations, then guess what, pay for things you don’t like is what it really feels like to be one”. We all have to do things we don’t particularly care for in order to keep our country running. I mean I’d love to not pay taxes too but would prefer if we didn’t open pandora’s box.

I really enjoyed reading Beyond The Gender Binary. I actually read this book through a Facebook book club for LBTQ people of color. Vaid-Menon provides their unique view and shares some really great words of encouragement. My favorite quote reads  “we want a world where boys can feel, girls can lead, and the rest of us can not only exist but thrive.” This is a powerful statement and essentially encompasses the idea of gender non-conforming people. This idea of masculinity, feminity, or both being something that anyone, regardless of their biological gender assignment, can use to express themselves is so beautiful. I think my classmate, Hilary, summarized how I feel when she posted her snapshot image of Young Thug in the garment that broke the internet. 

Vaid- Menon stated that “the assumption is that being a masculine man or a feminine woman is normal and that being “us” is an accessory. Like if you remove our clothing, our makeup, and our pronouns, underneath the surface we are just men and women playing dress-up.” Young Thug was genuinely expressing himself through his love for fashion but got some much hate because it wasn’t done in a way that supported the status quo. It is my belief that the system is set up to demonize anything that might encourage free-thinking and self-awareness. That said, this is a great book to share with anyone considering what else is “beyond the binary” or even for those who just want to learn more.

The author does a fantastic job at debunking some of the common arguments I’ve heard against gender non-conforming people. One of my favorite instances of this is in the section entitled “slippery slope”. Here They explain how the opposition attempts to associate the notion of being non-binary as an ideal that will lead to some kind of misfortune or disastrous situation. They then go on to explain how this stirs the metaphorical pot because people make wild claims or connections to other topics that don’t actually have anything to do with people identifying as non-binary. I remember how my dad tried to use the same logic when I came out; that my sister would somehow be influenced by lifestyle and end up unmarried. At the time, he really had convinced me that I was some home responsible for my sister’s future happiness. In reality, me being a gay man had nothing to do with her love life. We’ve since come to terms with my sexuality and he understands how I view the world. I’m hoping to revisit this topic in conversation with him and ask him to explain where he got that argument from. I’ve often found that it’s often something learned through socialization or is expressed as a result of the system pushing men to toxic. My classmate, Anevay, posted a snapshot depicting the Native American belief in people having two spirits. Gender fluidity, expression, and gender non-conforming were her long before the system ever existed. And will be here long after we destroy it.

I really enjoyed reading the Combahee River Collective Statement. The organization was created because the needs and overall best interests of black and lesbian women were not being considered by other feminist movements or even by the civil rights movement. The name itself was created based on efforts by Harriet Tubman on the Combahee River that resulted in the freeing of 750 slaves. I think this was a wonderful way to build the foundation for an organization aimed at freeing people from multiple forms of oppression. That said, it’s really sad to know that these divisions in feminism still exist. 

The reading states “Black feminists and many more Black women who do not define themselves as feminists have all experienced sexual oppression as a constant factor in our day-to-day existence.” I had a conversation with my best friend and she mentioned how terrified she was at the prospect of having children. Specifically, she was afraid of having to empower her daughter to forge her own identity while also explaining how the world would judge her for her nonverbal communicative choices. I can honestly say as a man that I don’t have that same fear when I consider empowering my future son to express himself. And this was one of the reasons The Combahee River Collective was created.

Paris is Burning has always been one of my favorite documentaries. I’ve always wanted to be a part of the ballroom scene and know several people who are. The film offers a glimpse into a much different time in NY when homophobia, transphobia, and the AIDS epidemic were all a struggle for life. I love the house families and the manner in which they supported through the battle against societal oppression. The film was actually made over the course of seven years and I’ve always found it really interesting to see the development of some of the cast members. That said, it’s also really sad to see that not everyone survived the duration in which film took to be made. 

When Venus Xtravaganza was found murdered, it hit really hard. But this makes me think about the duality of the trans-community in that non-white transgendered individuals have a different experience to that of their white counterparts. Ironically enough, this is essentially the message Dave Chappelle attempted to communicate in his recent stand-up. A system of oppression that exists within another system of oppression hard at work. I think this is why it was touching to see how the house families really came together to take care of their own. My classmate posted a snapshot of the ballroom scene as it is now and you can still see how close the house members were as they support their housemate’s walk. You can also see this evidenced in Isabella’s post from the fictional depiction of the ballroom scene from Pose. When the world was against them, the ballroom family was essentially all they had left. This is still the case today and why ballroom is so important to our culture. 

I think identity politics are something that has empowered all of us to take pride in the differences that make up our individual identities. I take pride in being a member of the LGBTQ community while also cherishing my black skin. I love being a man and cherish the women in my life. But I liken identity politics to a fully loaded gun; a gun is a tool that can be used by a person for nefarious purposes. I totally believe Trump and his political team used identity politics to help him when the 2016 presidential election. He made it very clear who he considered his core supporters but disguised his actions as progressive steps that ultimately only benefited his support group. For example, he approved a female nominee to take the vacant seat when Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed; a move that on the outside looked like a progressive for a man known to exclude women from management roles. However, he was strategic in picking the candidate as she was approved by his core group of supporters.

This is a great example of controlling the narrative as Garza mentioned in the reading. Garza states that “Controlling the story of who we are and what makes us who we are is an exercise of power…the more people you can get to invest in that story, to make your story their own, the more powerful you become.” It is important that we continue to fight for equal footing for all humans, regardless of race, sexuality, gender, and any other difference that makes a person unique. If we don’t acknowledge our unique histories, we can never expect said history to be included in conversations at the table in which we are working so hard to be seated. In learning that ‘the system’ is essentially an ongoing force of oppression designed to keep Christian, cis-gendered white men in privilege, I’ve also learned that we have to address the injustices that put them in there in the first place. My classmate, Raquel Hernandez, posted a snapshot of a meme that sums up the opposition to this. 

I remember having a conversation with someone about why I supported the Blacks Lives Matter movement and not the All Lives Matter movement. He was a straight, cis-gendered white male and couldn’t grasp the concept of acknowledging the pain other races had endured because they happened in the past. I tried to explain how the traumas of these historical events could be echoed in the experience of non-white people. How it’s not as easy as just saying we’re all humans because that has not been our experience. I gave him an example of how my sister, whose mom is white while our dad is black, struggles to be accepted socially. When she doesn’t straighten her hair, she is told it’s nappy or that it looks unprofessional. However, when she straightens it, she can sometimes pass for races other than black. Her natural hair is not something she was taught to embrace because we were told that we needed to be interculturally competent and able to adapt in order to be successfully. That, like many of her ancestors, she needed to be as close to white as she could be if she wanted to get anywhere.

This week offered some really interesting material to consider. As a gay man, I’m not the most familiar with the female anatomy and so i’d never considered how the oppression of women could hamper their sex life. I mean sure, I’ve seen popular culture float the rumor that the female orgasm can be elusive but this is something deeper. The female sexual experience has been shaped to accommodate the male ego and to benefit their male counterparts. Koedt states that “…Because of the lack of knowledge of their own anatomy, some women accept the idea that an orgasm felt during “normal” intercourse was vaginally caused.” I could only imagine what this must be like, especially for those who are married. 

The American dream is starting to sound pretty awful at this point. I don’t have female family members, at least as far as I can recall, who aspired to live the life of a suburban housewife. But I did get to watch my stepmother try and listened to my mom complain about how she felt she was ‘losing herself’ when she tried to play the perfect housewife. This echoed the claims that Freidan made in The Feminine Mystique. “The problem lay buried,  unspoken,  for many years in the minds of American women.  It was a strange stirring, a sense of dissatisfaction,  a yearning that women suffered in the middle of the twentieth century in the United States.” 

My classmate, Sadira Mohammed, posted a meme of a 1950’s housewife with a quote that reads “I don’t need rights-I have a Kitchen”. It reminded me of old war propaganda used to glorify the terrors of war. In all that we’ve learned, I feel pretty crappy as a man. Mainardt states that “It is a traumatizing experience for someone who has always thought of himself as being against any oppression or exploitation of one human being by another to

realize that in his daily life he has been accepting and implementing (and benefiting from) this exploitation..” But I also feel armed to go out and actually make informed decisions that go against the status quo. 

I had some really great conversations with my female best friend after completing the reading for this week. I think I’d like to shop these same conversations around with my dad and uncle. I wonder what the experience is like for a heterosexual male to come to the same conclusions that I have; if there experience is different being fathers themselves. My father has been married twice and both women attempted to, unsuccessfully I might add, be a housewife. I would wager that a large part of that had to do with how much emphasis he places on men being the head of household.