Hi all, my name is Dylan and my pronouns are he/him/his. I am a NYC native, and my main interests are makeup, musicals and animals. I am an animal lover, and like to study how gender bias is prevalent in how we treat animals, including but not limited to the animal agriculture industry, in which female animals are the majority of the ones being exploited and tortured. This is because the males are not financially profitable enough as they do not reproduce. I also love delving into the inherent sexism behind hating cats.
I am taking this course because I am pursuing a degree in Gender and Women’s study. A good chunk of my interest in choosing this degree comes from my personal experiences as a queer gender-non-conforming person of color. Because of this, the performance and perception of gender are extra pervasive in my everyday life. The effects of gender bias are prevalent in and affect many aspects of life like racism, sexism, disability, ableism, healthcare discrimination, and financial status/income.
I think that Legally Blonde may be an applicable movie, though I am partial to the musical over the movie because it expands on the plot. Legally Blonde challenges the popular movie trope of a girl chasing after a love interest, changing herself for him, and “love” being the ultimate and even only goal in the plot, by flipping the narrative. It begins with the main character changing her school/career prospects to win back her ex, however, she ends up discovering herself and her passion for Law and chooses her degree/career over chasing after a man. The ever-so-inspiring “I was searching for love, but found that love for myself instead.”
3 thoughts on “Dylan Dong Discussion #1”
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Hi Dylan!
After reading your introduction I can confidently say you taught me something new. I had no idea that female animals are more likely to be exploited in comparison to males, and that there is sexism behind hating cats?! I’d definitely like to dive deeper into these topics if we have the chance.
It’s funny that you mention legally blonde as a movie to watch, I remember watching it for the first time when I was younger and not understanding the plot twist from love to education. The narrative of this movie does in fact break down the idea of what a rom-com should look like.
Yes! I am a cat fan and also have an interest in why people hate cats. You may or may not know that cats were used in a lot of the propaganda around women’s right to vote. I also wonder if you have read “The Sexual Politics of Meat” by Carol J. Adams. I think it would dovetail with your interests nicely.
I am also so glad to see you are a GWS major! I wrote the program and, though I have stepped down from running it for personal reasons, I am happy to help you with advising or anything related to the major. I truly believe in this line of study.
Lastly, I am continually surprised that students bring up Legally Blonde every semester. I agree it is a good example, I just never realized it was so popular.
hey Brianne 🙂 i must have missed this reply.
Yes! I read that book a few years ago when I discovered veganism thanks for the reminding me of it!
I chose your class because I knew you do/did run the program. I saw you on the BMCC GWS page. Love your hair. I would love to talk with you sometime more about this major and my future in the line of study. I am excited to learn from you, now and in future classes.
I think Legally Blonde may be such a popular suggestion for this course because of the hyperbolic transformation of Elle from a “dumb blonde valley girl” trope, into an amazing lawyer, while retaining her sense of self. She is able to defeat everyone’s misconceptions of her based on her appearance and gender (They think she’s just a dumb blonde, with this being reinforced by her flashy all-pink outfits) She proves them all wrong by winning her first case with her “useless beauty knowledge”. She also refuses to change her hyper-feminine pink wardrobe to conform to what people think a lawyer should be.
If you like musicals, I recommend it! There’s a MTV bootleg on YouTube, it is one of my favorites. https://youtu.be/RiX-EJA8n4w