Existence

So, I had this excellent excellent post written out, marking my "triumphant" return to AEC. And I lost it. I hate not having a computer. Anyhow, I will try to remember it as well as I can, although it almost certainly won't be as good as the first.


Anyway. Hello there. Long time. Yes, I'm back. Not that I died and was resurrected or anything, but internet-wise, I have returned.






It is remarkable how my mind works. At least, to me. Usually I will plan to do something like write on this blog. And usually I know what I am going to write about well beforehand. But, that is not the case this time. Obviously, I had completely abandoned this blog. For various reasons. But I was recently making a tumblr for reasons I still don't understand, and had to enter a name for it. And then I remembered "an enigmatic conundrum" from this blog. One thing lead to another, as they say, and here I am.





So, one of my first thoughts when I thought of this blog again was "oh yeah, that thing exists". And so, being the extraordinarily philosophically deep thinker I am, I began to think about the meaning of existence. Then I came to the conclusion that existence in itself is meaningless. For example, this blog has existed for the past six months or so, but during that time it has been aimlessly floating around among the 3,736,927,522 other things in cyberspace.







And then, being the deeper philosophical thinker I am, I started to connect that to things happening to me now. I feel like for a long time now I have just "existed" to people, which normally is fine, but it is harder when that seems to be the case to people whose opinion you really value, to be as vague as possible. And that's a horrible feeling, both because it just sucks and because there's nothing I can really do about it outside of completely changing who I am. And so now what's left is this dull, existing being who doesnt appear to mean much. So all I can do is wait for the opposite to be the case. And to be honest, I am fucking sick of waiting at this point.






Anyway, moving on. When I first revisited this site, I read through most of my older entries, both because I always read my old text and internet interactions, and because I wanted to see how much I've changed over the past six months, if at all. Originally I had planned on saying that I no longer sound whiny, naive, and full of myself, but the first few paragraphs of this entry completely fly in the face of that suggestion.

So then, I decided to think about the most important things that have happened to me within the last half year. As I thought about it, I realized that the most important things have happened within the past few weeks or so, which is both convenient and depressing. I was accepted to SF State, which means I have something to do for at least the next four years. And then there's something else. Now here on AEC, it is always quite obvious what "something else" is, but I enjoy vagueness. Anyway, something else has made me realize how relative a term important is. What has been and still is mind-bogglingly important and amazing to me is not as important to, um, others. Which is disconcerting.

But, there you have it. I'm sure you have missed the depressing, pseudo-insane ramblings of a mind filled with thoughts like a fat man's stomach is filled with donuts and lard.

Ah, yes, the embarrassingly bad and tasteless similes have returned. Boy, it sure is great to be "back"!

Video:

After proofreading this, I noticed how terribly saddening this entry is. So, I decided to post something that makes me happy. Them Crooked Vultures make me happy. And so, I am posting them. Jesus, how many times have I used "so" or "and so" to transition? Yeesh. Anyway, enjoy!

Blog Commenting Etiquette

The following are a couple of reminders about writing effective comments: 

1. Acknowledge the author of the blog post.

2. Let the author know what part of their post your are responding to and why. If you agree or disagree with a point you are making, let them know that too.

3. One word comments, or short responses such as “I agree” or “That’s cool” comments are not useful.

4. Be appropriate and polite in your responses.

5. Successful responses are several sentences in length. Be thoughtful!

Jersey Shore

Paul Gill

Culture plays a prevalent role in prejudice and stereotypes. People constantly get judged by society in today’s world, whether its because of their ethnicity, religion, social class, or other reasons. Culture plays as an important contributing factor on the subject of prejudice because people with similar cultures tend to socialize with one another best. They tend to get along better if they are in the same culture because they have the same things in common due to their background. In the Cast of Jersey shore, a group of Italian Americans are made to live together and go clubbing and party every night. This show is very popular because it is appealing to the younger generations, but stereotypes have been exploited, and new ones have been made by Jersey Shore. Jersey Shore portrays a culture of “guitos” or Italian Americans that love to gym, tan, and do laundry. This show is very stereotypical because it is showing a group of people that share the same ethnic background, do certain things which makes them a symbol of Italian Americans today. Although one may get offended at the jersey shore because of its rather outlandish behavior, most look past the stereotypical oddities and enjoy the show for its excitement, style, and lively drama. However, people subliminally form misconceptions of the show and towards the characters, which tend to then be shown towards Italian Americans.

Jersey Shore is basically a show about a group of Italian Americans that have internal conflicts and they love to party. Relationships constantly get torn apart and put back together. The endless drama allows the audience to let go of their own problems and watch these peoples hysterical drama. They claim to be rich in their Italian culture, which makes the public believe that all Italians are like that, therefore, creating stereotypes. Their lack of knowing the Italian language, excessive hair gel, and sparkly clothes make it hard to believe, however, that all true Italians are actually like that. I myself am not Italian, therefore I cannot depict what I feel a true Italian is like, but the point is that no one should judge someone because of the stereotypes hey are categorized in. For all we know, the root of Italian culture may be “gtl”, (gym, tan, laundry) but who are we to judge.

Tommy Hilfiger.. Racist?

Recent updates show that Tommy Hilfiger the designer of the famous brand “Tommy Hilfiger” has stated that only upper-class whites should buy his clothes. They say that he never appeared on Oprah’s show, but who knows. The problem with this is on how he said that African American, Hispanics and Asians should not buy his clothes. It also shows that this whole conflict is a message that is being sent to emails from Oprah. This happened in 1999 so we can’t really tell if it’s true or not till this time. Either way if it’s true or not it still can hurt the people that buy clothes there. Being Hispanic or African American etc. doesn’t matter, a lot of people buy clothes from there no matter their Ethnicity. They also say that Liz Claiborne has also been saying that her clothing, etc. Is not made for black women. As they should on the website they are saying that it’s not true. Looking back into all the websites it shows that Oprah has giving her statement on how she has NOT, NEVER met Tommy Hilfiger. She also says that she said it on her show clearly letting them know on how they’ve never met.

This message was sent to someone via email, and since then they have been forwarding it to everyone they know and those people do the same.

Subject: FWD: Tommy Hilfiger hates us...

Did you see the recent Oprah Winfrey show on which Tommy Hilfiger was a guest? Oprah asked Hilfiger if his alleged statements about people of color were true - he's been accused of saying things such as "If I had known that African-Americans, Hispanics and Asians would buy my clothes, I would not have made them so nice," and "I wish those people would not buy my clothes - they were made for upper-class whites." What did he say when Oprah asked him if he said these things? He said "Yes." Oprah immediately asked Hilfiger to leave her show.

The main stereotype here, is how Tommy is saying that white upper class people only buy expensive clothes, Which is not true an race can buy whatever type of clothes they want. Its unfair to what the people can say either being true or not being true.

http://urbanlegends.about.com/od/tommyhilfiger/a/tommy_hilfiger.htm

The Office

A popular TV show that shows stereotypes is The Office. The type of stereotype that it can show is how people in a work office can sometimes be crazy. The Office represents the working person can sometimes behave with other people in a comedic way. The show is based around the manager, Steve Carrell, who is Michael Scott. He is the manager off a paper merchant company named Dunder Mifflin in Scranton. Most of the employees in the show don't work and goof around all day long which alot of businesses can relate to.

Through the course of the 30 minute TV show, the workers show how they have to deal with problems that other modern day office workers have in common, of course on the TV show they are more comical. The Office has little fights between its co-workers and the workers pulling pranks on each other. Inside a regular office, they deal with these problems but differently of course. The television show often shows the people looking into the camera during some of the scenes which is to represent that people often act weirdly when they are put on the spot or have to do a presentation.

Sources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Office

http://theofficequotes.com

The Office mainly stereotypes an office being influenced to do similar but in ways different ways. We often sterotype people in offices to be hard working, which some are and that they sometimes like to have fun. All of these sterotypes this TV show proves that it is partially right. A common stereotype is that people are in offices and have no fun and are all work work work, but The Office says that people will also have fun while doing it. "True, I may have been the second choice...but I was the first choice' first choice!" - Andy Bernard. The Office can have some perverted jokes and office harassment and that can also happen in real life offices.

Angels Sell

In this day and age, media is worldwide and as technology expands, so does the influence the social media has on its viewers. A simple commercial that lasts no more than a few minutes can have a great impact on society in developing stereotypes and prejudices. Victoria Secret often influence women with their advertisements of attractive, yet scantily-clad women. Thus, these commercials make the statement that all women should look this way to be desirable which forms a stereotype around “attractive” women and soon brings about prejudicial perceptions. In creating these influences, they help to shape society in both a positive and negative way.

Victoria Secret is an American retailer of women's wear, lingerie, and beauty products. It is vastly known for their alluring models, or “Angels.” They have made over five billion dollars in sales and 1,040 company-owned stores which are still expanding in places such as the United Kingdom. They promote lingerie in many of their commercials and usually have a yearly runaway show. Victoria Secret Angels, such as Tyra Banks, Heidi Klum, and Adriana Lima are known to keep a strict diet and maintain a extensive workout to keep themselves fit. Many of these Angels have helped to attract others, not only to buy their products, but also to create society’s definition beauty based off Victoria Secret’s ads.

Let’s face it, companies are mainly, if not only here to sell their products to the consumer. What do they sell? Anything you want. How? They make their products so tempting that you cannot resist or just enough to make you want to buy it. In this case, Victoria Secret uses the power of their models. Their models create this illusion that you can almost become as beautiful as they are if you buy what they’re advertising. These commercials develop the prefect girl stereotype. Victoria Secret models can be great inspirations to leading a healthy lifestyle, but can also become poisonous to one’s self esteem. This means perfect hair, body, smile, eyes, and plenty of other factors that we cannot always control. In my opinion, this is wrong as it damages a girl’s self esteem and creates this negative image about how a girl should look. Prejudice comes into play when this stereotype develops and people may start feeling the need to label what they see which can end up hurting many people. This doesn’t just apply to women as men experience the same issue and with these commercials, for any gender, can result in high expectations in a new relationship. The truth is, no girl has perfect features and shouldn’t feel the need to measure up to society’s standards as they are a bit too high. I think it’s difficult to understand the purpose of these prejudices and stereotypes as they can be offensive and in my opinion, we need to make ones that would somehow help society instead of attacking one another on some these issues.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7lLd5YtE58&feature=relmfu

Homophobia is Gay

The Colbert Report, the spin-off of and sister show to The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, stars Stephen Colbert, a fake-news pundit who lives his character.   He plays an uber-patriotic conservative, who will often enough declare his anti-gay stance in politics whilst proving the opposite and showing his own homoerotic tendencies.  His character is made for comedy, a satire, so even when he seems to be completely on the right, his character will break -- proving that he is not meant to be taken seriously.  Though the character is meant to be ironic, it still mirrors many of the harsh truths of prejudice and ignorance.  

In the segment, "How to Ruin Gay Marriage", Stephen “plots” a whole plan to become engaged to a gay man, only to insult him at the altar.  Though it starts out hypothetical, one soon catches on that it is part of his character’s back-story, and, as far as the skit goes, not just an idea, but a not-so-warm memory.  He begins to cry about how the other man will never forgive him and that he’s ruined the other’s life, until: “What have I done?  ...Saved marriage, that’s what.”  He sobers up pretty quickly, the homophobic front trying to hide all traces of care for his “mere pawn”. 



Stephen is the representative of the contradiction, of sorts.  By playing a completely homophobic character, he is showing how laughable homophobia really is.  Similar to this is the idea of a homophobic homosexual, some real life examples include politicians Larry Craig, Mark Foley, Ted Haggard, and Roy Ashburn, who were all very strongly anti-gay before stumbling out of the closet through various scandals.  This brings up a stereotype found in both popular culture and in reality called the “gay conservative”, which is essentially what Colbert is playing.  Whether gay conservative or homophobic homosexual, the hypocrisy is grand and apparent, especially to those of us who are striving for equality.  



Sources:
“How to Ruin Gay Marriage”: http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/343140/august-05-2010/how-to-ruin-same-sex-marriages
Gay Conservatives: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GayConservative