"Don't Judge the Way I Dress"

 

I decided to do my photo assignment about the judgment and stereotypes about the way women  dress. I asked my friend to participate in my assignment by picking out an outfit she would typical wear to go out. That she feels comfortable but at the same time has gotten bad feedback about her outfit. She picked a red shirt that shows her stomach and a cute flowery skirt that is short. I think she looks very nice and cute I would wear the same outfit. At the same time she has told me how people have make comments about that she is barely wearing clothes or that she looks slutty or that she is thirsty for a man's attention. Which is fallen into stereotypes about how society see women trying to dress. Judging someone's appearance in any sort of way is given them stereotypes of who they are. Which is a commonly issue in society today, because popular culture thinks women are trying to dress in some type of way so they can get attention. When in reality "we" and I say we because I also have had the same problems of how I dress and be called those names and asked if I don't owned any clothes. Were not trying to be slutty or dress as a skank to get someone's attention I dress like that because I like the way I look. It's clothes I like buying at my favorite store, I feel comfortable of being able to show my stomach not to be sexy but just to be looking nice. It does not define who I am and I should not be judge or be called names.
That is the problem with society nothing is ever good enough, if a women wears not so much clothes she's trying to be a slut but when she wears a long dress and is covered up she looks bad and is trying to dress like an old lady. The posted the picture with my friend and I because this was a picture I took of us when we were going out, I never thought of using it in my assignment but it was last Friday. You can see our stomach and we are wearing tight leggings. I wanted to show how I do like to wear this kind of clothes on a typical base, but I also always get asked "don't you have more clothes to put on?"
Yes, I might be influence of the things I wear because of the media, because obviously I look at magazines I see what trends are in and which one is last season. I also know what does look good on me and what I feel comfortable, it is not because I am trying to dress so I can get judge in society I dress how I want to be dress. WHY JUDGE ME IF YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW MY NAME.

Define Yourself

When thinking about this assignment I had a lot to consider when figuring what I wanted my project to be based on. It became apparent to me that I wanted it to be based towards an issue that majority of people can relate too: derogatory terms and harmful stereotypes. Wether it's face-face, online, or texting, these terms are becoming more relevant. In the photograph I had mentioned a few which may make some cringe just reading. What I hate to admit is that there are way worse terms that people are being called now. It seems to me that our society focuses on the negative, the bad not the good. They pay attention to the not so perfect parts of your body instead of seeing that being imperfect it absolutely beautiful. This pop culture has created an idea that is so engraved in our brains on what is beauty looks like and how your supposed to act and look to be perfect. I would like to make a note that this idea is what is making us critize others and ourself for not being that "ideal" perfect. We start name calling because "that persons too ugly" or "that's her 3rd guy in a month, she's such a slut". After comes the depression and then what? Suicide? I believe this is relevant in many ways to our class because I feel like this class is about figuring out who you are and defining yourself. To me this photo is saying be your own voice, challenge others and yourself to not let negativity win. To love all of your imperfections and others. Most importantly to love and respect yourself.

Photo Assignment

I'm sick and tired of people telling me how I'm supposed to be. My case is slightly different from other people in this class since I'm an international student from South Korea. It's way more conservative country than it is here in the U.S. Maybe It's a little different from few years back, but the "Gender roles" in Korea are supposed to be kept and people should follow and live up to that standards. If you don't follow that specific untold social rules, others will judge you by that and that could be a threat to someone with different ideas and beliefs. 

Thanks to evolving technologies, now we can get an easy access to social network services such as Facebook or twitter wherever you are. One time, I saw few posts on my friend's profile and they were called "How to dress up for your boyfriend", "The outfit that’s gonna make your man love you more ", "Look down, You need to lose everything jiggles". The most shocking thing is that those posts had more than 10,000 likes and young girls were tagging each other saying how they should change their styles and their body. 

Pop culture tells us to be thin, to be fashionable, to have big boobs and butts. The images are everywhere in our lives and let's be honest. They look good! You don't want/have to avoid it!  I was the worshiper of pop culture! But this quote changed the way I think. "You'll be with your body for the rest of your life, so why not love it instead of blaming it?" You Only Live Once? As much as I hate YOLO, That's true. You only live once and you should spend your life doing what makes you yourself and happy.

Beauty has no color/ Stereotypes on beauty

                                                           "Am I not beautiful?'
          
            This picture is a representation of how pop culture's idea of beauty effects women. In the picture there is an African American woman with pictures around her eye of woman. The stereotype of a beautiful women in pop culture has lighter skin and is thin. The pictures around the African American woman's eye are all of women who are perceived to be beautiful throughout the media. Each woman in the picture is "thin" and white or has lighter toned skin. These pictures are placed around the woman's eye because this idea of beauty is perceived to her everyday throughout pop culture. There is a tear running down her face because she doesn't feel beautiful, there aren't many woman who look like her in pop culture and are considered beautiful. In the corner there is a bottle of bleach to represent the extremes that some women go through to feel beautiful. There are many stories about women of color who have tried to bleach their skin to become lighter, and there are also many women who have developed eating disorders just to stay thin.
    
            I was inspired to do a project on the stereotypes of beauty within  pop culture because I want women to feel beautiful no matter their shape, size or color. I hope one day that pop culture celebrates women of all shapes, sizes and colors. However, the only way that will happen is if people are aware of the harmful effects these stereotypes of beauty have on women. There isn't only one way to be beautiful and every type of woman should be celebrated throughout pop culture.

photo assignment

I chose to do my photo assignment on the stereotype that girls can’t play sports with or as well as guys.  Many times guys do not let girls play with them because they aren’t good enough, strong enough, or just plainly, they are girls.  A lot of the times when guys let girls play it's out of pity and when they do let them play they treat them as “girls.”  Many guys will not play as hard as they would if they were going against a guy because they are afraid of hurting the girl.  They are also afraid of looking like a jerk if they steal the ball from her or block her shot.  It doesn’t make sense that just because a girl is playing with the guys that they need to take it easier on them.  A lot of guys think that they have to take it easy on the girls because they might cry or get hurt, but if it were a guy in the same situation they wouldn’t be afraid to hurt them, block their shot or steal the ball.  Many guys instantly believe that any girl who plays with them will not be any good and usually don’t want them on their team.  Some guys find it to be an insult if they are the one who has to guard the girl.  Guys shouldn’t think that automatically because they are a woman they won’t be able to stand their ground.  These women should be given a chance to play without judgement just like all the other guys.

I was inspired to take this picture because I go to the gym often and play basketball or soccer with the guys.  I used to not want to play with the guys because I didn’t know many of them and I figured that they would treat me like a girl and not play to their full potential.  When I first started a lot of the guys treated me like a girl but now many of them know me and play against me as if they were playing with the guys.  Sometimes new people will show up and don’t know how to act when playing against me until my friends tell them to not take it easy on me.  A lot of the guys underestimate me.  Many times the newer guys seem to get upset that they have to guard a girl.  This attitude makes me upset because girls can be as good as the guys and they can even be better but the fact the I am a girl makes them not want to play against or with me.  Many times if the girl is choosing to play with the guys then they want to be treated equally.  

Photo for Social Injustice

 

 

For this assignment I chose to take a picture that takes in several things. For me this depicts the struggle of many youth, particularly young women, that feel they have to go to extremes to become the size that society tells them to be in order to achieve true acceptance. This is a picture that shows me with a tape measure wrapped around my head to symbolize how numbers connected to our size are all consuming and continuously on our mind. Not only are the numbers on tape measures to show the physical representations, but they're on the scale we know all too well. We are told from much to early that numbers are important. Sure we're told math is important with addition and subtraction, but we take that to a new level when we put it to work on our own bodies.

Bulimia, Anorexia, and other eating disorders are the other half of this picture. As it's clearly enough displayed, I'm leaning up against a toilet while clinging to the scale to express my psychological need to change my weight. Because of the numbers that are always on our minds, many develop eating disorders in efforts to change they're body to what they believe they should be. Too often we forget about health. All we want is "beauty", which basically translates into "approval" in recognition of the social media.

Popular culture has developed so many different ways to make the same idea and concept seem appealing. Many young boys and girls struggle with their weight and self esteem because while struggling with their parents telling them "you're perfect just the way you are, don't change a thing", society is telling them "you're not perfect yet but you can be. Do this..".

"Be skinny" they tell us, you'll get boys attention. "Be small they said" you'll feel beautiful. We're trying so hard to listen to what society has been telling us that we didn't realize what they've been telling us has been changing too. Now it's "Be skinnier" and "Be smaller" they say, society will accept you. While we're trying so hard for society to accept us, we no longer are able to accept ourselves.

Photo Assignment

I chose to do the photo assignment on gay and lesbian rights.  Homosexuality is becoming more acceptable in today’s society with states slowly passing laws on gay marriage but it is still a major controversial subject and it makes many people uncomfortable talking about it.  Sexual orientation isn’t a protected characteristic under the civil rights law like race, gender, ethnicity, and religion are, which makes it harder to fight for its rights.  One of the biggest challenges homosexual people probably face today is judgment and violence from other people the apparently know how everyone should love and live their lives.

            When a picture of two people holding hands is shown it usually brings a smile to your face because you know those two people love each other and that love is the most powerful feeling there is.  However, when two people are shown holding hands it’s usually a male and female, or so we assume.  That’s why in my picture I focused in on the light in the background to make it impossible to know for sure if these are people of the same or opposite sex holding hands.  Why is it that when a male and female are holding hands or showing their love for each other it is a beautiful thing but when couples of the same sex show their love it becomes looked down upon and rejected by society?