Beth Richie and the Abolition of a Prison Nation

Beth Richie’s lecture today was quite interesting. At first, I was quite lost in the use of her vocabulary, but I was able to understand her point of view and what she aspires to accomplish. It seems that her lecture circulated around the idea of the abolition of prison nation and the instigation of community resistance. She made her points obvious through tales of the degradation of minorities by policy and how some policies instated for the “good” of the people actually just widen the amount of people that can be jailed. That, for example, in this prison nation we live in, “enacting a loitering law [just] widens who can be jailed for standing” (Richie).

            In her book Arrested Justice Richie explains the building of prisons and the impact on black women. Two stories from her book that she mentions are very heartfelt and lead to the idea that women are being incarcerated unjustly because of their race and gender and that there is a white mail hierarchy. Tanya’s story, for example, got spun by the media as an ongoing labor strike, while in reality Tanya had ditched her young child in a dumpster as a result (most likely) from her environment. No one knew that Tanya had been raped by her uncle and was in an abusive (like) relationship, while also living with three people with criminal records. Nothing Tanya had gone through in her life was placed on paper and so the legal system had no way to see Tanya’s real reason for leaving her baby, yet she would still be scrutinized for her actions by the law.  Ms. B’s story deals with abuse by the police and the favoring of a white male over her for being an African American woman. In Ms. B’s case instead of being able to go to the police for help, they attacked her. In the end we saw how the prison nation is causing a severe injustice to the underprivileged communities. A few key facts Richie mentions toward a solution are: create alternatives of prison state; build stronger more radical connections with other coalitions; build our base following the leadership of those who are most affected.

The Pakistan Transgender Community is Not Really Accepted, Although Legal

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After watching the video in class today, I can’t help but think that the Pakistan government approved a third gender option for their own benefit. After approving this third gender the government gave itself power over this new group of people. They gained hardly anything in return for this humiliation except for a new box to fill out on an application because in reality the Pakistan people do not all approve. The video made the passing of this law seem easy. The only way I think this law could pass easily would be by bypassing the people meaning that the people did not elect this law. The government uses the transgender community for money collecting, further humiliating this community. Instead of helping the transgender community be accepted, they make them something to run away from.  They essentially play a role of the debt collector.

            Some people in class mentioned that this humiliation is something they are accustomed to and that it may be a good pay off toward this new acceptance. However, in my opinion I’m not sure whether it was worth it. To the Pakistan people they may have their own gender, but they are no different than before, or they may have a worse view of them if they are targets of debt collectors. It would have been a lot better to first be accepted by everyone and have everyone’s support in getting a third gender. Otherwise they seem forced into the government and a smooth cohabit able transition will not occur for the Pakistan transgender community.

Evolution of a New Sex

 

After reading Anne Fausto-Sterling’s article in class it really opened me to this new reality. Although I had never really thought about it before, there are people who are born with two genders and either decide between one or the other or switch around. It’s kind of weird to think of someone having both sexes and it makes me feel bad for them. They embody the physical reality of what many have only mentally. They have both sexes and/or both genders. It really correlated with story about Maria Patina, who is in all reality a woman, but because she has a y chromosome everyone shunned her.

This article also got me thinking about evolution. I was wondering what it would be like if somehow through evolution we started to get a higher rate of hermaphrodites. Already 4% of the population is born this way, it is possible for numbers to increase if they start reproducing. This was a bit hard for me to understand, I never got a clear understanding of whether reproduction is possible for hermaphrodites or not. Either way, if they did reproduce normally, it is completely possible for the number to increase in the population. I wonder if then society would be forced to accept this double gender or genderless group of people (which ever way they decide to identify themselves). Once its physically impossible would they accept it, or would they force people to choose a gender as many are now? Or would they remain a secret to society, because for example, before reading this article I had never thought of this group of people.

Gender Variance Acceptance: Native American vs American

When I think of Native Americans I think of tradition. I’m not trying to be harsh toward Native Americans when I say that the original Native Americans were as close to the most natural form of human possible. What I mean to say is that they obeyed the laws of nature. They treated the Earth with care and respect. Although cruel, Europeans referred to them as savages, and that is kind of what humans should be like; we are animals. Unlike Native Americans, after conquering the New World Europeans continued to take the world by storm through innovation. Native Americans did not have a method of manipulating nature as we do now through technology. As humans we have developed methods to manipulate the normal human capacity on Earth. We’ve been able to increase food supply to enormous unnatural amounts and found solutions to fight off once plague causing diseases. All of these resources have created a world in which humans are in control and where innovation is sought. This idea is what lead me to believe that Native Americans, compared to others, would have a much more traditional view on life. I believed that they would follow nature’s course of only female and male genders. However, it seems that I was wrong, and in reality Native Americans were more innovative and accepting of gender and gender variance than even modern Americans.

It’s amazing to see how Americans were able to surpass Native Americans in technology by such large amounts, and yet something such as gender variance was accepted by Native American culture much more readily than American culture. Why is that? Could it be that their ties to nature, really do allow them to realize that nothing is perfect; nature is not perfect. Nothing is black and white in this world, there are always the colors in between, or in this case the identities outside of the norm in which we identify with. There is a whole spectrum of identities in which the majority of the population resides on either side with no respect for the in between.

Is it Okay to Raise Your Child Genderless?

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There has been a lot of debate about whether parents should guide their children to express themselves as a certain gender based on their sex. Some people believe that the child should be raised sex unknown, such as in Monicabielanko’s “Boy or Girl? 4-Month-Old Being Raised Genderless”. Although this does seem to give children a sort of freedom to express themselves in any way they please, I still think it is also a disadvantage to the child because of our current societal norms. It’s true that people should be able to identify with the gender they choose, but raising a child without knowing his/her sex may cause more damage than help. They could be made fun of for not knowing what gender they are. Although this is unkind, it’s the sad reality of the moment. Once the child is older then they can decide for themselves whether they better identify with a different gender. At a more mature level they can make this decision on their own, without the influence of others.

I also think that if a person is made to conform to something they don’t like, they will fight against it. If someone disagrees with the sex they were given, they will probably eventually try to change it when they are ready. For some people this comes early in life, such as childhood, and for others at adulthood. Just like some fight for the poor, others for immigrants, and some for women, people don’t tend to take things silently; we fight for what we believe in.