So I am doing research for this paper that I have to write on homophobic bullying and some of the stuff in these articles is absolutely ridiculous. Like, this rant is probably two weeks in the making. First off, all of these articles are arguing against homophobic bullying. They are all either studies or like, journal articles (and the CDC page) about why homophobic bullying is bad. But then, sometimes, one of the articles will say something like...
However, a reality is that some educators may not know how to intervene effectively (Whitman, Horn, & Boyd, 2007). They may normalize physical bullying as gender specific to males and relational bullying as specific to females, and therefore part of normal development. Further, adults may believe that children learn to be tough and resilient by dealing with same-age bullies and thus resist intervening as a way to promote self-confidence in victimized children. Finally, and of most concern, some may allow bullying, especially of children from certain minority groups, as a way to satisfy their own aggressive impulses toward those children or groups (Mudrey & Medina-Adams, 2006).
-Jane Close Conoley
Like, okay fine. I can accept that some teachers may not know how to step in when one kid is bullying another. But if you are an educator and you can look me in the eye and tell me that young males physically bullying each other to the point where one could be suicidal is "part of normal development," I will actually kick you in the balls. Even if you don't have any.
I wouldn’t challenge it [That is so gay] simply because... I know in normal usage for children, that’s not what they mean. [SW: So you would just let it go?] Yeah, because the phrase has a different meaning for kids. They mean it’s sad... it’s pathetic... they don’t mean ‘‘homosexual.’’ (Heterosexual female, education)
-Sherriff, Hamilton, Wigmore, and Giambrone
OH MY GOD ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?! NO! I just-! GAH! I really hate ignorant people guys. Like if you can read this and think that there isn't a problem, just know that deep, deep, deep down in the depths of my heart, I want to stab you in the lungs with a toothbrush and then slow-roast you over a barbeque pit while you burn alive in the most agonizing pain imaginable. Because when kids say "that is so gay," but they mean "that is so pathetic," then they are saying that being gay is pathetic and that is involuntary bullying and it probably hurts the most out of almost any type of bullying ever. Wanna know why? Because it can come from anybody. "That is so gay," has become such a normalized phrase that practically everybody uses it. And when you hear it, especially from someone you love, it really. fucking. hurts. Like maybe when a mom uses it to describe something she thinks is stupid right in front of her openly pansexual daughter. How is that supposed to make me her feel?
Anyway, sorry about the rant. I am just really upset about stupid people. I should probably go to bed soon. Maybe I'll watch some Kill la Kill before I hit the sack... Goodnight my lovelies (if you even read this...)
This is something else. I have to read secondary source material (the two books mentioned above) that is only somewhat useful because nobody seems to have looked at sexism in Doctor Who (I'm not even talking sexism in the language, I'm talking sexism in general) scholarly, read articles from the UK Guardian about DW, Moffat, Russell T. Davies, find articles that look at gender roles in Britain, and then read more scholarly research about sexism in language BEFORE I can even start searching through the scripts of DW to find episodes that really focus on the companions and how they are called. This is not the type of research I like. I like formulating my own theses about a topic and then finding material to back it up.
And it's 4am here, I've been up since 2:30pm yesterday (after going to bed at 7am), and I'm sick of my essay (THAT I'VE HAVEN'T EVEN STARTED WRITING YET!). And while I know I should have started doing research reading sooner, the ridiculousness of this paper is getting to me. I could probably speak for about 3000 words without any secondary sources to back me up, but I have to have a good variety or it'll look like I'm not interacting with the current literature that exists in sociolinguistics. ARGH!
Anywho, hears hoping I have this paper done before noon today (it's due Tuesday at 4pm) so that I can sleep for 4 hours, get up, study for the two exams I have Tuesday (Dutch and Early Modern History). I seriously hate this paper atm, but people want to read it, so yay if it turns out well?
