How the media damages women

I agree with this all the way!! Because of how the media portrays women having to be thin and have perfect bodies, this is why I don't read those gossip rags like People, Star, OK, etc. Seeing pictures of those famous actresses makes me feel insignificant, like no matter how much makeup I wear or weight I lose, I'll never be beautiful.

As a sort of experiment, 24 year old blogger Sarah Coffman wanted to motivate women and redefine how the media portrays women. Along with a few friends of hers and help from photographer Terence Smalls, each woman was given a Sharpie pen and told to draw on themselves, like a plastic surgeon would, highlighting what they would like to change about themselves.

1. "As women we try to fit inside of 'young enough,' 'thin enough,' 'pretty enough,' 'nice enough,' 'tough enough,' 'able enough,' without ever becoming 'too much,'" claims Coffman.

2. "If you want to be socially acceptable you need to keep yourself inside the lines"

3. "If you look at the cover of any woman’s magazine there’s three main themes: what can you do for men, learn to love yourself, and how to lose 30 pounds in some ridiculously unhealthy amount of time"

4. "How can anyone be okay with these articles? Why do we have to care SO much about what HE thinks?"

5. "Every woman out there has those lines of insecurity, and they continue to grow because we allow them to"

6. "In a few of the photos you can see that the women are actually pointing out each other's 'shortcomings.' That may be a bigger problem than the media"

7. "Part of the reason that media has such a huge impact is because we let it"

8. "Often times you’ll hear women call each other fat or sticks or slutty"

9. "..which not only gives men the permission to treat us the same way we treat each other but it gives permission to the media to treat us that way too"

10. "We are so much more than the bodies we live in..."

11. "That's what true beauty is. Not afraid to be and show yourself for who you really are"

12. "Internalized misogyny is such a huge problem"

13. "There's a trend, it's been a trend for decades, to cram women into a certain ideal that for most people is simply unattainable. That's not fair to young girls"

14. "We live in a society where women are constantly being stripped down and evaluated, without physically being stripped down," Smalls said on his website"

15. Smalls adds: "What does it look like when we actually strip women down and evaluate their physical "shortcomings?"  How insane does it look? How uncomfortable does it make us feel?"

16. Be your true beautiful self

17. Beauty is everywhere

Hot Man Thursday: Shemar Moore

Shemar Moore

For those familiar with the show Criminal Minds, he plays Special Agent Derek Morgan

Other link: Shemar Moore

Birth name: Shemar Franklin Moore
DOB: April 20, 1970
Where: Oakland, California
Height: 6'1''

Trivia
-Graduated from Santa Clara University
-Mother was white and father was black
-Since his father was not around, he did not learn to speak English until 5 or 6. When he was 6 months old, his mother moved the family to Denmark for about 3 years. After that, they lived in Bahrain until he was 6
-Cites interracial romances being forbidden, civil unrest and racism in the U.S. in the 1970s for being the reason his mother moved to another country with him
-While attending Santa Clara University for Communications, he modeled to pay the bills
-He has fans due to his very high-profile modeling and is often seen shirtless in these photos and in erotic shots

-Appeared on the 2009 cover of Men's Fitness








Known For
The Young and the Restless
-Malcolm Winters
Criminal Minds
-Agent Derek Morgan

Diary of a Mad Black Woman
-Orlando
The Brothers
-Terry White
Moesha
-Earl Thomas
Butter
-Freddy Roland
Chicago Hope
-Bobby Barnett

Stuff My Buddies Post on Facebook

I was inspired to do this post by a fellow blogger called 'SummerBaby'. Who I think is the coolest person ever! She is, from what I've read on her posts, is a student attending the London College of Fashion. Pretty awesome!

And because of her awesome sense in this stuff, I was inspired to post about things my friends post on Facebook

Amanda Ackerson posted this

Adam Hegge posted this about his truck

Jane Hlad, my high school art teacher, posted this

A girl nnamed Ann Papaneri posted this

My high school music teacher Tim Kennedy posted this

Robyn Meyer posted this

Hug Pugs. One of my favorite Facebook pages

Body Issues: Is the Media to Blame?

Eating Disorders

-Refers to a group of conditions that are defined by eating habits that involve either insufficient or excessive food.
-The most common ones are Bulimia Nervosa, Anorexia Nervosa, binge eating. They primarily affect women, approximately 5-10 million in the US. They also affect males, only about 1 million in the US.
-The cause of eating disorders is not really known, but there is medical evidence of it being linked to other stuff. One case study showed that girls with ADHD were at a higher risk for eating disorders than girls without ADHD. Another one shows that girls in foster care are more likely to develop an eating disorder, such as bulimia nervosa.
-And it's also thought that peer pressure and the media are to blame for the high number of eating disorders because the media places high importance on being skinny, being beautiful, being tall, tan and gorgeous. This can send all the wrong signals.
-The consequences of these can be fatal, with death being the likely end to it, or from comorbid(more than 1 disorder present) conditions, such as suicidal thinking.

Clasification
Anorexia Nervosa(AN):
-Characterized by refusal to maintain a healthy body weight, an obsessive fear of gaining weight, and a VERY unrealistic perception of body weight. Anorexia can cause menstrual cycles to stop, and leads to bone loss, loss of skin integrity. It puts great stress on the heart, increasing the risk of heart attacks, and other heart problems. The risk of death is severely increased in people with this disease.


Now tell me: Is this beautiful? Because I think it's hideous!

Bulimia Nervosa(BN):
-Characterized by recurrent binge eating following by behaviors like self induced vomiting, excessive use of laxatives/diuretics, excessive exercise.


This kind of stuff can wear down your teeth's enamel, causing cavities

Binge Eating Disorder(BED):
-Aka compulsive overeating(COE).


This can cause all kinds of health problems, and increased stress on the heart

Purging Disorder:
-Characterized by repeated vomiting to maintain weight

Rumination
-Characterized by involving the repeatedly painless vomiting of food following a meal which is either chewed or discarded

Diabulimia
-Characterized by intentional control of insulin levels by diabetics in an effort to control weight.

Eating disorders not otherwise specified(EDNOS)
-Refers to a number of disorders. In females, it can refer to a woman who suffers from anorexia but still has her period, someone who may be at a healthy weight, but who ahs anorexic thoughts and behaviors.

Pica
-Characterized by compulsive craving for eating, chewing or licking non-food items containing no nutrition. These can include things like chalk, paper, plaster, paint chips, baking soda, starch, glue, rust, ice, coffee grounds, cigarette ashes. The people suffering from this can't distinguish between food and non food items.

Night Eating Syndrome
-Characterized by morning anorexia, evening polyphagia(abnormally increased appetite for food)

Orthorexia nervosa
-Characterized by a person with an obsession with a pure diet to the point where it interferes with everyday activities.

Causes

Biological
Genetic: numerous cases have stated that there is a possible genetic reasoning for eating disorders
Biochemical: eating behavior is a complex process controlled by the hypothalmus-pituary gland in the brain.
-Serotonin: a chemical in the brain that has an inhibitory effect on eating, also involved in depression
-Norepinephrine: hormone and chemical, if it is in high amounts, it can affect eating behavior
-Dopamine: regulates the rewarding feeling of food

Models
See, this is the reason that so many girls have eating disorders. They look up to these models hoping to be as beautiful as them one day, but if they see these women obsessing with skinniness, these girls are going to be under the impression that in order to be liked, you gotta be skinny. BAD IDEA!

Sylvester Stallone

Michael Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone was born on July 6, 1946, in Hell's Kitchen, New York. He likes to go by Sly Stallone instead of his name Sylvester as he dislikes the name. He's an American actor, filmmaker, screenwriter, film director and occasional painter of Italian descent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvester_Stallone

Stallone's 2 best known roles are that of post-Vietnam vet John Rambo and 4th rate boxer Rocky Balboa. Stallone is best known for his hardcore action movies, his use of the stairs to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where his character Rocky runs up in the 1st Rocky movie, have been renamed the Rocky Steps.

Early Life
He was the eldest son to Frank Stallone Sr, a hairdresser, and Jackie Stallone, an astrologer, former dancer and women's wrestling promoter. His younger brother is actor and musician Frank Stallone. Their father was born in Gioia Del Colle, in Apulia, Italy and emigrated to the US as a child. Their mother is half Russian Jewish and half French. Complications his mom had suffered in birth had resulted in doctors having to use 2 pairs of forceps during his birth; because of this, they had severed a nerve and caused paralysis in parts of his face. As a result of this, the lower left side of his face is paralyzed, including parts of his tongue, lip and chin, which give him a trademark he is now known for, slightly slurred speech, and a snarling look.

Early roles
Most of his early stuff was just cameos in other movies, like the 1971 Woody Allen movie Bananas where he played subway thug, Klute(1971) as an extra dancing in the club, a youth in The Prisoner of Second Avenue, 1974 a  starring role in The Lords of Flatbush

1976, Rocky
On March 24, 1975, Stallone saw the fight between Muhammad Ali and Chuck Wepner, which gave him the inspiration for the movie Rocky. He went home and after 3 days or 20 hours, he came up with the script for Rocky. This movie went on to win various awards, such as Best Directing, Film Editing, Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Screenplay. In the early 1980s, he starred alongside British actor Michael Caine in Escape to Victory(1981), a sports movie where he plays a prisoner of war involved in a Nazi propaganda soccer game. Also that year he starred in the movie Nighthawks, where he played a New York cop named Deak DeSilva, who plays cat and mouse with a foreign terrorist. In the year 1982, he starred in a movie that would be a trademark of his forever. In 1982, he starred as John Rambo, a battle scarred Vietnam vet in the movie First Blood(1982). There were 3 other sequels, Rambo:First Blood pt. II (1985), which had him going to southeast Asia looking for POWs from the Vietnam War, and Rambo III (1988), which had him going to the deserts of Afghanistan to rescue his commander, Col. Trautman(Richard Crenna) and Rambo(2008), in which the now retired soldier is asked by missionaries in Burma to help rescue fellow missionaries trapped by Burmese rebels. During the making of the Rocky movies, Stallone worked out like a madman

As Rocky Balboa

Escape to Victory

Nighthawks

First Blood

Rambo(2008)

During this, he started doing other kinds of movies, like Rhinestone, which was considered to be a commercial failure for him, because he sings country music in it. And in 1987, he starred as in Over the Top (1987) as a struggling trucker named Lincoln Hawk who is making his way to a nation wide arm wrestling tournament in Las Vegas, with his son, who does not think too highly of him until he sees his dad arm wrestling. In 1986, he made the movie Cobra, which was about a police officer named Marion Cobretti, nicknamed Cobra who works for the Los Angeles Police Dept, on a squad called the Zombie Squad. He is assigned to protect a model named Ingrid Knudsen (Bridgett Nielsen-Stallone) who was a living witness to a series of crimes committed by a serial killer called the Night Slasher. This movie is where he met his first wife Bridgett Nielsen. In 1989, he starred alongside Kurt Russell in Tango & Cash, where he played a straitlaced L.A. cop named Ray Tango who has to work with a rival cop named Gabe Cash (Kurt Russell) when they are framed for murder by a criminal mastermind named Yves Perret (Jack Palance) and found guilty by the courts, they are sentenced to prison where they encounter many of the guys they put away.

Over the Top

Cobra

Tango & Cash

1990-2002
In 1992, he tried comedy with Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot, where he played a police officer named Joe Bomowski who receives a visit from his mother Tutti Bomowski (Estelle Getty). After she buys him an illegal MAC 10 and starts nosing in his police cases, she becomes witness to a murder of the gun dealer she bought the gun from. In 1993, he got back in to action with the movie Cliffhanger, where he played Gabe Walker, a professional mountain climber who plays cat and mouse with a group of thieves, led by professional thief Eric Qualen (John Lithgow), who was a former Military Intelligence member who looks to reclaim $100 million in uncirculated bills from the US Treasury. Later that year, he starred alongside Wesley Snipes in Demolition Man, where he played a cop named John Spartan who goes into cryogenic freezing and is later taken out to get a criminal who escaped. In 1994, he starred as Ray Quick in The Specialist. In this movie, he is a CIA explosives expert who takes a job from a woman named May Munro (Sharon Stone), who wants revenge on the Cuban mobster who killed her parents.

Cliffhanger

The Specialist

In 1995, he starred in the movie Judge Dredd, based on the British comic book 2000 AD of the same name. In the movie, he plays Judge Joseph Dredd, a very strict rule following judge until he is framed for murder of the Judge's Council by his own brother. In the 1995 movie Assassins, he played Robert Rath, a hit man who is ordered to kill a fellow hitman named Miguel Bain (Antonio Banderas), who has a psychopathic way of life. And Rath is contacted by someone named Electra (Julianne Moore), who is a computer hacker. In 1997, he starred as New Jersey cop Freddy Heflin in the movie Cop Land. This movie was about a town in New Jersey called Garrison, where most of the residents are NYPD officers. In the movie, Stallone's character is asked by Internal Affairs agent Moe Tilden (Robert De Niro) to tell anything he has about the cover up of a murder of 2 black teens by a fellow officer named Murray 'Super boy' Babbitch (Michael Rapaport). In 2000, he starred in the remake of the 1971 crime drama Get Carter, where Michael Caine originally played Jack Carter, a mob enforcer. In the 2000 remake, Michael Caine had a large role in the movie.

Get Carter

Judge Dredd

2003-2005
In 2003, he played the role of a villain in the 3rd Spy Kids movie, Spy Kids 3: Game Over named The Toymaker.

2010 and on
In 2010, he starred in The Expendables, alongside Mickey Rourke, Jet Li, Jason Statham, Randy Couture and Steve Austin. Basically the movie is about where he and the rest of the guys are a group of highly trained military mercenaries who have to kill a general in a fictional island town called Vilena.

Body Issues!

Yes, the title says it all. Yes, everyone probably has one part of their body that they are not fond of, for me, it's my entire body. I was completely inspired by Lisa's blog to chat about issues with image. I have noticed that when celebs get on TV, they talk about how "good" and "nice" their life is, it must be nice to have a good life when you have the money for it. What about the NORMAL people who have to get up every day and work a 9-5 job, worry about paying bills, making car payments, putting food on the table and supporting a family? You certainly don't see any of those celebs worrying about that, everything seems to come to them on a silver platter, whereas when it comes to me, everything comes on a plastic party tray platter.

I also noticed that on some of these diet pill commercials, they spread the idea that it's great to be thin, totally not right. There's this one commercial for a diet pill called Xanax 3, the motto is "It's great to be thin", that's going to send all the wrong signals. On the commercial you see this man and woman practically all over each other, practically having sex right there on TV, and it almost says you have to look like this to be loved.

The reason all these kids have eating disorders is because of these celebs getting on TV and almost coming out and saying how great it is to be thin. They spread this idea that if you don't have perfect boobs, a perfect butt or perfect bod, if you're not tall, tan , or gorgeous, you're nothing. I battled alot of body issues in high school, like people calling me fat a--, fatso, Casper the ghost because of my fair complexion, four eyes, you name it, kids in high school can be so cruel. But I never did anything because I figure karma will pay them back. What comes around goes around.

And what is sort of sad is that all these musicians and actors/actresses get look great because they have the money for it. If any non-celeb people want to lose weight, they do it the old fashioned way: going to a gym, exercise, eat right. It must be nice to have money and do what you please with it. Some of these celebs are in better shape than me, the only thing holding me back is my asthma. I'm told I'm not fat, that I'm just big boned, hard to know what that actually means.

But in high school, kids have eating disorders because they see these famous people looking thin as a rail and they are almost praised for it. Since when is it glamorous to look like a freakin' rail? Some celebs need to watch what they say/do. Because in high school, girls and guys worry about how they look so they can go on dates, but if they constantly worry about how they look, they won't have time for anyone else because they are so consumed with looking good. Sorry if it sounds like a rant, but I feel my opinion needs to be heard.

Pop culture/news

I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed, but does it seem like the media makes it out to seem that if you don't possess perfect boobs, a perfect bod, aren't tall, tan and gorgeous, that you're nothing? I do really hate this image that the media sends out. It's no wonder that so many young girls fall victim to eating disorders, like Anorexia nervosa or Bulimia nervosa. I mean, when girls get to be teens, they start worrying about their looks, they start worrying about attracting members of the opposite sex. But when they are constantly thinking "am I fat?" or " am I too ugly?", that's when they discover there's no room in their life for anyone else because they are convinced their not perfect.

That's when those eating disorders start setting in. I don't hope to sound like some raving moron airhead, but that's my opinion. I mean, in high school, so many girls are worried about peer pressure, rumors, bullying, it's sad! You got girls in high school pressuring girls and guys to have sexual intercourse at a young age, young girls dressing practically borderline prostitutes, teens getting pressured to try drugs/alcohol, it's sad! The media almost makes people grow up too fast. If people take a second to stop and notice, there are more teen moms coming out now than a few years ago. In fact, there were quite a few teen moms at my high school graduation. And I watch the news, and I hear about these moms out there leaving their kids in the car while they go in and rob places or leaving their kids in the car while they get their hair done and if it's hot out, the kids die of heat exhaustion. Did you hear about the mom who videotaped her kid smoking dope? I saw it on the news last night and I thought to myself, pardon my French, " What the h--- are you thinking, you stupid moron?" They showed her on the news and she was bawling! Yeah, she's crying only because she was caught!

That's one thing I don't like, it's when parents do bad things to their kids, I just don't like seeing bad things happening to good people. Another thing I don't like is when people are racist to one another, I may sound like some ranting person, but I feel my opinion needs to be heard. I'm growing quite tired of hearing about how people commit hate crimes and don't like people because of their skin color, race, gender, etc. It's not 1950's anymore! It's 2010! I recently visited some relatives in southern Kentucky, in a small town called Cynthiana, it's right outside of Falmouth. My uncle Justin, uncle Jeffrey, uncle Brud(Don't ask!), my aunt Lisa, my aunt Lois, aunt Robin all live down there! We went down there and I didn't think they would say anything because I had worn a t-shirt that said 'Italian fest, Newport, Ky' down there and the second they saw it, they started in on the insults. I'm sorry if I seem angry at this, it's just I was raised not to care about the color of skin or race. They started insulting Italians, Asians, Latinos, everybody, they didn't hold back on anyone. I just sat there, afraid to say anything, and my aunt Patty, don't even get me started!

You see, you have to realize that these relatives are pure country folks and that's supposedly their opinion. They had a radio playing out there and on the radio comes "Bailamos" by Enrique Iglesias, and I said I liked the song, they turned onto another station! How freakin ridiculous is that? Anymore, I hate going down there, I delightfully call it the 'Deliverance Family Reunion'. It may sound cruel, but they are my dad's family and I don't like them, I get so angry when they start badmouthing people. They start saying stuff like" Why do we have to learn how to speak Spanish? This is America, speak English!" Guess what I did? I didn't do anything bad, more funny than anything, I started speaking Spanish, but then my aunt gave me a dirty look and I had to sit there like I committed murder or something, most of the time when I visit them, my stupid aunt never shuts up! And P.S. If Mrs. Thomas is reading this, Hello, how are you today on this good day? Are you doing good? Are you having a good day?

And another thing: What is the big deal with this 'Jersey Shore' fad? All that show is about is a bunch of Italian teens growing up in Seaside Heights, NJ. If I'm going to watch anything out of Jersey, it'll be Cake Boss or The Sopranos. Either way, on either show, I have a favorite: on Cake Boss, my favorites are Joey, Buddy's brother, or Remy, his cousin. On The Sopranos, my 2 favorites are Silvio Dante, because the guy that plays him is Stevie Van Zandt, Bruce Springsteen's guitarist, and Michael Imperioli, aka Christopher Moltisanti, his character. He's my favorite because he is cute! But sorry this blog is long, I just see alot of injustices in the world and feel they need to be known and see if anyone else out in this big world agrees.