http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/07/24/you-don-t-hate-feminism-you-just-don-t-understand-it.html

http://www.newsweek.com/2013/07/24/when-rape-goes-viral-237742.html

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/locke-political/

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

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

John Locke believed that men are born with natural unalienable rights, such as life, liberty, and the property. Although at the time, Locke may have had a more liberal view of women, by today's regards, he falls short of feminist ideas and beliefs. He preached that women are not property, but at the same time, he only believed that they had authority over children, and only children would be forced to love and respect women. In a sense, he believed in giving women power; since he preached that women are not property, that means that he believed that women had the right to own property. Locke clearly had an overall liberal view when it came to politics, he failed to include everyone in his "natural unalienable rights".

Another philosopher, Thomas Paine, believed that if the government is not fulfilling its duties, then the people have the right to overthrow it. Unlike Locke, he was a true feminist; he believed in pretty much complete equality among men and women.

Single women with children make 60% of the money that man could make; why are we giving someone who works twice as hard, slightly more than half the amount of mornt they should be earning? This information really hits home for me because my aunt Helen had raised three kids all by herself. And, although I didn't realize this at the time, I now see that she is one of the hardest working women that I know; working anywhere between ninety and one hundred hours a week, putting three kids through college; it's inspiring. Growing up, I would always visit my cousins at their house in Framingham, and I would always wonder why there mom wasn't home.  It was always because she was working in order to support her family.  Now, some might ask,  "Where does feminism  play into this?". Well, if she was earning the amount of money that she should have been, she wouldn't have as much ware and tear on her today.

Anecdotes:
“When a man gives his opinion, he's a man. When a woman gives her opinion, she's a bitch.” 
― Bette Davis

“A feminist is anyone who recognizes the equality and full humanity of women and men.” 
― Gloria Steinem

“The thing women have yet to learn is nobody gives you power. You just take it. ” 
― Roseanne Barr

Questions:

Why does it seem that you're either for or against feminism? There's no middle ground

How can there be one "definition" of feminism, when there are so many different opinions regarding the topic.

What would we change from our society today in support of feminism?

Facts:

Source: A Room of Her Own: A Foundation For Women Writers and Artists

• Only 9 out of 52 winners of the National Book Award for Fiction are women.
• Only 11 out of 48 winners of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction have been women.
• Source: MomsRising.org
• Women with children make 73% of what men make

Book List

Feminism : opposing viewpoints / Jennifer A. Hurley - available

Feminism : a beginner's guide / Sally J. Scholz - available

Feminism / Nancy Dziedzic, book editor - available 

Who stole feminism? : how women have betrayed women / Christina Hoff Sommers - available

Gaga feminism : sex, gender, and the end of normal / J. Jack Halberstam - available

Feminism / J. Hannam - not available

Feminism / Kaye Stearman - available

Taking on the big boys, or, Why feminism is good for families, business, and the nation / Ellen Bravo - available

Feminism and its discontents : a century of struggle with psychoanalysis / Mari Jo Buhle - available

Feminism and women's rights worldwide / Michele A. Paludi, editor - available

Feminism is for everybody : passionate politics / Bell Hooks - available

Feminism, Inc. : coming of age in girl power media culture / Emilie Zaslow - not available

The death of feminism : what's next in the struggle for women's freedom / Phyllis Chesler - available

Feminism with men : bridging the gender gap / Steven P. Schacht and Doris W. Ewing - not available

Voices of feminism : past, present, and future / JoAnn Bren Guernsey - available

Response to a Question

Question: "I've seen the video and one one hand, yes it does show how woman are objectified as solely sexual beings, but on the other hand, the entire video only shows african american men cat calling her. How can we speak about feminism, when the prejudice of african american men is clearly there?"

I completely agree; not that I don't support equality for both men and women, I believe that this video was extremely bias. According to an article, the video was made by a promotional company by the name of Hollaback, that specializes in making viral videos. They chose only to walk through a predominantly black and latino neighborhood, which was extremely bias of them, as, obviously, the first thing many people noticed was that it was only African-American and Latino men being portrayed as "catcallers". At the same time, just because there is racial bias, it doesn't mean we can't address both of the problems at once. I believe that this video has one major beneficial impact, as well as a very controversial portrayal; the beneficial impact being that this video did reach a huge audience, and did somewhat portray what many women go through on a daily basis. On the other hand, of course, the video showed the bias and prejudiced views that many people still have today.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2014/10/29/catcalling_video_hollaback_s_look_at_street_harassment_in_nyc_edited_out.html

Topic Switch- Modern Feminism and its Impact

Recently I've decided to switch the topic I'm going to research to feminism. In society today, especially across America, both men and women have been exposed to a recent "boom" of feminism. Many different current events have sparked different reactions among all Americans. For example, the video of a woman walking through various parts of NY (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmD2nozwNcI), and she is catcalled constantly. On one side of the debate, many people were angry, and explained that this is the experience of women across the country every second of every day. On the other side of the argument, were people who claimed that men had just been "complimenting" the woman.

After watching this video, I had many questions. The two main questions I had were: What is classified as sexist? What about the hypocrisy regarding feminism?

After reading an article (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/13/sexism-feminism-comic-rasenth_n_5976660.html?utm_hp_ref=feminism), I found out that there are many things that are classified as being sexist. For example, when people claim someone is "acting like a girl". I also learned about the various double standards that are experienced within our society all the time. 

At the same time, another article (http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/gregor-smith/feminism-men_b_4592448.html) demonstrated the objectification of men, countering the popular yet controversial argument that "women go through so much more then men". 

Over the past two weeks, I feel like my understanding of homelessness has changed a lot. Statistically, I've learned a lot about homelessness in the United States, but I also believe that I've learned a lot from a social standpoint. For example, a lot of people look down on homeless men and women. There have been so many times in my life where someone will refer to a homeless man or woman as "that bum over there". But we don't really know anything about that person, the keyword being "person". We don't know why that person is homeless; there could be so many possible reasons. People believe that just because homeless men and women ask others for money, that they're somehow below them; but people don't know how hard it can be to ask someone for money. In my opinion, if all of the homeless men and women could be making their own money, they would much rather being doing that. Asking other people for money can be a huge blow to someones pride and ego. Just because they're homeless, it doesn't mean that they don't deserve to be treated like human beings.
What I'm trying to say is, what I've really learned in the past two weeks, is how to look at homeless men and women. I've "realized" that they're equal to me and everyone else in the world.

Homelessness News Article

This article was very bittersweet for me. A couple of weeks ago, I was browsing through the top stories on Yahoo. One of the articles that I scrolled past, was about a ninety year-old man named Mr. Abbott, who had been arrested in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, for feeding the homeless. I didn't read the article- just seeing the title made me upset. "What wrong could this man possibly be doing for him to get arrested?" I asked myself.

 Ironically, when I googled homelessness article, another article from the NY Times was the first result. The article also talked about Mr. Abbott, and gave me a more in depth explanation of what's happening to homeless men and women all over the country. What I read was sickening. Recently, throughout our country, like Fort Lauderdale for instance, series of laws have been passed that have basically criminalized being homeless and even helping the homeless.

"The latest one, passed last month, made food distribution in public places difficult by requiring toilets, written consent from property owners and feeding sites located 500 feet away from each other."

This is the reason that Mr. Abbott was arrested. What?

Although it made me extremely happy to read about a 90 year-old man going out of his way to help so many people, it made me extremely upset to find out that all over our country, homeless people, who probably have the hardest lives of all, are even being criminalized just for being homeless. We should be helping them and treating them as humans.

Another interesting topic I would like to study is feminism. Currently, the feminist movement has been gaining momentum, as stories such as the student who carries her mattress around that she claims she was raped on, sparks outrage and controversy across the country. Another example, is the woman who walked through certain cities in New York. After ten hours of walking, the producers of the video, claim that the woman had experienced over one hundred instances of verbal and sexual abuse. This caused controversy because many people wondered if the video was fake or not. More locally, I've noticed that feminism has been becoming more popular at Brookline High School. This has caused a division amongst students; while many approve and support the BHS feminist movement, many students also reject and make fun of the BHS feminist movement. I think this would be interesting to study because this has been a longstanding problem throughout our whole country.

Some questions:
What in society today causes people to either accept or reject feminism?
What is the definition of feminism?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/13/sexism-feminism-comic-rasenth_n_5976660.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2NUk5AFImw
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andy-hoglund-/what-the-internet-gets-wr_b_6160980.html?utm_hp_ref=feminism

Homelessness

One possible topic that I was thinking of doing for my senior project was studying homelessness. When I was young, my parents would always bring me to downtown Boston and Chinatown. In both of those areas, I saw a homeless person on almost every single block. I would almost always ask my dad if I could give some money to the men and women sitting in the freezing cold with their ragged clothes, and he would usually give me a couple bucks to give to them. I always felt a brief sense of happiness after helping, but the feeling of happiness would always be followed by a sense of regret; I wasn't able to give every other homeless man or woman in the area a couple of bucks, and even if I was able to, it would only help them temporarily. Although I don't go to downtown or Chinatown nearly as much anymore, I still occasionally see a homeless man or woman sitting on a corner asking people for spare change. I feel sympathy, and want to help as much as possible when I see a homeless man or woman, but I want to help long term.
Some questions I have is:
Would some homeless people even want long-term help? Some people are very prideful and wouldn't want that kind of help.
How could I help them long-term?
What factors play into homelessness?


https://plus.google.com/111664344816048247787/posts
https://plus.google.com/103889628295982379300/posts
https://plus.google.com/117435445210481709276/posts

All three of these blogs seem to be genuinely dedicated to spreading information about how people can help the homeless.