Gal Pal Email 13th Edition

Gal Pal Email 13th Edition
Quote of the Week:
True friends are the ones who walk in when the whole world walks out."

Ebonics Lesson of the week (more than just vernacular):
What is Jim Crow?(a crash course for those of you who did not know)The term Jim Crow originated in a song performed by Daddy Rice, a white minstrel show entertainer in the 1830s. Rice covered his face with charcoal paste or burnt cork to resemble a black man, and then sang and danced a routine in caricature of a silly black person. By the 1850s, this Jim Crow character, one of several stereotypical images of black inferiority in the nation's popular culture, was a standard act in the minstrel shows of the day. How it became a term synonymous with the brutal segregation and disfranchisement of African Americans in the late nineteenth-century is unclear. What is clear, however, is that by 1900, the term was generally identified with those racist laws and actions that deprived African Americans of their civil rights by defining blacks as inferior to whites, as members of a caste of subordinate people.

Discussion of the Week:
The Beauty Myth
American Culture has sold us all a raw deal. It has polluted our minds and distorted our ideas of what is beautiful. Like I always say, don't give in to the hype, because I am appealing to your psyche let's look at an article this guy wrote:Why waif is wrong and other beauty myths"I'm sorry but I am not a maiden fair. I am not a pretty girl, I don't really want to be a pretty girl. I want to be more than a pretty girl." - Ani Difranco I never met a woman who was happy with her weight, of course I never met one who was happy, but that's another column.
I also never met a girl who was haute couture, heroin chic or prêt à porter. (Of course I don't speak French, which may have something to do with this.) Cut me some slack, I'm not a women's studies major either, but I've got some problems with the popular media's tired portrayal of the ideal woman. Public enemy number one is the "glamour" magazine. I'm sick of the mythic nymphette who slinks her doe eyed angst across the cover of any glossy mag. If the popular idea of a woman is oil can slathered mascara and a figure that would make Skeletor jealous, count me out.
Take a look at any fashion spread and all you got is soft porn, drug abuse and gun- toting Lolitas. John Keats says truth is beauty, and the truth is these women really don't exist. A friend of mine who interned at a modeling agency informed me that the majority of their clients who front the covers of Elle and Vogue are 13-16 year olds. These girls would make Humbert Humbert think twice. This shouldn't come as a surprise, but any woman over 20 is gonna have a hard time matching the supposed elegance of a pre-pubescent teen. The girls in these mags have bony angles that you can only measure with a protractor and a ruler. They're about a decade from developing any type of curve.
There's a reason you don't see Claudia Schiffer or Rachel Hunter anymore, they actually became women, and who wants that? These magazines do have articles on healthy body image and the dangers of eating disorders, but right next to some girl who doesn't eat. (Do not worry - she's hooked up to a Glucose IV drip between shoots). The Cosmo Website actually has an advertisement for Jenny Craig, which asks "Are you overweight?" This is about as ridiculous as wallpapering an Alcoholic's Anonymous meeting hall with Absolut ads. You expect the worse from glamour mags, but not media like the New Yorker or Rolling Stone. It's amazing what passes as a serious profile of a female musician today.
A typical piece on Jewel usually includes the phrase, "despite her crooked teeth, Jewel is very well endowed; oh, and she has a new album out too." Male writers especially seem to focus on Alanis Morrisette's nude video, rather than asking why the hell is she thanking India? Television is even worse. If the booty shaking ghetto queens in Foxy Brown videos don't reinforce my point, then just watch commercials. The men in corporate boardrooms have caught on to the trend of selling product by making women insecure. As a case study, let's look at the Bioré Pore Strip. For the past 200 years, what did we do about those nasty blackheads?
I'm sure primordial woman just hit herself with a rock until they fell out, but all she has to do now is put a Band-Aid on her nose, and yank hard until she removes 20 layers of epidermis. There is a bright side - the pore strip can also reduce snoring and helps you breathe better if you play in the NFL. Beyond the pore strip, I'm sure the ridiculous Summers Eve commercial doesn't need further explanation. Marketing has convinced men that our women must match up or be relegated to the post party hook up. After all, you cannot really have a real relationship with a woman if she's not in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue. Women, don't pay attention to this. Men are stupid sometimes and while we fall prey to popular media too, we also have serious hormone issues. (Apparently so do women, see Sarah Lockyer's Tuesday column.) We will salivate at anything in a bikini, and I guarantee if you put Drew Carey in a Victoria Secret Angel Bra, we'd think twice.
Finally, lets just lay off Calista Flockhart and Kate Moss. While they exhibit the body types of which I am speaking, they are body types. It is possible that they have really good metabolisms. The climax of an Ally McBeal episode should not be, "is she gonna eat that sandwich?" It doesn't help much to keep harping on those people who may be different than us. All we do is generate a stereotype of what's normal by our standards, and this is the basis of all great discrimination like racism and sexism. Mike Nagrant mjnagran@umich.edu. 02-18-99

I know that that article was really long, but what is important is for you all to be confidant, and not allow yourselves to be swept up in that hype. If you do not love yourself, how can expect others to love us in the way that we deserve or need it? Never forget how beautiful you are!!Mama's Korner gets handed to my sister Kathryn this week:KB still has playa!I called my sister last weekend after I finished leading a retreat and she told me that she was playing in a basketball game. I was like what? My sister played ball in high school and she was fierce, but this is before my time. So bout 22 years ago she hit the courts for the last time. I proceeded to give her a pep talk. Telling her to smack balls in the women's faces and put her hands and arms in front of them. Talking to her later that day, my sister said she dominated the game, scoring 7 baskets in the first 12-minute game!! I was so proud. My sister went to town. The sister who is nice and not competitive finally grew a pair to handle hers. So the lesson in that ladies is that sometimes u are given the opportunity to shine...take it!! Sometimes there is nothing wrong with flexing some of your powers!!!

Go Women!!!have a great week and until later
~always the DIVA
patty jr