In 2004, Franco-Colombian feminist-activist Florence Thomas wrote a column on beauty pageants and the depiction of women. In her article, she only listed words. Nearly 5 years after, I can now understand what she meant. After seeing the way women were dressed during Halloween, I was inspired to write this. Sometimes, the right words are enough to describe the role women play in society nowadays. Only words. Those are my words; this is my protest.
1800’s. Home. Housekeeping. Marriage. Children. Father. Husband. Son. Corporal punishment. Marital Rape. No Voice. No Vote. No School. Financial dependence.
Submission? Submission.
Susan B. Antony. Elizabeth Cady Staton. Lucy Stone. Henry Blackwell. National American Women Suffrage Association.
1900’s. Work. Workforce. Job. Underpaid. Boss. ‘Men’s world’. School. College. ‘Not-like-men’. Pregnancy. Kids. Raising Kids. Leaving School. Leaving Work. Social Role. Social stigma. Miss. Mrs.
Submission? Discrimination.
Margaret Sanger. Birth Control. Right to Vote. Eleanor Roosevelt. Betty Friedan. The Feminine Mystique. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Divorce. Equal Pay Act. Title IX.
2000’S. Sex. Abortion. Object. Ads. Beer. Cars. Object. Body. Boobs. Ass. Legs. Hair. Image. Object. Mirror. Looks. Blonde hair. Blue eyes. Barbie Doll. Object. Gym. Calories. Diet. Anorexia. Bulimia. Cigarettes. Object. Tight Pants. Short Skirts. Small Dresses. Object. High Heels. Make-Up. Sexual Image. Cosmopolitan. Sexual Object. Slut. Hook-up. Morning-After pill. Object. Temptation. Object. Eve. Apple. Eve. Object. Object. Object. Object.
Submission? Slavery.
When is our fight going to end? I want my dignity back.
Carolina Medelin can be reached at colaya@ut.edu.
this looks like it was written by a woman. 2 thumbs down.
The TRUTH is that school children are treated differently in our great nation based on where they live. A middle school student in Texas died by having his chest crushed when his teacher sat on him to restrain him, a Texas high school student suffered deep bruising and welts to his lower back, buttocks and back of his legs when he received 21 “licks” with a wooden canoe paddle, which broke during the beating and had to be taped to continue the beating, a 9 year old Georgia 3rd grader suffered deep bruising injuries when he was paddled with a wooden paddle 3 TIMES IN ONE DAY (Decatur Co., GA affirmed Corporal Punishment Policy 9/17/09 for school children) and a Publicly Funded Charter School in Memphis, Tennessee physically punishes middle/high school boys and GIRLS weekly during a ceremony called “Chapel” by hitting them with wooden paddles and/or whipping their hands with leather straps IN FRONT OF ALL THE OTHER STUDENTS AS A DETERRENT to publicly induce shame, humiliation and fear! The school employees in the above actions have LEGAL IMMUNITY and are STILL paid by our tax-dollars to be ENTRUSTED with the care and education of our children!
Shocking News Headlines of Children suffering sever injuries by abusive practices in schools are all too common in states that allow paddling. Corporal Punishment of Children in Schools is an outmoded, ineffective and dangerous practice that has been banned in more than l00 countries. It puts school districts at risk for lawsuits for paddling injuries, which is the main reason many districts already have abandoned it.
A recent news headline reads, “Nearly 60,000 spankings in Miss. schools last year.” “Ouch! For the second time in a month, a school district in Leflore County has been hit with a lawsuit from a student alleging injuries from a paddling. An 11-year-old is seeking $500,000 from the Greenwood Public School District in a suit filed Monday in Leflore County Circuit Court. The child’s attorney, James Littleton, said photographs show deep bruising on the then-10-year-old’s buttocks and that he also suffered possible kidney damage.” “It was just unreal the abuse that this child took at the hands of a teacher,” Littleton said. Paddling has been a hot-button issue of late in Leflore County. Just last month, the guardian of a 6-year-old kindergartner filed a $500,000 lawsuit against the Leflore County School District for alleged paddlings. It was reported that a state legal adviser, who told Bristol, Tennessee Director of Schools Gary Lilly that while school principals who paddled students were legally protected from allegations of assault, they were not immune from accusations of inappropriate or improper touching.
School boards are asking for trouble to sanction a practice that is intended to inflict pain.
Make no mistake: beating schoolchildren on their pelvic area with a wooden board causes more problems than it corrects — if it corrects any at all. Teacher-training programs do not include instruction in the “correct method” for hitting students. Zero tolerance for weapons and violence is the standard that should apply to everyone in educational settings. Teachers included
What corporal punishment does accomplish is to degrade the teaching profession, drive good people away, and make the teaching field a safe haven for the dangerously unfit. Its net effect on schools is a negative one. The more that schools indulge in paddling, the higher the dropout rate, along with all the social ills that follow, e.g., gang activity, addiction, mental health problems, unemployment, etc.
The time is long over due for our lawmakers and education policy makers to apply the zero-tolerance rule universally. When paddlers complain, as some inevitably will, they should be advised to look beyond their classroom walls and see how schoolchildren are managed violence free throughout the civilized world. They should look and learn from the 30 states where corporal punishment in schools is forbidden by law. If they can’t learn, they can’t teach.
Research on toddlers and other studies following children into adolescence found physical punishment was bad for children and made them more likely to show anti-social behaviour. Children who were exposed to physical discipline most frequently were two to three times more likely to show anti-social behaviour as an adolescent, including things like getting into fights, being disobedient at home or at school, general delinquency and being in trouble with teachers. “It seems highly likely that children exposed to violence would themselves use violence in reaction to situations. Violence begets violence is a lesson from history not just child psychology.” “Children are the most vulnerable members of our society. Adults have constitutional and legal protection from physical violence. Why are children still waiting?” Physical punishment of schoolchildren is NOT education’s “Best Practice” as it is ILLEGAL in 30 states.
Over 50 National Children’s Health and Education Organizations have issued position statements to OPPOSE SCHOOL Corporal Punishment including the American Medical Association, American Academy of Family Physicians, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Bar Assocation, the National PTA (Parent Teacher Association), National Education Association, Prevent Child Abuse America and the NAACP, among others.
School Corporal Punishment as it is a SERIOUS HEALTH AND SAFETY risk causing stress and impaired learning for all school children subjected to or witnessing school corporal punishment. U.S. Congress is currently holding hearings on Abusive and DEADLY practices in SCHOOLS and MUST ABOLISH Physical/Corporal Punishment Nationwide of ALL Children in ALL Schools, The Cost is $0. School paddling bans must be tied to federal funding. Doesn’t it just make sense for all of us to keep our hands off of other people’s children? Don’t ALL AMERICAN SCHOOL CHILDREN DESERVE Education’s “Best Practices”? Pushing for anything less than an outright ban on all forms of classroom abuse reveals a gap in the administration’s professed commitment to making schools better, safer, and stronger.