Me on DeviantART! And the blog is back to norms!

Aha!
Thanks to this wonderful lady, I have a nice layout. Give her a look-see here, or just search for a blog from suckmylolly.com here at blogger!

Secondly, I've felt the need to express myself, so I've created a deviantART account! The link is in the title, and feel free to drop a comment.

UNDER SERIOUS-O CONSTRUCTION

I apologize, but I'm telling you right now that the blog is going under some really rad changes.
Like layout changes.
And I'm also trying to get this thing to go back to the new, XML layout.
So if you visit the site and it's not in its usual, crummy layout and happens to be something odd or maybe even more bland than it already was, don't worry.

I'm going to have it fixed soon!

Bawlin' Over Balls [warning, sarcasm within.]

I recently saw a bit of a blurb on TLC (otherwise known to me as PEC or the People's Exploitation Channel because of their documentaries) about a lil' something-something called purity balls.

My first thought was "Weird."
Once I heard what it was about, my second thought was "Disgusting."

So basically a young girl signs her virginity off to her daddy so that he can protect it. Protection...cool, right?! Actually, I find it pretty disgusting. After hearing things like "How great it would be for her to say 'I've kissed but one man in my life'?" Sure, it'd be nice, but that's quite farfetched. It isn't unnatural to pick a random person off the street (wait, it is...) and interview them about their love life only to find that they've had more than one partner over a lifetime depending on their age.

There are quite a few--and I use this word lightly--problems that I have with this particular practice.

• The ages involved are not, at all, regulated in any way. Not in any rational way at least. Upon reading numerous articles about purity balls (and even on the website of the founders, Randy and Lisa Wilson, in an article posted on the site) there are girls ranging in age from four to twenty-something. Nothing disgusts me more than taking personal choice from a girl who hasn't even lived a decade, not to mention probably has absolutely no idea what virginity is since her parents wish to keep her pure.
• What the f**k is this s***t?!? Regarding the age issue and how little these children actually know about their reproductive systems, how they work and will work, what they can do with them, and what may happen to them if they don't take good care, here's a little quote from one of the 10-year-olds gettin' purified...

Three of his daughters are with him tonight, including 10-year-old Taylor. I
asked what purity means to her. "I don't really know," she says, and she's shy
about talking about all this. "But it means you make a promise to your dad to be
a virgin until you are married and not have a lot of boyfriends."

• But what about the boys?! The boys have their own ceremony. Except it doesn't put them down and tell them that they're vulnerable--apparently he's blessing people with his shade and influence.

"Boys become men by watching men, by standing close to men. Manhood is a ritual passed from generation to generation with precious few spoken instructions. Passing the torch of manhood is a fragile, tedious task. If the rite
of passage is successfully completed, the boy-become-man is like an oak
of hard-wood character. His shade and influence will bless those who are
fortunate enough to lean on him and rest under his canopy." -Preston Gillham

• Where are your mothers? Nowhere actively in this kind of ceremony. Not even in the manhood ceremony since manhood can only be passed from man to man. I'll give them that. You certainly can't have a dainty female who needs to be protected passing years of her non-wisdom to her son since carrying his whole body within her disgusting reproductive bits.
• There's that stigma again...and it's that stigma about sex and women. Not just how they should be the ones protecting their virginity (which I hate to talk about in noun form, just take a look at some of the questions on Scarleteen about how to know if a virginity is still there) but also how they're not strong enough to protect themselves and there needs to be a manly-man around to help such a poor, poor soul.

I admit, this was a bit of a rant, and it will lead to a post about abstinence-only education fo' sho'. For now, just think about what you want to do for yourself, and if you really want to bond with your dad...just take some cooking classes, please.

TwiBashing and TwiHarding? Oh dear god...

Okay, people.
It's time for me, Brianne, to tackle probably the most buzzingest novel series in the world right now, my chickies.

Twilight.

OH NO. I SAID THE T-WORD.
What shall I do? Rant about it aimlessly?
No! Because that would be insulting the opinions of those who think that the series has something to it.

Shall I defend it without backup?
No! Because that would be just plain wrong, and I'd still be not making a point.

I will, in fact, try to list the good, bad, and ugly about this series.
And if I have time, the people who TwiBash or TwiHard it.
Now on to the list!

I'm going to start by saying that the purpose of a book isn't always necessarily to educate the reader and be completely innovative. This is an argument on the the book is shit and Stephanie does not know how to write if her life depended on it point. Obviously this book is poorly written. And it also has a story line that so many people despise greatly. But the last time I checked, waving the red flag in front of the bull makes it angrier. Honestly, if I didn't like a book (unless it was content that was blatantly offensive and was worth a great protest) I would just put it down because I don't like reading things that I don't like.

Then there's the whole zOMG Bella has no life! Look at her! She's given up everything for just one guy and that's totally abuse. Yep. It's abuse if he's hurting her physically and mentally or brainwashing her into doing things. But we must remember that no matter what, this is still a book and it's impossible to twist the words of a book once they're "immortalized" (for lack of a better word). Edward, honestly, is not the kind of guy I'd like. He's controlling. You can actually see that quite a bit in him that he wants to have Bella on a leash so he doesn't lose her. But Bella actually makes the choice to stay in the vampire world, and that's something she did, not him.

Now I come to the wonderful part of my post where I say: Jesus Christ! I don't like the way Stephanie Meyer writes. Because it's true. She takes way too long to make a point and a lot of her writing is really drawn out, making the series WAY too big for me to fit in my backpack--something I find of convenience, with me being a high school student and all.

Space issues and all other issues aside, this is a book. And no, I'm not saying this because I'm hetero or because I'm a fangirl (because I'm not one at all) or even because I'm a teenage girl. Because saying that all of those characteristics make me unsuitable for the job of writing about Twilight would be desrciminating against my sexual orientation, sexist, and ageist rolled into one. Books, as I said, are not always for the purpose of enlightenment or even for being completely revolutionary. Just remember; if you're looking for an absolutely spectacular book just don't read the Twilight series.

Double Standards?

I haven't done a post in a loooooong while...
I've been doing a lot of thinking.

About the whole thing about being too skinny and thin being in and how real women should be more embraced in society today is bothering me. While it's wonderful that people are cluing in to the fact that not everyone is the same, we're seeing lots of people not putting pity on larger women, but the smaller ones.

Not everyone in the world is the same, as previously stated, and that means that there are going to be some people that are just naturally skinny. Real women look skinny, they look fat, they look tall or short, and everything in between. So next time there's a skinny girl in an ad, it's not right to just assume that the girl is at fault, it's the advertiser. The issue, as shown here, is not the body type of the person featured, but why they were featured and what the advertiser wants to do.

On another note...
I've been thinking about feminism and how there are also standards there. As a young feminist I feel that not only am I prone to a bit more sexism for being open about it (I once talked about it in a gifted class and later that evening a classmate sent me a facebook invitation to a group called "Feminism belongs in the kitchen") but also ageism. I haven't really done research on feminist icons and when I start a discussion on a forum in places like Gaia Online I'm told that I'm not a real feminist and that I'm just looking for somewhere to belong. That's a nice example of ageism, I believe and I'm not liking it.

Another standard that I believe is lingering a bit (but usually stems from the outside world's misconceptions) is that a feminist must be queer/straight and single-not-looking and not Christian. I'm the opposite of those things. I have a boyfriend who I love very much, and I consider myself to be Catholic--just not terribly religious. And yet, I feel as if people are staring me down for being something common, something that "can't understand" and something that knows nothing about what they're saying. Last time I checked, feminism was supposed to be about making choices, right? So if one chooses to take their husband's last name, should they get married, it's their choice, right?

/rant. :)

Why Leshawna Is My Favourite (TDI Drama Part 2)

In my previous post on Total Drama Island, I talked about a few points that certain people were concerned about with the show.

One of them being Leshawna, and why she's so ghetto.

Well, listen up. She's my favourite. Why? Because she's different. No one complains about how Gwen is goth (and if you sifted through all the posts in the thread I posted, someone even says they don't have a problem with her because of that) or how Sadie and Katie are too attached. It's always

"God, I hate the way they made Leshawna so ghetto." Oh, I'm sorry. Does it bother you that there are actually girls like that out there? I understand that they could have made here any other way: Thin waist, quiet, timid, and submissive. But there are already characters in the show with those qualities, and quite frankly I don't think her character could have been any better. As far as I know not ONCE did she fall for anyone in the show. She was real the whole way. It was as if all the other girls except Eva, another strong character in the show, who was booted way too early and Gwen, "the individual" were made for the sole purpose of either:

1. Being a ditz
2. Falling in love
3. Being a manipulator
4. Getting betrayed

And the last time I checked, the only item on this list that applied to any of these three girls was falling in love. And that's not something too stereotypical for a goth (correct me if I'm wrong).

Enlist, Serve, Learn.

No I'm not talking about the Canadian Army. I'm talking about the All-Girl Army.
This is amazing. Finally a chance for young women from 10-23 of all shapes, sizes colours, and types to express themselves with some sort of authority. I find it important that young people are given a voice, especially when they're the age group that gets labeled the most.

I especially enjoyed reading a post by Irmelin called Se(x)education. It tells about how sex-ed was taught to her, and how Scarleteen (a BIG favourite of mine) showed her how it should have been. Her story is quite moving, if I may be a little bit cliché.

Here's some news; I've sent in an application to be in the AGA. It's really exciting for me! Hopefully I'll get chosen. I LOVE this project.

And interestingly enough, it's influencing me to write more.
Great, eh?

Total Drama Island Drama!

While doing some lurking around at IMDb.com I decided to search one of my favourite shows, Total Drama Island.

Huzzah! A Canadian show with Canadian stars and Canadian characters in a Canadian setting (it's said that it's "somewhere in Muskoka, ON). When I saw this show for the first time, I fell in love with it immediately (however due to my inability to remember when all of my favourite shows air I didn't watch it regularly). It's such a great show. It's a cartoon reality TV show that pokes fun at things like Survivor and Big Brother using the concepts of elimination, surveillance, challenges and such, but in a way that makes it both down to earth and exaggerated (watch the show if you're confused).

Even though the first season is finished, I was happy to know that TDI was airing in the states on Cartoon Network. I don't know, maybe it's just the fact that I love when Canada shows off in the US, but it struck a very nice chord with me. However when I was lurking at IMDb.com I found three things that made this chord quite dissonant.

• Here, a "viewer" is surprised to hear "children" saying "get bent" and guys saying things like "hot chicks". I understand that you live in a sheltered world, but that doesn't make sixteen year olds children. And at least they're not saying "F**k you!" or "a nice piece of a**." Doesn't anyone understand that if they're worried about their kids watching junk they shouldn't be watching TV at that time anyway? In the US (the country where most of the complaints are coming from) it airs at 9:00ET/10:00 PT. When I was in fifth grade my bed time was 9:30. Another thing. This is a show aired for ages 12-14. Seven year olds, will not get most of the jokes. And who cares if the rating is Y (C-C8)? The last time I checked, each human was put on this Earth with common sense. Don't watch it if it's "bad".
• Here another "viewer" as well as some others say that the show is mocking homosexuals. This clearly wasn't the intention. Being a person who knows a bunch of teenage guys, they're always trying not to sound "gay". It wasn't a joke making fun of gays, it was a joke making fun of how stupid guys sound when they're trying not to sound gay. And someone else in the same thread even has the guts to emphasize the fact that something about homosexuals is in a children's show. Why does it matter? It's funny how being PC can bring out the homophobe in some people. Catdogwordpainter pretty much sums up my feelings in this post.
  
• And then there's the whole Why is Leshawna so ghetto? issue. Well, for one...she's a stereotype. So there. Why isn't anyone saying Why is Gwen a goth? or Why is Owen fat? Because everyone's minds have already associated her ghetto-ness with being black. No one really associated Gwen's gothiness or Owen's fatness with being white. Why? Because there are extremely ghetto black people out there. If you don't believe me, get out of your house...or don't if you're "...scared [of getting] shot." I mean there's D.J. and he's really brawny but he LOVES animals. No one has yet commented on that.
  

So there. We give the US something nice, and they pout. I think it's about time they had something at least a little bit realistic on Cartoon Network.

I'ma SHOOT you people.

Today's post, boys and girls, is about pro-anorexia and pro-bulimia videos, also known as pro-ana and pro-mia.

This is absolutely disgusting. Anorexia is a serious problem (well, duh, you people know that) and there are people out there who actually want to look like they'd break with the slightest touch. I found out about these horrible pro-starvation videos on Yahoo! Answers. After watching about 10 of the videos i saw a few that actually had girls that looked about 12 years old in them.

12 year olds!

What the hell? I mean I understand that people that actually have anorexia, not by choice, are suffering and have a completely different view than the general public about everything HOWEVER, there's a whole new generation of people who are insulting people who are trying to get better by showing this off as a trend.

Opinions?

Playing word toss sucks.

"Oh my god, that was so racist!"

"Well, how come you didn't pick girls this time? That's sexist!"

These are just some of the few word-slinging sentences that I've heard being used by younger children in my school. And I don't like it. In my gifted class is where I've seen it most, surprisingly. If I say that Andrew, a Vietnamese guy, is Asian, then Leena or some other junior-division student in the class will say "that's racist!" when it isn't. Here's the definition of racism.

/rā'sĭz'əm/

1. The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.
2. Discrimination or prejudice based on race.

Hmm...I don't think that I said that Andrew could do certain things because he was Asian, nor did I say that Blacks were superior to Asians. Racist? No. Observant? Yes! These days children like to repeat words they hear all over. And this isn't doing us any good. Just because I recognize that certain people come from certain backgrounds doesn't make me racist. Many people put forth their identity using their culture. The problem lies in training children to be tolerant and politically correct. Political correctness does two things to a child. One, it makes them over-aware of what they say and in result comes the "I Don't Mean To Be Racist, But..." phenomenon. I've heard that phrase too many times in my short, 14-year life.

" I don't mean to be racist, but last night, there was this episode of Family Guy where Cleveland was a taxi driver and he saw Brian and offered him a ride, but Brian used an excuse and said that he had to pick up milk for Lois. Isn't that funny?"

No, it's not.

So as a last statement I will say this:

If there is no intention behind your action, the action is at its worst, un-intentional.

That All [Canadian] Girl

The link in the title is scary.

Very, very, VERY, scary. If you have ever read Miss Nomered's "And a big hearty 'fuck you' goes to..." then you'll know why.

The very first page is comprised of not one, but two hauntingly serene pictures of Holly Jones, a Torontonian youngster that was abducted in 2003. Nothing really makes Miss N's opinion more validated than that. According to everyone that knew Holly, she was the best, the greatest, and everyone's angel. And she has a parkette named after her. But if she so deserves a parkette, why doesn't everyone else who has been killed or abducted?

Because then the world would be made of parkettes.

Imagine that. Unfair? Yes. Descriminatory? Yes. Shameful? Yes. What did Holly do that was so important? Making people happy. I understand that if this was, oh say, my friend Raquel, I would be on the other side of the fence. But I still wouldn't want a parkette named after her. Cassandra Do, the sex worker mentioned in the same entry linked above, never got a parkette. Because that would mean that people would have to talk about something they find very uncomfortable. Not only was Cassandra a sex worker, but she was also transsexual. Those are two characteristics of Cassandra that wouldn't have "appealed to the demographic" so to speak.

But put a young, pretty, middle class, white girl in the news and everyone's rushing to name stuff after her.

Remember, remember, some time in November.

Now that I've (re)started this blog it's just hit me that I'm going back on a lot of stuff. Things that happened months or weeks ago.
Well, here's another throwback in time.
Months ago (probably in November) my class had a substitute teacher. Now a lot of people would go without saying that a substitute teacher has to have some kind of problem. But this one had a lot of them.
He looked like one of those guys who worked out too much, and was going through a mid-life crisis at the same time. As soon as he walked in the room--sweatpants and all--I had a feeling that something was going to go wrong. And it did. During geography. If memory serves me right (and this isn't all of it), we were reading a part about NGOs (Non-governmental organizations) and human rights when he started to push his beliefs over on us. He ranted about how there is no such thing as child poverty. He rambled ad nauseum about how the UN is a horrible, terrible organization and all NGOs are, as well. He said that abortion was wrong.
And then I snapped.
I knew that it would cause some kind of uproar because I rarely speak up during class other than to answer some questions, but I had to do it. I had to put this misogynistic a**hole in his place. And I did, but the safe, Nerd way. By posing an argument and being intelligent about it.
It was one of the biggest rushes I had ever felt in my life. I could see his greasy face turning red when he ran out of defenses for being anti-choice and heard my classmates chuckling in the background and taking my side.
Ah, the feeling of triumph.

These people disgust me.

So today, while I was looking back on some posts in the Body Politics category of the Shameless Blog, I stumbled upon one post that I had read but not commented on. It was about Thomas Beatie, a trans man from Oregon who was carrying his child for his wife. However there was a quote from the couple about how badly they had been treated. People like doctors, receptionists and the likes. These people disgust me. These are the people who we are supposed to trust our lives with. The same people who smile at a child for comfort when the child is going through hell. And just because they don't agree with what Mr. Beatie and his wife are doing they basically make a mockery of the both of them.

Ah, this reminds me of a previous post. In the same class yesterday, this issue came up and being the right-winger that she is, she said:

"That is absolutely disgusting."

After which I wanted to punch her in the face. Or slap her. Something to get it inside her head that she is a hypocrite. Catholicism in itself is contradictory. Hell, all denominations are contradictory. This whole love everyone as you would love yourself thing is getting to me because of a lot of things. If we are to practice the golden rule then we mustn't call people who are in unfamiliar situations "disgusting" because that is disrespect for human life. Saying that people who under the umbrella term of queer (thanks, Miss Nomered) are disgusting is disgusting in itself.

The strange thing was, in all the topics that we argued on, no one wanted to argue that Mr. Beatie and his wife's situation was not disgusting at all.

But I feel like a bit of a hypocrite for not speaking up, myself. Okay, so I'm one person, but maybe I would have been able to change someone's mind?

Look before you leap.

So today I got in a serious three-hour Guitar Hero III session and my mind was trying to not explode in the midst of all the fast-paced high-octane mini-mines that were the screen frets. Then again, I was trying Hard for the first time.

My brother can be a bit of a touchy kid and possibly accidentally touched my uncle's crotch area.

My uncle also happens to be quite a complainer, so he told my grandmother to get him to stop.

My grandmother happens to be quite the yeller, so she consequentially and aggressively said "What is WRONG with you? Do you think he is a faggot?"

Ugh.
Ugh, ugh, ugh. Nothing in my life (in terms of put downs and other -ist terms) has ever bothered as much as that did. And I don't know why. I know that my grandma has a tendency to be a bit...how should I put it...discriminatory. And it comes off as offensive, but honestly she doesn't know better. But this just struck something that I never knew could be hit.

This reminds me of something else. My uncle, the complainer. He's probably the most homophobic and stereotypical of all in the family and it makes me mad. Of all the things in the world he is trying to do, it's teaching my brother to be "manly".

I want my uncle out of my house.

Well, God Said I Could!

Today was interesting.
Yet another in-class debate at Catechesis classes.

Basically it was about sex, gender roles, stereotypes, and generalizations. I do actually enjoy the conversations that we get into without even realizing it, but one thing bothered me.

We're Catholic and we're supposed to wait until we're married, right? So then there's no need for contraceptives!

Ugh. What my teacher, Maureen, didn't know was that despite what she said before about "at least four of the students in the room getting someone pregnant or becoming pregnant before high school" and what she had said before, there is a need for contraceptives. She basically proved herself wrong within a span of half an hour. You see, these hypothetical unwanted pregnancies wouldn't exist if people just thought about it.

Well, you know, we're having sex. But we're not married. I guess if we don't use contraception, we'll just be sinning less than we "already are"!

That's how the catholic church is training the teens to think. And that's where they're wrong. Maybe they just need something to blame. But thank god that my teacher, Mrs. Donoghue-Stanford, knows how NOT to force her ideals on such an impressionable group of people. Mrs. Donoghue says:

You MUST make an informed decision...take the information that you get from everyone: parents, teachers, friends, and other people that you look up to. The rest is between you and God.

Maybe other people may not agree with this, but I personally find this as some form of salvation after four years of no sex-ed at a time when everyone needs it most.

Refresh

This isn't my first post.

I know it says that it is, but that is a lie.

I recently decided to restart my blog with a completely new attitude.

Please enjoy the future.

For my sake.