HW 25: Iraq Uraq

After reading the foreword and introduction to Baghdad Burning by Ahdaf Souief and James Ridgeway I found it very interesting and it opened my eyes about what was really going on in Iraq today. The forward, written by Ahdaf Soueif, was a very brief description of the blog written by “Baghdad Burning” by Riverbend. Soueif tell us what we can expect when reading the book and states, “ Baghdad Burning makes painful reading. It also makes enjoyable - even fun- reading. It is certainly necessary reading.”(Soueif, ix) Riverbend’s blog talks about how she feels about the war, the effect it has on her family as well as the effects the war has on her country as well as her daily life. In the introduction Ridgeway tells us facts about what is happening in the war and how Iraq has advanced over the years. Ridgeway speaks about the background of Riverbend's culture, as well as informs us about the struggle Iraq was going through since the Gulf War up until the war that is currently going on. Reading the introduction and foreword to the book really helped me to understand what is going on in Iraq. I had never pictured or even thought about what life would be like with the war going on where I live. This gave me sympathy for the people living in Ira during the war and also has intrigued me to dive into the rest of the book.

HW 24: My Room Of Two

According to Virginia Woolf, in order for a woman to write fiction or any type of writing for that matter, they must be educated, have money, and most importantly a room of their own. When speaking about Mary Carmichael and her first book, Life’s Adventure, she states “ give her a room of her own and five hundred a year, let her speak her mind and leave out half that she now puts in, and she will write a better book one of these days.”(Woolf 94). As a college student most people do not have a room of their own. I am no different from any other woman that shares a room on campus. Not having a room of my own makes completing my schoolwork on time very difficult. My roommate tends to listen to death metal while I am working and as you can imagine it is very hard to focus. As Virginia says, “five hundred a year stands for the power to contemplate, that a lock on the door means the power to think for oneself, still you may say that the mind should rise above such things.”(Woolf 106). This means that no matter what you should be able to bring your mind above what is not present and achieve what you thought was not possible before.

HW 23: Why Them and Not Me?

With Apologies to Virginia Woolf

Today I was taking a look at a blog entry on Jezebel and found something that intrigued me. There was and article about Tyra Banks that was pertaining to her show and was written by one of her so-called “loyal viewers”. The blog post was titled “Tyra Has No love For Women Who Love Sex” (http://jezebel.com/gossip/clips/tyra-aint-got-no-love-for-women-who-love-sex-314099.php). I knew prior to reading the article that it was going to brush me the wrong way. The post informed the readers about an episode of Tyra’s show about women who are proud to be sexually aggressive and how it upset her viewer. The author of the post was upset that Tyra would have the mettle to have extreme women that host sex parties on her show rather than the genuine slut like herself. The post proceeds to talk about how repulsive it was to hear about the bedroom behavior of these sex-craving women. The author also mentions the idea that these sex-craved women go about their ways due to some sort of inner “emptiness”.

HW:22 Patriarchy My Foot!!!

Patriarchy by definition is a social organization marked by the supremacy of the father in the clan or family, the legal dependence of wives and children, and the reckoning of descent and inheritance in the male line; broadly: control by men of a disproportionately large share of power. (Merriam Webster Dictionary) In chapter 2 it is clear that Woolf believes that anyone who reads the paper in England can clearly tell it is a patriarchy. Woolf supports her idea of patriarchy by making the following statement. While referring to the professor Woolf says, "Nobody in their senses could fail to detect the dominance of the professor. His was the power and the money and the influence. He was the Foreign Secretary and the Judge. He was the cricketer; he owned the racehorses and the yachts. He was the director if the company that pays two hundred per cent to its shareholders." (Woolf 33) It is clear from the selection that in England women are not important in the world. They serve no specific role in the world, have no education and have no say or control over anything. Men are the leaders, control everything and make the money. After reading a couple of articles in online newspapers, it is easy to support the idea that in the United States women are not inferior to men but actually considered equal to them. For instance, Hilary Clinton running for president is a perfect example of the fact that the United States is not a patriarchy. If patriarchy were the case then the men of the U.S. would prevent women from having any control or even gaining any.

HW 21: My Punk @$$ Cousin

Yo Punk,
After reading the first section of Virginia Woolf’s “A Room of One’s Own” it is very easy to be confused and not truly understand what she is saying and what is going on. Hopefully this will help you understand it a little better. Woolf is asked about her thoughts about women and fictional writing. Therefore within the first chapter this is the topic she focuses on. She believes that in order for women to write fiction they need to have money and a room of their own. (Woolf 4) While addressing this question Woolf tries to change people’s idea that women are inferior to men. She speaks of how women are continuously interrupted, held back, and unable to continue their thought processes, freedom, and what they want to do. This is where the idea of “A Room of One’s Own” comes into play. Since there is not a specific answer to the question she was asked, Woolf mentions several authors in history and provides background upon them to try and get the idea across that women need more and were less fortunate. For instance, in history women were never the one’s with the money and education. From what I understood from the reading she is trying to make people realize how women are less fortunate than men. Hope I helped you out with any questions and wish I could have helped more.

-Kim

HW 19: Out in Black Iraq

After reading “Web of Influence” by Daniel Drezner and Henry Farrell I learned a great deal about what the blogosphere represents and what it does to contribute to mainstream media. I found that the third paragraph (Kline and Burstein 84) gets the idea of blogging across most thoroughly. This paragraph provides a general understanding of the way blogs can develop over time and how the amount of readers can grow drastically due to just the content of the blog. This paragraph is most informative and interesting at the same time. The paragraph is about a blogger by the name of “Baghdad Blogger” from Iraq. It speaks about how his blog began very small and more diary-like than anything else. For example, his blog is about what life is like in a war zone, Iraq specifically. But above all he speaks about the three-day blackout they had in Iraq. It talks about how the blackout was not due to U.S. Missiles or Baathist Party thugs as they had thought. Incidentally it turned out to be just technical difficulties.

HW 18: My Least Favorite Blog Post

My least favorite blog post of the week was entitled “Even 95-pound Women Have Fat Parts They Want Lipo’ed. Like Toes!” I found this post on Jezebel, which I had found previously to be my favorite of the three blogs I am watching. The link to this post is http://jezebel.com/gossip/skinny%3F-suck-you/even-95+pound-women-have-fat-parts-they-want-lipoed-like-toes-311439.php. I was not truly fond of this post because I think that as it is skinny people already seem to pick out all of their flaws. It is unreasonable for a person who weighs only 95 pounds to go and get liposuction on their toes. Come on now, what is the point. Clearly enough if you weigh 85 pounds you are not overweight and have no reason to go and get liposuction. Within the post it speaks about a woman who was about to get engaged and knew her boyfriend was preparing to propose to her. Since she knew when he was going to propose she wanted to get liposuction to remove the small areas of fat around her hips. This astonished me. Why wouldn’t she just work out or get the dress she was going to wear fixed? I found this to be total nonsense and cannot fathom going and getting liposuction as opposed to trying to lose the weight first. This article just made me even more frustrated with the skinny people in the world who always try to pick out their flaws even if they don’t have any. Newsflash for all of the skinny people out there who think their fat: you don’t need to weigh 8o pounds or get liposuction to be attractive. If you are that worried about your figure then work out more and may off the surgery.

HW 17B: Make Me Laugh and I'll Vote

After reading “Blogging the Presidency: An Interview with Markos Moulitsas Zuniga” and “Sex, Lies, and Political Scrapes: An Interview with Ana Marie Cox” I can efficiently answer the question: Which blog would be more likely to influence the way you vote in a coming election. I found Ana Marie Cox to be extremely hilarious. She has a great way f keeping the readers attention by making them laugh and stating amusing details about her life. She speaks a great deal about sex as a general topic, which I find, is something that most young people in the world today would be more likely to follow. I myself would definitely be persuaded to vote for Cox or whomever she was representing in the election due to the fact that she would make me laugh. Since politics isn’t something that I am really all that interested in, this would be a great approach to get me involved. I am not currently registered to vote, but after reading these entries, I feel that it is possible to intrigue me and convince me to vote.

HW 17: We're Damn Good At Faking It!

The blog I enjoyed most was from Jezebel and was titled, What Does An Orgasm Really Sound Like Anyway. The link to his blog is http://jezebel.com/gossip/probing-questions/what-does-an-orgasm-really-sound-like-anyway-306844.php. I enjoyed this blog because it was very funny to me and I agree with the statements that are being made. The blog is about a list of 50 things men wish that women knew. The blog mentions numbers 19 and 23 off of this list, which truly amused me. Number 19 was “there’s no better sound in the world than you having an orgasm”. This intrigued me because I had never heard any man say that before. I can understand how it could be arousing for a man to hear that however it is hard for me to believe that it is the best sound in the world. Number 23 was “You’re really bad at faking it”. It was not only this comment that made me laugh. The comment from the woman responding to this thought was what really got me. She said, “If the sound of our orgasms is getting you off, then we’re probably really good at faking it.” This made me laugh because we all know how hard it is for a woman to have an orgasm, and in most cases women do fake it. However, that does not mean that the man never gets off because in most cases he does just fine. Overall I thought this blog was absolutely hilarious and utterly amusing.

HW 16-A: Blog Fulfills Scoble's Rules

After reading Scoble’s Corporate Weblog Manifesto and comparing it to a blog entry I read on a blog I am watching I was able to see where they were following Scoble’s principles at many different points. I read an entry off of Jezebel titled Standards of Booty: New Mom’s Hate Their Bodies, Heart Plastic Surgery. The blog entry was about a “Mommy Makeover” that is designed for women to have after a pregnancy. This surgery includes, breast lift either with or without implants, Tummy tuck and liposuction. It was easy to see that this blog supported many of Scoble’s principles starting in the first sentence. Scoble’s first principle is to Tell The Truth. As I read in the first sentence the blog was talking about how most women are insecure and not happy with their bodies after a pregnancy. This seems to be telling the truth about life’s situations. The next principle that I found satisfied was If Doc Searls says it or writes it, believe it. Throughout the blog the author mentions the opinions and statements from both Dr. Erin E. Tracy as well as statements from The New York Times. The blog also fulfilled the principles of never hide information and never lie. It is stated that women could risk chances of infections from this surgery and even death, sounds like the truth to me. It was hard to judge whether or not any more principles were demonstrated throughout the blog however, it satisfied plenty of them in general. There is no other set of standards that this blog should be following; it is clearly satisfying Scoble’s Corporate Weblog Manifesto just fine.

HW 14: Take and Obsession, Then Feed It!

As a result of reading the interview with Nick Denton “Take an Obsession, Then Feed IT!” in Blog! (Kline and Burstein 151-157) there were several things that I agreed with. In fact, I agree mostly with the comment he made that blogs should not be used to make money. After all blogging was not originally designed to make a profit, it was designed to give people a way to express their feelings, ask questions and get there ideas out into the world. Also I think his idea for hiring new writers for blogging as opposed to writers with track records in the media is a great idea. Although new writers might not have as much experience, I believe in the same way Denton does “they are hungrier”. In addition to those statements I was unable to agree with his statement about how blogging is pretty much going to take over newspapers. Although there is a good chance that blogging is going to develop more over the years there will still be the newspapers out there for the old fashioned type. Since blogging is mainly for discussion and things of the sort, it would be unlikely for everything to switch over to blogging such as fashion tips and things like that.