For this week's assignment, I chose to analyze Jason Derulo's "Swalla" video. 

What roles do the men in the music video play?  What roles do the women play?  Well Jason and the other rapper featured are the only men in the video, and they are basically soaking in all the attention of the woman that appear to be falling all over them.

Does the music video--as Sut Jhally insists all music videos do--tell a story about male and female sexuality?  If so, what story about sexuality does it tell? The story this music video tells is that women are men's sexual play things. The women are dancing sexually and eating candy provocatively. The video is definitely derived from a male's fantasy. Moreover, It promotes the idea that a woman's only desire is to get a man's attention by using their sexuality. Continually, most women in the video have on the same (or very similar) outfits which adds to the fact that they are not treated or dressed like individuals. 

What story (besides sexuality) does the visual music video tell?  If you had to watch the music video without sound, what story are you told and/or what message does the music video offer? It honestly has no story except "dance and act sexual". It was pretty difficult to watch because to me it's not even clever or creative. The video is so focussed on the sexuality of women that it cheapens the value of the song (which is already at a low value in my opinion). 

Does the music video reinforce harmful stereotypes or does it challenge them?  Provide examples from the video. It reinforces the male stereotype that men must surround themselves with loads of women, and only use them for sexual pleasure (a male stereotype that is present in many music videos). Nicki Minaj's part in the video doesn't help the female portrayal of a sexual object either. She crawls around on all fours wearing an extremely scandalous outfit. 

Given that music videos' target audience is adolescents (13-18 years old), what do you think adolescents learn about men, women, and relationships from this music video? I would think that adolescents boys will learn it's okay to treat women like they have little or no value. Adolescent girls may learn that the only way to receive attention from men is to dress scandalously and perform sexually for them. 

Toy Stores & Gender Roles

This week, I decided to choose the toy store assignment. I went to Target and went down the boy and girl toy isles. I wasn't very shocked to see that the boys isle had mostly toy weapons, and muscular action figures, while the girl's isle was mostly pink dolls and "domestic" toys.

Here are some pictures from the boy's isle.

Here are some pictures from the girl's isle:

Something that was pretty shocking was that Wonder Woman was found in both isles, yet her look was much different in the boy's isle than the girl's isle.  On the left side is the boy's isle action figure, on the right is the girl's isle doll. You can definitely see some noticeable differences in the physical appearance of the dolls depending on the sex they are targeting.

Ad vs Journalism.

The first image I found was from an old Carls Jr. ad for a burger. It shows Paris Hilton in a racy bikini and has a sexual double entendre that says "She'll tell you size doesn't matter. She's lying." This is obviously a play on the size of a burger they're selling while also playing into the sexualized image of Paris with the other meaning behind size doesn't matter. It's target audience is clearly anyone attracted to a beautiful woman in a swimsuit (primarily men). However, this seems to be a male- idealized image of a woman as she is glammed-up with hair, makeup, and diamonds, looking extra sultry as she holds a cheeseburger (I can tell you for a fact I don't look like that when I dive into a burger). This image clearly provokes feelings like desire, sex, and envy (oh and hunger!).

















The next image is a journalistic photo from the recent International Women's Day march/rally. It was posted on the Huffington Post website. This image could not be further from the advertisement above. It shows a woman being arrested while protesting outsideTrump International Hotel, in New York. Here, in contrast to the advertisement above, the woman is modestly dressed and displays a stance of empowerment with her hand in the air as an officer arrests her. This image clearly evokes emotions like empowerment, and defiance.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/womens-march-organizers-arrested-during-a-day-without-a-woman-strike_us_58c05a70e4b054a0ea67587e

Money Runs Everything.
This week we were assigned to research propositions or new legislation and trace the funding for them. I decided to look into the recently passed proposition 64 (legalizing marijuana in California). According to ballotpedia.org, Sean Parker, founder of Napster and former Facebook President, was a huge financial supporter of proposition 64. He donated 8.6 million to yes on 64 which ended up being almost 34% of the total contribution. The California Democratic Party, U.S Sen. Bernie Sanders, Jay-Z, and actress Shailene Woodley all supported Prop 64 as well (ballotpedia). Other major donators include George Soros, "The liberal billionaire investor is reportedly behind the non-profit group called the Fund for Policy Reform, which has contributed nearly $4 million in support of Prop 64. Soros is a board member at the Drug Policy Alliance, according to the group's website" (fortune.com).

https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_64,_Marijuana_Legalization_(2016)#Campaign_finance

http://fortune.com/2016/10/29/california-prop-64-marijuana-donors/

This week, we were essentially assigned to investigate our domestic news sources to see whether or not we think journalists are simply reporting what political leaders say, or if they are challenging it. My initial opinion was that most are simply reporting what they are told. However, I was pleasantly surprised. 

I went to one of the major news corporations, Fox News, which is primarily a conservative network. I initially thought they would not be challenging much of what President Trump or his campaign is saying because he is republican, but I was wrong. There was a news story I read on FoxNews.com about the selectivity of press the Trump’s campaign would allow into a specific event. I was happy to see that Fox News showcased multiple perspectives, and most that they reported on, were heavily against Trump's campaign media exclusion. Here is part of the quote they used from a statement by the Time’s executive editor, Dean Baquet; “Nothing like this has ever happened at the White House in our long history of covering multiple administrations of different parties. We strongly protest the exclusion of The New York Times and the other news organizations. Free media access to a transparent government is obviously of crucial national interest."

It was nice to see that Fox News is showcasing various opinions that are very challenging to the Trump campaign, especially since it is a conservative network.

Fox News Story: Trump excludes media

GUN VIOLENCE

The first incident that came to my mind when thinking about gun violence as a result of violent movies or video games was the Colorado movie theatre shooter, James Holmes. He openly fired in a movie theatre killing twelve people during a midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises. According to ABC News, Holmes said, “I am the Joker,” when he was arrested (http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/films-shows-inspired-real-crimes/story?id=16836535).

 James Holmes News Clip

Upon further research, I stumbled upon a site that had plenty of video game-related crimes listed. There was one instance where a teenager named Devin Moore, who was a big fan of the video game Grand Theft Auto, was brought to a police station on suspicion of stealing a car. He then got hold of a gun and shot two officers and a 911 dispatcher. Stealing cars and shooting police officers definitely seems like a Grand Theft Auto inspired crime to me (http://www.criminaljusticedegreesguide.com/features/10-deaths-caused-by-video-games.html).

The first part of the video from the link below discusses Devin Moore's crimes, as well as other video game related acts of violence.
Video Game Violence

What is happy violence?

George Gerbner expresses in his article, “Reclaiming Our Cultural Mythology,” that, “Most of the violence we have on television is what I call happy violence. It’s swift, it’s thrilling, it’s cool, it’s effective, it’s painless, and it always leads to a happy ending because you have to deliver the audience to the next commercial in a receptive mood.”

In my opinion, happy violence is violence on TV or in movies that is gratifying and entertaining to watch. I believe a great example of this type of violence can be found in most action hero movies. These violent movies with amazing stunts and elaborate fight scenes where the “good guys” take out the “bad guys” in violent ways capture the audiences attention, and make violence feel normal or even justified because you are rooting for the hero. One of the first movies that came to mind as an example of happy violence is the movie Taken, starring Liam Neeson.

I’ve posted a link below to the scene in Taken where Liam Neeson’s character electrocutes one of the “bad guys” who leads him one step closer to finding his daughter. This torture scene is a great depiction of “happy violence” as you feel that Liam’s character is justified to do these actions because he is trying to save his daughter.  If you really think of it, the entire movie is basically Liam’s character brutally and violently talking out people responsible or connected to his daughters abduction.  However, the storyline makes the audience support and even root for his violent actions against the foreign criminals.

https://youtu.be/3dCcNhCqzMM