(no subject)
*yawn*
I'm waiting for my second serving of broccoli to boil. I'm kind of hungry and I'm eating them as a snack. Broccoli is delicious, although I didn't think so until maybe 2 years ago.
... and they're done. Delicious, I tell you.
Today has been a good day overall, with some annoying aspects to it. The annoying part mostly consisted of a lecturer in school who I felt was being somewhat inappropriate. We just started this new course about the anatomy of the voice, and the teacher picked out a sound sample from a man with a throat disease. We were supposed to analyse it in class and the situation was pretty lighthearted so some people joked about the man's way of speaking,- he sounded a bit snobby and intellectual. Anyhow, the teacher commented with "Well, I'm not sure if anyone noticed, but I think he sounded kind of, and pardon my phrasing,- gay!". What she meant was obviously that the man's intonation pattern was similar to the way the stereotypic gay man speaks. Maybe the way she phrased it doesn't sound that offending in English, but in Swedish the word for gay is a bit more harsh,- not quite like "fag", but it's still often used as a slur often enough that I would think twice before using it in a place where I don't know how it will be received. Anyhow, that didn't bother me as much as the fact she continued playfully talking about gay men and how they speak in a pretty weird manner and explained that "obviously not all gay men speak like that, but those who are, you know, kind of bimbo like". *headdesk* I know she was just trying to be funny, but it's like some people forget that while queer is associated with a lot of positive and fun things, like pride parade and parodying the stereotype, people are still getting beat up and disowned because of it. I just think that when it's estimated that 5-10% of the population is gay, and we have 40 students in our class, that would mean that it's probable that there's someone there who might feel targeted and offended by what she said. Using edgy phrases about a marginalized group just to be funny is really, really lame when it comes to a classroom setting. She went on about homosexual men's voices and somehow ended up talking about voice training with transgendered people. I already know that some SLP choose to specialize in helping transpeople get a voice that they feel is more fitting for their identity. What irked me, which I actually called her out on, was that she said "homosexual transsexual men often need training to speaking in a believable feminine way". I know that most people don't know much about transpeople, so I can accept that she said transsexual men even though I would have said biological men or t-women or whatever. Saying "homosexual transsexuals" was really unnecessary and weird though. I like to believe it was just a slip because when I asked her about it she "explained" that transsexualism had nothing to do with sexuality, per se (again, I already know all this). The way she said the things before though made it seem like it was common for homosexual men to want to be women because they acted feminine, or that all transwomen used to be gay men, which are both prejudices that has been around for ages and have no place in a classroom. Since we were having a lesson I decided to leave it at that, since I think her intentions were good, but I think it would be great if she toned it down a little and used a bit more politically correct terms when talking about sensitive subjects in the future. Maybe it's enough if I mention it on the course evaluation later. I don't really care about being anonymous or anything, but it doesn't feel that urgent right now.
On to the good part of the day...
In between classes I went and had my ears re-pierced. I got them pierced for the first time when I was 12, but at some point the holes healed. They've been "re-pierced" several times by me pushing a jewellery straight through the skin without any anti-septic, sticking safety pins in them and just being a jackass to them in general. Poor ears. I haven't done anything to them the last year though and I thought it was time to get it done by a professional. After my morning class, I took a stroll downtown with a friend who decided to tag along. She eventually ended up getting one of her ears pierced as well in two places.
After school I went home for an hour to have some coffee and then deal with some apartment stuff, before biking off to aforementioned friend to help cut and color her hair. I told her several times that I don't know how to cut hair, but she insisted, so... :P The end result was pretty good though. I did a rather undramatic cut, but there was one part that looked kind of weird because she wanted it to be more dramatic, so it looked a bit botched. After coloring it and drying it, it looked much better.
ANYYYYHOW. It's getting late and I'm about to fall asleep.
Hope everyone had a nice day today.
I'm waiting for my second serving of broccoli to boil. I'm kind of hungry and I'm eating them as a snack. Broccoli is delicious, although I didn't think so until maybe 2 years ago.
... and they're done. Delicious, I tell you.
Today has been a good day overall, with some annoying aspects to it. The annoying part mostly consisted of a lecturer in school who I felt was being somewhat inappropriate. We just started this new course about the anatomy of the voice, and the teacher picked out a sound sample from a man with a throat disease. We were supposed to analyse it in class and the situation was pretty lighthearted so some people joked about the man's way of speaking,- he sounded a bit snobby and intellectual. Anyhow, the teacher commented with "Well, I'm not sure if anyone noticed, but I think he sounded kind of, and pardon my phrasing,- gay!". What she meant was obviously that the man's intonation pattern was similar to the way the stereotypic gay man speaks. Maybe the way she phrased it doesn't sound that offending in English, but in Swedish the word for gay is a bit more harsh,- not quite like "fag", but it's still often used as a slur often enough that I would think twice before using it in a place where I don't know how it will be received. Anyhow, that didn't bother me as much as the fact she continued playfully talking about gay men and how they speak in a pretty weird manner and explained that "obviously not all gay men speak like that, but those who are, you know, kind of bimbo like". *headdesk* I know she was just trying to be funny, but it's like some people forget that while queer is associated with a lot of positive and fun things, like pride parade and parodying the stereotype, people are still getting beat up and disowned because of it. I just think that when it's estimated that 5-10% of the population is gay, and we have 40 students in our class, that would mean that it's probable that there's someone there who might feel targeted and offended by what she said. Using edgy phrases about a marginalized group just to be funny is really, really lame when it comes to a classroom setting. She went on about homosexual men's voices and somehow ended up talking about voice training with transgendered people. I already know that some SLP choose to specialize in helping transpeople get a voice that they feel is more fitting for their identity. What irked me, which I actually called her out on, was that she said "homosexual transsexual men often need training to speaking in a believable feminine way". I know that most people don't know much about transpeople, so I can accept that she said transsexual men even though I would have said biological men or t-women or whatever. Saying "homosexual transsexuals" was really unnecessary and weird though. I like to believe it was just a slip because when I asked her about it she "explained" that transsexualism had nothing to do with sexuality, per se (again, I already know all this). The way she said the things before though made it seem like it was common for homosexual men to want to be women because they acted feminine, or that all transwomen used to be gay men, which are both prejudices that has been around for ages and have no place in a classroom. Since we were having a lesson I decided to leave it at that, since I think her intentions were good, but I think it would be great if she toned it down a little and used a bit more politically correct terms when talking about sensitive subjects in the future. Maybe it's enough if I mention it on the course evaluation later. I don't really care about being anonymous or anything, but it doesn't feel that urgent right now.
On to the good part of the day...
In between classes I went and had my ears re-pierced. I got them pierced for the first time when I was 12, but at some point the holes healed. They've been "re-pierced" several times by me pushing a jewellery straight through the skin without any anti-septic, sticking safety pins in them and just being a jackass to them in general. Poor ears. I haven't done anything to them the last year though and I thought it was time to get it done by a professional. After my morning class, I took a stroll downtown with a friend who decided to tag along. She eventually ended up getting one of her ears pierced as well in two places.
After school I went home for an hour to have some coffee and then deal with some apartment stuff, before biking off to aforementioned friend to help cut and color her hair. I told her several times that I don't know how to cut hair, but she insisted, so... :P The end result was pretty good though. I did a rather undramatic cut, but there was one part that looked kind of weird because she wanted it to be more dramatic, so it looked a bit botched. After coloring it and drying it, it looked much better.
ANYYYYHOW. It's getting late and I'm about to fall asleep.
Hope everyone had a nice day today.