SPC1017 Group One Blog 2 Anthony Martinez

 

SPC 1017 Group One Blog 2

            Hello folks, this is the blog for the second project on SPC1017. This presentation went much smoother than the previous one due to the fact that I personally already knew what I was going to write about and felt much more comfortable this time around. I did procrastinate a fair amount but fortunately got to thoroughly complete every single segment of my subtopic. I also had other classes that I needed to catch up on since I was a tad behind, which just ended up adding more stress to the table and didn’t help me fully concentrate since I was just worrying the entire time. Group one was speaking on gender inequality. At first, my topic was going to be on trans people playing sports and all the controversy behind it, but after further discussing it with my peers, we decided to switch my topic to lack of legal protection in the workplace. I knew this topic wasn’t going to be pretty, but the more research I performed on the subject, the more disturbing it got the deeper I went.

            At first, I believed the topic to be easy since I heard a previous story that I strongly knew was highly relevant to what I was writing about. The story had to do with a very famous game company called “Activision Blizzard” getting into a very controversial lawsuit involving sexual harassment and many worse cases inside their studio. The men working for the company turned the studio into an environment that was referred to as a frat-like environment. The deeper I researched the lawsuit, the more disturbed I became. Not only did the men make extremely disgusting comments and regarded them as “jokes”, but the higher ups and even the president of Activision were in on it and encouraged it. The sexual harassment in the office got so bad at one point, that a female worker took her own life due to her all the bad experiences at her workplace. This case was difficult to write about and definitely made me see the world through different lenses after further researching it and expanding my knowledge on it.

            After reading and writing the case, I became hooked on my topic and actually got passionate about spreading awareness of these horrible actions that take place during workplaces. It really seems like something that was left in the past or only seen in overly exaggerated movies, but it surprisingly actually goes on and it’s something that needs to be addressed and fully abolished. I am grateful I got to present this specific subtopic because it opened up my eyes and gave me motivation to learn more about the topic of gender inequality as a whole. I also got an interview at the last minute right before my presentation with the help of a former news reporter who used to work for KFOX News. The interview was with a woman named Norma Gene who was currently working at the Fort Lauderdale Port. The lady was nice enough to give out relevant information about past experiences in her workplace where she was taken advantage just because she was a woman. the My partners also had many interesting subtopics, such as abortion laws, vehicle insurance, transgender rights, and much more. The topics that the other groups had to present were infrastructure and climate change. Infrastructure spoke about buildings and the future while climate change spoke about the current direction the world is heading regarding climate and all the damage that has been produced to it.

            During the presentation, the first subtopic that was brought up was abortion laws. It was appropriate for it to be at the beginning since one of the first things people think of when they hear about gender inequality is the current controversies surrounding the abortion laws in the United States. The first slide showed a statistical comparison of abortions from the years 2018 to 2019 in Texas. This specific subtopic was relevant to mine and caught my attention because many women are oppressed of abortions depending on the circumstances, when the baby they’re carrying could’ve been unwillingly place unto this world by a man sexually taking advantage of a woman. There are many controversial factors that go into abortion laws and there are just too many unfortunate scenarios women go through to be so oppressed into keeping the baby. The next topic that caught my mind was sexual violence. The title of the subtopic speaks for itself; it showed gender norms and also a few statistics regarding sexual assault on both men and women. This presentation was more of a verbal one rather than one with the facts and notes written down on the slides. The interview for this subtopic was also very solid since it gave out good information on the effects of sexual abuse and also good advice on how to help someone who has been through it.

            In conclusion, most of group one did a fantastic job on their presentations. Some were a bit late due to personal problems but luckily pulled through the next lecture and got full credit. Everyone this time around was a lot more comfortable presenting, including folks from the other groups. My overall experience is a weird mixture that I can’t quite put together. The research of my topic made me feel terrible for all these horrible things going on right in front of our eyes, but also gave me a sense of wanting to fight for what’s right and raise awareness on these issues. The reason some of the women don’t speak up when they’re being sexually harassed in a work environment is because they believe it’ll just make the situation worse, but if we raise awareness, understand them, raise more laws on these issues, and let them know that they have a voice that will be heard, these situations will more than surely happen less often. This project was great for my mind and actually taught me new things that shed a new light on issues I didn’t think were so severe in the U.S. I hope everyone enjoyed themselves researching their subjects and presenting their info and ideas.