As an outside observer, it is impossible to say how much of Jersey Shore is constructed by the production team. This notwithstanding, recent episodes showcase how dating violence emanates among young people. We can see dating violence contextualized along imbalanced gender lines, as well as how bystanders of dating violence struggle to cope with the social problem largely because they don't know how to intervene in a healthy manner.
Not that we can expect more from MTv, but it would be nice if the company at least complimented these Jersey Shore episodes with supplementary videos on how to prevent teen dating violence. They must have the resources that could speak to greater social responsibility. I mean really, does MTv want young viewers thinking that true love is supposed to be violent?
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Ever since Eminem and Rihanna's video for their hit song "Love The Way You Lie" was released, I've been thinking about the song's violent lyrics and its video's violent imagery. The folks over at Sociological Images helped me wrap my initial thoughts around the video: Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s a beautiful song. Rihanna’s vocals are gorgeous; it’s was hard to not feel heartfelt while listening to them. And that’s the problem. It’s a powerful form of socialization. That we might internalize the message that passionate love and incontrollable rage go hand-in-hand is really very scary. It suggests not only that you should tolerate interpersonal violence but that, if there is no violence in your relationship, perhaps you don’t really love one another.
"It's something that, you know, [Eminem and I have] both experienced, you know, on different sides, different ends of the table," she said.
"It just was authentic. It was real," Rihanna continued. "It was believable for us to do a record like that, but it was also something that needed to be done and the way he did it was so clever. He pretty much just broke down the cycle of domestic violence and it's something that a lot people don't have a lot of insight on, so this song is a really, really powerful song and it touches a lot of people."
[...]
Ultimately, the song was something Rihanna felt was in line with her past relationship. "The lyrics were so deep, so beautiful and intense. It's something that I understood, something I connected with," she revealed.
Dominic Monaghan ads:
"The concept of 'Love the Way You Lie' was essentially a look at the relationship that Eminem was in with his wife, Kim, so I kind of felt like I was playing Eminem a little bit, and Megan Fox was kind of playing Kim.
"It's the story of them getting to know each other, and it's the story of their tumultuous relationship, and it was the story of the breakdown of their relationship," he continued. "Ultimately, what I think he's trying to say in the song ... is that he should have walked away a little bit quicker than he did and not let it get as messy as it did."
As for the video, I think maybe it has good intentions, especially using two artists who have a history with IPV, but I don't think it will be beneficial. Using [Dominic Monaghan] and Megan Fox (a sex symbol for everyone today) [it] seems to glorify the topic by using two high end celebrities. This video seemed like it wanted to make domestic violence look sexy and possessiveness look masculine.
...an image containing references to pop music culture might be seen by a young audience as an index of freedom and heterogeneity, whilst to an older audience it might signal manipulation and homgeneity. Which codes are mobilized will largely depend on the triple context of the location of the text, the historical moment and the cultural formation of the reader (p. 80).
2. Did not go to school because they felt unsafe at school or on their way to or from school on at least 1 day (during the 30 days before survey)
3. Threatened or injured with a weapon on school property one or more times (for example, a gun, knife, or club during the 12 months before survey)
4. In a physical fight on school property one or more times (during 12 months before survey)
5. Bullied on school property (during 12 months before survey)
COMMUNITY VIOLENCE
6. Carried a weapon on at least 1 day (for example, a gun, knife, or a club during the 30 days before survey)
7. Carried a gun on at least 1 day (during the 30 days before survey)
8. In a physical fight 1 or more times (during the 12 months before survey)
9. Injured in a physical fight one or more times (injuries had to be treated by a doctor or nurse, during 12 months before survey)
10. Hit, slapped, or physically hurt on purpose by their boyfriend or girlfriend (during the 12 months before the survey)
11. Every physically forced to have sexual intercourse (when they did not want to)
SUICIDE
12. Felt sad or hopeless (almost every day for 2 or more weeks in a row so that they stopped doing some usual activities during the 12 months before survey)
13. Seriously considered attempting suicide (during 12 months before the survey)
14. Made a plan about how they would attempt suicide (during the 12 months before survey)
15. Attempted suicide 1 or more times (during the 12 months before survey)
Okay, that's a lot to unpack. To begin with, there are some prevalence rates that merit discussions in their totality. The last survey item on suicide attempt(s) surprised me a bit. Over 1 in every 20 youths reports a suicide attempt within the last year. Survey item #11 on sexual assault also surprised me, with about 1 in 10 girls reporting forced sexual intercourse. These are American high school students. I knew these rates were high for young adults, but not this high for high schoolers.
Now onto the prevalence rates by "race." For 12/15 survey items displayed here, "American Indian or Alaskan Native" youth had either the highest or second highest prevalence rates. They had the highest rates for 8/15 survey items. "Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander" youth were in the "top two" for 11/15 survey items. None of the other construted "race" groups ranked among the "top two" slots nearly as much.
One could easily aruge the sample sizes for these groups are too small to make generalizations, and thus, they are not representative. That's a valid concern. At the same time, one cannot help but notice that these groups are also the colonized groups in the United States (well, for the NHOPI group, Hawaiians are). True, their proportion of the total U.S. teen population is small, but that is largely because of their colonial history.
These consistently high rates across numerous youth violence constructs demand further research with those communities and further illustrate colonialism's deleterious impacts on indigenous peoples. Without strong data, these communities have a more difficult time advocating for services and policy change. The feds need to get the concentrated research with indigenous communities conducted, and start providing these communities with more robust youth, family, and occupational resources, now!
He is 38 now, with a barrel chest and Popeye forearms that belie the gray hairs in his goatee. In the gang world, he and his contemporaries are of a specific age. They were the first to become men during the truly terrible years in South L.A. 20 years ago, when crack cocaine came through like a tempest and gangs were averaging a killing a day.
Everyone, he said, seemed to desert them at once. Many of their parents were lost to drugs; his own mother was murdered and his father was addicted and absent, like most of the fathers he knew at the time. The police, he said, became cruel and combative. The schools offered little hope. The factory jobs on Alameda and Slauson — the jobs that had lured his grandparents from Louisiana, like thousands of other African American families — were gone. Blue and his friends had hustled a little cash by offering to pump gas for customers at the local stations; soon, even that was taken away, as crackheads kicked the boys out and took over.
"We didn’t have a man at home. I never had a single man walk through the door and say, ‘I paid the light bill today.’ None of us did,” Blue said.
"So now your mom is getting high. The lights get turned off. The house is getting stinky. We all looked at each other and said: ‘Well, I guess it’s just us now. We ain’t got no malls, no colleges, no jobs. But everybody wants to be a part of something. All we could do is claim . . . this."
He stretched his arms wide; he meant the park.
["Blue"] also launched a tradition called “Spread Friday.” Each week he and his friends make a goulash of sorts, using only ingredients that are also available for purchase inside local jails: ramen topped with smoked oysters and canned beef, honey, jalapeños and crushed Doritos, tossed inside a garbage bag and doled out to all takers, who are surprisingly many — and eager. The meal, said Blue — who in his 20s served 22 months in prison for robbery — is a reminder that life will always be better on the outside.
Once Blue had signed off on the notion of the Avalons cooperating with the city — or at least allowing the community unfettered access to the park — the floodgates opened.
Using grants and money routed from City Councilwoman Jan Perry’s office, the park built a playground, replaced the gym floor and refurbished a band shell. The park launched a series of music performances. During the first concert, featuring blues and jazz, “everyone held their breath,” Cox said. Nothing happened. So at the next show, Cox asked Blue and his comrades — “the big, bad Avalon Crips,” Cox said with a grin — to provide security. It worked without a hitch.
Today, there are talent shows, tutoring programs, toy giveaways at the holidays. An aerobics class has exploded in popularity; more than 200 women are registered, making it one of the city’s largest park programs for adults. The class is so large that the instructor had to develop hand signals to telegraph dance moves. There are more than 700 children enrolled in classes and sports programs. And there are 18 kids in the preschool.
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