May meeting notes, and Pride info!

Hi everyone!

Sorry for the delay - I've been on the couch with a cold the past week, but I wanted to give a summary from our last meeting for those of you who weren't there as well as an update on our participation in Pride!

First of all, a big thank you to Jolinda for another awesome Justice Sunday, all about gender stereotypes! The elementary Sunday school kids played "Rita Skeeter's Rumors" (a Pottery version of the telephone game) to learn how a message can often be distorted depending on who's doing the telling, what their motivations might be, or just because they may have heard it wrong from someone else. And then we had interesting discussions with both classes about children's toys and how they are marketed to boys or girls. We wanted to show them this video of a young girl getting angry about all the so-called "girl toys" being pink and the "boy toys" being blue, but we had some technology troubles. If you'd like to view it at home, it is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CU040Hqbas. Being the last Harry Potter Justice Sunday of the year, the kids then got ice cream and popsicles out on the playground! But not before going around in a circle and saying what each of them would do to help make the world a better place until they met again in the fall - a lot of them promised to pick up litter, recycle, and fight bullying! :)

And then we had our fabulous Enlightened Hippogriffs meeting! I know it's a tough time of year to get together with all the end-of-year stuff going on, plus we had rescheduled this one since our regular meeting time fell on Mother's Day, so no worries if you couldn't make it. But thank you to Rachel, Emma, Audrey, Maddie, Gabe, and Lucia for coming and for your great participation! We took a close look at gender stereotypes and especially the presentation of girls and women in advertising and the media, and compared them to images of girls and women we know from Harry Potter and in real life. The pictures we reviewed are here: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1jh5O-zIxGeNdlG_2kImUcYOtnLLKg_nxrpHqF4uJpx0/edit. Please view them with the notes (handout view in PowerPoint) so you can read the things the kids said about the images - they were very insightful! I think we noticed some interesting patterns in the advertising using women and girls to try to sell products - often they are "sexy" and wearing little clothing, even when they're supposedly "strong" - while the women and girls in Harry Potter are usually fully clothed, smart, and strong. Just like the women in girls in our Hippogriffs group, pictured at the end! (yes, I may have borrowed a few pics from facebook, sorry!) This is definitely a topic that got us very riled up and I think we're going to have to revisit it many more times! Great work everyone! Oh, and I should mention that when we talked about the Rosie the Riveter image, we also talked about how women still today do not make the same amount of money for doing the same jobs as men, something that the Equal Rights Amendment was intended to address. Audrey felt we should support this as part of our work. To learn more, visit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Rights_Amendment

Finally, we talked about Pride! We are likely going to hook up with the UU district, who are probably going to have a truck in the Pride parade. However the truck will be for those who have trouble walking, so Hippogriffs, you'll be expected to walk (or skip, or dance, or roller skate, or apparate!) We can also have some designated wagon-pullers for water and rides if necessary. And we will certainly dress up in any kind of crazy witch and wizard gear we like, but we also plan to make Potter-themed t-shirts at our next meeting! Hooray, craft project! We agreed on a theme for our group: "Harry Potter taught us that no one should be forced to live in a closet!" So please brainstorm on this and ways we could make some sort of closet to carry with us - maybe out of a refrigerator box? Maybe using the door of the truck/car? Also think about things to toss out to parade watchers - candy in rainbow tissue? lightening bolt tattoos?

For our next meeting on June 10, please bring:

1. T-shirt to dye or mark up and a piece of cardboard to put inside it (so the dye doesn't bleed through)

2. Fabric markers, dye, glitter paint, whatever you've got!

3. Paint, posterboard, markers and yardsticks for making signs - and ideas for slogans!

We'll also work on a brochure about our group to pass out at the district's post-parade booth so we can encourage more people to join us! Speaking of which, please feel free to invite your friends to join us for Pride and also for any of our meetings and events! The more the more magical!

Thanks again everyone!

~Lynne