Lauren Kruger-Patchin
02/21/2013
Blog 4
With our recent articles comparing girls and boys with masculinity and other characteristics, I had several thoughts that I will share in this blog.
GIRLS VS. BOYS
Girls and Barbies/Princesses:
I was a pink-loving, barbie owning child. I would like to say that babies now are much different than babies back then... My barbies were more plan and less glamorous... I wasn't huge on the princess items, but maybe that's because there weren't a lot of them when I was younger. I actually watched the movies and understood the meanings behind the stories. Today it seems as if children know the princess before the movie and before knowing their story and what they stand for. The princess isn't about the fairy tale, it's about the dress and hair and how they look. This has created a new meaning and some problems. I grew out of that stage, but it's taking kids longer to do so, and some don't. I don't know exactly how I feel about it, other than the fact that those children sound like brats... I give props to the mom who tries keeping her child away from that, but it is scary how she still fails and the child tells her she looks like a princess... It's cute, but you don't want children growing up with the wrong message. The shows that have grown women spending crazy amounts of money to look like princesses still shocks me. I think the media and celebrities can also be at blame for glamorizing those images to women who can't afford it... but that's where your education, common sense, and responsibility needs to come in. It shows how influenced people can be by things and not put their best interest first...
Boys and superheroes:
This is the topic my group and I hope to do our project on. I am looking forward to discussing it more in class. Even after reading the article, I understand the main point, but I am sure there are so many arguments on the topic. The main point I hear is that the masucilinty of superheroes today has young boys imitating them and becoming more aggressive or getting the wrong message. Superheroes back in the day made their message of helping humans more clear... Movies now show them with women, money, cool weapons killing villains... where is the line? These are "superheroes" - the people young boys look up to... Their image is much different than in comic books and older movies.
MEN VS. WOMEN
Men in media: Men are portrayed as needing to be sexy with abs and tough... They should be really rich and be a very strong figure for women to rely on. This puts a lot of pressure on boys. They see celebrities in the media surrounding by cars, women, money and they have great bodies. This makes boys want those things and they may lead an unhealthy lifestyle to obtain them. Over the last few years we have seen more and more of this. Dr. Phil even had a show on teen male anorexia a few years back because they felt so much pressure from the media to be thin and fit.
Women in media: Women face similar issues. They should be pretty, motherly, and rely on their man. They need to be skinny as well. They take care of children. These are the typical stereotypical gender roles.
The media still portrays these roles quite often in TV shows and movies. However, in real life we are starting to break away from these roles (although the media might make it a struggle) because there are more and more single parents picking up both roles.
BABIES
The baby clothing article was very interesting... I think that baby fashion changes because fashion in general changes. If the parent's fashion is changing, than their babies will as well because they are the ones dressing them. If I had a baby right now, I know I would want to dress it up and make it look adorable... and yes, I would dress it in "gender specific" clothing because I think that is what it cute. It's not to enforce their role - they're a baby! If someone in today's world wanted to dress their baby in a neutral way, they could go with yellow or green. Those are the typical, gender neutral colors for babies. I don't think too many people read into what it means when they dress their children in certain colors. Maybe this goes back to the need to feel "cool" and go with the crowd - follow the current fashion... we dress babies the way the magazines show them looking cute. We dress them in the clothes the stores have. If we have a girl, we go to the girls section. If we have a boy, we go to the boy section. If there is fault, it should be on the designers that decide what colors/types of clothing go into those sections. I don't know if I see a big problem with parents dressing their babies in gender specific clothing, because when the child is old enough to notice and care, they can voice their opinion and tell their parents what kind of clothes they want to wear. Today's world is so different... just look around! I see girls in masculine clothing and boys in feminine clothing all of the time. It might not be widely accepted, but it's there. People are dressing all kinds of ways now... I can't even keep up with it. I'm sure some parents even make their babies into "hipster babies" and then other parents make angry blogs about it, given our hipster discussion in class... who knows! I say, dress your baby the way you want to dress your baby. Fashion will always change, but I don't think it's a bad thing to have gender specific clothing for a baby. Personally, it helps me know if the baby is a boy or girl because I can't tell most newborns apart at first glance...
CONCLUSION:
It is clear that gender roles are still separated. However, I grew up being told that women were the bigger target for enforced gender roles (being pretty, gentle, sensitive, nurturing, cooks, cleaning, taking care of children, but also expected to be skinny and beautiful...) More and more you find that boys/men are facing their own problems (masculinity, abs, muscles, toughness, money makers...)
I tweeted out this article today that was published yesterday. It was an interesting read to go along with these discussions... It examines how boys might be "the new girls" when it comes to education... It asks if boys are now facing more discrimination than girls. Could the roles be reversing?
Outside of this article I have two facts of my own that make me question whether the roles are changing... Women do not always get equal pay when performing the same job as men at the same company - it's been proven that they usually get a significant amount less. However, more women are currently seeking higher educations than men. As this happens, will more gender roles reverse in the work place as well?
Just something to think about...
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