Sexism directed toward males

[jpgray]

I started this thread not to fan new flames, but I realized I can't really empathize with some of the posts on the sexism threads. I can understand how one might construe some statement as sexist, but often I can't understand how a statement that appears so innocuous to me can offend people in such a visceral way. I can interpret statements in a way that they can appear sexist, but I can't feel any real outrage. This doesn't go for the uglier and more obvious forms of sexism (unequal pay for the same work, attempts to deny women the right to choose, etc.) but rather for general use of the term 'bitch', saying someone or other is 'hot', etc. I understand these can be seen as sexist, but I don't understand how someone could be deeply offended by them.

So anyway, I thought I'd turn the corner and try and find out why. As a white male, I have never been deeply offended by a comment that was sexist toward men. They do exist, and most often in commercials. Mom can say in a computer ad 'It's so simple, even DAD can figure it out!', but Dad will never say that about Mom. In an ad regarding an upgrade to cable TV, a woman regards her homely hubby/boyfriend and the voice-over remarks 'it might make you want to upgrade some other aspects of your life', cutting to the hubby/boyfriend tapping dopily on the glass door while she watches TV--this little scene would never feature a male and his homely wife/girlfriend.

I dunno, what do you think? My inability to understand being offended by some of the more innocuous stuff may stem from the fact that I have never been really offended by sexism toward men. Since it doesn't bother me, I guess I would have to go with option two--since it is unaccompanied by some form of subjugation, maybe that is why the offense isn't there? It seems to me that there is a profound difference in the way men and women interpret sexism, so I'm wondering if sexism toward men and sexism toward women are seen to be two different animals by people at DU.

(Please try and keep the flames to a minimum--I'm just interested in understanding what the Hell is going on between the gender gap on the past dozen flame threads we've had on this subject. Feel free to post your own long-winded theories. :))

[JohnLocke]

1. The second choice.

Reference Yang's thread.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

2. This is going to get locked just so you know

they are locking even reasonable people's conversations on the subject....

I will give you the best example of sexism toward men though...it is anything that infers they have a small or ineffectual penis..so from now on when men on DU make blatantly sexist statements and tell ME to get over it...I will invoke the tiny penis and see how they like it. I know it's hardly adult to do so...but it's getting clearer these boys need to be communicated with on their level.

BTW...in reality..sexism towards men is more like refusing to allow men to show any emotion but anger...forcing them to have masculine traits and the like...for the most part men on DU can show these things without women berating them..

[Paragon]

4. Isn't it awfully nice to have a penis?

Isn't it frightfully good to have a dong?
It's swell to have a stiffy.
It's divine to own a dick,
From the tiniest little tadger
To the world's biggest prick.
So, three cheers for your Willy or John Thomas.
Hooray for your one-eyed trouser snake,
Your piece of pork, your wife's best friend,
Your Percy, or your cock.
You can wrap it up in ribbons.
You can slip it in your sock,
But don't take it out in public,
Or they will stick you in the dock,
And you won't come back.

- Monty Python's The Meaning of Life

[Rowdyboy]

5. Small penises can be FUN!

Also

Sexism toward men is like racism toward Anglos. It exists as a concept, but is really not a serious societal barrier that inhibits general economic advancement for those discriminated against.

In other words, yeah, men can experience discrimination for their sex, but it rarely amounts to much of an economic liability.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

8. Exactly...it's about as valid as claims of reverse racism

When I was in law school (early 80's), maybe one out of every 7 students was a female...we were treated like idiots even though most of us were tops in our classes..then when we got before judges...there it was again...the bottom of the barrel males had nothing like it for an experience in spite of their inability to grasp certain concepts.

[Rowdyboy]

13. I remember the Bakke case from Constitutional Law

http://www.kansaspress.ku.edu/balbak.html

Naturally, the Supreme Court left the water about as muddy after the ruling as before.

BTW, my college con-law professor's name was John Quincey Adams-I shit you not! He inspired me to get up at 3am to read case law for 4 or 5 hour before breakfast, just so I wouldn't be humiliated in class. And he loved humiliating unprepared people.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

20. Actually I like the notion of compelling public interest

although they COULD have further affirmed it last year but heck...they at least LEFT that much in place..agree though..it was a dodge.

[wickerwoman]

3. Well, the example that you gave isn't very strong.

There's a long tradition in the TV world of presenting a "bungling old Dad" image. It isn't really generated by women trying to prove that men are useless (it pre-dates modern feminism by quite a bit) but runs more along the lines of the "if I pretend I can't do it, I won't be asked to." Hence Mom should do the cooking, clean the house, change diapers, vaccuum, clean toilets, etc. because Dad is just hopeless and can't manage it. It's actually a strategy to get women to do more work under a veil of "empowerment".

Now genuinely anti-male prejudice I do have a problem with. People saying that if women ran the world there would be no problems are nuts. People who say women are naturally smarter or more peaceful don't know what they are talking about. If those statements don't annoy you, fair enough. But from the threads I've seen on DU where they come up it your reaction seems abnormal. Plenty of men seem to get up in arms about it.

So I don't think there is a fundamentally different way that men and women perceive sexism. I do think women deal with a hell of a lot more of it than men do and the effect is cumulative. It grinds down your patience to be dismissed and ignored. So if women seem more militant in combatting sexism on DU, I would argue it's because:
1.) They deal with a lot more of it
2.) They have been dealing with it a lot longer and
3.) They are treated with less respect when it comes up.

(I'll have to be in and out of this conversation so if I takes me a while to get back to any responders, it's because I'm not here not because I don't want to respond.)

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

9. Agree on the "if women ruled the world" aspects of your post

Two words: Maggie Thatcher

of course given our numbers on the planet being allotted an equal voice might be nice...some of the earliest civilizations known in Asia were matriarchal societies.

[jpgray]

10. Dick Van Dyke lives on, then? :-)

I respectfully suggest that it isn't a veil of 'empowerment" when the cable ad has her kicking poor hubby out of the house--here there was no 'bumbling old Dad', it was a 'Dad is in need of an upgrade; kick 'im out.' And that, turned around, would be offensive to women, while it is not so offensive to men (I don't get riled by it, at any rate.) In fact, that scenario is not uncommon today, as there is still that old idea that getting married to a rich man and keeping his home is a woman's sole purpose in life, and if he gets tired of her he will 'upgrade'. Is it because that scenario doesn't exist for men that this ad doesn't have the same bite for us? That's the question I think I'm trying to get a grip on. If that makes any sense. :)

[Angelus]

6. I can care less if women talk about how hot I am.

I know I am. Doesn't bother me. As far as my attraction to women, I'll keep saying women are hot if I think they are. No one is going to stop me from doing that.

[Duncan Grant]

18. Theoretical question.

How would you feel if gay men objectified you? Imagine that we live in a world where the hegemony is constructed around the entitlement of gay men.

In this world, gay men could freely call you 'hot' (or babe, or honey, etc) without the slightest concern what so ever. (And, I'm not suggesting that's how you currently view women - this is all theoretical.) Gay men would most likely control your access to economic and social power - depending on how well we decide you 'play the game'.

Imagine too, a media that would feed you messages about how you could improve your 'game' - so to speak. In this imaginary world you would be relatively powerless to establish equal footing within a gay hegemony.

Not to belabor the point but I think you can imagine the inequity of that scenario - as far fetched as it is.

[jpgray]

22. Take it a step further--imagine them grabbing your ass all the time

In that situation, it's easier I think for us guys to see the sexism--a proclamation of 'hotness' doesn't get our hackles up, apparently. Maybe it is because we don't see that as a gateway to anything more?

[rumguy]

7. Is Homer Simpson a sexist stereotype?

The only two reasonable characters on The Simpsons are women - Marge and Lisa.

I'm don't care. I just always thought it was funny that the only characters who aren't total screwballs are females.

[REP]

11. The "Dim Dad" Slur

As someone pointed out, the 'helples father' theme in commercial predates feminism and is mostly an advertising ploy, the subtext being, "Women have less power than men, but can feel better about themselves if they can accomplish a meaningless household task that men do not do or do so infrequently they are not good at it."

Sexism and stereotypes are foolish when directed at either sex, but in the case of sexism against women, they are used to justify women receiving 75% of the pay men do for equal work and the many other ways that women are treated as inferior to men.

[jpgray]

12. But buying a computer/car or getting cable isn't scrubbing the floors

Is it just that the "dim dad" advertising technique is now being expanded as the roles and buying power of women expand?

[REP]

16. Yup

That's all it is; an advertising gimmick. "Women like to shop more than men do" is one idea in play, and by changing the computer from being 'male' technology into a product that women can use their 'natural shopping skills.'

Speaking of advertising ideas, notice how all the migraine med ads with women in them have 'women as caretakers of children' themes? That's one I can agree with - if I had to be in a minivan full of children or a nursery full of screaming babies, I'd have a fucking migraine too! But it is funny that one one hand we're fed the "having children is so important, so wonderful and everyone wants to have them" idea so often, but advertising often shows a grimmer side of parenting (remember the Lysol ads; "Kill the germs, not the children"? The office supply chain with the deliriously happy father shopping for school supplies with his grim-faced children while "It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year" played?)

[Kipepeo]

14. Thank you

The "helpless father" routine always seems to be a nice little inside joke. And I can go prove my importance in life by cleaning the kitchen and the bathroom because I am somehow so much better at it.

About the sexism in commercials...does anyone remember the story of that little girl a while back who wrote letters to all of the laundry detergent companies asking why they only showed mommies doing the laundry?

[jpgray]

15. So long as moms buy more of them than dads...

Advertising companies will put more moms in there than they will dads. But the 'dim dad' routine doesn't always describe only homemaking tasks dad wants to avoid at all costs--it is now used in buying cars, cable tv, computers--all sorts of traditional 'dad' territory. So is this just to reflect the expanding roles of women? I can't recall if power tool ads are sexist, or if they were in the past.

[rumguy]

17. I saw it in an advertisement for cell phones

The daughter was waiting with a friend for her dad somewhere....

I forgot the exact storyline but I definetaly remember a snarky comment aimed at the father...

[Kipepeo]

19. Chicken or Egg

about the laundry thing. How much does it affect a little girl's psyche to see only women doing laundry in commercials? Probably not enough that she will *like* doing laundry. :) But maybe enough so that she won't put up a fuss if her male counterpart just assumes she'll take care of it. And she would be less likely than her male counterpart, I'd imagine, to just assume the other person will take care of it in the first place. I understand that you are going to market your product to who you think buys it, but that doesn't mean it's not sexist. I am convinced marketing people have no soul.

The Dim Dad expanding to other sorts of commercials is interesting. I can't think of any commercials like that off hand though...other than the computer one where he memorizes something off of the computer store's website. In that particular one I saw it more as making fun of "old" people (parents really) for not being tech-enough.

[jpgray]

21. Advertising doesn't have an agenda beyond selling crap, it seems :-)

Maybe it wasn't the best example to use to open the thread. :dunce:

There are also similar enforced advertising ploys aimed at boys involving sports, don't play with dolls--play with this soldier/sports hero/killer robot, etc. I suppose one flipside of the 'dim dad' would be the 'dehumanized hot chick' of beer commercials. :D

[Dookus]

23. I think NSMA hit on the worst case...

which are the expectations society has of men. Growing up as a gay boy, it was pretty difficult to constantly fail everybody's expectations. I hated sports, didn't care about cars, didn't care about military things... I just wasn't a "typical" boy. I see no difference in that than a tomboy girl being thought of as odd and not fitting in.

None of that had to do with sexuality... it had to do with gender stereotypes and expectations, and it's just as hard on a boy as on a girl.

[Moderator]

24. Locking.

See this announcement by Skinner in Ask the Administrators.

Thank you for your understanding.