November 24,
2012
Women
and Men
Dear Women and
Men Who Enjoy Media,
The media
is an extraordinary influence in the modern person’s life. For decades the main
source for identifying the proper social conduct outside someone’s family has
been the media. Television shows, commercials, and written media have played a
large factor in determining how one should conduct themselves in society based
upon ones gender. The media’s version of men and women has been pretty straightforward
in the sense that women had their jobs and men had theirs. Men have always been
the providers of financial stability, and women’s job is to provide a stable
home life for their husbands and children, but now times are changing and we
must again look to the media to lead the way to establish a new world order to
the masses. More and more men are choosing the life of homemakers, and women
are becoming full time career holders. With the many decades of “women belong
in the kitchen; men belong in the office” being pounded into the minds of the
American public it’s going to be a hard stereotype to break, but with influence
of the media it’s possible. The American way of life is changing, and the media
and American people need to change with it encouraging anyone who wants to take
on the role of homemaker to do so, and to be proud of that role regardless of
gender.
All too
often do you see a woman in a commercial cleaning the house, making the meals,
rearing the children, and in general doing what a woman is supposed to be doing,
stereotypically speaking, but how often do you see a man take on that position
with ease in the media? A short answer to that question is rarely. In the past
the American media has portrayed men in homemaking positions as buffoons unable
to manage the simplest homemaking tasks like making a lunch or using a vacuum.
In the 1993 film Mrs. Doubtfire, 20th
Century Fox displays a man doing women’s work through Robin Williams in drag,
and in his first attempt in kitchen his lights himself ablaze while trying to
cook a dinner for his children. Even though the premise is slightly absurd the
belief still rests behind the fact that men, even when they’re dressed as
women, should not be in the kitchen because they’ll burn the place down. There
have been many major production studios that have taken part in poking fun at
the male homemaker such as, the 1987 film Three
Men and a Baby where, as the title suggests three men take on the
inconceivable task of trying to raise a baby without the help of a woman. Even when there are men in nuclear families
like Michael Keaton in the 1983 film Mr.
Mom the man can not manage at first without the help of his female
companion. Now while these examples are decades old and we’ve begun to see a
shift in the male homemaking positions like Johnny
Test a Cartoon network show that presents a competent father figure as a
homemaker, but it is still not nearly as common as it should be.
During the
last decade the amount of stay-at-home dads in the United States has doubled. In the year 2000 the amount of male homemakers
was estimated to be around 94,000. According to the Census Bureau’s website
since 2010 the number of stay-at-home dads has gone from 154,000 dads in 2010
to 176,000 in 2011 that 22,000 in just one year that amount alone is
impressive, and should be acknowledged more in the media. Many of the major
media sites attribute this rise in “Mr. Moms” to the economic downturn of 2008
believing that the lack of jobs in the male dominated fields has lead for more
women to take action and go out into the working world, and for dads to stay at
home. This has been discounted by a
research done by Boston College Brad Harington of the college tells the Fox
News channel in an interview in June 2012 that, “The
hype around stay-at-home dads is due to the ‘man-cession’ but the census data
shows that during the economic downturn the numbers were down.” Though Harington discredits the
statistical probability that it was due to the recession many believe things
like men in the home are only because they have lost their place in the
workforce.
The
mans place in the office is often shown in the media, as well as the
construction jobs, doctors, engineers, and many other jobs we as Americans
often associate with men, but the other side of rise in men in the home is the
rise of women in the workplace. While there has been a rise in the amount of
men staying at home the number of stay at home moms is still in the millions,
5,020,000 million to be precise. The amount is shifting though slowly but
surely. With societal minds opening up for women to work in high ranking
positions, and positions more attributed to men this is a chance for Moms and
women in general to help pave the way along with media. Women have long sense
been fighting for equality amongst the elite in our patriarchal society, and
with this fight the “extreme feminists” have caused a riff in the system
calling for equality by pointing blame, and placing stereotypes of their own.
To create equality you must insure that all involved are equal because you do
not gain rights and equality by stripping someone else of theirs.
Single mothers have already begun to
change the look of families in the U.S. because with single mothers come single
fathers. Single mothers and fathers are no longer a taboo thing that should not
to be talked about amongst civilized society. Growing up in a single parent
household full of women one would think that I would have a biased opinion on
fathers, and the fact is that really isn’t what created my image of fathers.
Men are important figures in the household whether you grew up with a father,
uncle, grandfather, or any male figure of note they are important, and should
feel that way. Growing up I didn’t have
a male figure in my life to base my understanding on, so I went to the next
available source, the media. Dads were always these passing figures in cartoons,
and they were behind newspapers, in front of televisions and grills, usually in
business attire with out a homemaking care in the world. In fact most of the father or male figures I
remember from my childhood were animals in Disney films, which doesn’t give
much of a real impression of the world at all. Although Timon and Pumba were
great caretakers they weren’t an accurate depiction of what a males role should
be, or what it could be. Children learn by listening and watching examples of
what they should do through the media, and although I knew and saw my father I
had the sneaking suspicion he didn’t quite live up to my impression on the
father figures of the Serengeti. It may seem like a funny situation but many
children’s families aren’t represented in the media, and they may feel left
out, or they may feel as if their families are atypical. This is where the
media can make huge stride by including the male figure in many different roles
including homemaking and single dads.
Compassionate
male figures taking homemaking positions are important for children and
Americans to see. If the media takes the first step to show a wider range of
possibilities for men in the home, and people allow for this to be acceptable
then as a country we will begin to see a bigger shift than we have previously.
Women have forever held the reign’s when it come to keeping a house in the
media, and it’s time to let go and allow the new cowboys of the kitchen to take
hold because when we abolish one stereotype we can abolish them all one step at
a time.
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