Vintage Sexism

This cartoon comes from a book called "Im Glad Im a Boy! Im Glad Im a Girl!" It was published in the 1950's. It was a children's book that many parents bought for their children to model the gender roles that they wanted their kids to follow. This is an example of the obvious stereotypical gender roles of the early 19th century. First of all this cartoon is a good explanation of gender role stereotypes that are still around today. Women still are expected to cook and men still are expected to eat. This is a stereotype that has been around since "the housewife" became a role that many women felt that they had to live up to. The fact that this was shown to kids for kids to model after is ridiculous. I thought that this cartoon was important because it shows an example of what started this kind of thinking in the first place. When they showed this to little kids it became a belief of theirs and then passed this belief onto their children, which created the role of women in society as housewife and unselfish caretaker. This is a key factor to the way that women are portrayed today. The one positive thing that i can say about this cartoon is it does also show how much progress women have made in gaining respect from other people. The part of the cartoon about how boys invent, and girls use is not related to our society today. Many women are now known for inventing and creating many important things that are used in our everyday lives. Altogether I wanted to show people this cartoon to show the origin of where many of these beliefs came from, and how they have changed in a positive way. Also just to share how completely shocked I was by it.

Eminem's Racist Lyrics

These lyrics are pretty self explainatory:


Well foolish pride has alot of things to say
You got foolish pride, you got tooth decay
But tooth decay is another
let's take this old foolish pride and solve it
Now, when I talk about foolish prideI mean blacks & whites taking different sides
When blacks and whites take different sides
Unity never happens, and we will subside
We will subside and hatred will release
And everything will just crush that peace
Well, when we crush that peace, we start hatin' each other
But remember, you are my brother, and you are my sister
Just like I'm a mister
I seen a black girlfriend and I kissed her
I kissed her ; I placed it on her cheek
And she didn't come back til next week


Now it was next week and she was back again
Wanting to kiss a white kid
So she was my girlfriend, we started going out
But that's okay because we were Black and white
Blacks and whites they sometimes mix
But Black girls only want your money cause they're dumb chicks
So I'ma say like this
Don't date a Black girl, take it as a diss
If you want, but if you don't
I'ma tell you like this, I surely won't
Never date a Black girl because Blacks only want your money
And that shit aint funny

So I'ma say look honey
Why do you do this?
You know, you step up to me like you a Brutus
Then you try to grab my spinach
Because its green and that's cash
So get outta here, 'cause I don't need your ass
I said that before, but that's okay because like I said you're a whoreBlack girls and white girls just don't mix
Because Black girls are dumb and white girls are good chicks
White girls are good ;
I like white girlsI like white girls all over the world
White girls are fine and they blow my mind
And that's why I'm here now telling you this rhyme'
Cause Black girls, I really don't like
We don't mix, it's like riding a bike
When you're peddling hard, uphill both ways
You know it's kinda hard and that's why I say to you
I'm giving you a little advice
Don't date a Black girl, if you do it once you won't do it twice
You won't ever do it again because they'll take your money
And that aint funny
So I'ma say look honeyI thought I said that before
But like I said again you're nothing but a big whore
So when mike catch on the bass line
That's okay ‘cause we will not just waste time


I'll get straight to the point
Black girls are bitches, that's why I'ma tell ya you better pull up your britches
‘Cause all that cash is making your ass drag
From the boyfriend ya ganked and that's pretty bad
I mean that's pretty sad when ya dating a Black guy
And then you turn around and fuck another big, Black guy
Now that's pretty wrong, but you're just ganking
But that's okay because you need a goddamn spanking
From me, the funky Eminem
I'm busting rhymes and I'm swallowing phlegm
I'm busting a freestyle just like this
I say swallowing phlegm and Howard gets pissed
But when Howard gets pissed that's okay
Because he leaves and he doesn't show up for two more days
So I'll just worry about that problem when I come to itI cross that bridge when I come to it

Because, I forgot the chorus
But that's okay 'cause y'all saying bust a rhyme for us
So I'ma bust another rhyme about this Black girl
She turned out to be a fuckin' wack girl
A wack girl, because Black girls ain't funny
All they want is your godamn money
They take you for everything you got
And then you stand with a bunch of snot in your hand
So I'ma kick it to you just like this
How does the chorus go, I forgot
But that's okay, 'cause I'ma tell you in stride
I'ma say oh foolish pride.



This is a song that was recorded by Eminem in 1993. This has many obvious examples of racism against black women in it. This really shows how racism in music and media has changed in the past sixteen years. First and foremost this song was just completely inappropriate in the racist comments it had on black women. It was completely offensive and shouldve never been recorded. A song like this unfourtantely may still be recorded these days, but would never be popular and most definitely have a lawsuit against the artist that produced it. There was a lawsuit filed against Eminem for this song but it was eventually dropped. This would not be accepted in 2009, which shows the strides in censoring (which sometimes is positive) against racist music, and ridiculous racist beliefs. It also shows the amount of racist beliefs in media dwindling. I personally believe that these songs should never be created in the first place, but realistically they are so its nice to see where America has improved with it. I think the ultimate question that songs like these bring up is where is the line drawn for censoring? When is it appropriate to tell someone what they can and cannot say in a song? I believe this song was definitely something that needed to be censored, and taken off the air if it ever was there.

Testing American's Tolerance

ABC News tested America's openmindness on the show "What Would You Do?". The concept of this episode was to stage a gay couple in a sports bar and see how others in the bar reacted. They also staged a straight couple that acted the same exact way as the gay couple did at the opposite end of the bar. Finally they added a staged observer who acted as though he was extremely disturbed by the gay couple, to see if others in the bar agreed with him or went against him. In the first experiment the couple is not very affectionate at all, and when the actor stands up and protests against them being there, he literally gets told to leave the bar by others sitting at the bar and no one agrees with the harsh comments hes saying. Next they have the actor use comedy as a way to protest against the gay couple and still, no one agrees with him and pretty much tells him to shut up. They then told the gay couple to be more affectionate and see if that changed people's reaction. They also told the straight couple to act as though they were disturbed by the gay couple to see if people went along with it. When the couple got more affectionate, one man seemed to go along with the straight couple and make comments about how disgusting that was, but when the actor got up and actually said something loudly enough for others to hear about it the man did not speak up with him. Also when the cameras came back and interviewed the man he said that he had no problem with it, completey contradicting the comments that he made previously about how disgusting it was. I think the fact that this aired on ABC is a great step for tolerance of gay and lesbian relationships in society. This show proved a couple different things about the way that society works. First of all it proved that many people voice their homophobic opinons in private, but will not express them to everyone because being seeing as homophobic in America today is a negative characteristic. The one man that voiced his supposed homophobia to the entire bar got told to shut up and leave the bar. The other man who obvioulsy had homophobic beliefs said nothing about them when the cameras were on. This leads to a deeper point that this show proved, which is the shift in how homophobia is viewed. Thirty years ago it was the obvious choice to be homophobic, and these relationships were never accepted. Now its a negative thing to have homophobic beliefs, or at least to offend other people by them. This shows the great improvement in the way that society accepts other people, wether they agree with their ways or not. Those people that sat in the bar and argued with the actor who made harsh comments may not have believed being gay was the right thing to do, but they did believe that they should be able to do what they want as long as they didnt get too affectionate. Thats a fine line that seems to be created for gay and lesbian couples but a line thats dwindling every day. I think this show is also positive because it shows people with homophobic beliefs, that although they may not agree with it they can still let people do what they chose to do as long as their not hurting anyone. Altogether homophobia will always be an issue, mostly because of religion but I think this episode showed much improvement in the acceptance of gay couples in society.

Observe and Report-Offensive Trailer

When I was at the movies a couple weeks ago I saw a trailer for the new movie Observe and Report that actually just came out on Friday. This trailer honestly just pissed me off. I think whoever looks at this trailer and laughs, is not really paying attention to what their watching. The concept is that their was a flasher running around the parking lot of the mall and the "dumb blonde girl" got extremely offended by it and reported it to mall security. Seth Rogen is the head security guard and is supposedly on a mission to find out who was running around flashing people. The first thing I noticed while watching this trailer was the stereotype of the "dumb blonde". The blonde character is over the top ditzy and doesnt seem to be able to complete one single intelligent sentence in the trailer. The idea of the man being the hero and saving the dumb girl, is also the main point of the movie. I understand that the character is supposed to make people laugh and be funny, but at this point it's old and I dont think anyone should be laughing anymore. Movies like this are the reason why the stereotype of a "dumb blonde" came about anyways. Its making women look stupid at the expense of entertainment and making money. Women are not benefiting from this though, besides the woman actor in the movie who is making money off of it. This just puts the idea in people's heads about women being stupid, and needing to be saved by a man, wether its supposed to be a comedy or not. The most offensive part about this trailer was the end scene where the character played by Anna Farris named Brandi was obviously heavily intoxicated and went home with the character played by Seth Rogen named Ronnie. The scene is basically Ronnie having sex with what looks to be an unconcious Brandi. She looks as though she was either sleeping or passed out. Pretty much the scene looked like the scene of a date rape, which is just obvioulsy offensive to anyone who has had an experience with sexual assualt or any woman in general. As though to make the situation seem less offensive, they have Brandi wake up and ask why he stopped. She was grumbling this, obviously not in the mind state to make any responsible decisions about what she was doing. The average statistic is one out of every six women have been a victim of attempted or completed rape in their lifetime, so this commercial would most likely be offensive to at least one out of every six women. The fact that this was not considered when the trailer was made is ridiculous, and shows that media would rather exploit women in order to make money rather than consider the way these women might actually feel about it. I feel like because an incident like this was put into a comedy, people might then think its okay or maybe even funny. I think thats a problem because its not funny, and is a real problem in our society. I could get over the idea of the dumb blonde stereotype being funny, date rape being funny? Not so much.

Baby got back used to advertise kids meals?

The way that the media advertises towards children is bound to be offensive in one way or another these days, but when I saw this commercial I was in shock. The concept of the commercial is based off of the cartoon character spongebob squarepants and the fact that you get a spongebob squarepants toy with your kids meal. This is supposed to attract children's attention. This aspect of the commercial makes sense. Its an obvious choice to use cartoon characters as an advertisement tool towards children. The song choice however was completely wrong. Six year old children do not need to be walking around singing "I like square butts and I cannot lie." That song is completely inappropriate for children to be associating with, or associating their favorite cartoon character with. The major aspect of this commercial that was particularly offensive to me was the fact that the main attraction was women shaking their butts. I understand the concept of the square butts with spongebob squarepants, but why did the commercial have to make this connection using women shaking their butts? First of all women are already degraded enough, and noticed particularly for their bodies and now this is carried over to children's commercials as well. Rather than having the women wear square pants, they have them in booty shorts dancing around. This is bound to create certain unfourtanate ideas about women in children's heads. Women are the one that are being used in this commercial to attract people to this 99 cents kids meal, but they are not the ones that benefit from it. Ultimately the beneficiary of this commercial would be Burger King's business. This commercial will attract children because of the spongebob squarepants concept and adults because of the women dancing. I think its unfourtanate that this concept was even considered let alone used as a children's kids meal commercial.

Racist Cartoon?

I first saw this cartoon on a news report a few weeks ago. I was obviously shocked by what I saw. It was posted in the New York Post newspaper February 18, 2009. The fact that something so obviously racist was posted in an American newspaper is completely rediculous, and unbelievable. Historically, African Americans have been referred to as monkeys as a racial attack or slur. It seems that this cartoon is comparing the newly elected president Barack Obama to a monkey. This is proven by the quote above the cartoon "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bil." This obviously is referring to the president since he would be the person that is writing the new stimulus bill. The cartoon is especially offensive since Barack Obama is of African American ethnicity. The fact that this cartoon was allowed to be published and distributed to the american people shows that racist ideas are not completely banned out of society. Although where we live these ideas seem completely rediculous, there are still some people with those racist ideas out there. The New York Post has defended this cartoon and said that the cartoon was a parody of a current news event, referring to the shooting of a violent chimpanzee in Connecticut. Most people are not buying this explaination though. The New York Post should have known that any cartoon that leaves room for interpretation about violence and race is bound to be critcized. Personally I think this cartoon is insulting, racist and flat out wrong.

Banned New Yorker Commercial

I came across this video on YouTube. It's a commercial for a clothing company called New Yorker that was banned from television, for a good reason. The first thing that I noticed about this commercial was the stereotype that many women get as "gold diggers". It shows the woman in the commercial marrying a man that is obviously much older than her. The end of the commercial also shows that her point of marrying him was for him to die, and then her recieve the benefits. This shows that women are greedy, and use their good looks and bodies to get married for the wrong reasons. Another thing that I noticed about the commercial was the scene where she's in the bathroom and the old man is watching her dance around in a bra and underwear. He stares at her for long enough and gets "knocked out" by the way shes dancing and what shes wearing. This shows the woman using her sexuality to get what she wants, which in this case is for the old man to die and for her to get his assests. This commercial was banned because of these sexist stereotypes.

Role Models or Bad Influences?

I was sitting at work one night having a discussion with my manager who has a 3 or 4 year old daughter. Someone left behind a bratz doll at one of my tables, and the discussion got brought up of how she would never let her daughter play with one of these dolls. At first I didnt understand her point of view but after thinking about it these dolls do seem to be horrible influences on little girls. First of all most of their outfits either include short skirts, tight pants, or high heels. I dont think that this is an appropriate, or realistic role model for the age group that these dolls are marketed towards. The average age group that these dolls are marketed towards is 6 to 10 years old. Giving these ideas to a 6 year old puts immense pressure on her at a young age to look a ceratin way. Also all of these dolls obviously have alot of makeup on, and some of the packages even put fake makeup in with the dolls as their accessories. This is showing girls that whats important is high heels and makeup rather than other positive things that could be given out with the dolls. I'm not saying that every single one of the dolls comes with a negative message, but for the most part the images that these dolls portray is over sexualized for 6 year olds to be looking at as role models. Some people see it as "its just a toy". Well I think that these "toys" have more of an influence on children than most parents think. The Campaign for a Commercail-Free Childhood even launched a campaign against them stating that "The market message to younger girls is that sex is power- a commodity." I definitely think it's something to consider next time parents are out shopping with their young girls.

Eating Disorders in America: Out of Control. Why?

I'm an avid watcher of Dr. Phil and have seen many episodes, but this particular episode as always stuck out in my mind. This clip is of a woman named Amy, who is 28 years old and has been diagnosed with bulimia as well as anorexia. When I first saw this episode I was actually distrubed and could not believe what I was seeing. Out of the many episodes that I've seen on tv that are about eating disorders, this is definitely the most memorable. During this show Amy weighed in at only 60 pounds which seemed impossible to me. This is less than half of what a 20 to 30 year old woman should be weighing, if they were healthy. Anorexia and bulimia have been diagnosed as psychological disorders, but I dont think that is the only factor playing into these woman's unrealistic ideas of how much they should weigh. It's obvious that the media plays a huge role in how a woman feels her body should look, even for those who don't have an eating disorder. I don't think that the people who create these ideas in the media realize the pressure and the outcome of these pressures.Not to say that that the media is the whole cause for this case, but I believe it is a contributor. It seems that one factor in why these woman do what they do is for fear of what other people may think. In the clip you can hear Amy say "I'm scared that Dr. Phil is going to think I'm fat." The fact that a woman that only weighs 60 pounds is worrying about someone thinking that she is fat is crazy to me, but I do realize it is part of the disease. This is definitely an extreme effect of what body issues can do to a person, but it obviously is a real one and although this video may be something that most people don't want to see, I'm glad that Dr. Phil put it out there for people to realize that this is a problem in America. Anyone who watches this video is bound to feel some sympathy and maybe this will make people realize why it does matter what images are put out there for young people to see. Statistics show that an eating disorder starts during the young teenage years, right when most girls are running to get the new "Teen Vogue". Therefore I think being more cautious of the images that we portray as "beautiful" could boost self esteem, and possibly prevent even one person from developing an eating disorder.

Arby's Sports Illustrated Ad

There are many ad's out there that use certain aspects of women to attract people's attention.  I came across this ad and was surprised at the obvious sexism that the ad displayed. Arby's put this ad in a  recent Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue to attract men to read that ad and consider Arby's next time they went out to eat. The first thing that bugged me about this particular ad was that they were comparing woman's breasts to two hamburgers from Arby's. I think thats pretty insulting and most women would like to think that their breasts were better than two hamburgers. The fact that the creator of this ad was comparing a part of a woman's body to food, is obviously sexist and shows a certain view of women as object that you can simply attain. The second thing that was particularly offending about this ad was the quote that was on the bottom of the ad: "Were about to reveal something you'll really drool over". This yet again compares a part of a woman's body to a piece of meat that people drool over. The fact that a woman and a hamburger are being placed in the same category is ridiculous in my opinion. On CNBC, which is where I originally found this ad and is also linked at the beginning of my blog, Darrel Rover gave his reaction to the ad. "Not only did I stop, I read the whole thing". This ad obviously caught his attention and made him want to read the entire ad.  I'm guessing that women might stop and read the ad as well, but wont have a very positive reaction. Altogether this ad is another sexist ad that was used to catch reader's attention, without considering the message that it portrayed. 

 

The Bank of England Dress Code

As I was searching for ideas of what to write about on my first blog I came across an interesting memo that was sent to all women employees working at The Bank of England. This is a portion of the memo:

“Look professional, not fashionable; be careful with perfume; always wear a heel of some sort — maximum 2 inches; always wear some sort of makeup — even if it’s just lipstick.” Shoes and skirt must be the same color. No-no’s include ankle chains—“professional, but not the one you want to be associated with;” white high heels; overstuffed handbags; an overload of rings, and double-pierced ears." http://www.thefword.org.uk/blog/2009/02/the_bank_of_eng

I think that this memo is self explainatory as far as how women are treated in this particular business setting. It is blatently telling women that they have to have a certain appearance in order to succeed at this job. I was shocked that a public institution especially, would willingly put something so sexist out there. This memo seems to state that in this particular business the appearance of a women is valued more than their actual skill. It also made me wonder if they sent a memo like this out to men that work at that bank, but i highly doubt it. This memo is one great example of the pressure that women get to look and dress a certain way.