Female stereotyping
4 Feb
I was talking with a female Comcast staff today to try to get cable internet at my new temporary apartment. She kept referring to the technician who would come for the setup as the “cable guy“, and so did I. After the phone call ended, I realized how both of us had stereotyped the cable installation profession as being something that involved only men. While many people have started saying things like “postal worker” due to the increasing awareness in different fields, I wonder why so many professions and ideas are still only associated with guys. May be it is because this world still favors men on many levels.
Female stereotypes in different professions
Stereotypes are simply traits observed in a few people and then assumed to be associated with a larger population. Thus, stereotypical traits do exist but only in the people who were observed with such traits. Consider this as an example: stereotypes take the fact that a certain woman might love taking care of babies at nurseries to say that all females are better suited for nursery jobs. There are so many things that people stereotype with women, it makes me wonder if we are simply riding the bandwagon of saying we believe both genders to be equal, as saying otherwise would cast us as gender discriminators. If I remember correctly, in my stay of almost a whole decade in Southern California, I did not see any female carpenter, painter, mechanic, plumber, technician or a truck driver. What is the reason for this? I do not know.
We usually stereotype certain professions with females. Secretaries and receptionists are expected to be beautiful women, and so are dental assistants. People working in clothing and shoe departments in retail stores like Macy’s and Nordstrom are usually thought to be females. Jewelry stores are assumed to have female workers, and so are Hallmark stores. It is funny how all fields selling more products to women than men are stereotyped as having female workers, while stores catering to both men and women and stores catering only to men are thought of being run by males, like electronic stores such as Best Buy and Circuit City. Cooking is an interesting activity that plays with stereotypes. Most people assume that all major restaurants have male cooks. Why is that?
Indirect female stereotyping
When you go to an electronic store or a car dealership, most store employees use gender stereotyping when trying to make a sale. The field of politics is no different. We cannot even stop gossiping and getting over-excited negatively over the possibility of someone who can give birth running the country, yet we talk about how we all treat women equally. Similarly, Superman is a hero, but Lois Lane is not. Did either of them do anything to deserve this? As far as I know, no. We are the ones who hailed the male as the hero while forgetting about the female. We get 500 male heroes before we get 1 female heroin who portrays intelligence rather than her body.
Female stereotyping is here to stay?
Women are also treated better in some situations which increases the validity of stereotypes in some cases. Many people immediately assume that the male will take care of the income after child birth, but very few assume that a female will take over the income situation after males go through major surgeries. How many marriages do you know where the husband has no job while the wife works full time? Compare that number to the number of marriages you know where the husband works full time while the wife has no job. Is it not amazing how we preach about treating genders equally while our focus so far has only been on giving both gender equal rights?
All living things in this world can co-exist, though many of us have used the art of stereotyping to feel superior to others. Yes, many people say they “think” females should be treated equally, but do you think all those people actually treat women equally? Who is to blame for female stereotyping? Is it the many men, who love the idea of being in control and love looking at women as being less powerful and only seductive? Or is it the many women who play into the stereotypes and in turn enforce the archaic stereotypical ideas that many men cherish? Are we all to blame, or can anyone be blamed at all?
Solution for female stereotypes : change the actual mentality
It is easier to say and agree to an idea than to actually change our actual viewpoint. We need to change our whole mentality about females and stereotypes, instead of treating the subject as a taboo topic and bragging to everyone how we treat the opposite gender equally.
Please let me know what you think about this. Thank you for reading.
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Keep it up, great job!
Wow, I think you are guilty of stereotyping yourself. “stores catering only to men are thought of being run by males, like electronic stores such as Best Buy and Circuit City.” I had never thought of electronics stores as catering only to men. How bizarre.
Hi Michael, thank you! :)
Hi Courtney, thanks for the comment. :) Awesome point, however, my point was about the mainstream population and mentality that is encountered, and not everyone. You don’t believe in that [yes?], which is awesome! I don’t think that either, which is why I wrote the post.
Also, majority of the gamer ads these days still point and focus on the male. The movement towards female targeting is slow and gradual, since more and more people are starting to accept the mentality that females have purchasing power too, including in married households, against the common stereotypes.
I hope that explains things? Thanks again! Excellent point!
Interesting article on female stereotyping. In my opinion, the reason that we dont’ see more women doing traditionally male pursuits is that our society — whether subtly or overtly — pressures women to not do those things, or lets women follow so-called natural instincts to go toward activities and jobs that interest them. Most women I know are not interested in auto mechanics, so they don’t become auto mechanics; furthermore, those women who ARE interested in auto mechanics are often dissuaded from engaging in that sort of job by the people around them and social messages that tell these women that auto repair is a guys hobby or job. And the same sort of thing occurs to men as well. Why don’t we see more male nurses, nannies, secretaries, midwives, retail sales clerks in female-oriented product areas — it is because men are constantly being told by other men AND by women that men aren’t supposed to do those things. Fortunately for women, some things are changing: feminism has increased the awareness of female stereotyping and along with it a undermovement to encourage women and girls to pursue non-traditional jobs and hobbies. Now I wish there were some movement similar for men; unfortunately there probably won’t be for some time because men who aren’t in non-traditionally-male fields often female threatened by men who are or want to be, and many women who are in those female-dominated fields or pursuits feel put off or threatened by men. Thus we have an entire industry of female-only clubs, stores, fitness centers, insurance agencies, etc. that cater to women who DON’T want men around. Sounds hypocritical to me: women want to do what men do but don’t want men to do what women do. Talk about double standards.
Thanks for the post. I guess this is just life… I am guilty of sterotyping women, but I think women sterotype themselves. Even men get sterotyped for cetain things and this is never going to change so we just have to get used to it.
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