*Note: While I don't quite agree with everything the video says, a lot of what it's points are valid. Some of it seemed a little silly and biased, but I don't think that's outweighed by its good points.
Why in our society that supposedly advocates gender and racial equality is considered acceptable to mock males (men and boys)? Why is abuse against men discredited and even encouraged when any abuse against a woman is considered horrible and chauvinistic, worthy of punishment? Why, when so much effort is put towards ending sexism and misogyny, is misandry allowed to run rampant in all forms of media for both adults and children? It is in our schools, our work-places, our politics, our home-lives, our courts, our military, on the playground... It is everywhere, this hatred of men. And we do nothing to stop it.
I am not ignoring the injustices against women in the media. I do care about that issue as well, I really do. That just aren't what this essay is about. I understand fully that women tend to be objectified as sex objects; either being attractive or unattractive (or less attractive) based on the role they're portraying. The same can be said for men. Ads that call for male attractiveness will include attractive men. Ads that downplay this choose unattractive (or less attractive) men. On the other hand, women in media are almost always portrayed as being more intelligent, more empathetic, more rational, and being better care-givers than men. Sure, there are exceptions to this - as in anything - but I'm talking majority.
How many times have you seen a commercial where the lazy/stupid/fat/etc husband has been asked to something simple - change a diaper/clean the house/pick up the kids/etc - but is, for some reason, much much too lazy/stupid/fat/etc to complete said task, leaving the wife to either clean up his mess/shake her head in disbelief/question his intelligence/solve the problem for him/show him that it all could have been done with the touch of a button/etc?
How many where a man gets hurt and you are expected to laugh? How many where a woman is hurt for comedic relief? How many times can a man be hit/blugeoned/beaten up/kicked/slapped/etc before it loses its humour? How many times for a woman?
Not Funny: Woman Hurt - Serious
Funny?: Man Hurt - Haha?
How many times have you seen an ad where a husband solved the problem for his wife? How many times have you seen an ad where the woman is lazy/stupid/fat etc and the man needs to come to her rescue? Not often, I'll bet.
Let me make something perfectly clear: I am not against women, nor am I against the rights of women. I believe in gender and racial equity as well as sexual equity (note that I separate gender and sex, I will get to that). It is because of this belief that I have come to realize just how much hypocrisy there is in our society. There are massive feminist movements, many of which are legitimately seeking common-ground with men. Many feminists are women who want for themselves only what their male counterparts can have. This is commendable.Quote from Jetrall
I don't think the videos are lop-sided at all. They prove a point. Violence towards men in advertising is almost always taken lightly - almost all the ads you can find of a man being hurt are along these lines. They're silly. They make you want to laugh. Almost all ads with violence done towards women are very very negative. Most are related to domestic abuse. No commercials about men being abused at home. That happens all the time, but nobody talks about it.
Those commercials are fairly accurate representations of violence towards men & women in the media.
What is not commendable are those people - men and women both - who seek to sow a feeling of female superiority and male subservience, painting a picture of men as incompetent brutes that would be lost without women to guide and educate them. We are sex-crazed, dim-witted, violent scourges. This idea of men and boys as incapable lowlifes has so proliferated itself in our culture that most men don't even recognize it. Our own developed apathy to this phenomenon - a result of a culture that devalues male emotion as 'weakness' - makes us shrug off what should be a cause for international outrage.
We need to start realizing that sexism in any form - against anyone - is a serious issue. Gender roles exist, it's true, and humanity will likely never be rid of stereotyping. But let's at least try to get away from where we are right now where women are the eternal victim of men and man's nature. Not all men are bad, not all women are good.
We're all just human.
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