Seeing Gender

Even though gender stereotypes in media today are different from those infamously presented in the past, they still send messages about how a “true” man or woman should behave. We often look, shocked, at media images of the 1950s and older thinking of how sexist they are. In the pre-modern era, advertisements targeted towards women reinforced how they should aspire to be housewives and mothers, taking up duties such as caring for the home and children instead of pursuing “men’s ambitions” of a career. Other forms of entertainment media like movies and TV also showed set gender roles. Men were the breadwinners, women were subservient.
We have come very far from these ideals, and some of the boxes certain media like to put gender roles in have shifted. A factor that plays into gender portrayals is a recent obsession with delaying aging for both sexes, clinging to youth as long as possible as people today are marrying and having children at much later ages than ever before. Young adults also seem to stay in college well into their 20s and are in no hurry to get a serious job. In a youth-obsessed culture, there isn’t much room left to enforce gender stereotypes based on “home”, “head of the family”, and “raising the children.” Now the gender ideals focus amply on the differences in coveted lifestyles between men and women of generations X and Y.
I do believe that gender roles are not as set as they once were, simply because both sexes are part of the workforce. What it means to be “masculine” has therefore not changed quite as much as what it means to be “feminine” over the years. However, women are still used based on sex appeal to promote in advertising, for men’s and women’s products. Today’s stereotype for the male is that he should be suave, intellectual, envied by other men for a great job and the chic, sophisticated women he gets. The female gender stereotype is to be those women- ones that can do it all by juggling career ambitions, very lively social lives and sex. Because women today seek power like men do, some media suggest that it is feminine to dress and act in ways that draw attention to a woman’s strong sensuality as well as show her career power. By showing women in collared shirts, pencil skirts and heels in the office, looking beautiful yet commanding attention professionally, media today is forming a brand new ideal for what it means to be feminine.