stereotyping gender roles

Generally, men are portrayed in media as the bread-winner of the family, strong, smart and skillful in technical and practical stuff. On the other hand women are supposed to stay at home, take care of the family, cook, do the house chores. The truth is this hierarchy of the sexes has been this way in the past, but now in the 21st century, things couldn't be more different. Still, the portrayal of the gender roles by media remains the same. Again, this stereotyping has great impact on children and their perception of what is typical of men and women to do. For example, if a man would cry he would be called as soft and girly, consequently, if a girl was playing tough and not dressed in skirts and dresses she would be called a tomboy. These stereotypes are rooted in the past perceptions, but as the world modernizes, so do the gender roles and the boundaries between what a boy is supposed to be like and how a girl should act are less visible. In today's society women had become more emancipated, independent, self-reliable, active and tough. They occupy many positions that only men did in the past. Men, on the hand, had started to acquire some of the female roles, such as stay-at-home dads, who take care of the children and house chores while the woman is making money. Women nowadays are part of the political elite or successful entrepreneurs, because simply just the assigned caretaker role was not enough. Also, when a men is sensitive, not afraid to show his emotions or cry, it is not taken as a negative thing, but rather a positive one. Another thing that contradicts the gender role stereotype is that men nowadays cook more often, or take care of some chore that has to be done, for example cleaning. Another big misconception there is among gender roles, is that the more sexual partners a man has, the more masculine and popular he is, due to the stereotyped macho image,associated with men.On the other hand, the more promiscious the woman is the more she is viewed as a prostitute and slut. The truth is, however, that men and women have the same needs, and there should not be an unspoken rule about how many sexual partners each of them should or should not have. This again creates negative feelings and problems among teenagers when a boy could feel insecure if he had not slept with x number of girls, or a girl will feel ashamed and called a slut if she slept with x number of boys.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWc1e3Nbc2g - this is a very nice video with little kids asked about gender roles, about their ideas of what men and women do and what they do not, it is prove that their perception is from the stereotyped images given by the media - otherwise it is really cute :))