Turn up the Stereo (type)!

(not that type of stereo folks, jeez)

There was a recent ad by Pantene Shampoo (it ran mainly in the Philippines) that attempted to show how women can be stereotyped differently than men—even when doing/acting the same as men.

I think it’s a clever ad, and do have to agree that people stereotype other people all the time. It’s probably human nature.  The thing is, it’s not just women. Men are stereotyped for their actions just as much, if not more than women (yes, you may remember another blog about stereotypes, it dealt more with looks).

For example.

A man who cries is a wimp; a woman who cries is sensitive. 

 

A man who is single after 30 is gay; a woman is carefully examining her options.

A man who keeps a clean house is gay (oops, a repeat stereotype word; popular to use to disparage men); a woman who keeps a clean house is normal/orderly.

A man who wears a suit and tie every day is a cog-in-the wheel/suit/robot; a female who does this is trying to break the glass ceiling.

A man who drives an expensive car is flaunting his wealth; a woman who drives an expensive car has broken the barrier and moved up in the world.

A man who complains about an ailment should “suck it up;” a woman who complains about an ailment shows more concern about her health.

So there is no doubt that both men and women stereotype. Whether it is bad or good probably depends on the situation. And who does it more often is debatable, but unprovable. So we'll probably keep on stereotyping and making guesses about people without much knowledge of the facts. At least it gives us bloggers something to write about and is good for conversations at bars.

(Okay, this picture really has nothing to do with this blog. It's just that I'm stereotyped as the type of guy who likes to post sexual pictures to his blog, and well, I didn't want to disappoint—plus I like this picture).

(images courtesy of http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/)