Sunday, September 18, 2011

Cayla Lepior Blog #4

For me, Eugene R. August’s essay, “Real Men Don’t” was about males being excluded in many parts of our society. As I agree with some parts of this essay, I also am doubtful of many as well. A part in this reading that struck me as interesting was when August says “American males are almost twice as likely as females to be victims of violent crimes (even when rape is included in the tally) and three times more likely to be victims of murder (August 130). I find this to be a point of conflict among our society as most people automatically imagine a woman to be the victim of a rape or physical crime when even more it is a male victim it just goes unheard of. I agree that people assume this because of society’s belief that women are inferior and maybe even weaker in a sense that they are more of a victim than any men. A part of this reading that I disagree with is when August is talking about the U.S. media, which he claims is “heavily influenced by gender feminism” (August 131) and when he says “Male victims are simply not news; women (and children) victims are (August 131). I disagree with this statement as I have watched the news many times and have seen a large amount of males as victims in crimes such as news reports on wars; they always talk about which men were killed in their line of duty, as heroes of our country. This is a bad example of excluding males because it simply is not true. In my opinion this is not a part of society that is un-favoring of the male gender.          
While reading Deborah Tannen’s essay “There Is No Unmarked Women”, several parts really stuck out to me. When Tannen is discussing unmarked and marked forms of English words, she says “Endings like ess and ette mark words as “female”. Unfortunately, they also tend to mark them for frivolousness (Tannen 142). She goes on to say, “Would you feel safe entrusting your life to a doctorette?” (Tannen 142). I found this part really thought provoking. I agree that most people would not trust a “doctorette” as much as a male doctor. Doctors have a stereotypical thought by people to be men, as that is how it used to be earlier in our society. While it was difficult to find a particular part that contradicted my beliefs in Tannen’s essay, I disagree with the part where she says, “Each of the women at the conference had to make decisions about hair, clothing, makeup, and accessories, and each decision carried meaning” (Tannen 142). This partially contradicts my beliefs because I have had friends who are male that also have to make decisions about what they wear or what they look like, which also carry meaning. It isn’t necessarily fair to imply that men’s decisions on their appearance carry no meaning at all, because in some cases they do.

2 comments:

  1. I agree that the Real Men Don't essay failed in trying to support its claim with the example of men not being portrayed as victims. Men are victims just as often as women and are featured on the news no less.

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  2. The statistic of men being twice as likely to be victims of violence also stood out to me because men are often viewed as superior so they should be able to defend themselves but often times they can't

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