Alice Valentine

Have you ever been asked to do a house hold chore and wondered if you were asked only because of your gender. Or have you ever arrived home from school and expressed just how hungry you were, yet your mother chose to serve your father or step father’s dinner first whether or not he was actually at home? Gender Roles affects everybody, whether you were born male or female.

Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women. (2012)(Retrieved March 22, 2012 from http://www.who.int/gender/whatisgender/en/) “It is apparent that the Mass Media portrays men and women differently.” (Nicholson, p.19, 1995). A few years ago I would have agreed with this statement. These days the media is possibly the greatest influence in enforcing  equality between males and females. Movies and advertisements these days no longer portray women as the damsel in distress needing a man to come and save her. Women are seen as independent, heads of the household and even bread winners and men are seen helping with house hold chores and doing jobs which were once seen as “girly” or “feminine”. In a popular TV series Desperate Housewives, despite the irony of the title the show is actually one which shows women and men from all different walks of life and backgrounds who are not confined to the gender roles which society wants to prescribe to them.

Society is slowly but surely removing the brands which were ascribed to us simply because of the gender we were born.