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All around you there is the public and media that tell what a woman is supposesed to look like and describes their behavior. In the late 1800's a man actually came up with the general idea of what women should wear and be like. He created the Gibson girl, an athletic women with a simple fashion of a skirt and blouse. Today our society has created a general belief a women in nearly all aspects (occupation, conscience, physical abilities, mental capacities,etc).

What do you think are the female stereotpes (such as all women want to be teachers)? How much do you think this is a problem to the femisnist movement and how may it be overcome?

Exactly. We have tons of stereotypes about men but is that ever addressed?

Everybody everywhere has some type of stereotype associated with them, be it white people, black people, gay people, males, females... I don't think that the human race will ever get past that. The thing to remember is that you don't have to go along with those stereotypes. Just because they're out there doesn't mean that you have to believe or follow them. I'll be the first to put down any kind of stereotype, and it actually annoys people sometimes. sweatdrop Nevertheless, I stand my ground. You should too.

stereotypes can come in handy sometimes. for example, not every suspicious-looking person walking down the street in the bad part of the city with a gun-shaped lump in his pocket and his hand eerily close to it is planning on shooting you. he could just be an undercover cop. but i would stereotype him and get the hell away instead of waiting around to find out.

that's my definition of a stereotype; other people will say this is simply judgement.

Even though streotypes are widly used & can upset people I think in the day & age that people that use stereotypes know that that's all they are: A made up/ traditional belief of certain expectations from certain groups in society!

i believe that almost all stereotypes are based on fact, although the fact might not be true anymore. they had to come from somewhere. for example, the stereotype that all germans hate jews. obviously this is not true anymore, but during world war two, many germans did hate jews. that's where the stereotype came from.

i think the blonde's are dumb stereotype comes from all the famous celebrities and models out there who are blonde. people assume that if you're career is based on your beauty, you must have no other intellectual skills. plus there are a lot of tv shows which feature the dumb blone as a character (clueless, sabrina, buffy the vampire slayer movie, etc.. )

as for the irish, i've never heard of irish people being dumb, but i always hear about irish alcoholics. i'm not sure why it's a stereotype that all irish people drink a lot. who knows.

(sorry don't know how to quote, but don't really need to...

in regards to the Buffy comment...its actually a little bit of a feminist film if you think about it. Its about female impowerment and breaking the steriotype of damsel in distress...(sorry, nerd with a degree in buffyology)

anyways...I think there are still what I'd call "gender roles" the things women are supposed to do and what men are supposed to do. Which is pretty much what this thread is about. I don't relate with the gender role of womyn, but since I was raised as a female, and my parents did all the steriotypical things you do when raising a female child. I was forced into female gender roles by chores...washing dishes, doing laundry, not playing video games. I mean as a female you learn things like that earlier than the males of the family (I started doing my own laundry when I was maybe 12? And doing it independently...no parents doing it ever at 13ish) I have a younger brother...he is 16, doesn't know how to do laundry fold clothes, anything like that.

Today the average womyn is taking on more and more work than before. Expected to work, raise kids, cook dinner, go to soccer practice, and look good doing it.

I think that the expectations for a woman as being weak, and having to do so much while the men are not as responsible for much...

okay, just realized how long that was....I think I'm going to take a nap from all that brain power.