women portrayed in the media

And so my gender discussion continues...

We are gender conditioned. We are raised to be women, or raised to be men which means we are raised to think and act differently.

Not only this but we learn how to act by imitating, mimicry. I just read a crazy statistic that showed the vast majority of people in creative positions, whether in the news, TV, films, literature and so on, are men. Which means we are watching a man's depiction of women, which means we are watching women characters act in ways a man wants them to act. They are shown to be likable and attractive if they have these qualities and unattractive and unlikable if they do not. And so we are conditioned to act and mimic the man's woman.

Unless a woman starts thinking of her life as separable from a man's she will unconsciously be striving for these attributes that are supposably attractive to men, and serving to man's need. But is it reversible? Not really. Man depicts himself as the man he strives to be, not the man a woman would want him to be. These masculine traits, are often not what seems logical for a woman to naturally find attractive; not representative of good "husband material", a good father, or sometimes even a decent person, men who take advantage of women, and expect the women to be at their beck and call.... And so women find themselves attracted to the assholes, the jerks, the bad boys. Is it no wonder when that is what is displayed on the media as masculine, strong, attractive, the guys all the attractive young women are chasing after?

Men should not be put on a pedestal, and women should not put a man's needs before her own. That's absurd.

And even knowing this, I fall victim to it. I say I am a strong independent women, but secretly I just want a stable relationship with a man- and then I fall for the irresponsible bad boy. I say I liberal and outgoing and yet I sometimes secretly wish I was still spoken to as a lady (what am i caught in the 1940s?)

I contradict myself constantly because I am confused. These social norms are ever evolving and maybe we are all trying to just keep up, and try to mold them in a direction that has a bit of a broader view on who we are and how we're different and what that really means. I'm tired of trying to deceive myself in order to come to terms with what I can respect and what respect I am getting in return.

Does that even make sense?

The thing is that these statements make it seem like I've been repressed or discouraged because I'm a woman and that really hasn't been the case at all. It all very deceiving because like most people most of these injustices are under the radar, they are the norm, they are what we expect. So it's not until further examination that one realizes something's a little off balance. And I don't expect that these little observations will make any change, its just that, an observation. That doesn't mean I wouldn't mind seeing some change around here though.