Gender Stereotypes In The 21st Century

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Gender stereotypes ingrained
For many decades, humanity worked hard to reduce the percentage of discrimination, inequality, segregation, marginalization and slavery, in order to create a better life for the humanity, and to protect the vulnerable and oppressed ones. Nowadays, in the 21st century, it is the era in which all people from different classes and genders are equal according to rules and laws. Despite the presence of all these rules and laws, some aspects of inequality still exist like gender stereotypes; Muffit (2013) in his article stated that “gender stereotypes are attached to children from a startlingly young age”. Gender stereotypes is defined as an over-generalization about each gender roles and attributes in life and society. …show more content…

Toys and games manufactured for kids affect the fact of learning gender stereotypes. Toys are sold in stores by gender; pink corresponds for girls and blue for boys. Bounding the boys to the “blue” toys prevents him from recognizing the girls’ values and vice versa. Muffitt (2013) indicated that gender stereotypes restrict the child interests because of the toys segregation, he said that “pushing boys away from playing with dolls potentially excludes them from entering caring profession; likewise, stopping girls from building miniature aeroplanes could be the reason for the low amount of women in STEM fields” (para 8). This toy gender classification on one hand teaches the girl that she cannot be a pilot that is a strong and powerful person, and on the other hand shows the boy that he cannot be sensitive and expressive and a care giving person like girls. These toys can also teach the child rules not only in games but also in his social life according to …show more content…

Fairytales and movies give an image on what to be a male and what to be a female. In these fairytales the man is always the strong, the powerful, and the rescuer, while the female is always the weak and the vulnerable. To illustrate, the rescuer prince in the story of Cindrella represents the ideal picture of a male, and Bella in the twilight saga, that always waits for Edward to come and save her, is a perfect representative image of a female. Also, these fairytales lead to make assumptions on what types of jobs are for women and what types are for men (Green 2012). Green also mentioned that “the tendency to ascribe … ” showing that job segregation exists. He revealed a study that shows that housework, secretary work are for women while as ”higher…