Essay Comparing Batting Clean-Up And Striking Out

Introduction: Are all neat people lazy, wasteful, insensitive, and less moral than sloppy people? Are all men more interested in sports than women, while all women focus their time on housework and cleaning? The answer to both of these questions is no. These questions bring up generalizations that are dealt with in both of the short essays which are as follows: “Neat People vs. Sloppy People” by Suzanne Britt and “Batting Clean-up and Striking Out” by Dave Barry. Suzanne Britt describes the generalized behavior and mindset of neat and sloppy people, which is not a popular stereotype heard in everyday life. On the contrary, Dave Barry describes a stereotype that is absolutely heard in everyday life, the stereotype involving women and sports, men and cleaning, and how they apparently can not be the

Barry makes this argument by describing how women and sports do not mix well and cleaning and men do not mix well. First, he begins by saying, “The primary difference between men and women is that women can see extremely small quantities of dirt” ( ). He then continues by saying, “The opposite side of the dirt coin, of course, is sports. This is an area where men tend to feel very sensitive and women tend to be extremely callous” ( ). In his argument, he is using humor, exaggeration, and a rather defensive tone. However, like most writers including Suzanne Britt, his writing should not be taken literally as it is. Exaggeration and humor play the biggest role in bringing out his purpose, which is to call out stereotypes of men and women. Barry understands that these stereotypes are completely incorrect, especially in this century, so he took an opportunity to bring them to the attention of everyone reading to make his purpose clear and