I had a similar experience to the "man sandwich" situation. While out to breakfast with some of my friends, there were six of us: three women and three men. At some point, not quite sure how it got brought up but they started talk about how flowers are "girlie" and one of the men asked himself aloud "what kind of flowers are manly?" They decided on a tree being manly. I asked them why they felt that tree's are considered manly, yet flowers considered feminine, or girlie. They explained that flowers are bright and colorful, and dainty, yet tree's are tall, thick strong and last through seasons and produce the most oxygen and a whole bunch of nonsense. They didn't intentionally mean any harm, and since we were all good friends I didn't take it to heart, but i felt it was good conversation for this.
Its interesting how bright colorful decorative or dainty things are considered for women and feminine. Peacocks for instance, the females are the brown boring looking birds, and the male peacocks are the birds with the bright colorful feathers, what many may presume are the females. The purpose is that the male species is who initiates the mating and must attract the females. Why is this acceptable but a bright colorful sweater is feminine or "gay" or why is the color pink considered a girl color, or flowers considered girly.
I think this is all very interesting, Just goes to show how much traditional thinking really shapes peoples opinions and actions.
Week 6 Eureka Moment
15 years ago
I like your blog, I do believe that many people think that everything has bright colors it belongs to girls, and the dark colors are for boys.
ReplyDeleteOne time I went with my brother shopping, he wanted to buy a phone case for his Itouch, there were so many different designs and colors, and he only liked one design. That design was on bright color cases only. He refused to buy any of them, and he asked them to special order one for him that it is either a white or black color.
When I asked him why he didn't buy any of them when they are cute colors, he said all of them have bright colors and they are for girls only.
I could see how these people decided trees were manly and flowers girly but I've sent my boyfriend flowers before and he loved it. I sent them to his work when they opened a new hotel, and his boss was blown away. His boss said he wished his wife would have send him flowers. I was a little worried about doing it, because I wasn't sure how his colleagues would have taken it but everyone loved the fact that I did it. Why shouldn't a man have something beautiful to look at on his desk? This makes me think of all the commercials we are seeing for fathers day now. For mother's day it's all flowers but for father's day it's send a fruit bouquet or a coffee assortment.
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