Through
the fascinating, and often disheartening, case studies discussed in John
Sloop’s book, Disciplining Gender, we
critics were given insight into how society has a tendency to try and dictate
for us the gendered meanings of our innate behaviors, our actions and our
choices. For example, in the “John/Joan” case considered in the book’s first
chapter, a young male baby was born, had his genitals accidentally mangled by
the physician, was surgically reassigned as a female, and raised in a way that
forced him to perform what society recognizes as the female sex. Despite the
doctor’s and his mother’s seemingly positive reports of the child’s
reassignment, it would later be revealed that the child railed against his
manufactured femininity, and ultimately decided to be re-reassigned as a male.
David, as he was later called, reflected on how it never seemed right for him
to be a woman, notwithstanding every pigeon-hole in which his mother, doctor,
and society attempted to place him.
In
both Sloop’s book, and the Brenda Cooper’s article from this week’s reading, we
saw an idea similar to this in the case of Brandon Teena. Teena, who was
physically defined by his female genitalia, was ultimately killed because of
the discrepancy between what he portrayed himself as, and what society thought
he should be. Brandon, who was quite the ladies’ man, caused confusion amongst
those he knew when it was revealed that he was supposedly a woman acting like a
man. The outrage over Brandon’s enactment of his own identity was so shocking
to the public that it cost him his life and—according to the national media—his
reputation. Framed as a “deceiver,” the memory of Brandon’s life is muddled by
society’s seemingly unshakable heteronormativity. Apparently, no one can rest
easy until everyone is categorized into one of two types: heterosexual male or
heterosexual female.
In
this week’s reading of Mary Douglas Vavrus’ article, “Domesticating Patriarchy:
Hegemonic Masculinity and Television’s ‘Mr. Mom,’” we encounter this same idea
of society’s insistence to define specific gender roles. Vavrus discusses the
“Mr. Mom” phenomenon—so named because of the successful Michael Keaton movie—in
which stay-at-home fathers are put in the spotlight. Vavrus’ claim is that the
idea of a Mr. Mom does less to expand dominant, narrow gender ideologies, and
more to naturalize existing stereotypes of gender roles in the household.
In
the movie “Mr. Mom,” the main character, played by Keaton, gets fired from his
manly occupation (being Batman… or was it an autoworker?) and is forced to stay
home with his kids while his successful wife maintains her job and supports
them all monetarily. This movie marked one of the first pieces of pop culture
to deviate from the engrained gender roles of male bread-winners and women
child-raisers. And at first glance (as was the case when I first saw this movie
as a boy) this seemed like a great tool for showing equality among men and
women: it was okay for men to do
housework and child-rearing. However, as the Mr. Mom phenomenon started to
spread to real people, and at-home dads became more common, the light in which
these stories are cast is bleak, in that it does the opposite of what made Mr.
Mom seem so ecumenical. Vavrus argues that in published news stories about the
Mr. Moms of the world, the rhetoric used leads to three harms:
“they
privilege a narrow definition of family by only featuring heterosexual, married
parents; they valorize men for learning parenting skills and adapting to
stay-at-home paternity; and they repeatedly reinforce the message that the
duties of a stay-at-home father are properly masculine activities.”
By conforming to
these frames of reference for how we should view these fathers only reinforces
a divide between the two dominant genders in our culture, possibly creating
backwards momentum in the push for total equality.
First, Vavrus asserts that the
narrow point of view from which these stories are disseminated to multiple news
outlets provides a skewed vision of the realistic situations. Because only
married, middle-class-or-above couples were featured prominently in these news
stories, it casts all at-home dads as
able to do the housework and child-rearing without concern for where the next
paycheck is coming from. Essentially this “normalizes the very narrow field of
these dads’ attributes,” providing unrealistic attention to particular cases.
Second, these stories valorize men
for learning to do household tasks. In this way, Vavrus argues, a new cultural
understanding of the masculine identity is formed—one in which “what it means
to be a real man” is framed as someone well-rounded and capable of housekeeping
and raising children. With this newly forged identity of masculinity, society
can view an at-home dad as some mythical, ecumenical savior; not only is he
manly, but he’s so manly he can sweep the floor, too!
Third,
while this view of a stay-at-home dad’s duties as acceptable male behavior does
work with the feminist critique of “traditional household divisions of labor,”
it simultaneously undercuts this notion. By affirming the dads’ abilities and
manliness, these news stories highlight a male who is perfectly capable of both
male and female responsibilities—making females, again, seem lesser by
comparison. An example of this point can be found in the Tide detergent "Dad Mom" commercials, and hopefully these will stimulate thoughtful discussion in class:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M28l-6LUp3w
At
this point in the article, Vavrus finally gets rolling with her analysis and
critique, as she points to more flaws with the Mr. Mom phenomenon. The majority
of news stories Vavrus researched portrayed the at-home dad’s counterpart as
the successful, job-wielding woman. Because she makes more money than her
husband, she gets the right to not
have to do the housework, and not
have to deal with the kids. Simply, this is a straight-up reversal of the
gendered roles we are used to. While it seems positive that the males can pitch
in by being “Mr. Moms,” it only allows for the wife, the bread-winner, to don
the dominant patriarchal role of the household.
Continuing
the critique, Vavrus deftly points to how the media frames these relationships
to illustrate her point. Instead of explaining the father’s new at-home
situation as one of circumstance, it was majorly framed as a choice by the dad
to do so—“even when the reason for the ‘Mr. Mom’ arrangement is a layoff.” This
was a really interesting twist on the media’s part, and Vavrus used it to bolster
he argument that “media representation is constitutive.”
The
strengths of Vavrus’ article lie in her research. By utilizing a wide selection
of these heteronormative news stories, she was able to peel back the veil on
the Mr. Mom phenomenon. A strongly-written piece critiquing the fallacies
behind the Mr. Mom fad culminated with the author’s conclusion. Because these
news stories relied heavily upon the trope of a heteronormative nuclear family
for the basis of its claims about stay-at-home dads, it cannot break away from
“disciplining” these gender roles onto the public. As a result, men only see
their problems with being at-home dads in the context of their sex, and not
because of their innate abilities. Personally, as someone whose father was an at-home
dad for a while, my only critique of Vavrus’ article is that it does not weigh
more heavily on the actual testimonies of real at-home dads. However, because
this is a class on media and gender,
my desire to stick up for these fathers may not need to be explored.
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