This boy, Alex, has recently become Twitter famous after a girl snapped a picture of him at work at Target. The tag #alexfromtarget quickly blew up all over social media. This boy has become famous enough to attract the attention of TV star Ellen.
Here is just one example I found:
The patriarchal society we live in today usually favors men over women. So there are more men in high power positions, men earn more money than women do in the same position, and things like that. But sometimes the roles are flip flopped and women have the advantage. Times when the role is switched is usually seen in divorce cases when women are almost always awarded custody of the child or children, and in this case where both parties were subjected to harassment but only the harassment of the woman was seen as problematic. There has not been a resounding outcry of protest in taking the creep shot of the boy that works at target, where there have been hundreds of thousands of reactions saying that women should not be subjected to harassment like that.
It just shows that our culture is rooted in the idea that men are strong and therefor are not affected by things like harassment, when they face it just like women do.
This is a great post! I never even though about comparing these two. I recently just watched the Ellen clip interviewing this kid and the thought of him being "harassed" didn't even cross my mind, but you made a very interesting point. I feel like #alexfromtarget can't personally be responsible for all this outrage since he had no control over the picture being posted, whereas the whole point of the Hollaback video was to go viral. However, I think it is a very good way to emphasize how patriarchal our society really is, and how young it can start. This kid is just a teenager, and yet people can/are considering him sexist. This post is really nice, and really makes you think and criticize our societies priorities, and as you point out, how they change in different ciscumstances.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't familiar with the alex from Target media attention but I think you make a really good point that this can be considered harassment by taking a picture of a complete stranger but we look past it because he is a male. It is interesting to see what the reactions would be if Alex was instead a girl and see if people would treat it the same way. Interesting way that you connected these two viral media content and how they are viewed differently based on patriarchal society.
ReplyDeleteThis is awesome! I hadn't even thought twice about Alex from Target as being comparable to the street harrasment, but it totally is. I like that you address the patriarchy here also. A big problem with that video to me was that it didn't point out the source of the problems it was displaying. I think cat calling is a symptom of the disease that is patriarchal rape culture, and it's not enough to just show people that it happens for 10 hours without answering WHY it happens. and its cool you found a way to show how it can happen to both genders, and the double standard that exists there. Good post!
ReplyDeleteI thing addressing harrassment of both men and women is incredibly important with this topic. I also think an important thing to remember is the sexualization of younger boys and girls. This boy is still just a teenager and people are talking about his appearance all over the internet. This kind of hyper sexualization happens all the time in the media to both young boys and young girls, a prime example being Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez.
ReplyDeleteThis is a really good point! Why is it considered harassment when it is targeted towards a woman but yet when teenage girls do the same thing, it is just treated as a joke. I think that the general public needs to keep this in mind when examining the media in an attempt to include both sides of the issue.
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