A post for Love Your Body Day.
Krista, Debbie, and Diego sent in the following commercial for FreeScore. It nicely illustrates our bias against men who don’t live up to idealized standards of masculinity. That is, men who are short, bald, and soft.
Like a bad credit score, men who aren’t young and handsome are a total drag. Klutzy, a potential serial killer, afraid to stand up for himself… his pain is our last laugh. Disgusting.
Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
Comments 8
Guest — October 19, 2011
Total drag?
Question for heterosexual women and homosexual men. All things being equal—save for their physical appearances—which of these three men would you consider yourself most (and least) likely to pursue romantically?
Oliver Crosby — October 19, 2011
This is why sociology is more then just feminist study. This video goes beyond just gender altogether. We're looking at the social struggles between short vs tall, bald vs haired, and muscular vs chubby. We're also indirectly looking at class conflicts, seeing as how all of those above struggles are a metaphor for a bad credit rating.
Interestingly the solution to all our problems is apparently a new TV. Probably one of the most powerful tools for reinforcing the body images that are the cause of our trouble to begin with.
Anonymous — October 19, 2011
I'm glad you wrote about this. I despise this commercial. The smartest man I know - my dad - was a small man, I married a small man, and my son, as you might expect, is small. They get so much crap for it. I think it's getting better, as my dad seemed to care the most, while my son cares the least. Commercials like this don't help at all, though.