Sociological Images

This four-minute video reports research showing that, even if we’re not aware of it, most of us have unconscious biases against short men.  (It’s also a great description of Implicit Association Tests.)

You, too, can take any multitude of implicit association tests.  Simply go to Harvard’s Project Implicit.

Borrowed from The Social Complex, a heightism blog. See also guest posts from The Social Complex introducing the concept of heightism as a gendered prejudice and discussing heightism (and other icky stuff) at Hooters.

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

The burqa and headscarf are often identified as symbols of women’s oppression in Muslim countries.  In fact, head covering is a form of religious garb in many sub-cultures.  Some of these subcultures require head covering all of the time, and others only during religious rituals, but all involve this tradition.  Yet, when it comes to Muslims, the discussion often goes forward as if it is a uniquely oppressive, and uniquely Islamic, practice.  Food for thought.

Thanks to Dolores R. for the link.  Found at Socialist Texan.

UPDATE: In the comments, Alastair Roberts suggests that it’s important to consider whether head covering is required for just women, or both women and men.  I agree.

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

Earlier this year we uncritically posted a spoken word poetry performance about prejudice against short men.  Geoffrey Arnold, who uses his blog, The Social Complex, to highlight heightism, had this to say about our tacit approval…

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I’ve gotten some e-mails and criticism lately for an entry on this blog which was recently featured on the Sociological Images website.  In this entry, I posted a video of a Def Poetry Slam entitled “Death From Below” and asked the rhetorical question whether the video depicted “Short guys making fools of themselves?  Or poetry with a message, delivered through humor?”  I should have elaborated further, but I neglected to at the time.

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The problem with Dan Sully & Tim Staffor’s poetry slam about being short is that it does not clearly convey the message that heightism is wrong.  In fact, as one commenter put it, the pair seem only to perpetuate numerous false stereotypes about short men.  Quite simply, the commentary which may underline their performance is too subtle for a general audience.  Instead of standing up for those who are the targets of height bigotry, it seems to me that these two are basically playing the role of the short male buffoon.  They are humiliating themselves and their bodies for the entertainment of others.  Any point which they are trying to make (and I’m not so sure that there is a point here) is lost in their performance.  Additionally, beyond their performance itself, some of their comments actually have the effect of supporting heightism instead of undermining it (“little man complex” as motivation for being healthy and “can’t date girls in heels people”).

Just the fact that they attempted to deliver their message through comedy is troubling when one considers that other groups rarely engage in this sort of behavior.  There is already a stigma against short men as people who are not to be taken seriously and so it doesn’t help when a short man publicly presents his body as a target for ridicule.

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Geoffrey Arnold is an associate with a mid-sized corporate law firm’s Business Litigation Practice Group.  When Geoffrey isn’t chasing Billable Hours in the defense of white-collar criminals, he is most likely writing about social justice with a special emphasis on height discrimination at his blog: The Social Complex.  See also Geoffrey’s guest post introducing the concept of heightism as a gendered prejudice.

This seven-and-a-half minute segment follows Jiang Tao, a child of farmers who graduated from law school only to discover that law firms discriminate against short employees.  After confronting minimum height requirements, he sued.

Borrowed from The Social Complex, a heightism blog. See also guest posts from The Social Complex introducing the concept of heightism as a gendered prejudice and discussing heightism (and other icky stuff) at Hooters.

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

In addition to selling stuff, advertising tell us something about what “normal” relationships between people look like, such as the case below, submitted by Kyra M.

What’s it saying? When a woman’s upset, you can fix it with flowers.

In equating “she’s upset” with “get her flowers,” we’re discouraged from considering whether she might have a good reason to be upset.

Women have long been considered irrational creatures (it’s one of the justifications for denying them the vote — they didn’t have sufficient reason to make good choices in government) — much like children. When a child’s upset, you don’t reason with them, or think about whether you need to change your behaviour, you assume it’s because the child is immature. This ad encourages us to treat women the same way, as if they’ve just had their feelings hurt and a little consideration and then everything will be fine.  This undermines women’s status in a variety of contexts, communicating that women’s complaints do not need to be taken seriously. This kind of attitude makes women less able to structure their social environments to meet their needs.

More, this trope suggest that whatever a woman’s concerns are, she’ll abandon those positions and principles if you spend enough money. This construes women as corruptible — another construction justifying the lack of women in positions of authority. After all, would you want someone’s who’s irrational, materialistic, and corruptible running your company? Or your government?

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Anastasia Kulpa teaches Sociology at Grant MacEwan University in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Her research interests include the sociology of post-secondary classrooms, and cultural vehicles for transmitting ideology (class, music, television, etc.).

Marketers are happy to respond to and create insecurities.  Here’s one we haven’t covered before, shoes and inserts for men that covertly increase their height:

Borrowed from The Social Complex, a heightism blog. See also guest posts from The Social Complex introducing the concept of heightism as a gendered prejudice and discussing heightism (and other icky stuff) at Hooters.

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

This is the official SocImages Election 2012 Sexism Watch.  We add content, as it arises, in reverse chronological order.

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#9 Bachmann Pours Away Presidential Bid

How did we miss this one? Representative Michele Bachmann performed the comically gendered role of pouring water for all of the (male) Republican candidates and the (male) host at the start of the Republican Family Forum debate in Iowa this past November.

Some of the candidates seemed uncomfortable at this puzzling behavior, and the host joked, “I want to begin by thanking Representative Bachmann for taking care of the water for today’s event.” It’s possible that Bachmann only intended to pour water for the person sitting next to her, but was put on the spot when the host assumed she would pour water for everyone.

This event was hosted by CitizenLink, the political action arm of the uber-conservative Christian organization, Focus on the Family. CitizenLink describes itself as a “family advocacy organization that inspires men and women to live out biblical citizenship that transforms culture.” They promote traditional families as the “building block of society,” so it’s possible that Bachmann was strategically catering to an audience that is less supportive of women in “unconventional” roles.

Whether intentional or unintentional, Bachmann’s actions highlight the contradiction between traditional gender roles and conceptions of leadership.  And the lack of media focus on this incident illustrates how unremarkable it is for a woman to be in a service role in the company of men.  If Governor Rick Perry had gone around the table and dutifully poured water for all of the Republican primary contenders, it would have made the front page.

More Election 2012 Sexism Watch after the jump!

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