Sociological Images

Happy Fat Tuesday to all our friends in New Orleans! Don’t do anything we wouldn’t do!

If you’re not in the middle of the revelry, enjoy these Mardi Gras posts from previous years:

• Where Mardi Gras Beads Come From
• Mardi Gras Krewes, Tourism, and Segregation (pictured)
• Race, Class, and Collective Mardi Gras Memory
• The Evolution of Beads for Boobs

Consumption:

• The Sweet Smell of Environmental Degradation
• Measuring Love with $$$
• Love for Sale with Dogboy and Mr. Dan

Heteronormativity

• Have a Very Straight Valentine’s Day

Cross-Cultures

• Valentine’s Day in Japan

Gender

• The Feminization of Love
• Violent Metaphors in Vintage Valentine’s Day Cards (pictured)
• Do Men Want Flowers?
• The Heterosexual Gift Giving Imperative
• Men are Loved and Women are Property
• The Sexes are “Opposite”
• Steak and a BlowJob Day (for men)

Race/Ethnicity

• Vintage Valentine’s Day Cards Punning on American Indians
• More Vintage Cards with Racial Caricatures

One of our readers sent in a Valentine’s Day card that came in a box of cards her 10-year-old received. The card reinforces the idea that pretty girls are high-maintenance; they’re materialistic and, implicitly, demanding or difficult — which they presumably get away with in exchange for being attractive:

For another example of cultural assumptions about pretty girls, and the idea that they play by a different set of rules, see our post on the “I’m too pretty to do math” magnet or t-shirt.

Do you?  Do you!?  DO YOU!?

Corporate promotion of Valentine’s Day courtesy of The Grumpy Sociologist.

Zeynep P. sent in a commercial for Teleflora, a company that delivers flowers, that, as Zeynep points out, combines objectification with the explicit message that women exchange sexual favors for gifts from men:

The ad normalizes the idea that women would manipulate men with sex, and that men would expect that doing things for women (especially spending money on them) should result in sex. It’s a winner all around.

Cross-posted at Montclair SocioBlog.

Being in the dominant majority allows you that comfort of not thinking.  People in that majority can assume that everyone shares their views, ideas, and even characteristics, and much of the time, they’ll be right.  “Flesh colored” in the U.S., sometimes even today, means the color of white people’s flesh.

White is the default race, the American race.  It’s easy to ignore that African Americans might not see those Band-Aids as flesh colored.  Similarly, Christianity is the default religion, and those who are in the majority can make those same flesh-colored assumptions.  Justice Scalia, for example, seemed unable to understand that the Jewish families of Jews killed in war might not feel “honored” by a cross placed on the grave of their son or daughter. (My post on this is here.)

The latest example:  this Hannukah card sent in South Carolina, presumably to Jews, by Rick Santorum’s local team.  First tweeted by political reporter Hunter Walker, it’s rapidly making the rounds of the Internet.

We’ve posted in the past about awkward or puzzling attempts by companies to recognize Black History Month. The L.A. Clippers let underprivileged kids attend a game for free, though technically in the wrong month. The NBC cafeteria offered fried chicken and collard greens, as did a grocery store. Or maybe you prefer to celebrate Black History Month by buying hair straightener. And sometimes companies just sort of say they’re celebrating Black History Month, but without any specifics.

Emma A. sent in our newest example. Chad Ochocinco, of the New England Patriots, tweeted this pic of Black History Month being celebrated…with a sale on Kool-Aid:

Yep.