After a four years hiatus, I’m back to blogging…. for the time being.
Remember the popular American comic book series Archie? At this point, I’ve come to terms with the fact that Archie – no matter how much I loved reading it – it reflects gender stereotypes prevalent in our current society.
Archie is a comic book published in the United States and geared towards teenagers. As you might probably have already known, the comic book series revolves around the main protagonist, Archie Andrew, and his circle of friends. The setting takes place in Riverdale, a fictional town in the United States.
Gender stereotypes are generalizing a person or a group.
Types of gender stereotypes:
Personality …show more content…
In this particular cartoon, Bob Montana depicts a girl beating up a guy, for humour purposes. So, here is my question… Would you approve if there was a role reversal and Archie beat up Betty? You are aware of the double standard here – that men should never hit women, but women beating up men are considered socially acceptable.
More often than not, women are succumbed to a man’s fist , and are unable to retaliate. This scene depicted is the opposite of current societal situation. We don’t usually see this in our everyday lives as females are being stereotyped as the ‘weaker sex’. This cartoon successfully addresses the issue of violence against women in our society and to allow men to put themselves in the shoes of women whom are often victims of domestic …show more content…
This reinforces on the stereotype that unacceptable actions taken by women are deemed justifiable and completely acceptable when done by men.
Can you see the problem surfacing here?
This puts men in a ‘spotlight’ and the women are the ‘ complementary figures’ as they are being centered around men, which makes men look better. Furthermore, the female characters are clustered alongside Archie, suggesting that they are dependent on him.
The stereotypes don’t just stop here. Women are being stereotyped as the ‘weaker sex’. They feel insecure and are dependent on men. By depicting women as vulnerable in the picture as shown below, it sends a message reinforcing that a woman needs a man to protect her. Betty is seen hugging and leaning on Jughead, showing her emotional vulnerability. Instead of comforting her, Jughead said that ‘ All women are failures otherwise they’d be men’. This implies that men are far more superior than women and women are all failures, which isn’t true at all in the society we lived in. It is unfair to say that women are all failures and implying that men are successful because you are devaluating women, creating a distinction between men and