SAP Proposal II

Gender and Digital Media

Think back to some of your favorite movies, TV Shows, Video Games, and pictures. Who are the characters? Usually men and women doing normal things. They follow their stereotypical roles and do what we as an audience would expect. Men are the tough ones while women are shown as the sensitive, thinking types. Male characters in Video Games are the norm, and they normally are the player, especially in first person shooters. They wear functional clothing and are almost always the hero. Women, if they are in these games or movies, tend to be more revealing and open, eager to shown their form to the world. They also tend to be the "Damsel in distress" who require a tough male to save them. 

Facebook's policies for name require that you use your "authentic name" meaning that you must have a name you actually use in your life, something you are actually called. Say there is a person who's name is Richard, for example, and he is always called that. If he created a Facebook account, would that affect him in any way? Well, that depends. 

What if he is called Richard by everyone by everyone but really feels like being a male feels wrong and that he feels weird being one. What if she (Richard) is scared to come out to his family or maybe has and was denied the ability? Does she still have to be Richard on Facebook? What if she meets some people who are supportive and call her by the name she prefers or wants? Can she use that name on her Facebook account? No, because it is not her "official name." 

What about Skype? Signing up for that only gives you three options for gender: Male, Female, or "Unspecified." What if you don't identify as either? Do you just put "unspecified?" This is a personal topic to many and one worthy of attention because it may actually be painful to them. 

To me, digital media is attempting to define who we can and cannot be. It is becoming even more personal than just knowing what you like to shop for or look up because it is now beginning to define who we can be and what is acceptable. Together, they seem to be cracking down on how and what a person can identify as, all the while reinforcing what we are supposed to be (stereotypes) through popular culture with movies and video games.

Where popular culture and digital media lacks, we can step in. Purposely going against Facebook's policies, creating posters about non-conforming shows and people, breaking down stereotypes; the binary was created by an old order, an order that sought control. It is time we break this order and stand up. Demonstrations of non conformity on campus, organization through social media, all are things we could do to combat stereotypes. 

Have you heard the phrase "Rules were meant to be broken." Let's change that into "Stereotypes were meant to be broken. An advocacy for individuality, to show that we all are individuals and that we are not all the same, that is what we must do. Killermann's "You Soup" and "Genderbread man" are good starting places, good calls to action, good bases to work from. We would take this base and use it, work off it, and show off our individuality. 

How do we effect the larger population though? People throughout the world? Well, fight fire with fire. Many of us are tied to our Digital devices. I am stuck to programs like Steam and Skype, communicating with people back home. Facebook is a site I used to use and check religiously I know I am not alone. Others do this more than I do, others use Tumblr and Reddit, sites like that. 

I encourage the reader to do some reading on the Arab Spring. One thing we know was that Social Media played a big role here in that it allowed information to be spread across the region and allowed people to communicate their thoughts. Ferguson showed that digital media can take issues and spread it across the Web. Twitter was ablaze with reports from the front. A few weeks ago, before I came to John Carroll, I remember seeing a news report on a video revealing Police Brutality in New York City. Social media spread it around the country to the point it became a issue big enough for the news to report on it. 

Let's do something to end stereotypes.