So last night, I saw a commercial on tv that shows a child looking in a closet for something, and then yelling "Mom, where's my ___?", than the husband looking for something elsewhere in the house (can't find it), "Honey, where's the ___?", and on to the next child fruitlessly searching for some elusive item that apparently only Mom has the required observational skills to locate.
It seems to me that as with so much of the way that moms and dads are commonly portrayed in popular culture, it somehow manages to be both anti-feminist and semi-misandrist. Maybe misandrist isn't the right word here; see below.
Is there a word for the way that (in pop culture, at least) men, when it comes to household tasks, child-rearing, and to a lesser extent, cooking, are generally shown as fumbling and inadequate buffoons? The way that they are popularly portrayed would lead most to believe that without their feminine counterparts, they would be likely to injure/possibly poison or starve our children, while wallowing in filthy clothing, bedding, and households generally. This, I think, is unfair to men. While certainly many women have an advantage concerning tasks relating to these areas, men are perfectly capable of accquiring these skills. Just as women have been proven capable of joining the workforce in a plethora of male-dominated fields. Imagine if there were commonly commercials for office supplies or something, which showed women, clearly out of their depths, constantly requiring the help of men to help them sort out some work-related issue. There is a clear double standard here. Perpetuating this myth that men just can't manage a household is damaging to women, in that it provides cover for more men to not step up and help in these areas, while also being damaging to men by portraying them as being overgrown adolescents.
I think that as more, or even most women are working outside of the home, the expectations women have of men to help with work within the home are being raised. And as they fail or succeed, so do our relationships to a great extent. And so it will be for our children and their future spouses..
On a more personal note, the aforementioned commercial has inspired me to boycott telling my husband where whatever he's looking for is. Call it tough love. I'll simply have to remind him that it's an excersise in empowerment.
So what do you think? Is this a double standard, or would you stop buying Tide if men were using it in their commercials?