Don’t Be A Dick…It’s Just A Banana
We have been discussing how fashion is gendered and how we as humans consume these gendered labels in clothing. I have come to realize however that there is another category of gendered products that regularly hold a specific role for both men and women, and we as people literally consume it.
Food for a while has been presented in our American society as something that is meant for the women to deal with in the form of cooking it, preparing it, and then serving it. There are certain foods however, that are socially acceptable for a man to have control over like the grilling or BBQing of meat on a grill. Why is a stove considered under a woman’s jurisdiction and a grill under a man’s? Both are mechanisms which use fire on a relatively open surface to cook food so what is the difference?
The difference here is outlined by the idea of social determinism which is where society determines who you are, dictates how you act, and guides how much agency your to take over already pre-established norms. So for example if someone wants to commit to the label “Female” or “Woman” then she must commit as well to being what a woman is conceived to be within the society, and the same applies to being a man and accepting the title “Male”. Through this set up of normatives gender is performed as a guided practice. Who sets up these norms then; what is the mechanism that constricts gender? The media, legal system, the language used to define it all?
Let’s start with the media. There are many portrayals through mainstream TV shows, commercials, and movies that imply where the man stands versus the woman on matters of cooking. In a popular TV show That 70s show a couple of the main characters, a husband and wife (Red and Kitty), go over to a friend’s house to meet his new girlfriend (Bob and Joanne). When Joanne insists on doing the grilling and suggests that the men go make a salad Red becomes furious and insists that it is “the ladies job to do salad, us men do the grilling”. After battling Joanne and now his own wife Kitty, Red reluctantly joins his friend however, during dinner has nothing nice to say about Joanne’s steaks stating “It’s too dry”…”maybe if I drink some water” implying that Joanne as a woman can not grill correctly. Later in the episode Red invites his friend and his plus one over to his house were he again tries to put Joanne in her place by stating “alright well I got the steaks cookin, why don’t you make a salad Joanne” which she of course responds to him by basically telling him to bite her. Regardless this is one example showing how threated the man becomes when women try to step out of the gendered role society has outlined for them. Even scarier than that Joanne was able to influence Red’s wife who usually is submissive to him to stand against him.
Lets look at the legal system and its influence on gender roles. Gender itself is a way for one to stay organized within the system. It is given at birth to ensure the labeling process, boy versus girl, whichever stated on your paperwork that makes it true and this follows you forever, your birth certificate, your school applications, driver’s license, and obituary announcement your gender is constructed and controlled to make sure you perform the right set of rules or laws throughout your lifetime. In the reading “The Chic of Araby Transvestism and the Erotics of Cultural Appropriation” by Marjorie Garber she states
“Accordingly, a complete womanly and “absolute” woman would be such a one who not only produces egg cells but also corresponds to the womanly type in every other respect; an “absolute” man would be such a one who forms semen cells yet also, at the same time, exhibits the manly average type in all other points.” then provides a list she explains is to help differentiate and divide the sexes. “then we, to make the rest simple, summarize
what has preceded by separating the difference of the sexes into four clear groups that can be
defi ned one from the other; they concern, as we see: 1. the sexual organs, 2. the other physical characteristics, 3. the sex drive, 4. the other emotional characteristics.
Your gender and your body is a representation of the gender the legal system chooses for you and therefore if gender is constructed by the legal system then your body, your actions, and your thoughts are representing the law. In another example from a very popular and well known movie White Chicks a man posses as a woman and reluctantly has to be forced tp go out on a date with another man (who of course has no idea who hes really dating) and during their date he brings her to a resturant, when the waiter comes up he orders for himself then orders for his date “and for the lady a salad” to which “she” immediately holds up her finger and replies “I don’t think so” then begins ordering a soiree of messy food items from the menu. This could be viewed as once again the man trying to put the woman in her place implying that salads are light just how women are supposed to be light (slender)but keeping this in mind the man posing as a woman immediatly takes back his masculinity by asserting himself through a massive order of food. This scene in the movie shows two male figures battling to be in control over one body, the female body using food as their weapons.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI69LVtq6iU
Many foods along with having a gendered connotation are also sexualized. You know what I’m talking about anytime a woman simply peels the skin off of a banana the proceeds to stick it in her mouth makes other women blush and men stare. Popsicles and any other food that is long have the same stigma around them. If the second I even mentioned the words banana and woman in the same sentence your mind thought of a sexualized scene in your brain then you are like the mass amount of our society who have been taught that certain foods carry with them a very perverse conotation and are only acceptable for certain people to eat. In the reading “Can You Spot How These Unique Purses are Removing Stigma” by Rachel Lubitz she states
“Using design to confront beauty standards: Yes, genital beauty standards. The design sewed into her backpacks, clutches and overnight bags is, admittedly, an idealized version of a vulva. We’ve now decided that the vagina needs to look a certain way,” Feinberg said.”
Although I agree that these purses are making a statement about how the framing language about a woman’s vagina is something of discomfort to people the part that the author overlooks through her argument is that by doing this the vagina as an art form is still being performed for those who consume the purses. In other words a woman’s body and in this case her body parts are still being exploited just the same as a man’s genitalia is exploited in portrayal through food similarities. A woman eating a banana excites and grabs attention, therefore being a performed act for the audience it is enticing, however a man eating a banana totally uninteresting and no one will think twice about it. This could be for two reasons. the first being that the woman’s body is already a hypersexualized thing and adding an object which resembles male genitalia only adds to the idea that she can be controlled. Second, in our society even with more open attitudes towards gays collectively it is still very hetero idea based so a man watching another man eat a banana may be too perverse and is instantly dismissed or avoided.
Not just women have sexualized food however, men too have to deal with a certain level of critique based on their eating habits. For example if a man chooses to eat a salad or some type of vegetable with the absence of meat he is considered weak or soft. Even worse if his lifestyle choice is to completely eliminate meat from his diet than he is stripping himself of all masculinity equaling himself to the level of a women who apparently only eats leaves like a giraffe. When did meat become the new stereotypical image of a healthy males diet? Perhaps it has something to do with the perception that eating meat makes you stronger, tougher which of course men should be both, it could also have something to do with the fact that by eating something that once made noise and moved it evokes a primal behavior within males that they are conquering their kill. This could also be why men are so territorial over their grilling rights. Regardless of what it is if a woman has too much meat then she is instantly viewed as unlady like. In the movie Miss Congeniality a women in the FBI goes undercover posing as a “brainless bimbo” aka a contestant for Miss America however she is not the first choice because she is not considered beautiful of graceful. She meets with a beauty consultant at a restaurant and during their meal hers being a steak dinner she is given rather rude remarks about her eating choices “That’s ok Philp I think later we’ll be needing a drop cloth” “another keg for you?” “I’m sorry what was the question I was distracted by the half eaten cow rolling around in your wide open trap” “and I have Dirty Harriot”. This shows how the food one chooses to eat whether your a man or a women effects the way others see you in society.
Point in case don't play with your food because your status in society will be determined by what your putting in your mouth.
