We talk a lot about the pressure of girls face from hyper-sexualized images in the media, and from the beauty industry, but what about our boys?
According to one expert in gender studies, Jonathan Allen, we’re presenting men with an ideal that can never be attained either, any more than most girls can look like Barbie.
For example, he says, we’re told that boys don’t cry so when a man does cry, he has failed the test of masculinity. While women are encouraged to have a range of emotions, men are allowed only two: joy and anger.
Allen asks whether there’s any wonder that we have “angry white males” out there given those limited options and says we need to come up with a definition that doesn’t doom most men to failure.
