Real Men Wear Pink.
Plenty of stereotypes exist regarding women. They are the chef/maid/primary caregiver in a family. They are dainty. They are delicate. They must love the color pink. However, what some women do not realize is that men face equal and opposite stereotypes. After having two baby boys, the author realized just what types of stereotypes boys face (Breedermama). Even though she herself was a girl, she was hesitant to buy pink diapers for her son. What makes pink a girly color (Breedermama)? Realizing her insanity, she purchased the pink diapers – breaking the stereotype.
But was pink always associated with girls? The answer is no. A couple centuries back, mostly in the mid to late 1800s, boys and girls actually had reversed roles. Pink was seen as a cousin of red, a strong color symbolizing war and bloodshed, and thus associated with males (Adams 7). On the other end of the sexual spectrum, females, wishing to emulate the Virgin Mary, dressed in blue in many of her portraits. My favorite color has always been green – generally accepted as a masculine color for Caucasian men (Adams 11) - however, growing up I had a pink changing table and a few pink stuffed animals. Thus, while some studies appear to show that girls gravitate towards pink because of its warmth and motherly feeling, I must add an addendum. People in general, gravitate towards pink because of its warmth. Boys and men are meant to separate themselves from women and thus it has become commonly usual for boys to like blue rather than pink. However, this is a close-minded stereotype whose roots mainly stem from wars where soldiers sent off to war would wear darker colors – blues and greens – for both practical and camouflage reasons. Slowly, but surely, the general public’s opinion on color stereotyping became more and more emphatic even rising to the classless level of labeling male homosexuals with pink in concentration camps and various other places (Adams 8). Similarly, though on a much less severe scale, Breedermama struggled with buying her son a pink diaper, most likely afraid of other people labeling her son as a feminine boy.
This is an old-fashioned phobia that is sneered at even by its ancient roots. Instead of wizening up and reducing our headstrong beliefs on manliness, men are simply
perpetuating the Gender-color stereotypes that have infected each new generation like a virus. There have been attempts made by clothing stores, Hollister and Abercrombie-like stores, to break this “color barrier,” but few strides have been made. Everybody always looks to the past for guidance (using precedent in law, successful military campaigns as the blueprints for invasions, and even basing Olympic performances on those of past athletes) so why don’t we take a piece of our own advice and look to the past? This is one instance where we want “history to repeat itself.”
