3: Vintage Sexism
Freud was wrong about a lot of his theories, but one thing he was right about was the great importance of the sexual drive. In viewing many vintage commercials in class is it evident that men have the power over women in vintage advertisements and in society at that time. For instance the Folger’s commercial displays a woman making coffee for her husband, and her main focus is for him to like it. Her major priority in life is not only to do things for her husband, but to do everything up to his highest standards. If the woman does not follow through with pleasing her man then she feels inadequate and useless. The woman feels her place in this world is to be there for the pleasure of her husband.
Another advertisement that was shown was the vintage Volve commercial. It essentially was diplaying the stereotype that women cannot understand or drive cars as well as men can. The idea of the advertisement is that a woman could not drive a stick shift, while the Volve is an automatic. This is geared toward men who want a nice new car, without the risk of their woman driving it and ruining it.
An interesting point was brought up in class about how in today’s society when a woman and man are driving together in a car, more often than not the woman is in the passengers seat. This could be explained in a number of reasons. Depending on the seriousness of the realtionship it could come down to just a matter of who owns the car. Another point that was brought up was it could date back to when men had the control over women. If the car is the symbol of power and freedom, when occupied by two genders the man is taking dominance over the woman.
Personally I think the majority of this comes from the fact that civalry is not dead. A man likes to take care of his woman, therefore he wants to escort her when driving in the car, as he feels that is his duty. While this still could be seen as displaying dominance over the woman, it is more respectful than doing it for the sheer reason of dominance. The man in this case is serving the woman by escorting her around.
In any case, it is different for each driving situation. I, however, chose to believe that a man still has the desire to serve his woman.
