"Patience, I think, is the best tool. Though it's often one we struggle for." Page 15.
My fiance has been very good at discovering my utter lack of patience. It's funny, because I used to think I was very, very patient. It seems that somewhere between puberty and my 23rd birthday, I lost the ability to chill the fuck out and just let things happen. I mean, I can...if I have to, but I really don't like it. Reading this book did not help my general temperament at all. I think if you read my review of the book, you'll understand a little better about why this frustrated me so much. Or you can just keep reading, whatever.
I am the person who notices the utter lack of males in advertising for household cleaners. Occasionally there's one or two, but they are either A) demasculinized or B) looking over the "little lady's" shoulder (I'm talking about you Mr. Clean). This kind of advertisement says a couple things, namely that only women are good at cleaning, only women should be cleaning, and that a man still has to come and approve of our work because we either can't live without a man's validation or we won't do it right unless a man comes and checks up on us.
Really? I guess we should take away all the manly jumpsuits male janitors wear and place them in little frilly maid costumes. I'm actually not certain why people (and I'm actually targeting men more than women in this statement) don't get more upset about this representation of cleanliness=womanliness. Okay fellas, here's the thing these commercials are really getting down to: If you don't have a woman in this house you are living in utter and abject filthiness. You are so lowly and disgusting that you are not even capable, much less motivated, to take five or ten minutes to spray a counter and wipe it down. That is what the chemical companies and the advertising companies are saying about you, by not targeting you or including you in their advertisements.
I bet most men don't even think about the way that sex and sexism in advertising affects them. I mean, that is one of the privileges of being male. They don't have to think about it. And you know what, I find it difficult to be patient and wait for men to come around and stop being misogynist assholes when I feel like I have to live with it almost every single day. There's a reason I stopped watching tv, and it's because of commercials like the ones I've mentioned. And there's a reason I wish that books like The Atlantis Code would stop being published. But apparently there are still people out there who think that these books are "interesting" or that the commercials are "informative and entertaining."
Maybe I would have a little more patience with it if they weren't created at the expense of half of the world population. I don't mind there being misogynist characters in books, or seeing women do housework, but I'm getting really tired of hearing the phrase "get back in the kitchen" followed by peals of laughter by puerile males. I'm not impressed with that kind of behavior, and I don't find it funny. I have a great sense of humor, and I will laugh at dead baby jokes, but when you've just been "let" out of the "kitchen" having some schmuck who has never even thought about what that phrase might mean to a woman just makes me want to kill a bitch (of the male variety). So you'll have to forgive me if I don't have all that much patience.
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