IN-EQUALITY CELEBRATED

 

Old and rusty clichés in docutainment formats will never right the wrong of gender inequality.

 

The opposite doesn’t always work, I know that. The audience's preconveived impressions of who is strong and who is weak is constantly bolstered by tv series and other moving pictures: Take the vigilante in Arrow, for instance. Is he as capable of killing and righting the wrong if he was a woman? I doubt it, the audience doubts it, the producers obviously doubted it. 

The last docutainment format I have seen in TV had a boss go undercover to work four days in a row as an intern. Of course, all his employees didn’t have a clue who he was but they were all very nice and competent and, well, deserving of some "divine" intervention of the boss. The undercover boss soon found out that working in this close to the bottom of his own company jobs ain’t so funny after all. By the end, the boss invited all his employees in his real office, granting, and this is where the world apparently still needs to learn about equality, the two women a long overdue holiday and one of the guys new cleaning machines for making his work easier and the other guy a promotion.

Notice anything?

And the mean thing is: the women like their holiday surprise, they’re in tears when they hear of the generosity of their boss, the audience follows this emotional set-up and rejoices with them. Why on earth did no producer of that show cop on it? Or maybe they did but promoting a woman and sending a man to the South of France for a little holiday seems such an impossible thing to do. No audience member would like that very much, would they? The message that comes across is, for the men, be nice to all your intern you might get promoted here! And for women: wouldn’t it be nice to have some holidays paid by the boss?

German television, or, maybe, television shows like this in general, seem to support and bolster the idea of woman = emotional (hence the time-out to get rid of all the massive, emotional, stress symptoms by buying them a holiday) and man = rational (hence the logic next step in his existence, i.e. a better-paid job) and by tying it to these images of true happiness (none of the men cried, by the way, for getting new toys to clean with or for getting a raise) making the audience a dumb accomplice. 

Promoting one of the ladies actually would have helped in the long term: they would have gotten a raise, a better position (less work during ungodly hours like 3 o’clock in the morning) and, I suppose, more days off. Hence, they could have afford their own holidays and they would have been even allowed to take them. No charity from the boss involved at all. They would have been promoted simply because they showed how able and structured they work.

I would love to see a TV format that turns things around, switches man and woman, work and holiday, rational and the emotional or, you know, wouldn’t bother casting male or female in a pre-set role. I mean, there is more than one fictitious TV series from the US, always making the “strong” part, the outcast, the one who almost crumbles (but doesn’t due to will power and, ironically, with the help of a great female character) with all the responsibility on his shoulders, a male part. It’s not like us women cannot take responsibility nor blame nor be physical active. I would love to see the Hood in Arrow be a woman vigilante, yet strangely enough all the female vigilantes that were equal to the Hood were forced to leave the city or died. Coincidence, huh?

Is there anyone out there who can give me an example or two of tv series that do change the roles? I'd like that, so please comment!

Dear TV, wait until I get to you. Until then: please be so kind as to shake off all your biased assumptions of why men are in for the better job and women get a time out. This is just stupid.