I was just watching Hell's Kitchen, a reality show about a group of chef's who try to win their chance at running Hell's Kitchen. Chef Ramsey, a really mean guy, is the host. They compete in challenges against one and other, and the teams are divided by gender. The guys are on the blue team and the ladies are on the red team. Both teams were preparing for their challenge and one of the men said,
"A room full of girls is useless, unless they are having a Tupperware party or something."
The next clip showed another guy saying,
"There is no way she's going to win without a man there to lead her around."
Now, this is a culinary competition. I realize that top chefs are generally men, seemingly because people trust them to boss around a kitchen. However, as far as culinary skills go, I would be led to believe that men and women are equally capable of cooking well. These guys seem to be set on the fact that they are far superior to the women. Part of this is the nature of the competition, but instead of talking about the women just as a team, the men are spouting out offensive gendered insults.
Do you think it's fair for the guys to treat the women this way? If instead of cooking the show was about baking, which is often dominated by women, do you expect the opposite would be true?
7 comments:
I don't think it is fair that men are treating the women this way. I think that if it was a baking competition you would still see the same things being stated. It is a societal/cultural expectation that men are supposed to be in the head positions and have control of everyone and everything. In the views of many, women are not supposed to be as good at leading anything or anyone.
I think that a lot of these gendered roles such as men being dominant and competitive while women are passive and emotional especially play out in these reality shows that revolve around a competition. After watching that clip from The Apprentice in class on Tuesday and seeing how even in a competition with men and women that in the end (of this show in particularly) that the last contestants left were men, say a lot about society and how gender roles play into games and competitiveness. Through Social Learning theory and Cognitive Development theory, as children we learn through verbal and nonverbal feedback how to act appropriately which is generally defined through our genders. We search for role models and replicate our own gendered behavior after them. In class we’ve read and talked about how men gain closeness through doing while women gain closeness through dialogue. That being said it would make sense that a team of men competing against a team of women would make these comments because by working to defeat the women and by communicating about how they are going to defeat the women, the gain group cohesion which will probably lead to greater productivity.
I personally don’t think it matters what the show’s premise is. Maybe men do chose to be cooks over bakers because traditionally women (especially mothers) do the baking and Cognitive Development theory says that boys generally define their masculinity as “not like mother”, but I don’t think it makes a significant difference.
Now I didn't see this particular episode, so I have some questions about the discourse that took place.
Were there comments flowing from the women towards men such as: a man is only good for mowing the lawn, or a man only belongs behind a grill.
With that aside, I believe the problem with hells kitchen is the host (the pompous prick). He is the one that sets the tone for degradation and gender stereotypes of all the contestants and allows them to degrade themselves.
It's not fair that the guys treat the women that way, but I believe that there are equally gendered comments flowing the other direction.
I think this interesting. I have never watched the show but I can only imagine what it is like. It is kind of weird that women are degraded so much in the show. To me it feels as if the tables have been turned. A kitchen was always a "woman's place" and all of the cooking was left up to the woman. In fact I would think the woman would have to take care of all of the housework and cater to the man. I think it is weird that now their is a tv show about cooking and women aren't welcome. Well I suppose they are but the men should be worshipping the women for their culinary stereotype. However, in this case their is competition and power and men always think they deserve the power. The male chef is using this power over the woman. I think this is even more degrading because a woman was depicted as a housewife in the first place, and then these men came along and said they weren't even good enough to be in the kitchen anymore. Is it just me or is it possible that men can't be perfect at everything. I think a woman is just as qualified for a culinary position as a man is. I don't think anyone deserves to be in a kitchen as their designated place unless they choose to be like a chef on the show!
I don't think that it is fair that women are put down and degraded as much as they are in this show, but for the little that I have seen of it, the men are put down by the show "host" or main chef or in this case main ass. I really think that the major premise of the show is him putting everyone down regardless of their gender. I also do not believe that if the show were about baking and not cooking that the premise would be any different, in some ways the main intent is to cut all of the contestents down, but it seems as if the women are getting the brunt of the insults. Do people think that this makes for good tv?? Because I do not watch it, I do not know. Do the women stand up for themselves either to the other contestants or to the host? Or do they allow themselves to be belittled for the sake of being on tv, which we have seen before in many other shows.
Also I am not sure where the idea that men are chefs and women are bakers came from because unfortunately in many large kitchens, corporate and otherwise, men are also the bakers. Even in Lincoln, my mother worked in a four diamond hotel here, in the restaurant, a very nice one, the entire time, she was there for many years, the head chef and head baker were men. While women have made many inroads in these fields, it is the same as many other vocations, male dominated. I think we like to believe that women are bakers because of the tradition of Betty Crocker and other "faces" of baking, but not necessarily true.
Actually, if you think about stereotypes, the kitchen is supposed to be a women's domain. I would think that women should be the stronger competitors in this instance. The individuals on this show probably only say these things because they are fueled by others (probably the producers), to say things like this. I doubt the men on the show are like this in their own worlds, in an individual setting.
I agree with “prince charming” I usually view the kitchen as the woman’s domain as well. So I feel like if insults are flying they are probably being motivated by the producers. I bet this show is like reality shows in the sense that they are probably more staged than people realize. If men are supposed to be the competitors in a traditional stereotype it makes sense that they would be insulting the women. Men are typically portrayed as being in control while exhibiting power and dominance. I don’t think that the comments are necessary but conflict gets people to tune it. So I’m sure someone pushes for the fights to erupt so that ratings in return erupt.
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