Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Grab a Beer for Your Lady: Breaking the Gender Stereotypes of Beer




I need to get something off of my chest.

This is going to be difficult to say but…

I used to think that beer wasn’t a beverage for women.

Man. That looks even worse typed out. I can feel the bigotry pulsating right out of the words.

Yes, when I was a younger man, or boy, I thought that beer was only for men. Reflecting back, 
I don’t think I was alone in thinking that.

This isn't quite the video I wanted, here is a link to the real one 

If college has done one thing for me- one very expensive thing- it has challenged the way I think. Right now, I am in a course called Anthropology and we are studying sex and gender. Those two ideas are separate.

Biological sex is the anatomical end result of the type of X and Y chromosomes you have. It determines the type of sexual organs and hormones that your body will naturally produce.

Gender is much more complicated than your biological sex. Why? Well, first we need to understand that people are taught gender. It is something we are shown. Little boys are not born instantly liking sports and things that are blue; little girls are not born loving dresses and things that are pink. This is a culmination of society and their relationship with the world. Nothing is natural about the way Western society- specifically America- thinks gender should be applied.



So, the reason I just gave you a run-down is to explain this: Beer is not a gender specific beverage.
It sounds so simple, it is simple. Yet, I can’t help but think back to television ads I watched early on. I remember a lot of women in bikinis finding men with beer attractive. I remember seeing men in movies challenging each other to keg stands, and flip cup. I do remember girls with red plastic cups in their hands, but never to the extent that the little plastic cup was shown being chugged down by a bro.

Beer is only beer. People are people, everywhere. And everyone deserves a nice beer.





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