Reconco, Erik!

Reconco 1!

Professor Ditch!
English 114A!
November 4, 2014!
Youre Not a Man. Unless!
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Male gender expectations are key to the way a society in general can be shaped.

Male gender expectations affect everyone. But they don't always have good outcomes.
A male gender expectation can be being dominant and even violent. Violence is more
common amongst men because violence is portrayed as a male gender role. For
example, Grand Theft Auto Five, is one of the most violent games out there and it
presents men as being dominant. A person playing the game can go to a strip club and
pick up females as if they are only important for sexual purposes because females have
really no other significance in the game. People who play this game, typically males,
can see this dominance over females as true and may incorporate this into their own life
because they might be trying to fit into the male gender role of being the dominant one.
Male gender expectations should change because it causes men to try to fit into them
and by trying to fit in can become violent, and overly dominant and it just doesn't let the
males and females become who they want to be without being criticized and considered
nonconformists. !
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The visual text i have chosen is quite the one to look at. The collage is a series of

pictures displaying what the video game known as Grand Theft Auto 5 is all about. The
collage displays many different pictures where men are displaying dominance through
violence. The men in the collage are holding guns and have cars, displaying their clear !

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dominance. The men are a symbol of masculinity and thus portray what a real man
looks like. The women on the collage on the other hand, display weakness and
sexuality in the pictures within this collage. The collage has two pictures of females.
One of them displays a women in a bikini and a women being handcuffed by a police
officer. The women in the picture where she is being handcuffed displays weakness and
submission, which typically is what is expected of a female in some societies. The visual
text is meant to grab the viewers attention by displaying what a man should be like in
order to look cool or accepted as a male. The game is directed towards males because
everything you can do in the game is considered something a man should do. You can't
be a female in the story part of the game. All the selectable characters are males and
perform violent actions. The only purpose females serve is to be a stripper really and
attend to a males sexual needs. The game puts females in a position where they are
considered unimportant when it comes to life situations. The male displays control over
the women. This type of display in a video game can influence young people quite
easily for they are not yet completely matured and they might think what they see in the
media and especially video games is what is expected of young males. Males aren't
commonly displayed as emotional or weak which leads to the obvious conclusion that
males act according to what is expected of them. !
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Male violence is a constant problem in almost any society. Video game

advertisements such as this can not only put gender roles on people but have influential
effects on young males. Young males can see this type of violence as being cool and
are taught by the media and video games that this is what a man is like. In the game !

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you can go around insulting people and young kids playing the game online don't even
say hello to other international gamers before they start talking smack. I play many
violent games such as GTA5 and Call of Duty. And in every game it is filled with kids
that sound very very young and all they do is curse and talk about how they are going to
do bad things to your mother. The kids do this because they feel like they have to act
this way in order to be seen as men rather than boys, and violence to them is a clear
way of displaying dominance and masculinity, or so they think that because it is
presented to them by video games like this that men are supposed to be violent. Kids at
a very young age are presented with this type of male gender rolling and will only copy
that image of a male so they can fit in and avoid criticism from other males and even
females. Males at a young age are taught to be dominant and these types of gender
role teachings will stay with men even into their careers. !
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The current United States Government is largely controlled by males. 70 percent

to be a little more detailed. Males control far more important roles than women do. Many
men believe only other strong and powerful men should uphold these responsibilities for
most women are considered incapable of that. Male hyper dominance can be an issue
because it leaves female opinions out of the picture. And males may act to what they
believe is best for males and females, when the truth is the action they have chosen
only affects the women negatively. Like the video game, Males control the government. !
Leaving most women powerless to do otherwise. African female political leaders are
presented in a negative way by the international media, calling into question the
credibility of these women as leaders of their nations. ( Anderson, Diabah, hmensa. !

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1)Women in political positions in Africa are criticized by the media. This type of criticism
puts fourth the possible fact that women are incapable of leading a nation, and who is
left to do the job, well the sex that has always done it, the male. The females are
criticized for being non conformists and taking on roles they shouldn't have. This puts
females in an inferior position to males. Thus giving the males the gender expectation of
being dominant and able to lead, while women are given the gender expectation of
being incapable of that dominance. !
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In Tough Guise Jackson Katz explains that men are more violent in almost any

aspect of crime. Sexual harassment, rape, and murder. Male violence is substantially
more common than that of female violence. This lead me to find out what percent of
women play this game. If men play it less, it should mean that women are more violent.
If men play it more, it should mean that women are less violent. Well it turns out that
men do play it much more than women and this game most likely influenced some men
into becoming violent. Grand Theft Auto around 15 percent of its fans are
women (Sydell 1) This quote explains how little females play Grand theft auto. This can
be a valid piece of evidence showing that since less females play violent video games
like this, it could most likely mean that women wont be as violent as men because men
play it more and are more exposed to this type of gender role. Men are more exposed to
this violence caused by men and it can lead them to think that men are like this. Men in
the past have committed various crimes like mass shootings and murder. But some
murders are similar to murders done in media. For example, a librarian asked me that if
i heard on the news that a women was killed by her boyfriend. The women that was !

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killed was killed in a way similar to that of a murder in a television show named Dexter.
The man would watch this show. Leading to the speculation that this might have
influenced the man. Media is very powerful and can influence people to do many things.
Males will be taught to be violent and women will be taught to be submissive.!
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Males are violent because violence is presented to them by their family and

other circumstances like where they grew up in, not because of video games. Violence
in Video games is only one way a male can be influenced to be violent and dominant.
But it in fact can have a great deal of influence on young adolescents. However it is true
that those other circumstances may also influence violence in men as well. Living in the
ghetto surrounded by violence can cause a man to feel the urge to be violent in order to
protect themselves; they Conform to the male gender role of being violent rather than
taking the supposed female gender role of talking things out. My son plays these video
games and he isn't violent at all. Video games have no influence on people when it
comes to being violent I play video games like this and consider myself a very passive
person. It doesn't affect every man, it only influences some men. Ive personally
experienced little kids being rude and make threats on online gaming. These kids show
clear symptoms of being influenced by these types of video games that the definition of
a man is to impose dominance over others, even through verbal abuse. ( which keep in
mind, the game has a feature that allows you to talk smack to other characters in the
game.)!
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Male violence and violent video games may not have the clearest ties but it is

evident that men can be influenced by video games such as this because other types of !

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media do have this effect on males where they are influenced into acting ways a man
should act like violent and dominant. Women are portrayed as being nothing more than
sexual tools in the game and in real life you can see similarities to the dominance men
have in the game and in governments around the world. Young males shouldn't be
exposed to this type of violence for they are the most vulnerable to being influenced for
they are not matured yet. Men and women shouldn't be put forth what is expected of
them and they should be allowed to do what they please without being criticized.!
Games like this influence men negatively and put females low on the totem pole of
dominance.!

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Works Cited!
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Anderson, Jemima Asabea, Grace Diabah, and Patience Afrakoma Hmensa.

"Powerful Women in Powerless Language: Media Misrepresentation of African Women

in Politics (the Case of Liberia)." Journal of Pragmatics 43.10 (2011): 2509-518. Web.!
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Austin, Grace. "Surprise! Government Is Still Mostly White and Male-Dominated -

Diversity Journal." Diversity Journal. N.p., n.d. Web.!

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"Tough Guise: Violence, Media & the Crisis in Masculinity." YouTube. YouTube,

n.d. Web. !
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Sydell, Laura. "Female Fans Love New Grand Theft Auto Despite Demeaning

Content." Www.npr.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Sept. 2013.