Girls wear pink and boys wear blue. Girls are flirtatious and tender, boys are strong and brave. These are some of the stereotypes that we regularly associate with each gender. Does being male or female define what we can or cannot do?
A 13-year-old girl shows us how ridiculous these thoughts can be, in a short film in which gender stereotypes appear inverted.
Ella Fields is a teenager who was participating in a Motion Picture Arts program at her school in Los Angeles last school year. One of his projects was to make a short film and decided that I would focus on gender stereotypes to prove that they are ridiculous.
The video, titled "Stereo", begins with a message that says:
Since the beginning of time, things have been exactly the same. Boys and girls are separated by what they can and cannot do.
Then she starts mentioning the stereotypes if the reality were reversed: "Boys wear pink, girls wear blue. Boys wear dresses, but girls can't wear them. We are seen as strong, we play sports."And it ends with a phrase:"Stereotypes stink".
In the short film we can see her dressed in those lifelong stereotypes for girls in that alternate world, and we realize that she has an interest in doing different things. During a scene while shopping for clothes, her mother scolds her when she realizes that she starts to see the dresses, which are garments for boys.
While at home, She is interested in watching a musical, to which her mother turns off the TV and replies: "Stay focused, I raised a strong athlete, not someone weak and interested in musicals."At school the atmosphere is no different, since by showing interest in auditioning for a play, the rest of the children make fun of her by telling her that these are childish thingss.
We arrive at the strong moment of the short film, in which She is discovered by her mother watching a video of the first woman singing on Broadway, who starts telling you that you should stop doing those things. She then replies:
And what if I look at a dress? It's a piece of clothing, a piece of cloth! There is no gender assigned to a piece of clothing! It's people like you who stereotype me and try to make me normal! What if I want to wear a dress? What if I think a dress is cute? And who says girls can't wear makeup and paint their nails? I'm tired of being stereotyped and being told that I should or should not like it just because of the way I was born! Well guess what, I want to wear that dress, I want to paint my nails and I also want to be in the school musical. You are my mother and I love you, but I just wish you would support me.
In the end, She fulfills her dream and astonishing all her classmates, attends school in a dress and takes a piece of paper to audition for the play.
With her video, she reminds us that stereotypes are just generalizations that really have no foundation, and that they can affect the safety of people by not fitting into them.
What did you think of the short?
