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Give Me RESPECT, You Sexist Pig!
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Give Me R-E-S-P-E-C-T, You Sexist Pig! The internationally known lyrics to “Respect” by Aretha Franklin—the Queen of Soul—not only represents girl power, but more importantly, serves as a powerful message holder to all the men out there: women want and command respect. Being that we are still living in a male-dominated society, women are still in the process of battling against the gender role restrictions and limitations that society has placed upon us since as long as we can remember—not to mention fighting for what matters most to us: respect. With all sorts of restrictions that are placed upon us whether it is socially, physically, emotionally, or occupationally, it is no wonder or surprise to see strong and powerful women taking the stand of just how capable and just how equally dominant we can be. Holly Devor, author of Gender Role Behaviors and Attitudes, implies that “gender roles are the result of systematic power imbalances based on gender discrimination” (488). Men have always had a naturally set mentality that women are nothing more than sex objects that merely satisfy the daily needs and wants of their dirty work. There is clearly a lack of mutual respect and communication towards the women on the men’s part. In the film “What Women Want”, Mel Gibson plays the promiscuous role of Nick Marshall, an aggressive, chauvinist businessman that has utterly no respect or sense of concern for women. However, through a strange twist of events involving getting electrocuted by a blow dryer, he is given an amazing talent of being able to hear everything that goes on in the mind of a woman—to hear what women want. Through this life-changing, roller coaster ride experience, Nick defeats society’s and his own gender role expectations of women and ultimately comes to a deep realization that having respect and communication with the opposite sex is essential to one another’s growth and existence in the long run. Nick Marshall’s early upbringing by a Las Vegas showgirl mom is what structures his view of women as objects. Because he has strongly looked at women in this way after watching these scandalously dressed women displaying their bodies out to the world at such a tender age, he has strictly prohibited himself from looking at them as real human beings—not wanting to get a grasp of what there all about on a human level and not wanting to have or give any respect to them as people. Devor states that men are naturally “characterized by dominance and aggression” (484), therefore supporting the fact that men are restricted to display themselves as softies—someone that is of emotional service to the needs of women. Nick cannot do the simple task of calling his housemaid by her real name, instead calling her “babe”. He does not try to make an earnest effort of wanting to build a close and loving father/daughter relationship with his daughter, Alex, instead playing the minimal role of “Uncle Dad”. He does not have any respect for any of the women that he works with that he arrogantly has doing all of his secretarial and personal work for him.
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