Sex Toys And Their Key Functional And Semiotic Components

This paper will summarize the ERR articles from the bulleted topics and issues. This paper will also include summaries on toys that may encourage violence and aggression, toys that may promote pro-social behavior, gender stereotyping in toy selection, and cultural stereotyping or, lack of cultural awareness in toys.

Toys play an important role in childhood development as children learn roles and skills from playing. As a result, the toys children are subjected to have an affect on which roles, interests, and skills are learned and practiced. Through Lego’s product Duplo, I will demonstrate the influence particular gendered toys have on children and their performance of traditional gender roles. Gender, which is a learned performance, is something society has been taught from a very early age and toy advertising has played a significant role in reinforcing the performance. One tradition that is reinforced and naturalized by society is the ideology of a male dominated society, representing strong characteristics of heterosexuality and masculinity; also known as hegemonic masculinity. Therefore, using Ideological Criticism, I will analyze how through the branding and design of Lego’s Duplo toys, children have been constructed to do gender differently, ultimately perpetuating and reinforcing hegemonic masculinity.

Sex life is full of complete mysteries. We know there is a lot of unfounded gossips, myths, and taboos floating in the air about sex toys that hold back people wanting to explore the kinky side of sex, keeping them from discovering their own pleasure power. Thanks to Sex in the City’s infamous episode “Rabbit Pearl” vibrator because it brought sex toys more into the open for the American public. For those who have broken those chains, another problem arises “cheap/fake and substandard products!!” The sex toy industry is exceptionally unregulated, and many toys are made out of chemicals that can be dangerous to your body. Research was carried out and about 60% of loyal sex toy customers were being sold

Suppressed sexuality and coy, coquettish femininity are nothing new to the world of women. Women are told to be polite, appreciative, and at all costs, protect their ‘womanhood,’ also known as their sexuality. Yet, women for ages have been fighting this oppression and pushing the limits of their physical roles as sexual beings; ancient Greek women used sex toys to illicit pleasure, and Asian women have been doing the same for a thousand years. There have been vast improvements in women’s sex toys, but exposure of them has been continually stifled by the overwhelming tone of patriarchy. By analyzing the vibrator in Wendy Griswold’s cultural diamond I will show how the agents of the vibrator patented women’s

The sexualization in children’s toys does not stop at the commercials for them that are aired on TV. Around the 1980’s, products for children suddenly saw a stark divide in gender. The gender difference in toys is characterized by often harmful gender roles. Toys for boys are usually based on being macho, tough, and violent, while girl’s toys tend to focus on appearance, being pretty and attractive to boys. These toys are often highly structured, limiting creativity and are centered around adult themes. According to Levin and Kilbourne, when we give children these toys, “We’re letting the sexualized media and popular culture, not ourselves, control the lessons children will learn” (44). When a culture that treats sexuality in such harmful ways controls children’s experiences, it creates an artificial and harmful identity in young girls that focuses on sexiness, and an identity in boys that values violence and devalues kindness and nurturing.

According to cook and Cusack (2010), Gender stereotypes are concerned with social and cultural construction of man and women, due to their physical, biological, sexual and social functions, structured set of beliefs about the personal attributes of man and women. Childhood is a fundamental and significant period in forming an impression of an individual boy or girl, and man or women finally. Subsequent researchers Ania and Cameron(2011) hold an accordant opinion with Cook and Cusack(2010) that gender stereotyping is problematic only when it operates to ignore personal characteristics, abilities, needs, wishes, and circumstances (Cook & Cusack, 2010). In fact, during children’s learning process of gender stereotypes, most of them are under gigantic pressure of the society they belong to and formed a problematic view through normally ignored. One obvious phenomenon is about the toys. Toys are designed and retailed separately for boys and girls with different colours, styles and functions by toy manufacturers. When acquiring a toy, gender will normally be the first issue to consider instead of children’s inherent preferences. It will highly possible to limit children’s personal experiences and future development for both gender groups (Martin, Eisenbud & Rose, 1995). This article will analyse the role of toy manufacturers in gender development in order to decide whether they are responsible to

Children love toys because they find them enjoyable and help them in building an imagination. Toys are advertised on televisions and radios in order to get parents to buy them for their kids. Playing with toys helps to build character and teaches children the basics of early life, like shape-sorting or building things with building blocks. Some toys are educational and teach kids numbers, letters, and how to read using fun ways that they find understandable and delightful. All kids have their own preference of toys, boys like cars and Nerf guns and girls like American Girl and Easy-Bake Ovens. Girls and boys are different genders and have their own preference of toys based on what society says is “for girls” or “for boys”. Since the beginning of time, societies have made women out to be frail people that do “feminine” activities, such as: making clothes, cleaning the house, and taking care of the children. Today, we see these activities as “sexist”, women can other things when given the proper motivation. It’s demeaning to think of women as people who only love shopping, overly romantic tokens-of-affection, chick flicks, and etc. Stereotypes and demeaning rumors still go around today, it’s even shown in toys that young children play with. Toys in today’s society affect gender stereotypes.

One man, Davecat, has found his answer to combat isolation through relationships with inanimate objects. He has married his synthetic sex doll, Sidore, while carrying on an “affair” with his mistress, Elena, who is also a synthetic sex doll. The concept of marrying a synthetic sex doll may appear to be one born out of perversion but it is not necessarily so and in Davecat’s situation it is not. Davecat describes his connection with said sex dolls and the impact it has on his morale as “I'm about 99 percent fulfilled. Every time I return home, there are two gorgeous synthetic women waiting for me, who both act as creative muses, photo models, and romantic partners. They make my flat less empty.” It is easy to view situations like these as jokes or punchlines of society, much easier than it is to examine the society in which these incidents happen. That is what one must do though in order to definitively cast incidents like these off as the result of a crazy outlier within society. Upon examining our society, it becomes obvious that these steps, though they may be drastic, they are not crazy. We live in a society where consumerism has gone off the rails and the value of connection and intimacy is overshadowed by significantly less important things, such as saving five dollars on a t-shirt. This inverse relationship between globalization and intimacy displayed by American society is

Unfortunately, the packing and the products conveyed the tone and pressure associated with being a female in our culture. For example, a display of a vibrant pink light up vanity set dressed a corner of the isle. It was accompanied by a matching brush set, pretend curling iron, blow dryer and a few curling rollers. Sold separately, I smiled as I found scented perfume. This model was aligned with the standards place on young girls to be dainty and pretty and to entertain the importance of physical appearance. It applauded not too far from the vanity display I came across kitchen sets along with food pieces to complete the set. I was intrigued by life size brooms and dust pans and matching aprons. I gasped as I set my eyes on an ironing board and iron set. I was taken back for a second, because I refused to buy into my own thought that the toys were an implication of what society views as female roles, but the message was overwhelming and significant. Babies dolls, swing sets, play pens, bottles, diapers all set the stage for the image of the idea of a mother tending to her child. Is this a representation of a women’s worth? Although, knew the answer I asked myself “are there any toys that entertain the role of a

Many people can agree that the toys they played with shaped their childhood. A child should be allowed to play with toys of their choosing; however this is not always the case due to traditional gender stereotypes. There is a clear separation that girls should play with dolls and other domestic-like toys while boys should play with action figures and toys that are more educational or physical. This was not always the case. Before the 1990s toys were primarily gender neutral. But in the 1990s, toys became increasingly gender divided due to marketers seeing an opportunity to sell products to two different audiences, which would increase sales. Consequently, gender toys have lead to many negative effects including girls and boys believing

With today’s society growing more accepting sex has never been harder to define. Historically society has found ways to conceptualize everything from sex to sex work. However, with conceptualization come consequences. The language we use, the historical concepts we hold on to and the approaches we take on topics effects our views. Our language can change depending on who is being talked about and our historical concepts can become weak the deeper we discuss a concept. Sex is a complicated topic and can cause tension around negotiations in recognizing different ways of understanding it. All of these approaches to sex have always been, and still is, the locus of so much debate precisely because what is being investigated has never been, and likely never will, be completely agreed upon.

Gender is the personal traits and social positions that members of a society attach to being female of male. “Are Gendered Toys Bad for Boys and Girls?” is the question asked with in the podcast. So in this essay it will discuss the opinion in the podcast vs. the fact of the sociological perspective in the book.

Gender roles in toys are overwhelmingly obvious. The breakdown has not changed in so many years that we all comply with and follow without question. Taking a trip to the local Toys R Us store showed me just how obvious the line was drawn for the sexes, showing a specific division of the two. The stores layout clearly establishes the line between girl’s toys and boys toys. There are very few isles that will intermingle within the sexes. For this project I selected the following age groups; infant, preschool and school age with a focus on girls toys.

In this article researchers determine how some Latin American prostitutes identify with their sexuality. The most important aspects to consider understanding prostitution include sexuality, gender, class and ethnicity. Due to the fact that good portions of the Dutch prostitutes are immigrants it was helpful to gather information from a Latin American male sex employee who is working as a transvestite prostitute. It was important or the author to allow readers to experience the information from the perspective of a known sex worker. Often time’s information gathered for research on prostitution is not from the sex workers themselves but general information by the researcher perspective. This information was based on his life experiences everyday sex workers, immigrants and how they sexually identified him. To help give us a

Bubble wrap can be used to make a great, and unusual, dildo, in virtually any width you want. Take a length of bubble wrap and roll it tightly, bubble-side out for additional texture, until it's as thick as you like. Place a condom over the roll of bubble wrap, and use a rubber band or tape to hold the end of the condom in