He Can but She Cannot: The Harmful Effects of Sexism on Women
The idea of a sexual double standard emphasizes that men have more sexual freedom than their female counterparts. According to Professor Derek Kreager, a sexual double standard is “the belief that women and men are held to different standards of sexual conducts in contemporary society” (Kreager 1). This concept is evident not only in modern society, but in the past as well. Stephen Crane, an American author of the late 1800s helps prove this. He was extremely thorough in making sure he wrote truthfully to the times he lived. With that in mind, in his novella “Maggie: A Girl of the Streets” there is a clear sexual double standard. There is a strong presence of a sexual double standard
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Many would claim that men and women are treated exactly the same. This statement is disproven in “Maggie: a Girl of the Streets”. This is obvious when Crane writes that, “Pete did not consider that he had ruined Maggie. If he had thought that her soul could never smile again, he would have believed the mother and brother, who were pyrotechnic over the affair, to be responsible for it” (Crane 61). Pete never even considered the repercussions his actions would have on Maggie. At first in the novella, Maggie was nervous about kissing Pete. When Pete slept with Maggie he “ruined” her but he never would have considered her downfall to be his fault. Since Pete had a higher status as a man and in general, he did not concern himself with what would happen to Maggie. This reveals the sexual double standard because Pete did not even have to think about his actions, while Maggie was forced to take responsibility for both of their actions. Oakland University sociologist and anthropologist Heidi Lyons explains the overwhelming proof that there is a sexual double standard. She reports that, “Teenage boys who gain considerable sexual experience do not run the same risk of being labeled deviant as do their female counterparts. More specifically, young women who had a high number of sex partners were socially reprimanded for their behaviors, and young men were rewarded.” (Lyons 3). The young women in this study are seen as socially inferior to the men and Lyons works to expose this fact. Since the men are held on a pedestal they are not scolded or held responsible for their actions. The more confirmed sexual experiences a woman has the lower she falls socially. The more experiences a man has the higher he is held in esteem in today’s society. This sexual double standard makes no sense at all. The women are expected to stay
Have you ever noticed how some people just stand out from the crowd? Like the clouds in the sky and blades of grass, people are all different. “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker has a good example of an interesting, unique character. Maggie is a young girl who is not only physically but also mentally scarred. The way the burning house, her stuck-up sister, and society affects Maggie makes her different from everyone else.
Maggie Vandermeer dwells in a contemporary society where proficiency in regards to social media is a rather dominant feature, especially in her search for a job and as an attempt to conform. As Maggie is not familiar with such social media’s, especially in comparison to the younger generation, this renders Maggie somewhat of a misfit and continues her path of solitude, as she has no friends or a job. Although Maggie routinely uses her cell phone to text or tweet, she has not yet integrated herself to this contemporary society, as the younger generation is remarkably adept with social media. Moreover, Maggie isn’t conversant with the proper norms that belong to social media. For example, at the beginning of the story, Maggie is woken up by her daughter, Lacey Vandermeer, who sends her a text at 1:27 AM. Next, she begins to Twitter stalk Lacey’s page until she discovers Lacey’s presumed lover named Dane Davis, and begins to stalk him as well. Maggie also seems to prefer face to face interactions, rather than communication with some sort of social media. This preference differentiates her from the younger generation, as they tend to prefer communicating through social media. For example, When Lacey suggests how she does not need to come over, Maggie insists on the value of face to face interaction. “The point was to have a visit with you,” Maggie says (Cullen, 36). When Maggie attends her job interviews, the interviewers, who are of that younger generation, stress the
The author of “Everyday Use,” Alice Walker, portrays that society values people like Dee more so than Maggie. The two sisters in the story are described as two complete opposites in personality, how they carry themselves, and even overall appearance. Walker describes Maggie with a quote, “she has been like this, chin on chest, eyes on ground, feet in shuffle, ever since the fire that burned the other house to the ground” (71). This description of Maggie relates to someone who is clearly shy, not very confident, and appears closed off to the world. Society does not appear to value people who are not very confident and not open to the world in general. Describing the illiteracy of Maggie also adds to the view of society valuing Dee over Maggie.
During the early 1800s into the nineteenth century it was believed that men and women came from two separate spheres. These spheres influenced the way gender roles were shaped and perceived. Suggesting that women belonged in the household, apart of the private sphere and men belonged in the economic world, apart of the public sphere. Men and women were understood to be polar opposites and because of this, women were oppressed. Female sexuality was defined as “passionlessness,” and only for the purpose of reproduction. We learn that women were considered “voracious” for expressing their sexuality however, men were encouraged to express their sexuality as part of maintaining power, prestige, and masculinity. (Cott, 1978, 222). Men
Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, a novella written in 1893 by Stephen Crane, focuses on a poverty stricken family living in the Bowery district of New York City. This novella is regarded as one of the first works of naturalism in American literature and it helped shape the naturalistic principle that a character is set into a world where there is no escape from one’s biological heredity and the circumstances that the characters find themselves in will dominate their behavior and deprive them of individual responsibility. Throughout the story, the primary goal of the main characters is to escape the lives they lead and to find more comfortable lives away from their current problems, which differs from the romantic ideal that the main characters usually turn inwards to solve their problems.
Stephen Crane’s analysis of life is spawned from his point of view about the world. These opinions correlate alongside naturalistic train of understanding. He applied a legitimate law of the universe, “ one can either accept the laws determining the social order or become their victim,” which is applied to the novel Maggie: Girl of the streets. The book is an example of Naturalistic and a Realistic novel that offers an accurate and specific illustration of life and was portrayed based on people living in a poor society, and how they were affected emotionally, physically, psychologically, and mentally. The novella serves as a medium of drama that occurs,
“[E]nvironment is a tremendous thing in the world, and frequently shapes lives regardless.” (“Although it’s origins…”) Stephen Crane was influenced to write his 1893 novella, Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, as a result of his religious family, the secrecy to publish a novel that reveals the reality and impurity of the real world and from the impact of needy, urban landscapes that ended realism and began naturalism.
Maggie: A Girl of the Streets The theme I chose for the novel, Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, that centers around the main character Maggie is that family isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be. When you think of family usually you would think of warmth, happiness, support, love, affection, shelter and all the above, right?
The novel, Maggie: A Girl Of The Streets, by Stephen Crane, takes place in the slums of New York City during the 1890’s. It is about a girl, Maggie Johnson, who is forced to grow up in a tenement house. She had a brother, Jimmie, an abusive mother, Mary, and a father who died when Maggie was young. When Maggie grew up, she met her boyfriend, Pete. In Maggie’s eyes, Pete was a sophisticated young man who impressed Maggie because he treated her better than she had been treated to all of her life. Once Maggie’s mother and brother found out that Maggie was sleeping with this man, Mary threw Maggie out into the streets, condemning her to a life of evil. Eventually, Pete decided he no longer wished to see Maggie.
After the Civil War, realism became a dominant form of writing in the United States, with writers attempting to write about everyday life. After realism came naturalism, a form of writing similar to realism, but with more pessimism. One of the reasons for this pessimism stems from free will and the question of whether people possess it or not. In realism, it is definitely true, while in naturalism it seems less so, but the options are often less than ideal. Because choices do exist for characters, free will is still there, which indicates that naturalism is a derivative form of realism. In Stephen Crane’s “Maggie: A Girl of the Streets,” the characters may have little chance to escape the world they inhabit, like Maggie, Jimmie, and
Stephen Crane wrote many short stories, one of which was Maggie: A Girl of the Streets. His stories contained various aspects of Naturalism, a literary movement that sought to replicate a believable everyday reality, as opposed to Romanticism or Surrealism, in which subjects may receive highly symbolic, idealistic, or even supernatural treatment. Poverty, abuse and a survival of the fittest way of life created an environment which Maggie was negatively influenced by. Her environment is made up of many circumstances that affect her, one of which is poverty.
Crane’s Maggie: A Girl of the Streets opening scene features violence, which is a taboo subject during the time period he wrote the piece; “His coat had been torn to shreds in a scuffle, and his hat was gone. He had bruises on twenty parts of his body, and blood was dripping from a cut in his head”(946). The three children experience abuse, both physical and emotional, from the mother and the father in the early chapters of this work. Stephen Crane states, [ Youse allus fightn’, Jimmie, an’yeh knows it puts mudder out when yehs come home half dead, an’ it’s like we’ll all get a poundin’ (949).] Furthermore, this abuse is evidenced by the following quote from Stephen Crane [The mother’s massive shoulders heaved with anger. Grasping the urchin by the neck and shoulder she shook him until he rattled(949).] Violence is a
What is even stranger is that women fully enforce this sexual double standard. Over 99% of woman agree that women enjoy sex as much as men do, yet when asked to describe a woman who has had many sexual partners, over 59% percent of women used words that fell under the negatively connotative ‘Promiscuous’ category, using words like “slut,” “cheap,” “loose,” “whore,” “easy,” and “dirty.” Twelve percent of women even used words that would suggest that sexually liberal woman are psychologically damaged, using words like “insecure,” “lonely,” “desperate,” “needy,” and ‘unfulfilled.” Only 8% of women tagged a sexually liberal woman in the more positive category of “sexually focused,” the respondents feeling that “these women were uncommitted and focused on sex rather than the relationship” (Milhausen and Herold). In addition, “Women were more likely to discourage a female friend from dating a highly experienced male that a male friend from dating a highly experienced female” (Milhausen and Herold). This fact furthers the case for women’s involvement in maintaining the double standard. In a one study researchers found that “Women will endorse a sexual double standard in which women are judged more
In the Novel Maggie: A Girl of the Streets was a very dramatic story that contain lots of anger, abuse, emotional, and naïve scenes. This story took place in New York in the bad side of town where most of the kids spent their days in the streets or known to them as the rum ally. This story showed a lot of reality of everyday life of people living in poverty. It shows a great example of people’s decisions affecting their life’s. As seen in the story Maggie the main character her decisions impacted her life. I believe that if things would have different Maggie could have had a fair shot in life.
In Stephen Crane’s book Maggie: A Girl of the Streets there are various themes, one of them is the impact of the social environment. The impact of social environment is how people are products of their own environment and people are who they grew up to be due to the conditions, people, and environment that surrounds them. The Bowery is 14 blocks and has 82 bars there that make alcohol very accessible to the residents, including children. The Bowery has a negative impact on people and even children that live there. The Bowery is a concrete jungle where only the strong survive. The living conditions are unquestionably poor and the tenements where they live is full of immigrants. The kids in the Bowery live with alcoholic and abusive parents, pregnant women who are not married, and finally prostitutes. Maggie, Jimmie, and Pete are all characters that deserve forgiveness due to Stephen Crane message, people are products of their own environment and deserve forgiveness.