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Assignment 05

Semir Mulic

10-1-17

In C.J. Pascoe’s book ‘Dude You’re a Fag’ we’re able to see that there a couple different outlooks on gender and sexuality in River High.  A main setting I want to focus on was the play, it really pushed gender norms. With the girls being kidnapped and having to need saving from the male nerds it seemed as though the girls were helpless and needed sort of a “big strong man” trope. The boys would be seen as weak even when they spoke because they spoke in feminine voices. The boys were then “turned into men” when they did some weightlifting, an interesting thing here was that the female weightlifter would be applauded for lifting these weights as it was seen as breaking the gender norm, the boys were laughed at when they ripped off their pants to expose skirts, they laughed at the feminine qualities but applauded the masculine. The play in it’s entirety seemed innocent but played on the gender bias of the students.

The teachers were a different story, they placed dress codes on girls , promoted pairings with dances, rallies and prom. a couple teachers stand out, Ms. Mac for example would promote abstinence and encouraged heterosexuality through the pictures she kept of male and female pairings at the school’s events, she even in her teachings drew on heterosexual concepts. Ms. Mac wasn’t the worst offender of pushing gender norms, that would go to Mr. Ford and Mr. Kellog. They would go up to a student named Huey and make fun of his lack of success with females, even going from one class room to another just to tease him about it. Mr. Kellog had even said after Huey flipped off Mr. Ford that he should be having doing that with girls and not Mr. Ford. They pushed this agenda that he HAD to have relations with girls or else he was a failure.