‘—

Assignment 5

In C.J Pascoe’s book, the roles of gender identity and sexual orientation was a huge factor that was discussed, especially in the begging of chapter 1 where he explained the skit that took place in this high-school. The theme that was portrayed in this skit highlights the themes of masculinity and sexuality that is present in high school. The contest that was taking place in this skit was called the Mr. Cougar competition and it shows the different dynamics of sexuality, gender, social class, and race. The skit starts off with two nerds who are un-masculine and have high pitched voices and can not protect their girlfriends when they are kidnapped by the complete opposite version of themselves. The skit shows how they do a complete 360 change in their overall appearance and act like someone who they are not, just to prove to themselves and everyone around them that they are masculine. When they were trying to change who they were by working out, it showed that they were weak and came across as they were homosexual. In representing black men, the ganstas in this skit symbolized the hyper- sexuality by threatening the white men’s control over how they treat and protect their women.  I believe the entire message of this skit was wrong in so many ways by how they were trying portray that if your a young man you have to act a certain way. You need to be masculine and straight and act a certain way, because if not it wouldn’t be considered the “norm”. The administration of this school must agree with this skit because they approved of it and allowed it be shown in-front of the school, meaning they agree with the skits overall message of it. The administration must be trying to prove a message of a certain norm they want to have in their school, that in order to be a regular boy you must be masculine and powerful and heterosexual and not homosexual and a nerd/weak. Gender and sexuality was a huge part in this skit and I believe that is not the social norm. It does not matter in today’s day what sexuality identity you are or how you even identify yourself. I believe that there is no social norm and everyone should choose to live their life the way they want too.