Tough Guise

By Matt Goryance:

I think the film “Tough Guise” is very interesting and since we only touched on it briefly in class I thought I would take the opportunity to bring it up again. I took a Women’s Studies class here online a few semesters ago and we were told to watch a couple of clips from this film then and we discussed it in there too. I think the title is just as clever as the ideas in the film. The word Guise is defined as “an external form, appearance, or manner of presentation, typically concealing the true nature of something.” So therefore he believes all these “guys” are just acting tough because that’s how they were brought up thinking of guys. There is a lot of pressure if you are a male to be strong, tough, respected, etc. and you are generally treated poorly and made fun of if you don’t fit those characteristics.

As if peers, siblings, and parents didn’t help their sons in the manly direction enough already giving them G.I. Joes and footballs to play with the media reinforces these ideas on a daily basis and that’s a lot of what “Tough Guise” is about. The guys in movies, on television, and in the papers are all usually in good shape and doing something we think of and respect as manly. I think this plays a big role in why most guys think that women can’t compete with them. All physical aspects aside, because there are certainly some exceptions like we saw with Holley Mangold being very strong, we just generally don’t think of women as being big, strong, and tough. Some women definitely can fit these characteristics but the ones we see in the media all the time are incredibly skinny. So every one associates women as being skinny, having long legs, and being pretty blondes, while guys are supposed to be jacked and tough.

A couple of my friends and I work out a lot and I don’t think any of us care about the health benefits or things like that. We work out because we are mostly concerned with not getting overweight and we want big muscles. We used to have to workout when we played high school sports but no one is making us workout anymore, we just want to in hopes of looking good because that’s how we want to look and it has to be the media that puts these wants in our heads. From the clip we watched in class the actors muscles are getting bigger and G.I. Joes arms have increased substantially. Maybe people would be more open to big, strong girls in sports if people saw them more. I believe most people feel the way they do about guys, girls, and sports because of what they see everyday and it’s hard to reverse a lifetime of thoughts and feelings for some now. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3exzMPT4nGI