I'm sure all you girls have seen this hilarious classic, "The Devil Wears Prada," and even you boys have probably seen your sisters and mothers watching is and stayed to watch for a while because it's so good. This clip is showing Andy Sachs, or Anne Hathaway, at her first day on the job as the assistant to the editor of a fashion magazine. Her coworkers are trying to show their ideas of clothing lines to her boss Miranda Priestly, or Meryl Streep, but Miranda is making rude remarks back and is proving to be extremely hard to impress. Andy let's out a giggle on accident at the ridiculous spectacle her new boss is putting on and suddenly Miranda sharply turns towards her and just rips her apart. Miranda criticizes her fashion sense and even her her competence in the workplace.
Modern female bosses are almost always portrayed in this light as
the terrible "queen bee" of the office who demands an excessive
amount of work from her assistants, is rude to everyone in the workplace and
works at the expense of anyone around her to succeed. There are countless
examples of the queen bee of the workplace in the media, including in popular
movies like Margaret Tate from The Proposal. Can you think of a movie where the female boss is a nice, caring
young woman who does wonders for the workplace? I certainly can't.
One article even gives a name to this stereotype of the female boss in the workplace, calling it the "Queen Bee Syndrome," and defining it as, "The alpha female who tries to preserve her power at all costs," and instead of supporting her younger coworkers, "she feels threatened by them and ends up obstructing their attempts to climb the corporate ladder."
The words "threatened" and "obstructing" both
have very negative connotations as they refer to someone who lives in constant
fear that the people around them intend to do them harm, which is almost never
the case in our modern day workplace, and she has the intention of
"obstructing" or making the lives of her colleagues more difficult
instead of working collaboratively with them.
American media
is perpetuating this stereotype of the "queen bee syndrome" and
affecting the way all female bosses are viewed, even to their own gender. As you can see from this previous post on female bosses in the workplace, we need to increase the numbers of women in high professional positions and stereotypes like this one can only hurt the chances. As a woman myself striving to one day have a future in the business world we need to open our eyes and realize what kind of effect things in the media like this have on our American society.
What other stereotypes do you see being perpetuated in American media?
Feel free to comment your thoughts!
Hi Madi,
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad you're writing about these issues! I grew up thinking that sexism was something out of the past-- feminism wasn't really needed, because women had gained the vote, and gained equal rights. It wasn't until college and joining the workforce that I really understood how sexism is still so prevalent in our society. It often appears in subtle ways, such as the Queen Bee syndrome, which is why I think people tend to overlook the persistence of gender inequality. Have you heard of the Bechdel test? It asks whether a work of fiction (book, movie, tv show) features at least two women who talk to each other about something other than a man. It's really disappointing how many contemporary works fail this test.
I also think a lot about how feminism is a "dirty word." How many female celebrities insist that they are not feminists? (Taylor Swift comes to mind, but I know there are many others). I think such statements, especially coming from prominent media figures, are really damaging to young people, making them believe that feminism is bad or that women should not publicly promote their equality.
One final thought- there are currently 20 female senators, the most in US history, and there have been 44 total. I think that until this number changes, we will continue to face discrimination throughout our society.