Blog Three
In the Allan Johnson piece, he places an emphasis on difference is responsible for privilege and power. By using differences to separate people into groups, the privileged can keep to their own groups while holding themselves superior over other groups. These differences may be based on physical appearance or entities such as wealth or family. Johnson splits privileges between two types: unearned entitlement and conferred dominance. These types determine who has to do what, such as the mother taking care of a child and the father being the breadwinner.
The piece puts forth the +5 system, where a white middle-class male who is heterosexual and a Christian has the maximum score and confer the most advantage and anything deviating from those types lose points and advantage. From the differences in how people fit into this system, privilege and power are bestowed. It's from this socially-constructed scale that Allan Johnson claims disparity in things such as how most wealthy persons are white males. On the flip side, Johson points out that blacks are more likely to be arrested and convicted, women are less likely to be paid equal to their male counterparts for the same job, and homosexuals are more likely to be harassed or assaulted because of their sexual orientation. It's putting down these groups of people listed that Johnson claims has become the norm.
Thus, as the piece goes into a list of how males have more advantages than females, so too does the performance that woman are given differ from males. For example, as I stated earlier, the woman is expected to rear a child and raise it while the male acts as the source of income. Also, if the woman does start working, she can expect to be paid less for the same job as a male. Also, woman have to put on makeup and dress up for the guys. On the other hand, it's supposed to be the guy's job to ask her out. And if a guy puts on makeup, he'd be cast as a metrosexual or homosexual. Thus, gender performance is not just stuck to one side, but a game that both sides are made to play.