women in movies and TV have been portrayed like this for a multitude of reasons. the first being that in the time frame you talk about the male figure was socially accepted as dominate over the female. therefore he would need to “save” her from pretty much everything, regardless of the situation or how minor it really is.
Bones is a recent TV show, she is displayed as independent and headstrong. See the problem even with that show is that she is socially unaware and therefore we can say that the male FBI agent in the show “saves” her from that social handicap. If you don’t understand what I mean then watch the new trailer for the show. She explains complex ideas to him and then fails to understand why he said “she’s da bomb”. In a sense her “weakness” is that social handicap she has from being a “squint” as the show puts it.
He probably wouldn’t, but his physiological reactions (flight or fight) would be different. Males and females had different roles after all in our early incarnations…and different levels of importance in a community. Men were less valuable since they didn’t carry the children (and since it takes less men to ensure a continuation of a population).
Of course, some women don’t reflexively scream…and some men do. There are variations in any population.
I don’t deny that she has character flaws, but the relevant point is that she is emotionally detached from her work. You might even argue that her emotional detachment is not always beneficial (perhaps hindering her ability to form close relationships). I also realize that she doesn’t usually stumble across the bodies, either (she is called in to investigate after they have been discovered). I’m just presenting an example of a female character who doesn’t follow the traditional emotional profile under discussion.
Stereotypes exist for a reason-- not all of them are some conspiracy of the powerful over the oppressed or some such babble that a lousy college professor might argue.
Women scream when startled. Some don’t, but most do. Most men don’t scream, but some do.
I spent most of the night at a haunted forest two weeks ago. Women by the boatload screamed bloody murder. Men, much less so. I did yell out a couple of times when startled, but my tough-as-nails RN GF (who has actually seen her fair share of bloody corpses) screamed like the proverbial little girl at every fright.
I also don’t see this as being something parents teach-- this one appears to cross cultures pretty easily.
Yeah, but why are their physiological reactions different? Are you saying that because a man is less valuable people are less likely to come running when a man screamed, and therefore fewer screaming men survived to pass on this trait?
Well…because men and women have different physiological traits. They also have different cultural differences wrt roles in their societies. Why would you expect them to be the same?
No…I’m saying that men who reacted by screaming may have had a slight disadvantage in terms of survival over men who picked up a stick and jabbed it into the predator instead. Or, maybe they just developed other traits instead of screaming that gave them better chances of survival. Remember that men were the hunters (this is where the ‘less valuable, more able to put at risk’ aspect comes in). Think that through. You are out hunting with your chums and a predator (or something else) surprises you. What would be the optimal response over time? Screaming (and maybe driving off the PREY) or some other more aggressive response?
Again, why would you expect a males response to be the same as a females, given the high level of differences both physical and cultural both sexes had over the period of our evolution?
Same here–I startle inside and freeze up. After a moment I might make some distress noises, if there was still a threat, but a dead body that’s just lying there, no. I would have a mental cloud to fight through to get to “Call 911” but no screaming.
BTW…I think some folks here are assuming that screaming is some kind of sign of weakness or something. Or that because some women reflexively scream this means they are weaker than men.
Far from it. I was watching a show on (I think) Discovery this week about animal attacks on humans. In one of the segments they were talking about a man and his wife walking through the woods somewhere in California. The man was out in front on a trail and was attacked by a mountain lion. The man’s response was the fight (and probably be eaten) while the woman’s response was the start screaming…and grab a stick and start whacking on the lion. According to their accounts on the show the man was losing the fight and the stick was having no effect on the lion at all…but the woman’s screams eventually annoyed or spooked the lion enough that it gave up and walked away. The man nearly died, but his fight response was enough to keep the thing at bay long enough for the woman to either get away or help out…and the woman’s response was enough to frighten off or disturb the beast and eventually drive it off.
Even if this kind of thing was a fairly low probability event it would have SOME effect on later behavior and response in both men and women. I thought the description of the attack was a pretty good indication that our flight or fight responses are pretty reflexive in us…and definitely differentiated by sexual roles.
For the record, I’d probably let out a string of expletives. It’s my default reaction to many things. My cow-orkers claim I have Tourettes because I won’t say a word then suddenly say, “FUCK!” when AutoCAD crashes.
And actually, I don’t believe women instinctively scream when surprised but men don’t. I suspect it’s cultural. It’s a cliche that “Men never let their guard down,” but if they did you would not only hear them scream like Pvt Wilhelm but also sob during a movie besides “Ol’ Yeller” and “Brian’s Song.” And what self-respecting guy wants to do that?
On a similar note, I’ve noticed that women are more inclined to make a joyous “WOOOOOO!” for many things that men would otherwise do silently; taking shots, seeing a friend for the first time in months, a favorite song begun on the radio or by a band, and so on.
Firstly it seems to be assumed that this is an ‘innate’ difference, rather than socialised.
Secondly, Ive seen plenty of men yell non verbally when shocked, both in movies and real life. So really its more what kind of noise made rather than a noise being made at all, and Id put that more down to voice pitch than anything else.
I’ve considered starting a similar thread on several occasions prompted by different observations, just never thought about it while I was actually in front of a computer. But now that I’m here and thinking about it.
In one of the Lethal Weapon movies, Sgt. Roger Murtaugh’s daughter is caught out in the open during a firefight and rather than diving for cover she dances around in the open flailing her hands and screeching a lot. I remember thinking “What kind of survival behavior is that? Give me a gun and I’ll shoot her myself.” While that was obviously scripted, I have observed similar behavior in RL.
Another instance. Listening to radio in the car with my daughter, she wanted to listen to Disney radio so I flipped over to it. Shortly they had one of their call-in contests. Approximate dialog…
DJ: Hi there! You’re caller 15!
Caller: EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!! Ohmygod, Ohmygod, Ohmygod, EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
DJ: Congratulations, you’re entered in our drawing for (whatever)
Caller: EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
I’d buy the cultural thing, since a bunch of Middle-Eastern cultures, among others, have it as accepted gospel that women wail and collapse at funerals. Contrast this with that part of the East Coast in the US that believes in restraint at the same type of event. There Will Be No Drama.
If someone’s going to be fighting the smilodon, you want it to be the man. His greater physical strength makes him more likely to win, and even if he loses, the tribe can afford the loss of a man better than the loss of a woman. If a man’s at risk and screams, he might get the rest of the tribe to come to him and put the females at risk, and that’s bad. If a woman’s at risk and screams, she might get a man to put himself at risk instead of her, and that’s good (compared to the woman being at risk, at least).
Men don’t scream since we can’t. I have seen men gasp and be taken aback all the time. After a lads voice cracks its hard for him to scream in the classic “girly fashion”.
I don’t know but I watched one of those “World’s Scariest Moments” video the other day and there was this stunt boat that had a horrible accident. It was supposed to turn to the left in a quick fashion and the stunt man was supposed to jump off, what nobody knew was that there was a hidden stunt driver beneath the boat and the rutter broke and the boat flew into the crowd.
They had a woman on there who was hit by this bigass boat and she said that she heard this loud scream coming from somewhere and once everything stopped she said that she realized it was her screaming.
I confess, I scream when I see large insects. And it just happens – I don’t consciously take a big deep breath and belt out a scream or anything, but if I’m trying to kill a centipede on the wall and it falls onto the floor before I can get it, out will come an inhaled, “Yeeeeheeeheeheaaaah!” But that’s fueled by panic. I don’t think I’d react the same way upon finding a dead body, because I myself wouldn’t be in any danger and my panic response wouldn’t get triggered.