I have a bit of an issue with one of the scenes in Olly Murs' latest music video for his single Troublemaker.
We meet a woman, slim and attractive (obviously, it's a pop video *rolls eyes*) working in a cafe, being verbally harassed by an impatient man as she serves Olly Murs. The said impatient man (who is a stereotyped, 'greasy' middle aged man) slaps her backside and laughs as she walks past...
- Cue the first problem, you see a shocked face on Mr Murs, but no move to defend the girl or pick up the impatient man on his unacceptable behaviour. It's not just Murs though, none of the people in the cafe react.
So the girl - visibly pissed off (entirely justified) - picks up a big jug of icy water and pours it into impatient man's lap (also entirely justified).
- Cue the second problem, the video cuts to shocked faces of various customers in the cafe... A reaction to the girl's actions, not to the impatient man's vulgar behaviour. Her boss comes over and starts shouting at her while the impatient man kicks up a fuss.
Olly Murs - who saw the whole incident - does nothing to jump to the girl's defence and help explain how unacceptable the impatient man's behaviour was to provoke such a reaction in the girl.
No, nothing was done. So she takes off her apron and quits her job.
Granted, she doesn't really seem to try and explain why she poured water into the impatient man's lap, but I doubt her boss would be sympathetic even if she did.
Furthermore, she is labelled a 'troublemaker' for her reaction to the impatient man's behaviour.
Sigh, yet another example of everyday sexism, depicted in pop culture, where young people are shown that girls should expect that kind of harassment and suffer the consequences for reacting to it. While boys aren't set an example to stand up against that kind of behaviour towards girls, but to just sit back and keep quiet.
No comments:
Post a Comment