Question 4 Prompt:
Are there any direct references or appeals to the audience on the featured text? State your theory about what those appeals to the audience suggest about who the writer believes the audience is, what they believe the audience values, or what the relationship between the writer/audience seems to be.
Response:
The article “Metrosexuals Come Out” explores how and why metro sexuality has become more common and acceptable in modern pop culture. The author writes this article for a sophisticated and skeptical audience that is interested in finding out why metro sexuality has become more popular. The New York Times is a very prestigious and respected newspaper. Writers for this paper need to support their claims with empirical evidence and sound reasoning. Many of the articles within The NY Times are meant to expose people to topics and ideas they may not know much about. These articles also serve the purpose of spurring further conversation and dialect on the written topic.
This article is written with the assumption that the normal man does not particularly enjoy shopping and spends less time and effort trying to look good. This assumption was fairly accurate in the past but is quickly changing as more men begin to fit the stereotype of a metro sexual. One reference from the text supports this bias of the author, “ 'They're all low-slung jeans and working out with six packs and more hair product than I've ever used in my life, and they smell better than your mother on Easter,' he said.” This quote demonstrates how much effort metro sexuals put into looking and smelling good compared to what is thought of as the norm.
The most interesting claim this article makes is the role of marketing in the rising popularity of metro sexuality. The gay writer Mark Simpson believes that marketers wanted men to spend more money on consumer products such as clothes, colognes and eloquent food and beverages. Since marketers had this incentive to promote male consumer spending, they helped to promote the idea of the metro sexual man. Marketers made it more acceptable for men to appear metro sexual instead of the stereotypical “manly man.” Whether this rising emergence of metro sexuality is good or bad is left up for debate. One gay man talks about how it’s become increasingly difficult to distinguish gay from straight men. “'Before, you used to get punched,' he said. 'Now it's all, 'Gee thanks, I'm straight but I'm really flattered.'”
When you stated that writers for the New York times need to support their claims with evidence, I found that after reading this article, this particular writer does not support many of his claims. The writer automatically assumes that now that men of the past were not well mannered or well dressed according to his quote, "a man who dresses well, has good manners, understands thread counts or has opinions on women's fashion is gay." This is a bold statement with no evidence supporting what a man before the trend of sexuality and a man during the trend act or dress like.
ReplyDeleteI feel that some writers just try to put the issue out there and they just say what they want to say without actually backing it up. This can misinform readers and should really be watched out for by more people.
ReplyDeleteI feel like this author did not back up most of his statements in this article. I also think it is pretty crazy that the term "metro sexual" came about mostly because of marketers. That just shows what kind of world we live in.
ReplyDeletei find it pretty interesting that homosexual men are finding a different reaction to their accidental courting of straights. through just that observation, we can see the times and how they have changed. in my opinion, they have changed for the best too. it went from violent retaliation to taking the whole thing as a polite compliment.
ReplyDeleteI found that term metrosexual is just looking 'cool' word. But, that looking cool term makes people spend money on their clothes. As time changes, many men trying to groom and trying to become like women. and that made people spend some money for that to follow trend.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the author had valid claims either. they could have supported their ideas more clearly in order to make this article stronger
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