Gendered Drinks

Well, this Thanksgiving break was the first one where all of my friends from high school (including me, one of the youngest) are finally 21. Naturally, "hanging out" with old friends over breaks no longer involves only going out together for dinner, movies, and the like, but is instead rather excitingly supplemented with (well...kind of dominated by) going out to the bar(s). I got a little taste of "bar-hopping" at summer's end because my sister and I turned 21 on August 22, only a few days before everyone else "of age" were heading back to their schools. Over the past weekend, I went out with a few friends who were home and since I'm now almost constantly thinking about gender roles, I finally noticed the gendered drinks phenomenon.

I'm not saying that I wasn't aware of "the great divide" before this weekend; obviously attending school here has taught me a lot about American college students' alcohol culture. Anyway, I was at boxer's splitting a pitcher of some kind of light beer (I'm really no expert, but I think it was Yuengling) between five girls, two of whom I didn't know, and two of the girls kept complaining about drinking beer because they really just wanted to have girly drinks (as a side-note, I later found out that this meant dumping cheap whiskey into a whiskey sour mixer bottle and drinking it from the pouring nozzle. Uh, yeah...super girly!)

But all this got me thinking about how weird it is that our society has "girly" drinks and "manly drinks." Girly drinks are the ones that are fruity, garnished, and fancy-looking. Manly drinks, I guess, are basically anything not girly. Isn't that the truth about everything "manly," though: To be a man, negate what it means to be a woman and you've got it! (credit to Valenti). There exists this great divide, though. Some guys think it's awesome if a girl loves beer (the darker and hoppy-er, the better in my experience), so really...women have a lot more options when it comes to drinking alcohol without being judged by others. Guys, on the other hand, are criticized for wanting to consume "girly" drinks. Same old, same old.

Here's a funny link that explains, for guys, what NEVER to order at a bar (if you want to keep your masculinity).

http://www.justnews.com/slideshow/entertainment/13648473/detail.html

Cheers!