The Search for Masculinity in Gendered Products

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If you're shopping around a store, typically a drug store, you're bound to see something in bold letters stating, "FOR MEN." A lot of the time you'll think, "Does there really need to be a product like that for men?" Apparently, yes if you happen to see more and more products being gendered. It makes you wonder if those products or somehow better for men? Yeah, there are physiological differences between some men and some women, but I don't think "Man Candles" has to do with physiology or biology.

I think a lot of gendered products or "FOR MEN" products have to do with masculinity. If "man candles" are any indicator, there are things people associate with women. Candles, I guess, are one of them. I mean, the extent to which marketing teams, product developers and design teams are essentially coddling men is amazing to me. They are literally saying, "Ah, so you don't want to seem feminine. Well, here are some candles with "man" in front to help ease your sense of masculinity."

It extends into this notion that anything associated with women is weak or less than in a man's eyes. That is, unless it;s made for men or says that, which makes it okay. I recently saw something that said "meggings" as in leggings for men. I guess the word "leg" attached to "-gings" is now associated with femininity. It's ridiculous, men are searching for masculinity in products now. As though touching a bottle of lotion that is neither explicitly for men or women implies femininity or not for men.

Companies must have realized that in men's minds products that women buy means it's for women when that was never the case. I guess it's great way for companies to make money, using masculinity and fragile egos as a sales tactic.