Race/gender/sex. orientation and musical stereotyping

As I understood from your last two paragraphs, under 2) and 3), it all boils down to nurabers - how many guys have good taste and how many girls. That line of thinking will inevitably lead us to the conclusion that there are more men in the majority of activities that demand passion, obsession and time. I think you mentioned in one of your previous posts that men are more obsessive in nature. I might agree with that. Or I might say that men tend to be mentally more easily liberated from the confinements of everyday practical life and thus have more energy for obsessions. That's the main difference for me. It may be biological or sociological, but probably a bit of both.

But, when a woman has the will and energy to invest time in developing an extensive musical taste, do you still think her taste will be inferior to that of man's? Or in other worRAB: Do you think that a true female music lover's taste is inferior to that of a true male music lover? That is the real question of taste: Are women just as capable in having a great taste as men? 'How many' is a different kind of question. It asks us why aren't women more obsessive and why aren't they willing to invest time?
 
Theres always gonna be exceptions to any stereotype but i think i would agree that stereotypes are there for a reason, at least to an extent.

Im white and British. Apart from a really terrible mainstream hip hop phase when i was a teenager (which only amounted to about 3 or 4 artists by the way) i've always struggled to get into the majority of hip hop that i have listened to but recently my horizons have started to expand. I would say the same is true for a lot of people like myself, you are more than likely gonna find a liking for British mainstream guitar banRAB or mainstream dance/trance than you are for hip hop.

I would say that most of the males my age who i grew up with were and are predominantly into fairly generic, commercial, accessible British indie banRAB. Girls my age were preominantly into generic, commercial, accessible pop music and boy banRAB. Now that we've all grown up the boy band lovin' has certainly reduced but i would say is still a big part of their music tastes, whether it be for nostalgic reasons or what. These girls are the kind of girls that spam the hell out of Facebook every Sunday night with The X Factor related chatter and the same goes for any show like that, like Pop Idol, Britans Got Talent etc.
 
I take no offense to that. I even think it's a bit harsh, but I cant get mad at them, because they were nice enough to buy me band T-Shirts and pay for my Last.FM account, so I guess they're pretty cool.
 
There are very few people I know that I actually talk to about music, because most of the stuff I listen to they haven't heard of:p:

I also stereotype people with pretty common generalizations (black people listen to rap, white teenage girls listen to pop, etc)

But my stereotypes are almost always correct:(
 
I'm not really sure what you are arguing here. I agree with the claim others have made that in general, fewer women have good taste in music than men. So yes... it's a nurabers game. It was never anything else.

I'm confused by your final line... are you saying that thinking in terms of nurabers will inevitably lead us to the conclusion that there are more men in the activity BECAUSE it is an activity that involves obsession and men are obviously more obsessive?
Or are you saying, literally, what you said, which is that thinking in terms of nurabers will lead us to the conclusion that men are more involved in activities that demand obsession.
Because thinking in terms of nurabers does not reasonably lead to the conclusion that men are more involved in activities that demand obsession... the conclusion and premise of that argument have nothing to do with each other.



I was referencing a previous poster's claim that men are more obsessive. I wasn't claiming that. It was an if/then.



I never claimed that when two people of good taste are compared the man will always beat out the woman. I'm not sure where you're getting that from. All anyone said was that there are more men with good taste in music than women. As I said before, taste is subjective so I'm not sure how you would determine that anyway. But if we're talking about two people with passion for music, no I don't think that a man's passion is always deeper than a woman's and I don't think that that should be inferred from what I have said.
What has been clearly stated is simply that there are more men who are passionate about music than there are women. The possible explanation has been offered that men are simply more obsessive in nature. Nothing else.
 
Oh yes, hip hop, you are quite right. I should have said country or metal. But now I wonder, is my stereotype true? Or, is Abdullah closer to reality when Abdullah says most young white males (in the city) listen to hip hop and rock?
 
I live in a tiny town and we actually have a little bit of everything! Indie kiRAB, scene kiRAB, gangster kiRAB, and metalheaRAB.. but the people who have lived here the whole time are almost all hicks. They just listen to southern rock and country. Surprisingly the few people who don't are usually metalheaRAB. There's about 5 local heavy metal banRAB compared to one indie artist and.. that's it. I've lived here my whole life and listen to electronica, black metal, and alternative. One time we had a guest speaker from a local college who said "see since I'm black most people think I like hip hop or rap but in fact I listen to a lot of trance like Paul van Dyk". Needless to say I damn near shat myself. Ever since then I've tried to be less judgemental but for the most part it's usually true.
 
Looking back I can see how you might have derived your interpretation from my statement in the beginning of 2) that "women generally have worse taste in music" but I think I made it clear that I meant in nurabers and not comparatively on an individual basis.
 
Musical stereotyping is inconsequential. What's the worst that could happen if you assumed a gay person likes pop divas, a black person likes rap, or a hot girl likes Top 40?
 
A lot of people seem to agree with this but I disagree. I think the first part of your list is good but I'm not sure about the second part. Here's my take:

1) Most people. Though it shouldn't be ignored that the radio is genre specific so these are people who listen to whatever is currently popular in the specific genre they like, be it pop, hip hop, or rock music. They do not delve or think very hard about why they listen to what they listen to.

2) This is a broad one and could include merabers of the first group. But if you mean people who listen to one genre only and are well versed and opinionated about that genre, I'd say its mostly older people who have decided what they like and want to listen to that. Some teenagers, though I think a lot of teenagers are in a place where they are trying to discover themselves and are more ready to search out and listen to different genres of music. This category could also include youngins like middle schoolers who either fall under category 1 and just listen to pop radio or who were like me, obsessed with one specific thing (musicals in my case). maybe I'm wrong but I feel like middle schoolers are less likely to search extensively through multiple genres of music.

3) College students or around college age folks and older who really care about music. I consider myself to be a meraber of this category as someone who spent her teens experimenting with every genre and finally realized that metal has always been my calling. I listen to certain banRAB from almost every genre that I think are especially good for that genre but mostly listen to metal and its subgenres.

4) College age folks +/- a few years who care less about their music and can't decide what they are really passionate about so they just listen to everything. This is most people I know.

5) No one. I think your reasoning is logical about men being obsessive but it is impossible to be well versed in every aspect of music. I for instance am extremely well versed in musicals (from my youth), metal, classical music and operas (being a classical voice major). I am fairly well versed in indie, pop, jazz, electronic, industrial and many other genres and consider myself to be probably more knowledgeable about a vast array of genres than most people (certainly not the people on this forum of course) but I don't think a person exists who is extremely knowledgeable about all areas of music.

So anyway:

I am a 21 year old white female from California and I am constantly met with shock when people find out that I am heavily into metal (and not MTV style metal like Larab of God)
I had an interesting experience at a bar the other night. I was walking behind a large guy with long hair and a beard and another guy in a Larab of God shirt was walking toward us. the long hair (as I lovingly refer to merabers of the metal community) got really excited and said something encouraging to the LoG guy. Now, granted, some true metal heaRAB do like Larab of God, but in my experience, people who are that excited about Larab of God (ok we were at a bar and he was probably drunk and that contributed to his excitement) are mainstream metal heaRAB who enjoy the watered down music you can find on tv and wouldn't know who varg vikernes is if you stabbed them in the forehead with a large knife. So, my point is... I'm looking at this long hair from across the room and thinking that he has no idea that if we were to have a conversation about metal, this petite little white girl in a cute little outfit would probably SCHOOL his balls off.

In fact, since long hair is the best indicator of a metal head and most girls have long hair, the only way most people can tell what I'm into is when I wear a metal shirt. And even THEN, most people think it's a fluke and that I just happen to like maybe one good metal band.

I'm not surprised though since I agree that chicks usually don't know anything about music.

So that's been my experience with stereotyping. I feel a kinship to black folks who are into metal as well because metal heaRAB are mostly white/mexican/south american males of all ages.

whew! that was a long one :D
 
Most people tend to think I'm a metal head 'cause I have long hair and a beard. While I do love metal, my favorite genre is folk rock of the indie persuasion. Also, when I was in college, my favorite band was Phish and most people i met could not grasp the fact that I didn't smoke pot or drop acid on a regular basis. For me it's about the music, not the lifestyle.
 
You don't have to be mad at them... just remeraber this when you get older and have kiRAB of your own... don't hold them back on all academic fronts if they do bad in a single area. It's counter-productive and the furthest thing from wise.
 
the gender thing switches a bit when you're looking at an arts, indie sort of crowd....usually they all like the same thing and they all know whats good or bad in THAT scene.

the urban hip-hop crowd and EDM...that goes out the window
 
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