Sociological Image (Flower Shop Edition)

I'm always showing pictures I take to my students in Sociology classes. Of course, the Sociological Images blog has had a great run and has definitely influenced me. There's a recent article in Teaching Sociology "Using Sociological Images to Develop the Sociological Imagination" that shows us the value of analyzing sociological images. My students in Introduction to Sociology will be presenting sociological images as an assignment this semester. I'll give them plenty of my own examples to help prepare them. Here's my latest image, taken yesterday outside a flower shop.

I have a story about this flower shop. They pretty regularly update the sign outside their store. Once, when grabbing flowers there, I was over excited to share my idea for the sign with the person who was working that day. My sign idea was "Men Like Flowers Too." My recollection is the person was not impressed. This was many years ago and I can tell you my sign idea never saw the light of day. But I still embrace the idea. Why cut out half the market for flowers? Why do we cling to the socially constructed idea that women receive flowers, but men don't? Here's my simple test to whether a person should be eligible to get flowers for a gift, or for no reason at all: Does the person like flowers? If the answer is yes, the person can get flowers. Speaking for myself, I like pretty colors and the smell of flowers, so I'm eligible to receive flowers. But stupid norms means I don't get flowers. You know the song "You Don't Bring Me Flowers" as in "You don't bring me flowers anymore...." How about a song called "Can You Bring Me Flowers for the First Time?" Okay, this post is getting away from me. I can buy myself flowers and in fact I do grab grocery store flowers quite often. Point is, it'd be cool if we could rethink this gender norm. Fellas, you ever get flowers? Please report back if you can. Meanwhile, I'll also take your thoughts on the socially constructed expression "Happy wife, happy life." Thanks everybody, and have a good fall semester. Flowers improve office hours!