The Unfair Sex - Television Tropes & Idioms

In Ranma 1/2, Akane, Ukyou, Shampoo, and Kodachi are incredibly quick to administer violent "justice" upon Ranma whenever he shows even the slightest sign that they understand as interest in another girl (Akane more than any other, since she's the main lead and thus appears in almost all stories, but the rest of the Fiancée Brigade are just as bad, if not worse, if they're in range.) But past the manga's turning point, when Ranma sincerely believed that Akane loved the newcomer Shinnosuke, he took his grievances with the new guy and was incredibly polite and submissive towards Akane, only screaming his frustration when he was alone in the forest. Akane never bothered explaining why she was helping Shinnosuke, either, but then, no one ever lets Ranma explain his unfortunate accidents.
In another Rumiko Takahashi work, Maison Ikkoku, Kyoko's reluctance to choose between perpetual ronin Godai and suave, well-off tennis instructor Mitaka drives a large amount of the plot, and it becomes Godai and Mitaka's responsibility to win her over. However, this doesn't stop Kyoko from criticizing Godai over his own inability to tell the truth to his not-quite-girlfriend Kozue, and formalize a relationship with Kyoko herself. The manga agrees with her point of view.
I suppose Rumiko Takahashi is the queen of this trope because she used it frequently in Inuyasha as well. When the title character showed any sort of interest in his old flame Kikyo, not only would he later be subjected to physical punishment by a jealous Kagome he'd also get chastised by his companions for making Kagome feel bad. Yet, somehow when he shows jealously over Miroku (before meeting Sango) and Koga flirting with Kagome, not only does he still get physically punished by Kagome he still gets criticized by the others for acting stupid.
One non-Rumiko Takahashi example may be Love Hina, especially at the very beginning of the story, with the girls trying their best to drive Keitaro away from the Hinata Inn. However, he still has a hard time winning them over (except for Shinobu and, arguably, Kaolla); Naru, for example, kicked him once when she dropped into his room and found Kaolla lying over him - in fact, he was trying to stop her from messing his room, but she kept on running up and down.
- Another example is when Naru frequently beats Keitaro up when he enters her room as she is changing her clothes. Once, however,she had dropped in while he was changing clothes. Still, she beat him up.
- yet another example happens when Mokoto and Keitaro are forced to bathe together (long story). Keitaro is forced to wear a blind fold but not Mokoto because male peeping is never justified but female peeping is A-OK.
- Perhaps the most unfair example would have to be that whenever Keitaro walkis into the girls baths (always accidental) he is punched right out of the sky no questions asked, but when Naru suddenly walkied in on keitaro bathing and jumped into his bathtub, Keitaro could do nothing. Afterwards her clothes became see-through and she decided to punch Keitaro for her stupidity.
- Mind, Keitaro IS the Butt Monkey; the manga does call them on their treatment as the series progresses.
Similar to the above example, in Seitokai No Ichizon main character Ken frequently refers to the girls they're his harem, that they'll end falling for him and fantasizes with them. Naturally, they punish him for that. So far it's normal, perhaps a bit more focused on this than your average Unwanted Harem series but not too bad. However, one episode has Mafuyu reveal herself as a Yaoi Fangirl who writes Slash of Ken and a fictional brother of him. Naturally Ken complains, and not only he gets punished for that, Mafuyu's sister Minatsu makes him write slash of himself with said brother. When two minutes later he writes a story where they're his harem, he still gets treated as a pervert, and nobody even points out it's the same thing Mafuyu does.
- In addition, Ken spends half an episode with his eyes covered by a mask that tazes him if he tries to remove it... so he can't see the girls in their swimsuits (In fear of what? At worst he would say pervy comments, but nothing beyond the usual. It's not like they can't kick his ass, they do it on a daily basis anyway), and once the mask breaks by sheer luck, they lock him on a closet and leave him there overnight. Basically, they treat him like if he was a super-pervert of sorts who would, well, do really bad things to them if let unguarded even one second, even though he's more of a generic pervert at worst and he genuinely cares for them. However, and now comes the "unfair" part: Chizuru acts MUCH worse towards Kurimu, but the attitude of Mafuyu and Minatsu is... stares and lifted eyebrows, but that's it. Definitely she doesn't gets treated to half the crap Ken is put through, for no apparent reason at all, even though she IS more dangerous and they're aware of that.
In general, this happens way too often on most Unwanted Harem series, where the guy will get treated as a pervert even when he's completely innocent (Or simply get mistreated for anything period), but girls doing the same thing or worse results in... nothing at best, the guy being punished anyway at worst. Is this supposed to be compensation for the Fan Service of the girls these series have?

Happens in dozens of Lifetime Movies. The man cheats? His fault! The woman cheats? His fault too!
Before the Rains has the man taking advantage of the woman, who is trapped by her society.
Waitress treats the man slightly more sympathetically, but has the woman end the affair due to an attack of conscience after she meets his really nice wife, and also after she leaves her abusive husband.
Subverted in It Could Happen to You, the husband has an affair after his wife turns materialistic after they both win the lottery, and he is considered to be sympathetic.
- The wife is always materialistic, it's just a case of It Got Worse once they actually had a large amount of money to be materialistic with. The affair also does not start until after the wife kicks him out of the house after asking for a divorce. Which she wants partly because she's crazy jeleous over his platonic friendship with another woman, but mostly because he keeps giving the Lottery money away to good causes.
Another subversion: In Along Came Polly, the wife has an affair on their honeymoon with the hunky, nudist scuba instructor and is considered to be completely heartless, and when she runs back to her husband he won't take her back.
In the beginning of Friday, Craig is called up by his jealous girlfriend, angry because of some gossip that placed him going to the movies with another girl. If you pay attention to the scenes showing her, you'll notice a man sleeping on her bed right behind her.
In the Meryl Streep movie It's Complicated, the main character divorced her sleazy husband when he cheated on her. But when the main character has an affair, it's treated like one wild fun sign of her living life. Her friends cheer and laugh when they find out, and there's no indication that she's a grade "A" hypocrite.
Somewhat subverted in American Beauty, as although the protagonist, the dad, does get 'punished' in the end, it's not at all related to his breaking away from his materialistic diseased harpy and hateful daughter and subsequent adultery, but a bizarre misunderstanding. Although we're lead to think that at first.

In Saved By The Bell, two occasionally-reused plots throughout the high school and college years were (a) "Zack pays a little too much attention to another girl and Kelly gets mad," and (b) "Kelly sees another guy and drops Zack like a hot potato." In cases of A, Zack having to figure out how to make it up to Kelly (or realizing he needed to) would be the focus of the plot. However, in cases of B, Zack would still be made the villain, for standing in the way of Kelly's happiness for his own selfish needs. Apparently, Negative Continuity is in play and you're not supposed to notice this pattern, but it's hard not to. The Grand Finale of the original students' saga is Zack and Kelly's wedding. What led Zack to pop the question? Kelly was drooling over another guy again and there was an upcoming trip. Zack wasn't going on it, but Kelly and the other guy were, and Zack was rightfully concerned about what would happen. Had Zack been female and Kelly been male... well, when the plot happens that way, the woman in Zack's shoes finally deciding that the possessive or unfaithful (the relationship never lasts long enough for him to become both of these) man in Kelly's shoes isn't worth bothering with and she deserves better is invariably the episode's happy ending.
Used regularly on Friends. From Ross and Rachel's breakup in season 3 to the beginning of season 5, when Ross was in a relationship, Rachel would become jealous, distressed, and often seek to make everyone around her miserable until he was inevitably single again; while this behaviour wasn't necessarily condoned, she was often given a great deal of sympathy from her other friends over it. Meanwhile, if Ross ever displayed the slightest bit of jealousy over any of Rachel's relationships, it was met with utter exasperation and being told the relationship was over and he needed to move on. However, from season 5, they became more comfortable with the others dating.
- Though one episode finally seemed to put this in some perspective with Rachel latching on to a complete stranger on a plane and telling him her entire sob story, only for him to eventually get fed up and tell her how immature, selfish, cruel and petty she was being (especially in going to ruin Ross and Emily's wedding - calling her a horrible, horrible, person), and "By the way, it seems perfectly clear to me that You WERE on a break!"
  - What made that moment even more glorious was the fact that the stranger was played by none other than House himself, Hugh Laurie. Here it is, by the way!
Used far too often in Scrubs. Elliot sleeps with JD then immediately dumps him the day after because her old boyfriend came back; JD's jealousy is depicted as petty and he's advised to "be a good friend". Later, JD convinces Elliot to leave her boyfriend but realises that he doesn't love her. After struggling over his dilemma, he admits this to her; she physically assaults him and carries a grudge for the entire next season.
- Elliot is engaged to marry Keith. The day before the wedding, she realises that she doesn't love him (wow, small world) and dumps him. The day afterwards, she changes her mind and gets back together with him, sleeping with him twice. Then she decides that she's repeating a bad pattern and dumps him again. Keith is understandably furious and carries a grudge for the next season; meanwhile, Elliot can't understand what the big deal is and bemoans Keith's "lack of professionalism". (Speaking of professionalism, the reason they got together in the first place was because Elliot wanted a sex buddy and chose Keith, her subordinate.)
- JD accidentally gets Kim pregnant on their fourth date, but they decide to raise the baby and work together to make their relationship work. Kim suddenly takes a lucrative job offer a few states over (naturally, JD doesn't want her to go but "learns" that the correct reaction is to support her decision unconditionally) and a few months later, informs JD that she has miscarried. Turns out, that was a lie to get out of their relationship. JD is furious but decides that he will get back together with Kim for the sake of his child, even if it means trapping himself in a loveless relationship for the rest of his life. When Kim is in labour she demands to know what he thinks of her; he admits that he doesn't love her and she is furious, dumping him immediately afterwards.
How come no one has mentioned Desperate Housewives? I mean, if any TV male did any of the horrible things those women do, there would be a feminist scandal of huge proportions.
Sex And The City runs on this trope.
- Although subverted during the time Carrie was having an affair. She thought it was romantic and fun, but it's made very clear by all of her friends that what she was doing was terrible.
Greys Anatomy just... Greys Anatomy
- Not always. Sometimes it's inverted, too! Men cheating (Alex with syph nurse, Mc Dreamy with Meredith, George with Izzy) is forgiven much, much faster then when Meredith (single person) has a one-night-stand with George (single person) and is blamed by everyone else for being heartless, using him, and just not loving him.
- The Spin Off series Private Practice invariably follows suit, taking this to the extremes, to the point that one character dates two men at the same time, sleeping with/cheating on both of them regularly, gets pregnant, refuses to allow a paternity test while ignoring both men during her pregnancy, abandons her child after birth, sleeps with Addison's father, and when confronted about it tells Addison that she doesn't regret it because "It was a wonderful experience", and after all this, is still shown in a shining, positive light by the writers of the show.
  - ...Actually, she's kind of shown as a bitch. Most of the other characters act like she's completely insane and very selfish but they just aren't mentioning it to her face, because she's so traumatized.

Intentionally invoked in The Belgariad, as the main characters engage in a long running exchange of witty banter over the "fairness" of which gender gets to do which things, complete with an informal scoring system for particularly telling jibes.
Can't remember the name of the book, but it's a Slice Of Life novel about a yuppie Latina in San Francisco. One of the subplots is her affair with an older married gentleman. No judgment is ever made on her about this, it's just presented as is. The only problem is that 3/4 through the book, she runs into her best friend's fiance on a date with another man and all hell breaks loose. She tells him off, and agonizes over how and if she should tell her friend, but what about the wife of her own paramour? Not once is this hypocrisy ever noted.

Even men buy into this. At the end of R. Kelly's video for "When a Woman's Fed Up," a caption reads, "There is no such thing as a no-good woman, only women made that way by a no-good man."

Between Friends is the queen of this trope. The only major male character that hasn't been one the teenaged kids, a hunky waiter, or Viggo Mortensen (don't ask — please), has been an abusive husband featured in a recent story arc which had the added benefit of sending the comic spiralling into Cerebus Syndrome territory. Lovely.
A rare Gender Flip occured in For Better Or For Worse: when The Wesley Anthony was emotionally unfaithful to his wife Therese, readers were supposed to be perfectly okay with it because the other woman was Elizabeth, one of the Pattersons. This didn't work out so well... not simply because of the prevalance of this trope, but due to the massive Moral Dissonance, Anthony being a detestable Wesley, and all the Wall Banging involved.

In Dreamgirls, Lorrell has an affair with Jimmy Early, who's married. Throughout the entire play/movie, he is made out to be a total sleaze for treating her badly and sleeping with two (possibly more) women at the same time. However, Lorrell is shown in a strictly sympathetic light, despite the fact that she's knowingly and willfully engaging in a long-term affair with a married man.
Partially subverted in An Inspector Calls. While everyone agrees that Gerald's (including Gerlad himself) affair with Eva Smith was wrong and Sheila gives him her engagement ring back, she does admit that he did at least try to help the girl and that it was partially her fault. Eva wouldn't have been in need of Gerald's help had Sheila not had her sacked in the first place. It's also implied (particularly in the film version) that she will consider (or at least, was going to consider) taking him back.

The Proud Family: Oscar showing the slightest interest in another woman (even so far as being tongue-tied around Mariah Carey)is perfectly justified grounds for his wife to abuse him (sometimes physically, sometimes emotionally, sometimes taking his things, sometimes depriving him of things ranging from dinner to entrance into his own house), but said wife is allowed to run off with any handsome man she sees and expects Oscar to go along with it without question (to the point of when, in one of the few occasions he was able to get out an objection, she threw him across the room and basically said she was going to cheat on him with this random guy).
Very simply and frequently played in Heathcliff And The Catillac Cats, usually in shorts involving Riff Raff and Cleo. If Riff Raff was cheating on Cleo, Cleo would beat the sauce out of him until he saw the error of his ways. If Cleo were cheating on Riff Raff, Riff Raff would beat up 'the other man' to win her back.
A frequently overlooked fact of Homer and Marge Simpson's marriage is that Homer is incredibly faithful- to the point where he breaks down into tears when he thinks the universe is forcing him to commit adultery- and Marge gets incredibly possessive and jealous at the drop of a hat (such as with Lurleen Lumpkin, or Mindy Simmons). Sadly, this aspect has been lost in Homer's gradual Flanderization into the world's most unbearable husband.
- Of course, Homer wasn't entirely innocent of jealousy, himself, like when Jacques attempted to sweep Marge off her feet in one of the earlier season.
In one Family Guy episode, Lois forcefully and lustfully tongue kisses John O'Hurley, but later when Peter under amnesia is going to have sex with another woman Lois is hurt.

Many American day-time talk shows, especially of the tabloid variety, really abuse this idea, with perhaps the most notable example being Maury Povich's program. Therein, men who fail lie-detector tests and turn out to have cheated on their wives with dozens of women are depicted as selfish, devious, ruthless, lying, controlling, deceptive bastards. However, women who bring several men to the show for paternity tests to determine their babydaddy are never criticized for their promiscuity, while the men are thoroughly vilified for their share in it.
- Maury is an even bigger abuser of this than you'd think. Women who were proven to have been cheating are all shown to do the "weeping run down the back stage area" acting as if they had been tricked into cheating. Men are treated as vile, horrible, nasty, bastards for even *thinking* the child is not theirs, even when the woman's been on the show with five other guys. Let's let that sink in a bit. They get booed for questioning whether-or-not they are the father, even when it's shown they have EVERY REASON to think they aren't.
- "This is the seventh time you've been on our show." "I know this one's the father, Maury! I'm a million percent sho'!" "You are NOT the father!"
  - *dance of joy*
- Averted by the Steve Wilkos show, though he usually deals with more serious issues like abuse and rape accusations, but sometimes cheating comes up as a secondary issue. A woman who cheated on her girlfriend and falsely cried rape on the man who got her pregnant and a mother who, according to the Lie Detector tests, apparently cheated on her husband and abused and neglected their children were booed by the audience and told to get off Steve's chair just as vehemently as male cheaters/abusers, if not more so.
- To the extreme on the Telemundo show Laura En America, where the security personnel will hold the man back as his angry significant other is allowed to beat the crap out of him.
Largely averted in the British equivalent, The Jeremy Kyle Show. All cheats are depicted as the bad guys of the show unless they're genuinely apologetic.
Several years back on Oprah Winfrey's talk show, a researcher was getting disbelieving catcalls from the (normally very well-behaved) audience when she pointed out that there had to be just about as many women as men cheating in relationships. She asked if they believed there was a pool of a few dozen women all the cheating men shared? She also explicitly described the "When he cheats it's his fault, when she cheats, it's his fault" Double Standard.
Prince Charles and Lady Diana. Both were apparently unfaithful; Diana had multiple acknowledged lovers, most of whom were ignored after her divorce; Charles had one, Camilla Parker Bowles, to whom he is now married, and they were together even from long before Diana came into the picture. Of course, Charles is an evil insensitive scumbag who drove poor sad and saintly Diana to it. Camilla, meanwhile...
- Part of the reason Charles is labeled as the worse one is that Camilla Parker Bowles was in the picture long before he married Diana and many people feel that he should have never married Diana in the first place with those feelings. But, being the Prince, his family insisted he marry someone, and Camilla wasn't eligible.
- One of her biographers even said flat out that she slept with a reporter to get him to write a fluff piece about her.
- During an episode of Have I Got News For You following Diana's 1995 interview on Panorama, Ian Hislop criticised the selective blindness Diana (and the public) seemed to have regarding adultery in her marriage to Charles. "She said there were three of us in the marriage, which shows that her maths doesn't change much. (counting on fingers) Hewitt, Hoare, Gilbey, Charles, Camilla...."
This article claims that women watching male strippers are just having fun, while men watching female strippers have "darker reasons". The quality of the research is heavily debated in the 700+ comments; in particular, the fact that the journalist (a woman, for what's it's worth) doesn't appear to have actually asked any men — whether a male stripper or a man who watches female strippers — what they think about all of this, having focused entirely on interviewing the women, has not gone unnoticed.
Christopher Titus's relationships, for the most part - he manages to find the humor in it, though. For a bigger bonus, watch from 4:00, where he establishes his side of the divorce from his wife.

Main Tropes Index

Troperville

Editing Help

Tools

Toys

Examples