Relationship of the Sexes in Greys Anatomy Essay

Relationship of the Sexes in Greys Anatomy - Essay Example The argument shall be based on an individualized character description of the characters from the show and then segue into a discussion of Season 6, episode 15 a.k.a Timewarp. This episode is the one that set the tone for the mother of Meredith Grey to become one of the most admired surgeons at Seattle Grace. The discussion shall conclude with a look at how sexism still exists in the modern medical workplace as evidenced by scenes from the show. There have been many instances on the show when women were portrayed in a sexist manner. Take for example the episode in the first season when Dr. Isobel Stevens (played by Katherine Heigl) was treated as a sex object and disrespected by the other male interns on the floor because she used to do sexy modeling assignments in order to help pay off her medical school expenses. She did not take the disrespect sitting down at the time. Instead, she chose to force the men to respect her by giving them more than they expected to see herself in the l ocker room. Thus shaming them into thinking about how they were treating her and in the end, getting an apology from those who disrespected her the most. Then we have Cristina Yang (played by Sandra Oh), the overachieving cardio-thoracic surgeon who tends to get on everyone's nerves because of her by-the-book attitude. Since she always held herself in a manner higher than the other interns, and then residents in Seattle Grace, she was able to gain their respect and then the respect of her superiors such as Derek Shepherd who saw and treated her as an equal both in and out of the operating room. Dr. Yang gained their respect and high regard by proving herself where it mattered the most, in action in the operating room. Dr. Bailey, also known as The Nazi lead the team of then medical misfits as their resident advisers. Her job was to whip them into shape in order to make them respectable and noteworthy additions to the field of medicine that they may have chosen to specialize in. She was not exactly respected by her peers in the sense of the word. In fact, the respect for her person and position was born mostly out of fear for these people because she has a tendency to be tactless and straightforward in order to get her way. That is perhaps, the only way she knows to gain the respect of her colleagues in a profession that is mostly dominated by men. Of all of the interns and now medical doctors on the show, however, none of them carried the same kind of responsibility and unfair expectations of her peers than Dr. Meredith Grey whose mother, Ellis Grey, was considered to be one of the foremost surgeons at Seattle Grace during her tenure at the hospital. Meredith chose to follow in her mother's footsteps because of the influence that her strong-willed mother had on her existence as a child. But that is perhaps also the reason why Meredith found herself lost during the first few seasons of the show. She was the most uncertain and self-doubting doctor in the hospita l because she felt that they all expected too much from her.