'Despite the legislative changes of the last 40 years, it still cannot be said that gender stereotypes are over and that equality between males and females has been fully established.' Discuss the factors that have made it difficult to reduce gender stereotypes and achieve full gender equality. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Gender stereotypes are generalizations about the gender attributes, differences, and roles of male and female individuals, or males and females as groups, but because each person is individual and very different from others, gender stereotypes are generally simple and incorrect. However, many people still make basic gender-based assumptions that often begin in early childhood, for example, the assumption that boys should wear blue and girls should wear pink. Until the 1940s, it was generally believed that children wore neutral clothing, which was a matter of practicality, as white cotton could be bleached, but the change towards gender-specific clothing was slow to begin as colors were introduced to children in the mid-19th century. century, but it was not until after World War I that the color was promoted as gender-specific. Up until this point, most children wore exactly the same clothes since parents could not afford to buy a new set of clothes for each new child, and so the same neutral items were used again and again. Gender stereotypes are deeply rooted in people. and are often reinforced by mass media, and especially social media, which encompass a much wider range of stereotypes from many different sources around the world. This can make it very difficult to reduce gender stereotypes because what is said about gender stereotypes can easily be spread quickly and easily to the majority of the population, and since almost 90% of the population uses some sort of social media it is very difficult to hide these ideas. Since there is also a much larger following for many celebrities and social figures, when stereotypes are portrayed by these types of people, many of their followers will consider what they say to be true and right, thus reinforcing the stereotypes. However, the media can also reinforce these gender stereotypes when popular characters attempt to challenge such ideas. For example, Kim Kardashian-West recently posted a near-nude photo on Instagram and was immediately attacked by people and the media who suggested that she not post such photos because she is a woman and needs to be "respectable" by covering her body. However, when high-profile male figures posted similar photos around the same time, there was little to no negative comments on such posts and they were often celebrated for being attractive. It could be argued that the media suggesting that women should remain covered to be "respectable", while men do not need to, reinforces this idea in people, especially younger and more impressionable people. While the initial intention was to break away from these gender stereotypes, the media reaction reinforces the very ideals they were trying to question in the first place. However, in the UK there are many laws and regulations that affect gender equality such as the Equal Pay Act and the Sex Discrimination Act. These two acts, and other previous legislation, were combined into one main act called the Equality Act in 2010..