Sexism, alive and kicking
My friend Sam sent me this link to an astounding documentary on sexual representations in music videos. I strongly recommand that you watch it (you can click on it) :
Of course, that won't deter some people (mostly men, some women) from deploying the following defensive statements :
A: «Those are just images, people are free to make their own minds of them»
In extenso: Normally, people should not be influenced (even) by (repetitive) images because they have free will. If some are nonetheless influenced by them, that's their problem. The fact that there are (loads of) objectifying images of women is not the problem. We can keep all these images like they are. Status quo = fine. Complaining = nonsense.
So wait a minute. Do you mean that:
a) this objectifying pattern is not actually objectifying? We - the influenced people that we are - are just imagining things up and getting offended for nothing?
b) there is no link between these images and the objectification of women in everyday life?
c) there is no intrinsic problem with the fact that men are influenced into objectifying, vilifying and abusing women because of these unrelentless images? It is their own problem? But whom exactly? Should abusive men just get to realize, all by themselves, that what they're doing is wrong? Should «Non influenced free minded» people not feel concerned and bother with this because it is not their responsibility? Or should it only be women's responsibility to show influenced men that they're erring in objectifying them?
d) it is women's problem if they *think* they are objectified and abused as a result of these recurring images?
I've had an extract of this documentary shown in class and a student pulled that defense out. I was giving a sociology class. As in, things are not just played out on individual dimensions.
It always amazes me when I hear people say they're not affected by recurrent images, concepts and behaviors (publicity being an exemple). I guess they think that culture stops with cuisine, clothing and dance.
B: «But women consented in or enjoyed doing these videos»
That part is the hardest to answer because most people can't wrap their minds around the concept and reality of internalized sexism/racism/heterosexism/ableism, etc. Following this idea that we possess total free will and should not be influenced by cultural images, there's this notion that members of oppressed groups are impervious to the negative representations that dominant groups dish out to them. However, just a quick look at history would provide gazillion examples of self-depreciating women, slaves and poor people (to name a few groups).
Also, oppression is often exerted with subtlety. If a dominant group constantly says that a certain group is inherently bad and inferior, if it constantly mistreats that group in the most horrible way - no matter what individuals of the group do or say -, it will assuredly nourrish their anger, their resentment, and their rebellion. It is so blatantly wrong that they have absolutely nothing to gain with the status quo and absolutely nothing to loose by contesting it. They might still be affected by self-depreciation, but less so because the dominant group appears as so thoroughly wrong that its judgment of things and of them looses all value.
This for the dominant group, can be the source of problems. It is harder to tame a unified rebellious group than to have some occasional protests from fractions of the group. The solution? Tossing in some candies for well-behaving-know-their-places individuals. It sends the message that the dominant group is actually fair. If you behave well, you can have some reward. You can improve your condition. That mechanism will help keep your attention away from the structural privileges the dominant group benefits from. It will be easier for them to maintain a wall of fog beyond the rewards you can get, so that it will be very hard even to conceive of the possibility of better alternatives.
Lots of women feel they receive some reward for achieving conventional beauty. But it's so very hard for the majority of them to look for other and better alternatives because they're pounded to the ground with beauty imperatives.
This problem has directly to do with the fact that the vast majority of magazine owners, marketing directors, book editors, video directors and producers are men. They decide what they want to market out and how they want to market it. And they can get to tell that this or that specific kind of image/message/scenario is what we must perform because it is what sells. Or, in other words, it is what more men love to buy. And if you're not happy with that, go somewhere else.
... to another company owned by other men... and so on...
By contrast, it is very difficult to broadcast better alternatives out there when, as women, we have less economical and political means... and less money to buy stuff than man have.
C: «But we should not censor art.»
We're showing that the constant and almost exclusive repetition of some images have serious negative effects on women (to a large extent) and men (to a smaller extent) and the guy utters not a trace of genuine concern for this, but rather jumps up to the defense of «Art». So... what should we do?... Keep the status quo as it is because anything else would be art censorship, and a far worse fate to humankind than objectified and raped women? Something tells me that this guy treasures more his own vicarious enjoyment of objectified women than women's full ackowledgement as thinking and feeling human beings.