In 1987, March was named “Women’s History Month” and just about every March since, we have celebrated many wonderful women such as Rosa Parks or Susan B. Anthony and their contributions to society. In fact women have played a variety of vital roles in the change and development of our nation. However, one thing that has not had much of a change or development is how women are portrayed in the media. Take a look at some of these advertisements from 1950:
Women are displayed as weak and needy in these advertisements. Domestic abuse is even normalized in them. Now take a look at some more recent advertisements. While the message is not identical, the dehumanizing theme is perpetuated. Modern day advertisements target the sexuality of women.
Nowadays we have so many methods of consumption from the media, some of which did not exist back in the 50s. Between television, the internet, video games, magazines and various other digital or print platforms, the media has a hold on us nearly every moment we are awake. Even if we are not actively engaging with the media, we are still absorbing the information it is presenting us. A study published in the journal Psychology and Marketing shows that by preschool age, children are already demonstrating brand recognition when many have yet to even begin learning to read. Children are observational learners and therefore, if they are already picking up brand names, it won’t be long before they subconsciously pick up on the way women are treated in the media.
This article is not from a feminist point of view meant to preach about how amazing women are. I’m not asking for you to treat women as if they are superior. I’m asking you to just take a look at how little improvement women have seen in their portrayal in the media. Why should you care? Surely there is a young female in your life who is important to you: a daughter, sibling, cousin, niece, friends, neighbor, etc. You care about her and want her to be happy. Do you really want her to be negatively impacted by what she is seeing every day? With magazine photos promoting body types that are nearly impossible to attain, advertisements that objectify women, and an overall very poor representation of women in the media, young girls are left feeling disempowered.
In a study conducted through USN Annenberg, sociologist Stacy Smith looked at the amount of gender inequality in popular films that were released between 2007 and 2009. In this study she found that “32.8 percent of the speaking characters are female and 67.2% are male.” Not only that, but of these speaking roles, women are more likely to be shown with some nudity in these films than males (23.6% vs. 7.4% respectively). The most concerning part of this is about 28% of that partial nudity of female characters is occurring within the age ranges of 13-20 years old.
Women have more worth than just cleaning, cooking, and looking pretty. Medicine would not be where it is today without women. Many discoveries were actually made by women assistants but credit was given to their male employers. The medical syringe was invented by Letitia Geer in 1899. Kevlar, a material used in several products from bulletproof vests to fiber-optics cables, was invented in 1966 by Stephanie Kwolek. We can thank women for a lot of other things too. Yet, we still reduce them to simple, superficial beings in the popular media. A change is long overdue, but it is coming. Research is being conducted to get information on current standings and efforts are being made to educate the public. The first step to addressing the issue is to destroy the ignorance toward the subject that exists amongst a majority of society. One organization working on this is the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in the Media. In addition to providing education, they are working on evidence-based solutions.
Someday there will be a shift in how women are shown in popular media. For the sake of that young girl that means a lot to you, let’s hope it starts shifting soon so that she may develop a healthy, stable sense of self-worth that is not affected by tainted imagery.
