Socially acceptable, but sexually distorting

I do warn you, this video does have some disturbing images, but I'm going to safely assume this class is mature enough to handle it without making a big deal about it and overlook the message that this video has to offer.



After watching a documentary on the hypersexualization of children, especially young girls and "tweens," by images from the media and advertisements from companies, it's become increasingly difficult to delineate what one can call sexy, slutty, and just plain pornographic. I'm not gonna lie, but everywhere I go, any magazine I pick up, every show I come across has the same theme over and over again: women have to portray themselves as hot, exuding sex appeal in every frame or snapshot in order to get attention from viewers.

In my opinion, the audience being manipulated by these images and shows with women portrayed as hypersexual is definitely children, especially girls. I know it must be frustrating to constantly hear that girls and women are the perpetual target of the media, but there is a definite connection between the media and its creation of this standard that it expects or almost forces girls to follow. It's a feedback loop that I feel is created when the media creates the idea that men enjoy these images, and that girls cannot be accepted or loved by men if they do not follow that standard. Straying away from the norm that is girls must be concerned solely with their image, that their intelligence does not matter, and that sexy is the only attitude to embrace makes a girl "ugly," "unattractive," and "unpopular."

There's no doubt that sexual images that are borderline pornographic have permeated society to the point where everyone is exposed to them but is almost ok with them. We are subjecting ourselves to a hegemony of where it's ok for women and girls to be sexualized because if they don't follow that standard, there cannot be any possibility of ever being considered attractive. There is definitely evidence that the insecurity of not being accepted by social standards has been exploited by the marketers and media, but if we keep buying into that idea, I don't think we'll be able to break free from it any time soon.