“All of us who professionally use the mass media are the shapers of society. We can vulgarize that society. We can brutalize it. Or we can help lift it onto a higher level.” – William Bernbach, co-founder of international advertising agency Doyle Dane Bernbach.
“Miss Representation,” a film by Jennifer Siebel Newsom that premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, discusses how mainstream media strongly influences society’s perception of women and creates gender stereotypes as a result. Through interviews of politicians, journalists, activists and entertainers, the film shows how media technologies are the strongest communicators of cultural norms and values.
These technologies spread a deprecating message about women to the extent that it has become common, almost acceptable, to objectify women’s image and limit their access to positions of power. Indeed, norm-based discrimination against the female population is clearly observed in how the media often trivializes and deprecates women’s presence in the political process. Their role in society therefore seems reduced to upholding 1950s conceptions of beauty and femininity.
“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any” – American author and activist Alice Walker.
The mass media is a true form of political economy where advertising purposefully handicaps its consumers by making them feel self-conscious, vulnerable and undeserving of any intellectual recognition. It is an impairing misrepresentation. We saw this originate with the birth of broadcast media and continuously grow ever since.
Media can be an instrument of change, or it can preserve the status quo. The choice between these are made by those with power in media, the male-majority media CEOs and marketers who dictate consumer choices. Only 2.4 percent of the 2012 Fortune 500 CEOs are women.
From the moment that women’s self-image is tainted by the institution of the mass media, it becomes almost impossible for women to rise above self-depreciation. Negative media portrayals and stereotypes of women affect aspects of life beyond the media, such as the political sphere. Women make up 51 percent of the US population, yet compose only 17 percent of Congress.
How can areas of life such as politics be fair if media perpetuates stereotypes of females? More importantly, how can women be taken seriously in the corporate world, if sexist behaviour is still apparent in their working environment?
“Gender is a primary way of signifying relationships of power” – American historian Joan Scott.
A sexualized perception of women in the media, which is then channeled into the workplace, also affects men. Boys and men are socialized to think that they need to be “masculine,” dominating and detached, and feel similar pressure to strive for an ideal of the “macho” figure. They are sexualized just as women are. Constraining women to fulfill certain outdated gendered responsibilities is also greatly restrictive to men.
Yet, it is not coincidental that mass media imposes distinctive roles on women and men. Excluding young women professionals from certain types of occupations allows for those in power to safeguard their jobs and control the hierarchy of employees that they have instated to serve their personal interests.
“Media creates consciousness, and if what gets put out there that creates our consciousness is determined by men, we’re not going to make any progress”- Jane Fonda, Academy Award-winning actress and activist.
There is an undeniable negative correlation between the representation of women in the media and potential roles of power available for them in Western society. The question now is whether digital media and the Internet will depict women in a different, more positive light than mainstream broadcast media. Can Web-based technologies and social media empower women? If the traditional media companies start to conquer the Internet space, it will be difficult for women’s image to change and evolve. We cannot afford for the digital age to be just as sexist as the 1950s media age. To not be treated the same as a person of another gender is to be dehumanized.
Thus, objectifying or sexualizing women is a violation of their basic humanity. Women must spread their own vision of what they should be. Female entrepreneurs and businesswomen are now taking on the multiple platforms of digital media, like blogging and tweeting, to highlight their own empowerment and professional success. Such actions give hope for women to reclaim and re-conquer male-dominated workspace, exert more influence in entertainment and communications industries, and promote an accurate and fair picture of the female population so that gender stereotypes will no longer exist.
