With the constant growth of violence in the world each and every day, mass media only continues to enable subliminal and unconscious messages that can be linked with violence and sexual crimes towards women. It is important to note that these correlational findings are specific to violence laced content in particular. This is to say that non violent pornogrpahy will not replicate the same negative effect, and is far less likely to induce aggressive behaviors. However with exposure to heavily violent materials, multiple factors are working at once to produce dangerous results. The combination of high arousal, destructive thoughts, and dense negative emotional responses creates a perfect storm for harmful behaviors to develop. (Kassin, et. al, 2014 p.494)
But why is the subject of cruelty, and force so appealing in the world of pornography? It is a structured, coordinated, and consensual fantasy made for the purpose of satisfying a target audience and to generate revenue. While it is important to note that interest and a draw to this type of content is okay, the problem arises when fantasy is turned into real expectations. Humans are creatures of patterns and habits, so it is easy to see how these violent behaviors can keep reoccurring and continue to develop under the radar as it begins to become a normalized behavior for some.
This type of sexist portrayal and depiction of women has been around for a long time. Classical Hollywood films have been centered around this type of relationship. For example, the theory of “The Gaze.” This is a kind of viewing relationship is centered around the male identifying with the male ‘hero,’ and the female identifying with the woman who is being sexualized. (Mulvey, 2018) Film and media become vessels for voyeurism. The more films that exhibit this relationship of tension between ‘self preservation’ and ‘instinctual drive’ can lead to much larger problems with sexual crimes and violence. Cinematic voyeurism produces pleasure through the idea that you can break the rules that deviate away from the acceptable norm, yet get away with it because you are behind a screen.
Mass media over the years has not improved these problems, and in fact have gone backwards in the sense of how they are representing what it means to be a “man.” To simplify this, over the years of media production, and even toys targeted at young boys, the comparison over the span of a couple decades show a huge increase in the size of weapons, and the size of muscles. Again targeted at males while making money off this ideology. This is because as our social culture has developed, men feel the need to prove their masculinity through dominance. (Tough-guise, Violence, Media, & the Crisis in Masculinity). Mass media gives men the idea that they need to prove themselves, or derive pleasure from obtaining a position of power over women and treating them as a sexualized object. Not only is this something that is incredibly damaging to women, but will even begin to have negative effects on the male psyche as well.
Sources Cited
Kassin, Saul; Fein, Steven; Markus, Hazel Rose. Social Psychology (Pages 493-495). Cengage Learning. Kindle Edition.
Sut Jhally. (1999) Tough Guise: Violence, Media, & the Crisis in Masculinity
Film Theory 101 - Laura Mulvey: The Male Gaze Theory. (2018, May 03)
Hi Allison! I liked reading your blog and found it interesting you used a photo from one of my favorite directors: Martin Scorsese. The picture you used perfectly depicts the tone, of sexual desire and willingness to do anything for it, that you were trying to achieve. However, you say that the issue with fantasies is when they turn into real expectations. I see what you are getting at but I think that fantasies are in nature something that we always want to experience in reality and are therefor a real expectation when given the opportunity. Or at least they are an experience that we want to experience only after being exposed to them. It's this relationship, in my mind, that produces the sexual violence and objectification.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with your point! I could have done a better job of clarifying this. The relationship with wanting something after seeing media create these scenarios of violence and objectification without any sense of the issues that can arise outside of entertainment purposes is the problem. Thanks for reading the article!
DeleteHey Allison, nice blog topic! I agree that pornography is straight up destructive in the sense that it ruins relationships and creates false ideas about sex.
ReplyDeleteIn your last paragraph when you bring up that media has been misrepresenting what it means to "be a man", I was curious as to what you believe "being a man" means in our society?
Thank you in advance
Hi David, thanks for reading my article! I believe that over the years with media representation, that the idea of being a "man" has grown into the expectation that men need to be in shape, with large muscles, and who holds a great amount of power. For example, comparing the men in the 1931 film The Public Enemy, versus the 2008 film Rambo, there is a significant difference in the size and portrayal of muscles and the weapons they carry. With these changes also carrying over to marketing of toys, I felt that over the years media has made men feel inferior if they did not meet those standards seen on TV.
DeleteHey Allison, Thank you for getting back to my comment!
DeleteI would agree that social media has set these social expectations for an ideal model. I would also say that this is the same for women as well. Media such as commercials for makeup, clothing brands, and has also portrayed that there is an ideal figure for women that beauty is obtained by also looking fit. From having large breasts to a large butt. These are expectations that men and women both encounter.
What about sports?
Athletes are purposely exercising to gain muscle. Both Women and Men make who make a living in athletics have these figures that people envy, often models are athletes.
I think the quote: "Mass media gives men the idea that they need to prove themselves, or derive pleasure from obtaining a position of power over women and treating them as a sexualized object." says a lot, and I agree wholeheartedly with it. It's concerning to see how media is developing and shaping our culture.
ReplyDeleteI agree, it is also concerning how the rate of these developments are forming. Our society is shaped fairly fast and easy.
DeleteI remember talking about sexualization in advertisements in a high school health class. We looked at different ads (posters, commercials, music videos) and discussed why we thought sex was being used. What it came down to was that sex sells. Companies will exploit the fact that people are hooked by sexualized ads and not pay attention to some of the side effects that can cause.
ReplyDeleteI agree with this completely. Sex does sell and those companies know it. Money is the driving force, not a fair or realistic portrayal of women.
DeleteI also think this article ties nicely into the current use of the term "toxic masculinity." Your picture above shows this very nicely by portraying the extent men will put themselves at to get what they want. The picture shows as if the woman is a toy that he is crawling after, almost showing that he is her "trophy." Very nice article.
ReplyDeleteDefinitely an issue that people need to be talking about more. Society does largely want to pass pornography off as something that is perfectly acceptable, but then we need to answer the question: how normalized, how plain, how accessible and meaningless, are we going to make sex?
ReplyDeleteJust as YouTube and the new wave of independent journalists it has empowered has harmed TV and print news by making it so.... easy, so accessible, so much less meaningful (as opposed to waiting each morning for the newspaper or something). Who is to say that pornography could have the same effect?
Pretty interesting stuff. I certainly don't disagree that media can give people incorrect ideas about the real world, and that these ideas can be harmful. However, I would be interested in your thoughts about the fact that crime involving sex has actually decreased in recent years. Perhaps that could be a result of the second point you brought up.
ReplyDelete