The film industry and the advertisements Industry has presented images of both sexes, most of which have been unrealistic and stereotypical. For patriarchal civilizations, women and their bodies have always been commodities, sources of pleasure, and exploitation.
Sexualization and objectification of women in television, films, advertising, and music videos became a developing trend in the twentieth century. The mainstream media has traditionally portrayed women’s physical appearance, body image, behavioral norms, and beauty in a misleading and unrealistic light.
Today, we witness hypersexualized and excessively flawless female bodies on television, billboards, glossy magazine pages, and social media. Advertisements, music videos, and films dehumanize and present girls and women as commodities. Everything from car tires to entertainment is sold using women’s bodies.
The very quality of femininity has been portrayed in the film industries. Ironically has victimized them, nearly as pretty faces and sidekicks. So you might be thinking women are exploited by the film industry and advertisements. And in spite of the visible female objectification, why women let it happen to them. And what is the role of multimedia in the gender bias.
The seeing and treating a person, usually women and girls as objects is called Objectification.
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
We are talking about it as if it were a great mystery, right?
1. Objectification of Women in Media
There is a woman who agrees to be in the commercial advertisement of a men’s safety razor, and there she is, half-naked, dancing and inviting men to buy that safety razor. Don’t you know how that happens, Don’t you know the dynamics involved. She is being paid some money.
That’s it. and that’s all that a woman cares for. You take care of my food, I’ll do whatever you want me to do.
We are saying that the media includes mainstream movies and commercial advertisements, among other things. We are saying they insult and degrade women. Can anything happen to you without your consent? Is it really being done forcibly? No, it is not being done forcibly. If something is being done forcibly, why not fight it.
I am, at this moment, what I have always been to him: an object of beauty. He has never loved me as a woman.
Philippa Gregory
Women believe that their physical attractiveness is a measure of how much love and power they should have, putting enormous pressure on them to adhere to traditional beauty standards.
Psychologists believe that women absorb other people’s objectification of their bodies, causing them to continuously criticize their own bodies. Girls and women obsessively scrutinize the outer look of their own bodies. They become too preoccupied with how others view their physical appearance.
What’s the worst that can happen to you? You lose certain privileges. In extreme cases, you will lose your life.
2. Women Life in Bondages
How is a life in bondages worth living anyway? Please tell me.
You see a woman in a movie, say, a Hindi film, playing a very heinous role. Somebody coerced her. Was she made to dance at gunpoint? Was somebody holding a gun to her?
No, it’s an offer that she accepted. And that offer, the tendency to accept that offer, comes from mother nature.
Imagine what your life will look like when you have broken the bondage of fear.
Bruce Wilkinson
Don’t you see how animals behave? Show them a little food, and they’ll come after you. Is that not the case in the jungle, please. As long as we continue to be animals, we will continue to be susceptible to greed, fear, insecurity, and other such things.
3. Women Consents to Objectify Herself
It is pretty rich on our part, quite unbelievable to say that things are happening to us. No, things are not really happening. They are happening to us without our consent. Make a lucrative enough offer, and you can get any actor or actress to do whatever you want him or her to do. Maybe there are a few exceptions, but that’s all.
And why does that happen?
We exist as our biological selves. The biological self says, “Have prestige, have power, have a lot of assets, have food, have security, gather a lot of material things, and that’s what the purpose of life is.”
4. Is Pleasure the Purpose of Life?
We are being told the purpose of life is pleasure, and pleasure can be bought. Pleasure can be bought with money. So if somebody comes to you and offers money for something, you’ll have a tendency to accept that money. And if you don’t accept the money, it’s not because you don’t want to accept it; it’s because usually the money is not big enough. Quote a big enough number, and almost everybody can be bought.
Where is the question of exploitation? tell me. Where is the question of exploitation?
But a person who realizes that pleasure and consumption are not the purpose of life, cannot be bought. I want girls and women to be that person, the person who gives to hoot to all kinds of temptations, the person who says, ‘I lay down my life, rather than sell myself in any kind of marketplace’.
We can be that kind of person, right. You have the power.
5. Bitter Family Bondings
Why do we care so much about security? Why do we care so much for belongingness? Is there really a need?
And don’t we see the price that we pay for our internal weaknesses. So many women continue to live pathetic lives, just because they can’t walk out of their households.
I ask them, “What is the reason?” Why can’t you walk out of the house?
They say that because we love our children and want the family to survive, we have certain duties and responsibilities to such and such people.
I investigate deeper. What do we get to see?
Girls you’ve gotta know when it’s time to turn the page.
Tori Amos
There is insecurity, there are economic issues, who will feed me. Come on let’s give it a try, We’ll do something; maybe you’ll not get as lavish lifestyle as you are currently living in your beautifully decorated prison. Maybe you’ll have to make do with far less. But, come on, freedom is worth it. Is it not? No, is it not.
I don’t know; each of us has to decide for herself. What is the value of freedom? You figure that out. And if you have much in life but not freedom, what do you have figure that out.
6. The Hormones of Sins
As a human being, you are the only species that can watch this play of hormones. That watching is joy itself. Can you watch the entire thing happening, and then be in a powerful position to accept or reject it.
This power is pure joy; otherwise, you are just a slave to circumstances.
What fun is there in that somebody showed you a pizza, and your hormones got activated and you said I want because I want pizza. You have not decided to buy that pizza. Somebody has forced you to buy that pizza. It’s just that the force has not been exerted through a gun or muscle power or something.
The other one is controlling you through a remote control, with a chip within your mind. So you don’t even come to know that you are being enslaved. There is no fun in that.
7. What if Freedom and Liberation?
When you say “being liberated,” obviously there has to be somebody in bondage, right? Only then the word liberation has any meaning.
Who is the one in bondage? First of all, figure that out. If you do not know how deeply you are in bondage, liberation will remain just a word, a good word, a nice word, but not a word you can give your life to.
You can give your life to this world liberation or freedom, only if you firstly realize that you are deeply in chains. That every part of you every cell of you is a slave.
Freedom is the open window through which pours the sunlight of the human spirit and human dignity.
Herbert Hoover
What do you mean by “family”? You are an individual first of all, right. And if you have to have relationships, they have to be based on love and respect.
What kind of relationship is that which entails oppression and insult. And if family is the collective name for such relationships, why do you even need the family?
I mean just because somebody is labeled as a relative, therefore you have to be with that person. What nonsense is this!
8. Quit – Bitter Relationships
Love is great, respect is wonderful, but what is this oppression and humiliation in the name of relationships. Quit right now, no second thoughts on that.
We are afraid, we are just afraid, right. The moment I say this there is no nod of approval, there is a silence of the stunned kind.
I said quit and you are stoned. How do i quit? how is it even possible?
Cry. Forgive. Learn. Move on. Let your tears water the seeds of your future happiness.
Steve Maraboli
If this is not possible, you will have to bear the bondage indefinitely. Relationships are wonderful being with a man or a woman is great, but there is a condition to be met, right, without that condition being met, how are you spending even one day with that person or persons.
Just because there is a social contract and a legal thing.
What is that?
9. The Free Women
No family, no institution, is bigger than the fundamentals of life. And remember the fundamentals of life, remember who you are. You are not born to serve the family; you are born to liberate yourself, and it is your liberation that is your greatest act of love towards others.
She was born to be free, let her run wild in her own way and you will never lose her.
Nikki Rowe
If you really want to help the world, work toward your own freedom. Instead, if you say because I have responsibilities, I am choosing slavery, that is both stupid and self-defeating.
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