feminism
24 Sep 2009
We Haven't Come a Long Way, Baby
The pressure on young girls to conform to p*rnographic ideals of female beauty and behaviour has never been stronger, writes Melinda Tankard Reist
In 2009, former Hi-5 children's entertainer Kellie Crawford posed for a lingerie photo shoot for men's magazine Ralph. The Ralph cover for April features Kellie in tiny knickers and black bra, and shouts "It's Hi-5 Hottie Kellie!" with the subtitle "Busting out some bedtime stories". It includes another smaller picture of Kellie in her Hi5 costume. In the accompanying interview, Kellie explained that as a children's star, she "just forgot I was a woman". She did the photo shoot to "find the woman in me".I responded in media interviews by asking why it was that the Wiggles were not expected to prove their manhood by stripping down to their jocks and having their photos taken for a magazine shoot, yet women were expected to take off most of their clothes to prove their womanhood? Opponents of my position, both men and women, filled my inbox with intellectually challenging arguments. These included:
That I was sad, old and dog-ugly
That I had saggy breasts and a droopy arse
That I needed liposuction
That I was a bitter ugly woman
That my face would break a 60-inch plasma television
And, my personal favourite, that I was "as ugly as a hat full of arses" (obviously not a hat full of Kellie's arses, because hers was magnificent, according to her fans).
However, one little girl in Victoria who seemed not to care about whether I was bitter or needed cosmetic surgery, wrote me an email earlier this year which I now quote with her permission:
"My name is Delaney and I am 10 years old. On Today Tonight I saw a story about Kellie from Hi-5. Of course, you know that she has done a photo shoot for a men's magazine. I think it is very silly how she feels she has to do it. It sets a horrible example for younger kids like me. When I was little I used to love watching Hi-5 and it makes me feel dissappointed [sic] that she has done something like that."
Delaney, and girls like her, receive messages from every level of the media and popular culture that the baring of the female body is what makes you a "real woman". Very few young girls have Delaney's courage to distance themselves from this message. Ideal womanhood is now all about sexual allure; the ability to attract the male gaze has become what is important in life. As Pamela Paul writes in Pornified, "being publicly sexual has become the only acceptable way for girls to demonstrate maturity".
The pressure to conform to an idealised body type in a sex-saturated culture that values girls who are thin, hot, sexy and "bad" is taking a terrible toll. Despite the many opportunities at school, university and in the workplace available to them, girls today are struggling. Courtney E Martin describes it as "the frightening new normalcy of hating your body". Self-hatred is so prevalent, it's like a rite of passage for teenage girls.
In the past it was often adult women who understood that their bodies were being pulled apart bit by bit and analysed for imperfections and flaws. Women understood the imperative to be sexy, a message shored up by advertising propaganda. Now this understanding has come to younger girls, who learn to see that they too are always at risk of failing.
Martin has noted that many girls say they would rather be hit by a truck than be fat. I know of a fit and healthy five-year-old who won't go swimming because, she says, people would laugh at her and say she's too fat. Eight year-old girls are admitted to hospital with eating disorders. Schoolgirls develop ranking systems on the basis of "hotness", resulting in guaranteed misery for the girl with the lowest ranking.
Girls internalise the body critiquing messages of shows like Extreme Makeover and America's Next Top Model and its Australian version. The program Ten Years Younger in Ten Days puts couples in glass boxes at Sydney's Circular Quay so that 100 passers-by can tell us what they think of their looks. "She looks like she just gave up", commented one viewer before the transformation begins, and the women have their faces pumped full of botox and fillers until they look like chipmunks with cheeks so plump they can hardly talk, their feet stuffed into heels so high they can barely walk.
English girl Sasha Bennington absorbed today's messages about what constitutes female beauty early:
"Sasha ... has a spray tan once a week and a new set of acrylic nails once a month. Her hair is bleached white-blonde and regularly boosted with a set of extensions. She plucks her eyebrows and carefully applies makeup every morning. Her favourite outfit is a white satin boob-tube dress and Stetson hat.
"But Sasha isn't a Vegas showgirl — she goes to primary school and only turned 11 last week.
"While most children her age have been desperately waiting for the arrival of the new Harry Potter, little Sasha has been hanging on for her heroine Jordan's latest book. She says, 'I'm obsessed with her.'"
Sasha's bedroom, the UK Sun article tells us, is "a pink shrine to Playboy, with a Playboy door curtain, satin duvet set, Playboy pillows and pyjamas". For Sasha, the thought of not being pretty is just too awful to contemplate: "My mum would just call me ugly. Everyone would call me ugly. I wouldn't like that at all."
Playboy make-up, including "Tie me to the bedpost blush" and "Hef's favorite lip gloss" (in colours Centerfold Red, Sex Kitten and Playmate Pink) is marketed to girls, along with Playboy doona covers and pencil cases. Girls are wearing the brand of the global sex industry directed by a sleazy 80-year-old man in silk pyjamas and they think it's about cute rabbits. When Hugh Hefner was asked by the Washington Post about a growing trend among young girls to wear Playboy-logo clothing and accessories, he replied, "I don't care if a baby holds up a Playboy bunny rattle".
The sexualisation of girls has seen a rise in beauty rituals and a desire for cosmetic surgery at ever younger ages. Disordered eating is on the rise. A 2006 National Youth Cultures of Eating Study found that close to 20 per cent of adolescent Australian girls use fasting for two or more days to lose weight. Another 13 per cent use vomiting. Others rely on slimming pills, chewing but not swallowing food, smoking, and laxative abuse, as found in this study. According to AAP, one in four 12-year-old girls in Australia would like to have cosmetic surgery. A Brisbane Sunday Mail investigation in 2008 reported a 20 per cent increase in inquiries from teenage girls for plastic surgery.
A Queensland surgeon was quoted in the Sunday Mail report as saying that between 5-10 per cent of young women want to look like the former Big Brother contestant Krystal Forscutt. Cosmetic surgery practitioners are cashing in on the body angst of girls and women, with growing numbers of teenage girls having breast implants.
The makers of a UK Channel 4 documentary The Sex Education Show v Pornography, which screened in March 2009, showed photographs of 10 pairs of breasts to a group of boys from Sheringham High School in Norfolk. According to a Guardian article:
"All say the most attractive are the ones that have been surgically enhanced. Alarmingly, a posse of their female classmates says the same thing. Both sexes are unimpressed with normal breasts, which — unlike porn stars' silicone-boosted chests — are often not symmetrical and sit down, not up."
Almost half the girls at Sheringham High School were unhappy with their breasts. Even small children get the message that the real thing just isn't good enough. My Beautiful Mommy, a 2008 book by a Florida plastic surgeon, Michael Salzhauer, is written to explain mummy's new makeover. The book's front cover shows mummy in body hugging pants and snug top, enhancing her pert new breasts. Surrounding her is pink stardust, as though she's been touched by a fairy. What girl doesn't find sparkly stardust appealing? Maybe the magic cosmetic surgeon will visit them too one day? A more fitting title would be, "If mommy's not good enough maybe I'm not either?"
We see in these examples a phenomenon identified by M. Gigi Durham as the Lolita Effect, that is, "the distorted and delusional set of myths about girls' sexuality that circulates widely in our culture and throughout the world". Girls are encouraged "to flirt with a decidedly grown-up eroticism and sexuality".
One mother described the impact of these myths on her 13-year-old daughter, in a poignant letter to The Age:
"I am the mother of a 13-year-old girl. She is not overly developed, she does not wear makeup, she is aware of her burgeoning sexuality, but a little daunted by it and curious of it. Whenever I go out with her — be it to a shopping centre, a walk down the road or picking her up from school — she is gawked at, wolf-whistled and stared at by men usually aged in their 20s and 30s. It doesn't matter that she is standing with her mother.
They do not hesitate for a second. They wave and gesticulate while she's sitting in the car next to me. Her girlfriends also suffer this indignity.
"I believe this is the result of the sexualisation of children that some men think it's fine to lust after them — and not just fine, but acceptable. It doesn't matter if they see revulsion, fear or confusion because they're looking at these girls' faces. The girls are totally objectified ... I don't think it even enters these men's heads that it is not only offensive, but frightening to attract naked lust when you are only 13."
This is an edited extract from Getting Real: Challenging the Sexualisation of Girls, edited by Melinda Tankard Reist (Spinifex Press: 2009).
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Isnt it time women started taking responsibility for this? All the examples cited in this article and others like it are of women choosing to sexualise themselves for personal or career gains. I have yet to here any evidence of a male forcing a women to strip for a magazine or to get a boob job etc. and these types of articles seem to imply that that is what is occuring.
I thought one of the points of feminism was to give women the right and power to decide their own lives, and if they choose to sexualise themselves isnt that their right? If other women follow suit, and ppl like the author believe it is a stupid thing to do, what is that saying about women then? They are too dumb to see when they are hurting themselves?
Alot of women will admit that their biggest critics are other women, so who is responisble for the low self esteem some women feel? Who is responsible for teaching young girls they need to look a certain way to fit in? Who supports these company’s and magazines which perpetuate these images? I dont know any men that buy Cleo or Cosmo. I dont know many men that would judge a women by some of the ridiculous standards her fellow female peers would judge her by, so why do ppl like this author seem to imply it is the mens fault? And if we have that much control over women, does that not imply that women are weak minded and easily led? If men have to come and fix this up, does that not imply that women are incapable of recognising self stupidity or sorting their own problems out?
I believe its time for the smart and strong women to take ownership of this problem and come up with proper solutions rather than keep pointing the finger at men. One reason why you dont see the same atitudes in mass media in reagrds to men is because most males wouldnt buy it (literally), and the author is conveniently leaving out the times when men are judged as objects in one form or another (just look at the metro vz macho debates over recent years) or the worship or sports stars etc.
One could make a similar arguement the author makes here in reagrds to males and violence and the fact that from a young age many young boys are almost indoctrinated into worshipping violent alpha males through the media. Would it be fair to blame women for all the fights men have in their lives?
surdo, it is disgusting that you think its women’s fault for this shit. We live in a sexist society where men are dominant over women. Women are oppressed. Men aren’t.
It is society’s expectations beaten down into women from a young age that causes them to feel this way, to feel they need to do this to attract men. Women are constantly scrutinised for their appearance and men aren’t.
Whilst I don’t believe men actually benefit from sexism, it is men that perpetrate it and are raised to be the dominant gender within this society.
It’s time for men to stop denying they’re doing something wrong and to change their behaviour. Did you ever stop to think that your relationships might more satisfying if they were based on genuine equality and not pressure and dominance.
I agree with the author but she is only looking at a single perspective.
Men also face a great deal of body-image issues. A man’s self-confidence can be at an all time low when he sees the Adonis’s that grace the magazine covers. These images create an unrealistic ideal of what a man should be.
This is a social trend. Media saturation makes free choice in whether or not to participate extremely difficult. God help us.
"I think it would be a very good idea." Gandhi
Benjamin- whats disgusting, actually idiotic is for you to attack me without reading my comments and also passig judgement on ‘my relationships’ when A. I made no mention of them in my post and B. you have no knowledge of my personal life.
If you are male, you must be one of the opressing types, I am not. I have also grown up and had the pleasure of spending time with a great deal of smart, strong and independent women, and while the world in general is skewed towards males (with some of them-the white,anglo, middle class ones) getting the biggest piece of the pie, on an individual level women in AUSTRALIA do have access to more options than women in other places. My point is, if those women are adults and CHOOSE to sexualise themselves why are the males in this country being held responsible.
The author brings up the example of Krystal. It was her MOTHER who allowed and piad for Krystals boob job (and got one herself), her father had nothing to do with it. Examples like that are found everywhere. Delaney is a grown woman and chosse to strip for a magazine, no one forced her to do it. Thats my point, why is the author using these as examples of male operession? Why arent these women who perpetuate and push the same stereotypes that men are accused of doing, held accountable by other women? And why do a minority of women with a certain ideological position such as the author believe they can speak on behalf of the majority of women in this country?
You sound like you have had no real relationships with women, because if you did you would realise they are not one homogenous group, but individual people who make the same mistakes and erros as individual men and who have the same potential and power to become what they wish. If some of them choose to sexualise themselves, and teach their daughters to do the same, then other women shouldnt blame ALL men if some men decide to enjoy that.
I myself have never ogled or objectified a 12 year old girl walking with her mother, and neither would a lot of positive men I know, and I personally do not find what the mass media says is a ‘hot women’ always to be the case according to my persoanl tastes, and I know alot of men who would prefer a women many other females would call ‘fat’ in their bed than one of these photoshopped silicon pin ups.
The author has a good intention but her apporach has been to muddle up different situations and try and direct all the responibility and balme towards males, which in counter productive.
First there needs to be a clear division of situations where women are oppressed and abused by males -which does happen. And that needs to be dealt with with legislation and education.
But then women in this country need to look at what actions they take that perpetuate and feed the stereotype that women are only sexual objects and make conscious decisions on where and what they spend their money and time on and what images and example they set for younger girls who they are role models for.
And the women in Australia that are in positons of influecne need to start taking the lead and create new avenues for women to be able to dioscuss these issues and work on constructing alternatives. If you rely on the men to do it, you are basically regurgitating the old myth that women need men to save them (which is what I think you are doing, and which is much more sexist IMO)…
Surdo - I think the main issue here is that Reist’s article isn’t focused on women - it is focused on young girls, who are far less able to take a stand against the pressure to look sexy/thin/beautiful etc.
I remember as a teenage girl reading Dolly magazine with my friends. At an age when my body was changing from stick thin to curvy, it was hard to look at the skinny models and not hate how my body was changing. I starved myself, and complained constantly about being fat, even though I was in a completely normal and healthy weight range.
It was only as an adult that I realised how sucked in i had been, and how much my mother’s efforts to drown out the messages I was getting from everywhere else were in vain.
These messages included the boys at my high school - most of them lusted after 2 or 3 skinny and popular girls at the school, unaware they were sucked into the same size and image pressures as the girls.
But you have a point - I must admit feeling frustrated at some of my female colleagues railing against media depictions of women but still buying New Weekly/Grazia/Famous magazine every week.
But it’s equally frustrating seeing men buy zoo/alpha/fhm etc etc, particularly knowing how much silicone and airbrushing have gone into those magazines.
Solutions have to come from a bigger picture, legislative change to protect young girls, as well as individually - but voting with our wallets and not paying for items which support these views of women and girls.
I think the damage is more profound.
These messages can only have a such an effect on people’s behaviour if they have a lack of depth to their thinking and little perception of what is truly valuable.
I have always been at odds with this one , arguing that physical beauty is intrinsically linked to character , at about the age of 25 people have reached an important level of maturity and that character is starting to be expressed in their faces. Why people chase some stereotypical faceless veneer is beyond me.
Sexual politics and the confusion between lust and beauty seems to be the hallmark of society.
Articulate , intelligent , compassionate , capable , steadfast , for me these are the foundations of beauty and the pre-requisites for sexual attraction.
But then again I have never been sheep like , media saturation an influence ? Why would you waste your time watching TV ?
from my point of view it has nothing to do with which gender did what. where are the parents of these children? granted as per above, mothers and fathers worrying about adolescent girls has been going on forever and unlikely to change. first it was covering them up, then pre-marital sex, education, providing a voice, rock music and those nasty nasty Beatles. I mean please. a teenager is always going to have anxiety regardless of which gender it is. peoples desires are complex and ever evolving. girls will always feel awkward around boys, jsut as boys feel awkward around girls and then boys feel awkward around other boys and girls feel awkward around other girls.
the parents are integral in establishing sense of self for the child’s entire life and treat other children the same way. with respect.
"Isnt it time women started taking responsibility for this?"
First post no less. Well done, Surdo. I recommend you seek out a Politics 101 course somewhere in order to understand how it all works.
Good luck.
I agree with Surdo. Men are not reponsible.
I have two teenage nieces. Neither are body selfconscious.
One loves fashion and the other, horses.
If the new femanism promotes having any body shape you want then how can girls remain impervious.
As a totally square guy I hate anything artifical, make-up included.
surdo, you hit the nail on the head. It’s a dam sorry state of affairs for kids these days & the only way to make things right, is for adults to take responsibility for their ‘actions’ & stop putting toddlers in T-shirts with "I’m a tits man", or giving 5 year old’s laungere etc. The mentality which drove Crawford to pose for Ralph magazine has to be pointed out by a ten year old because adults don’t have the basic mental capacity, or they are driven by financial enticement to the detriment of every parents worst nightmare.
Melinda,
You’ve made some good points about the way in which unscrupulous people are cashing in on the sexualization of young girls. I would have liked to see more on this. Name some names. Point some fingers. Help people, help themselves by providing some tangible evidence of exploitation.
But your haste to talk in absolute terms about the disposition of an entire gender unnerves me and does nothing positive for the empowerment of people who are genuinely oppressed.
"Ideal womanhood is now all about sexual allure; the ability to attract the male gaze has become what is important in life. "
I would have thought that for many if not most females ‘attracting the male gaze’ has always been ‘important in life.’ Expressing ‘sexual allure’ is undoubtedly very important to males. I don’t think your assertion that ‘womanhood is now all about sexual allure’ can be substantiated. Unless of course you also assume that we all inhabit the same media bubble. I spend alot of time watching the cricket myself.
Similarly, Pamela Paul’s comment not be substantiated.
Feelings of inadequacy don’t necessarily lead to self-hatred. They might. But they can also serve to motivate people in a very positive way. Feelings of inadequacy have always been a ‘rite of passage for young girls’ just like they have been for young boys. I think it’s called puberty. I don’t think you can intervene to prevent a child in throws of puberty from feeling inadequate, in the same way you can address the inadequacies of a fully developed adult.
There is nothing wrong with young girls not wanting to be obese or fat or overweight. I venture that it would take an adult about five minutes to build up the self-esteem of your five year old acquaintance in order to get her to go swimming and completely forget what she was worrying about. I think that’s called parenting. I hardly think it necessary to assume she might have the same debilitating cognitive malfunction as, say, a neurotic 35 year old.
Schoolgirls have always had ranking systems based on attractiveness. Just as schoolboys have always had ranking systems based on physical prowess. Not that I’m saying that this is good thing. It’s just not ‘new,’ so I can see some difficulties in attempting to use it as an example of some kind of externally enforced (new-media based) oppression. Given these ranking systems, it has never been easy for those on the lower end if the ‘scale.’ Implying that such developments are new and going on to blame ‘big media’ does little to address this.
It’s refreshing to read here an number of people openly admitting the state of oppression of women in the west, regarding patriarchal inverted rules for men vs women, in terms of success and beauty.
Let’s keep this in mind the next time we discuss the oppression of women in countries like Iran, where, although they are required to wear (a semblance of) head scarf, they have more degrees per capita than Australia, US, UK, et al, and are *not* required to damage their backs and their mental health in order to be successful and happy.
We have a lot in the west to answer for, not least the seductive but selective position that we have advanced women’s rights so far in the last hundred years. It all depends on what measures you use…
As it is, I know a lot of women in corporate positions (as if that were an enviable thing), but nearly all are expected (by default) to maintain the home and family as well, and to dress in heels and makeup in the boardroom. Seems like all we’ve done is make women work *even* harder across the course of the last century..
On the other hand, I know a lot of women castigated for choosing to stay home and bring up their families (particularly single mums), cast as benefit scammers, etc. It seems a woman is no use unless she is doing *both* jobs.
cheers, Derek
Surdo,
Apart from the case of the men who ogle the thirteen year old girl mentioned in the letter at the end of the article and Hugh Hefner saying he thinks his prognography brand should be on products for babies (both of which are individual cases and which melinda never says are typical of men in general) I don’t see where in the article men are told the problem is their fault.
I have read pieces (never on NM) that voice a vague and unhelpful anger at men in general, but this isn’t one of them.
I think you’re being overly defensive. The point seems to be that society in general - men and women, should be concerned about this trend.
She could have made the point that men still generally control the media companies that reproduce these sexualised images of women for younger and younger audiences, but she doesnt.
I do, however, wish there were some more constructive suggestions in the article… what do we do to combat this?
It’s a question that troubles me and which, apart from the oft repeated (and very valid) idea that parents should take more interest in the media their children consume, I draw a total blank on.
Melinda? Anyone? can you help me here?
I could give you some very valid reasons AustinGMc but the admin of matilda will only remove my comments from the discussion. Freedom of speech is not tolerated on all web sites & some feel the need to refrain persons from the public image for their fears of religious or political protection.