The Women In The Mainstream Media

The women in mainstream media

The argument claims that women are underrepresented inaccurately in mainstream media that implies that women are less important than males. Media portray women as sex objects by emphasizing on the elements of beauty, passive, dependent and incompetent. Media pervades the lives of people by misrepresenting males and females. The argument claims that people continue to see females as beauty symbols and males as powerful because media has misrepresented gender. This caused incontinence to the females who strive to present themselves as leaders or independent. Irrespective of all the campaigns and struggles females have been unable to detach the stigmas of sexuality and weakness due to media's biases.

The argument claims that gendered stigmas can be removed by changing the way of media’s portrayal of women. Research reveals that in 1,000 ads created by Unilever women were portrayed in stereotypical ways “with just 1% conveying them as funny, 2% showing them as intelligent and 3% depicting them as leaders” CITATION Joh173 \l 1033 (Rudaizky). Women in ads are rarely shown as leaders, powerful or independent that encourage the audience to attach such stereotypes with them. Media is thus misrepresenting them by representing them as housewives, sex object, weak and dependent. The analysis of the marketing and media industries depicts that women only get 25% of the executive roles. The facts also indicate that over 50% of the females manage to get only early professional roles in media and advertisements.

It is claimed that the purpose of media is to promote the old traditional ideology of male-female differences. Critics state that media portray man as, “aggressive, dominant, and engaged in exciting activities from which they receive rewards from others for their ‘masculine’ accomplishments” CITATION BTh93 \l 1033 (Wood). Males are shown as leaders, strong and bold that plays a significant role in shaping the mindsets of the audience. The presentation of women in mainstream media as a sexual symbol has been the cause of male satisfaction. This promotes the beliefs that females are vulnerable to sexual assault, and only males can rescue them. Media played a dominant role in reinforcing the same old cultural ideals of masculinity by showing them powerful and intelligent than females. Their interpretation of males depicts that they are strong, violent and sexually aggressive and are in no way feminine.

The inaccurate representation of females in mainstream media transmits the notion that females are better at homes. Media also underrepresent women as two-thirds of the parts are only addressing males. They portray women as, "younger and thinner than women in the population as a whole, and most are depicted as passive, dependent on men, and enmeshed in relationships or housework" CITATION BTh93 \l 1033 (Wood). Two stigmas attached to women are beauty and youth. The female newscasters and speakers are young and physically attractive. This again represented women inaccurately by separating them form important fields like science, research, math, etc. the role of media has been discouraging because women failed to remove the stigmas of stupidity and beauty for ages. The role played by media thus satisfied male sexual fantasies by showing females as attractive as they can.

Society presumes the roles of males and females in the same way as media present them. two issued faced by women in the mainstream media is their inaccurate and underrepresentation. Media has not changed it strategy of treating males and females differently. It continued to show females as weaker against powerful males. Such representation resulted in creation of certain stigmas that encourage society to see females as beautiful and attractive. Females have been unable to get rid of these stigmas irrespective of their involvement in fields of science and research.

Work Cited

BIBLIOGRAPHY Zaretsky, E. “Male supremacy and the unconscious.” Socialist Revolution 4:7-55 (1975).

Wood, Julia T. “Gendered Media: The Influence of Media on Views of Gender.” Communication, Gender, and Culture (1994): 231-244.

Rudaizky, John. Shifting the way women are portrayed in the media can help close the gender gap. 2017. 20 02 2019 <https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/shifting-women-portrayed-media-help-close-gender-gap/1421255>.