Blog Post 4

Women’s bodies have been policed from the very beginning in basically every aspect of life, I feel women now subconsciously police their own bodies because that is all they know and have been cultured to know. From a young age going to school some dress codes for girls, which most schools only have dress codes for girls, were: your shorts had to reach the length of your fingertips when your arms are by your side or no shoulders showing so no tank tops. The no tank tops one always confused me, even when I was younger and did not know all of these concepts about sexualization, I would always question why a boy can show his shoulders and a girl couldn’t; when I was about the age of 10 to 14 I would question what was so sexy or provocative about a shoulder? how can a shoulder of a little girl be sexualized? that question should make people cringe and realize how wrong the policing of women’s bodies is, and the focus should be on policing the ideas that boys and men have to those female bodies. In the article “The policing of women’s bodies needs to stop” by Lerato Moloi, she also discusses how the policing of women’s bodies is engrained in us from a young age. Moloi says “Policing women is normalized by both men and women and legitimized through state law and policy, educational institutions and in the workplace. Policing women is a form of repression that restrains freedom of expression.” this policing has become normalized, but can become much worse with other rights of women becoming debates. 

There has been a constant battle for women to have full rights over their own bodies. Whereas men do not get policed on what they should look like, how they should dress, or what is right, wrong or “socially acceptable” to do with their body, yet the topic of a women’s reproductive freedom is a debate in politics and being debated by men. In the reading “The Alienable Rights of Women” by Roxane Gay she discusses the reproductive freedom rights of a women such as brith control and abortion. During her discussion about abortion she says “Things have gotten complicated, in too many states, for women who want to exercise their right to choose. Legislatures across the United States have worked very hard to shape and control the abortion experience in bizarre, insensitive ways that intervene on a personal, should-be-private experience in very public, painful ways.” when she says this she is talking about how even though women had the right to choose to terminate their pregnancy since 1973 and since some of the men in charge do not like this right for women to be able to chose what to do with their body, some states have created loop holes to try and change the women decision by forcing them to do many things including but not limited to, undergo invasive medical procedures. When I read things such as this I can not help but to compare this to a man, there is nothing a man is not in control of doing with or to his body, there is no debate in politics by women on whether or not a man should be able to choose what to do to his body, and there never will be because there will (hopefully not) always be this double standard. 

Another double standard between men and women is the body image portrayed in the media, both men and women are portrayed as these ‘perfect’ people in ads and media but the pressure for women to actually look like that unrealistic women in ads is extreme. In the reading “Beauty and the Beast of Advertising” by Jean Kilbourne says “But the ads sell a great deal more than products. They sell values, images and concepts of success and worth, love and sexuality, popularity and normalcy. They tell us who we are and who we should be.” (Kilbourne, 121) not only is the government trying to tell women what they should or should not be doing with their bodies but ads and media also try to tell them who they are and who they should be. There is a constant pressure on girls and women, in all aspects of their lives to be a certain way, whether it is what they look like or even what they wear. 

In the article “Stop Policing Women’s Bodies“ by Beth Cone Kramer, she opens the article by saying “We can teach our children there’s a time and place for cocktail or beach attire without shaming girls for their bodies. And we need to teach and show boys that a girl’s attire or presence at a party doesn’t mean she’s fair game.”, which I agree there is a time and a place for certain dress codes and attires but currently the policing of what women wear instead of teaching men self control is absurd. Kramer also says “The idea that women are the protectors of “virtue” and “chastity” is the basis of the rape culture. If a girl is sexually assaulted, we ask why she was at a party, walking home from class unescorted or wearing “that dress.” which is something we discussed in class; we talked about the things boys and girls are taught when they are younger to protect themselves from this rape culture, boys could come up with two or maybe three things whereas a girl could make a list easily, such as, never walk alone, keep your key in between your fingers, never walk with both headphones in etc.

Dove Ad

Dove Ad

There is a new wave of trying to fix these problems in media, there is definitely a long way to go but it is relieving to know that people are becoming aware of these issues and making it a topic of discussion, which it never would have been years ago. A lot of these efforts are seen in Dove ads such as the “Real Beauty Campaign” where they used models who aren't ‘perfect’ and they use models who are ‘normal’ and ‘average’. In the reading “Here’s What Bothers me About the New Dove AD” by Lindsay King-Miller discusses the Dove ad where women walking into a building can either walk into a door labels ‘Beautiful’ or another door labeled ‘Average’. In the other reading “Taking Beauty out of Body Positivity” also by Lindsay King-Miller, she discusses another Dove ad, this one sits down women with a police sketch artists, who never sees them, and asks them to describe their facial features to him, he then asks strangers who have just met the women briefly also for a description of the women; the outcome is that the women describe themselves more harshly and include every ‘flaw’ whereas the strangers create this beautiful description of the women. Some things Miller says in the articles is “These ads each depend on the assumption that in order to be happy, empowered, or confident, women need to feel beautiful.” and “While I’m in favor of encouraging women to feel confident and happy, I worry that today’s body positivity focuses too much on affirming beauty and not enough on deconstructing its necessity.” I think Dove had the right idea with these ads and it is a step in the right direction to create these new understandings of women and not everyone being perfect there is still plenty of room for growth and change in the media.