Women in the West: liberation or manipulation?
The excessive sexualization of the image of women and even little girls in the media, advertising and marketing can have harmful psychological and physical effects on adolescents and young girls, according to a study released Tuesday. The American Psychological Association (APA) has released a report that analyzes some 300 studies published over the past 18 months, examining media, particularly television, movies, magazines and even song lyrics and body shapes. dolls. This pressure, which experts call “sexualization,” bases a person’s worth primarily on their sex appeal and can lead to depression, eating disorders and poor academic performance, says the APA. (…) The 66-page report includes a wealth of advice for distraught parents who don’t know how to help their child resist this pressure, when, according to a study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, nearly one in every American child two, aged 4 to 6, has a television set in his room. The authors also scrutinized music videos and denounced the lyrics of songs like those of the “Pussycat Dolls” (“Don’tcha wish your girlfriend was hot like me?”, “You wish your girlfriend was hot like me?” ) or those of rapper 50 Cent (“I tell the hos (whores) all the time, Bitch get in my car”, “I always tell the whores, get in my car, bitch”). Advertising also relies heavily on sexualization. In 2003 in the United States, pre-teen girls spent $1.6 million on thongs, according to Time Magazine. A shoe brand (Skechers) used the singer Christina Aguilera, dressed in pigtails, her T-shirt unbuttoned and licking a lollipop. Bratz dolls, which rival Barbie, feature “little girls in bikinis in hot tubs making cocktails while boys play guitar and surf.” The dolls are dressed in mini skirts, fishnet stockings and feather boas. (La Libre 02/20/2007).
We could multiply examples of excessive or premature sexualization, whether in the world of rap, cinema, advertising, or in the factual evolution of morals. Or even in the well-meaning and misguided attempts at early education (13 years old) in sexual life such as that which was recently carried out by the Belgian Ministry of Health…We could also refer to the critical reflection on these developments expressed by the novels of Michel Houellebecq. These trends are not new. They can probably be dated from the new ideology put in place by those in power from the end of the 1960s in Western countries. An ideology which, as our research has shown, is based on three pillars which are the values of the New Leviathan: individualism, hedonism and consumerism. The search for individual fulfillment through pleasure and consumption, which can also be relational and sexual, is the most powerful factor in destabilizing contemporary social bonds.
More recently, the racist “blonde jokes” have highlighted the ambivalence of the image of the Western woman (of which the blonde woman is the symbol), presented both as the woman that everyone dreams of having and like a stupid and easy doll. It is clear that in pornography or elsewhere, “liberated” sexuality almost systematically depicts women in humiliating, submissive and degrading situations and postures. Or she suggests that the sexual and romantic behavior of women should be equivalent to that of men, without taking into account the fact that the patterns of interpretation remain totally different. It is not surprising that this new bludgeoning results in psychological disorders among those who are most exposed to it and is socially detrimental to women, their image and their status.
In this regard, the fact that recently Paris Hilton, this American heiress who made herself known for her sexual escapades on screen and her blonde stupidity, was asked by Simba Toys to choose the clothes and appearance of a brand of dolls for little girls competing with Barbie dolls, may appear as a detail which is not purely coincidental.
