Mail feminism
It's not hypocritical to cover a wide range of views. Of course not. Even having articles with opposing views from one way to another doesn't necessarily imply a flakiness; it's often a strength in a publication to have a variety of opinions.
However.
Here's an article in yesterday's Daily Mail, complaining about, well you can see for yourself:
OK. But how to illustrate the problem of women feeling that their bodies are their only passport to success? Hmm, it's a tricky one, but they went for:
You might possibly conceive that those images aren't just depicting the horror of women feeling that the only way they could achieve things in life would be to present themselves in a certain sexualised way; and that, just possibly, there could be a sliver of a chance of them being titillating. If you did think that, the next image might be a little bit disturbing:
Hmm. Not so sure about that, after all those other ones. But that may just be me. This quote stood out in the piece:
Yes, it's the internet's fault for damaging young women's expectations. It wouldn't be the case that a family newspaper would present images of barely clothed women to its readers in a way that isn't a million miles away from a lad's mag, would it?
Would it?
You know what's coming by now. Published today by the Mail comes this:
Ah, 'totty'. A bit of a contrast to that story yesterday, isn't it?
Yes, I read something about that yesterday. Can't remember where it was... ah well. It wouldn't be as if the same publication would slobber over pictures of a woman in a bikini and call her 'totty' in a 'saucy shoot', would it?
Oh, it would.
Thanks to Sadie for the links!
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Hello. I'm a Bristol-based writer and soon-to-be-redundant journalist. You can read more about me and the Enemies site here, or follow me on Twitter. Email me if you like - antonvowl at live dot co dot uk
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January 26th, 2010 - 13:22
Truly depressing. I was looking at that article yesteray because it's interesting how they've managed to twist the headline to take Natasha Walter's new book completely out of context but hadn't appreciated the full horror of the pictures.
January 26th, 2010 - 15:27
Sweet lord, tell me about it. When the 1st article appeared saying about women being image conscious, having the wrong roll models, etc you then have two other articles about women and image.
One about a woman having her teeth removed and re-fitted with new, nicer looking teeth, plus a snazzy pic of what perfect teeth should look like, and then bloody Liz Jones or some other hack going on about feeling naked without make up and having her eyebrows tattooed onto her face.
All this was praised as confidence boosting, "you go girl" bullshit. It's all cosmetic surgery in my eyes, whether you get your teeth fixed or your boobs done, and it all says to women that they are inadequate as they are and should change to try and be perfect. The idea of perfection that the media has portrayed for many years, not the internet.
January 26th, 2010 - 19:44
I would think that looking upon women as sexual objects has been a male instinct since The Garden of Eden. Bit late to change now.
January 27th, 2010 - 13:22
gee travelling toper, so that's ok then! if men have been treating women as sex objects since the begninning of time we have nothing to worry about! i mean, 250 years ago everyone thought slavery was fine didn't they? oh right, until we realised that this was a disgrace and changed the way we think about human rights.
it is not ok to treat women as sex objects, to teach women that their biggest worth is their body. whether this is something that has happened since the beginning of time is not at all relevant