Women’s bodies are not their own. In Western society women
are continuously objectified, largely through mass media, leading to a very
dangerous way of thinking – that women are objects to be won, bought or taken
by men, that women should not be in charge of their own bodies.
In her TEDTalks video, Chimamanda
Ngozi Adichie aptly states, “show a people as one thing, as only one
thing, over and over again, and that is what they become.” This is precisely
what is happening to women, and it needs to stop.
Throughout the United States, legislative barriers have been
put into place to prevent women from standing on equal footing with men. One
main barrier is that of reproductive rights.
In 1970s Los Angeles, it was common practice for poor women
of color to be sterilized after abortion without consent: “low-income patients
were more likely to be forcibly sterilized after a therapeutic abortion than
their white middle-class equivalents” (Nelson, 9). Male doctors took it upon
themselves to make life-changing decisions for these women without even
consulting them.
Although now these forced sterilizations no longer happen as
frequently as they did forty years ago, they unfortunately still happen,
especially in women’s prisons.
The Supreme Court case Roe
v. Wade definitively legalized abortion throughout the U.S. in 1973.
However, women’s abortion rights have been under constant attack ever since
that ruling. Even now in certain states, such as Texas, Indiana and Alabama,
it’s nearly impossible for a woman to get an abortion. There are so many ridiculously
unnecessary, strict and invasive requirements that a woman must follow before
being able to have the procedure (including mandatory waiting periods,
ultrasounds and counseling) that many women opt out of having an abortion.
The goal of these insane legislative barriers is to keep
women down in order to maintain control over them. In gaining complete control
over their own bodies, they will gain power. As Roxanne Gay puts it: “If these
politicians can’t prevent women from having abortions, they are certainly going
to punish them. They are going to punish these women severely, cruelly, unusually
for daring to make choices about motherhood, their bodies, and their futures”
(Gay, 271). The message being sent by the enforcement of these barriers is that
women are not capable of wielding the same amount of power that men do, and
must therefore be controlled for their own good. When it comes to women’s
rights, the idea that a man knows better is ludicrous. Female politicians don’t
pretend to know more about a man’s body than men, and men’s reproductive rights
have never been a topic of conversation, so why are women’s? Maybe because women are severely underrepresented in U.S. politics.
The media coverage of women’s rights is shockingly predominantly given by men. This perpetuates
the “single story” concept that men are experts of women’s rights, bodies and
needs. However, there have been social media movements with the aim of
promoting women’s rights – coined hashtag activism – such as #BringBackOurGirls
after more than 300 schoolgirls were abducted in Nigeria, receiving more than
4.5 million tweets, #equalpay, and the Facebook group “My Favorite F Word isFeminism.”
While media can be used to combat
negative views of women’s bodies and sexuality, it’s generally in the form of social
media movements. In this case individuals are attempting to make a change in
the world because they see that something is fundamentally wrong. Other media outlets,
such as magazines and TV do not portray women in such a flattering light. Tanya
Steele describes Hollwood’s incredibly warped depiction of women in her Rewire article: “displaying women’s
breasts, or putting a woman’s body on display is code for ‘this is sexuality,’
This sexuality belongs to men. American culture is dedicated to male sexuality”
(Steele).
For the most part, the media (and a whole lot of
heterosexual male politicians) objectify women. To them, women are parts,
whereas men are whole. Everything that a woman does matters and must be
controlled because we, as women, are apparently not capable of being in control
of our own bodies. As I write this, young girls are being exposed to the
walking used diaper bag (aka Donald Trump) who constantly spouts astonishingly
sexist remarks about women. His latest comment was that women who undergo an
abortion should face “some sort of punishment.” Maybe it’s time to stop letting
men try to run the country…
Art imitates life. When women’s rights are not reflected in
media, it becomes a social norm that women are not privy to certain lifestyles
and are required to conform to the status quo established by the patriarchy.
Thus it is imperative to point out the problematic depiction of women in media
in order to establish a new status quo where each person has control over his
or her own body, regardless of gender or race.
Works
Cited
Gay, Roxanne. “Alienable Rights of
Women.” Bad Feminist. N.p.: Harper
Collins, 2014. N. pag. Print.
Nelson, Jennifer. “Introduction: From
Abortion to Reproductive Rights.” Introduction. Women of Color and the
Reproductive Rights Movement. Np.: New York UP, 2003. N. pag. Print.
Steele, Tanya. “’Hobby Lobby,’ and a
Woman’s Right to Sexual Exploration.” Rewire.
N/a, 2014. Web. 31 March. 2016.
