A friend of mine recently sent me this video in which little Sophie, with the help of her mother, sends out an important message via YouTube. The title seems like a big DUH (“Beauty is Not How Skinny You Are”), but it surely is a message we don’t hear enough. The message extends past dissatisfaction with body weight as Sophie asks the audience “Why are you trying to look like someone else?”:
Why are we trying to look like someone else? Why do companies want us to want to look like someone else?
You might think, “I’m not trying to look like someone else!”, but the truth is that social standards of beauty say that we are only attractive if we have certain physical attributes. These physical attributes tend to come from a select pool of celebrities, too.
Just glancing at the magazine racks as I do my grocery shopping, I can’t escape constant reminders that I, too, can get Michelle Obama’s arms, or Cameron Diaz’s abs, or follow Britney’s quick weight loss plan. How do I copy Kristin Stewart’s outfit, or Beyonce’s hair? My complexion is most like Halle Berry’s, and here is a list of lipstick shades she wears! These magazines say that I, too, can be glamorous, and so can you–we just need to alter our appearances to match Hollywood standards.
As technology advances, we are not limited to simply changing workouts or getting new haircuts! A wide array of reality shows about cosmetic surgery inform us that we have new options!
A contestand from "The Swan" after having plastic surgery. Is this the cost of beauty?
Shows like The Swan (2004-2005), which About-Face protested, and ABC’s Extreme Makeover (2002-2007) portray cosmetic surgery as just another makeover. There is also MTV’s I Want a Famous Face (2004-2005), which documents people who go through surgery and makeovers to look more like the certain celebrities.
As rates of cosmetic surgery rise, more and more people request specific celebrities’ features. The most requested celebrity nose is Jessica Alba’s. Women are asking for collagen injections to get Angelina Jolie’s lips. There are people asking specifically for Scarlett Johansson’s eyes. Would you want to go under the knife to look like your favorite celebrity?
With these shows and ads telling me that looking like my favorite celebrity is as easy as 1, 2, 3, little Sophie’s voice pops back into my head: “Why are you trying to look like someone else?”
Little can remind us more of the beauty of our individuality than a child’s voice reminding us that “You are unique.” Sophie tells the viewer that there will never be another person like them, so why would we want to look like someone else?
“Do you want me to look like somebody else?” she asks. Hearing that from a young girl is almost heartbreaking because we imagine that girls as little as Sophie should be free from the media influences that tell them to change.
If we don’t want Sophie to change and doubt her own uniqueness, why would we want to change ourselves? As Sophie repeats the question “Why do you want to look like someone else?”, I find that I can’t come up with a better answer than “I don’t.”
Do you want to look like someone else? Why or why not?
–Tea
Tea is a college student in Berkeley studying Art and Sociology. While working at a café, she realized there was a lot of negative body talk floating around and wanted to encourage women to rethink the roles their bodies have in their lives. She hopes they would embrace their bodies (and minds!) rather than aspire towards unattainable ideals. What good is a body if you can’t enjoy it? When she’s not blogging for About Face, she writes, runs a photography business, and cuddles up with good books.
Mauritanian girls forced to gain large amounts of weight so they will be more appealing to men
Some things simply exhaust me. An article in the October 2009 issue of Marie Claire magazine, titled “Forced to be Fat”, is one of them. It also made me sad, angry and horrified. And you know what? It made me a little bit jealous.
In the country of Mauritania, girls and young women are often force-fed up to 16,000 calories a day to make them fat. The article states:
Now big women are back in vogue, and the custom of funneling rich food into young girls like geese farmed for foie gras is once again thriving unchecked…Government figures from before the 2008 coup put the rate at 50 to 60 percent in rural areas and 20 to 30 percent in cities. “The practice is re-emerging because men still find mounds of female flesh comforting and erotic,” explains Seyid Ould Seyid, a Mauritanian male journalist. “The attraction is ingrained from birth.”
Let me be clear: The practice of force-feeding is barbaric and abusive. It’s an invasion of your body no less violent than rape. Picture a young girl in Mauritania sent by her parents to a remote hut where she is force fed gruel and animal fat. She feels sick, scared and alone.
But while you’re at it, also picture a young girl in the United States, laying alone on the bathroom floor after binging on so much food she vomits it all up. She feels sick, scared, and alone. Both are equally painful and unfair. Neither girl is able to have a healthy relationship with their own body.
Here is my disclaimer: I am a fat woman. I weight over 250 pounds and wear a size 22. And I have wrestled the eating disorder monsters most of my life. I have binged to the point of vomiting. I have starved myself dizzy on lemonade and maple syrup fad diets.
This Mauritanian women fits her cultural beauty standards.
Can you blame me for fantasizing about living in a country where men would flock to my “mounds of female flesh”? Ironically, I think I even experienced this cultural difference when I took a cab and was actually proposed to by the Somali cab driver who, upon finding out I was single, replied that he would marry me because I was the “perfect size”.
I am struck by the realization that women’s bodies are considered beautiful only in how they appeal to men. As the article states, Mauritania’s view of beauty is the United State’s obsession with super-thinness in reverse. We are valued in a way that makes our bodies nothing more than fetishes.
What is missing in Mauritania as well as the United States is the idea of choice — the choice we are all entitled to regarding our own bodies. Do any of us really feel we are able to choose what we would like to look like and be okay with our bodies? How much does each of us prescribe to what society is telling us we should look like?
I believe in my own worth and my own beauty whether I’m a size 22 or a size 2; it’s been a hard-fought battle, and I have to renew my commitment every day. I keep thinking about how every time I watch the evening news there is a story about the obesity epidemic. It is drummed into us on a daily basis accompanied by those infamous anonymous headless photos of fat people walking down the street.
Now I can picture the same news story in Mauritania, only the headless photos depict skinny idealized Western images of physical attractiveness. In the end it feels like none of us win and quite frankly, that exhausts me.
What words have we been programmed to use when defining beauty? How about flawless, skinny, model, glamorous, celebrity, or perfection? How about painful? Well, I’m rebelling.
I have a word I would like to include my in my definition of beauty; that word is “real”. “Real” as in something we all possess. “Real” as in every woman in her own uniqueness. “Real” as in the stunning photographs by acclaimed South African photographer Jodi Bieber.
Real Beauty depicts women who live in and near Bieber’s South African community. According to Bieber’s website, she encouraged all of the women she photographed to explore their own personalities and fantasies for their shots.
"Caroline" by Jodi Bieber
The photos are intimate. In some instances, they are so unflinching and personal that they are hard to look at. I felt like a voyeur, yet I wanted to keep looking.
The women in the photographs are proud and dignified. They are black and white and fat and thin. Some of the women are clothed, some are not. Some of them are sensual and some are very matter of fact. Each of them is very real and beautiful.
I dare you not to find at least one that doesn’t make you think “that reminds me of me.”
Bieber’s award-winning Real Beauty collection is an extension of the Dove advertising campaign depicting ordinary women in their underwear advocating real beauty. Bieber’s photos also came out of the reality of an increase in the number of black anorexic women in South Africa. This new trend has western body shapes being more desirable even in cultures that have historically celebrated a more full-figured shape.
"Brenda" by Jodi Bieber
On her web site, Bieber says that while thin women can often be seen as more desirable, in some communities thin and tall women are perceived as being sick (HIV) while full figured women are seen as more healthy. I imagine that in an impoverished nation, being fuller-figured is also a sign of prosperity, as you are obviously eating. It shows that you have a better chance at survival.
Ironically, in the United States we have an over-abundance of everything, yet we are expected to deprive and starve ourselves in order to fit unrealistic body and beauty expectations.
"Tami" by Jodi Bieber
In western culture, beauty is generally held up as an unachievable gold standard—and darn it if we don’t enjoy a good challenge! We pluck, shave, laser, dye, cut, diet, paint, exercise, liposuction, nip and tuck our bodies to fit someone else’s ideal of what we are supposed to look like. And yet, only a select few are ultimately celebrated for having what is deemed perfect skin, perfect hair, and the perfect body.
Look at the photographs Jodi Bieber has gifted to the world and ask yourself “what words would I use to describe beauty?” I like these: dignified, stylish, confident, serene, inclusive, unique, healthy, me, you. Real.
–Jodie
Jodie Maruska is a freelance writer, public speaker and stand-up comic based in Minneapolis.Her popular talk “Belly Laughs” effectively combines humor with the powerful message of body acceptance as Jodie shares her experience and observations of the complicated relationship we have with our bodies.She is a regular contributor to the Minnesota Women’s Press and was a recent finalist in the Flash Fiction competition for MNArtists.org.
This Dolce & Gabbana ad (2007) glamorizes gang rape
Most people have heard about the alleged gang rape of a teenage girl a couple weeks ago, along with many shocking and horrific aspects of the event. However, some reported details may have done more harm than good in increasing awareness about sexual assault.
According to the Associated Press, “as many as a dozen people watched a 15-year-old girl get beaten and gang-raped outside her high school homecoming dance without reporting it” and, in addition to the two suspects in custody, “as many as five other men attacked the girl over a two-hour period.”
The article goes on to be a regular crime reporting article, then it hits you like a ton of bricks:
Police said the girl left the dance and was walking to meet her father for a ride home when a classmate invited her to join a group drinking in the courtyard. The victim had drank a large amount of alcohol by the time the assault began, police said.
WHAM! She was drinking—underage nonetheless—so there’san implication that the attack was her fault. No, it’s not an outright statement of blame, but an implication. This sort of coverage may lead people to believe that she “had it coming” because she participated in this “risky” behavior.
This language and discourse is how the media upholds the status quo regarding sex crimes. We, as a society, place blame on those taking part in what is perceived as risky or promiscuous behavior. In this case, that behavior was consuming alcohol.
Any time a survivor’s wardrobe, substance use, or even sexual history is mentioned in the article, you may have a case of victim-blaming on your hands, whether it was intentional or not. Intent does not dictate how the report will be interpreted by the general public and what conclusions they will draw from it.
Rape is never okay. It doesn’t matter how much she had to drink because that didn’t directly contribute to the personal motivations of the perpetrators to participate in a gang rape for over two hours. The alcohol she drank wasn’t responsible for the 10 to 20 bystanders who didn’t call the cops.
A screenshot from Jamie Foxx’s “Blame It (On the Alcohol)" video. The song and video present harmful ideas about women, drinking, and rape. (And it's in our Gallery of Offenders.)
When reporters mention a fact like that in their reporting, they contribute to this misplaced blame. Sometimes blaming the victim is subtle, and sometimes it’s not. Regardless, it happens all too often. Look for it when you read these crime reports.
The opinion piece that appeared on CNN about this case mentions increasing safety precautions (such as police patrols and students identifying “hot spots” for crime and danger on school grounds, etc.) rather than focusing attention on the horrific bystanders’ behavior. The author recognizes that these are preventative measures, but they’re still very surface-level.
These suggestions, while good ones, do not solve the problem of assault. Instead, we need to get at the root of the problem to enact greater social change by shifting society’s perceptions of women, sexual violence, and power.
Sexual violence is a pervasive social problem across the globe, and we need to treat it as such by integrating greater sensitivity and accuracy into reporting of sex crimes. This is just one way to increase public awareness about the problem and just how widespread it is.
Covering sexual violence as a disturbing trend rather than these isolated cases can potentially hit home for many people. Getting victim-blaming out of the media and encouraging public discourse around sexual violence are the first steps. Consistently providing a narrative that allows for victims and survivors to feel guilty about the heinous crime committed against them is wrong.
Despite what news and popular media would have you believe, sexual assault is never the survivors’ fault—never.
The cover of the November issue of The Australian Women’s Weekly
Something unprecedented has happened in the world of Australian women’s magazines: model, actress, and presenter Sarah Murdoch voluntarily appeared un-retouched on the cover of The Australian Women’s Weekly (a publication similar to U.S. magazines like Woman’s Day or Good Housekeeping). Her wrinkles are clearly visible, as well as some freckles and other skin discolorations.
Inside the magazine, the lengthy feature article discusses Murdoch’s home life, charity work, upcoming TV show, and her role in the National Advisory Group on Body Image. This advisory group is chaired by Mia Freedman, a former editor of magazines including Cosmopolitan, and various people from healthcare, the media and charitable organizations.
Last week, the group announced its recommendations to the government along with revealing Murdoch’s cover image. The recommendations include a voluntary code of conduct for magazines to show more diversity in body shape, mainly so teenagers can stop being forced to make unrealistic comparisons between these images and their own bodies.
When announcing the recommendations, Freedman said: “Some say these industries are built on dreams and aspiration. That’s fine. But who said dreams only come in size zero? Who said everyone aspires to be underweight?”
As is usually the case with magazines publishing “body-positive” images, the question of real change is raised: can these one-off anomalies actually forecast a change in the magazines’ behavior?
A flick through the rest of Women’s Weekly reveals the usual inconsistencies: ultra-retouched advertising for beauty products and fashion spreads, diets, and an article on swimwear for “all shapes and sizes” featuring a very small range of sizes of models.
The magazine’s editor, Helen McCabe, was quite open when questioned about whether she would commit to publishing these types of images as standard, saying:
I can’t possibly commit to that, I’m a realist… There are real business imperatives why magazines have gone this way. It’s a very competitive industry and I’m–at this stage–just taking a little baby step and seeing how this goes for now.
I applaud Women’s Weekly for publishing un-retouched images, and the advisory group for drawing attention to these issues. There has been significant positive support for the move and I hope that the magazine industry listens.
Murdoch covering her wrinkles on the larger-than-life cover.
However, I found it sad that at the magazine’s launch, Murdoch shied away from the blown-up image of the cover, and made self-deprecating comments about her wrinkles and spots. Could it be that these issues are more than skin deep?
Susan J. Douglas’s report, “Where Have You Gone, Roseanne Barr?”[PDF here], details the media’s failure to represent the real American woman—the everyday breadwinners and caregivers. Douglas says the media are funhouse mirrors that exaggerate certain parts of our collective reality and hide others.
The media, it turns out, are gravely overrepresenting the success women have made in the workforce.
By judging by the protagonists I see in the majority of TV dramas and sitcoms, I would deduce that, by and large, American women are successful doctors, lawyers, police detectives, and, sometimes even Presidents of the United States. They occupy high positions in male-dominated areas. It seems, at last, as if women have really “made it.”
I think I fell for it, too.
But in reality, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the top five jobs women held in 2008 were (in this order) secretaries, nurses, elementary and middle school teachers, cashiers, and retail salespersons. And the median salary for women was $36,000 a year — 23% less than men.
Most American women struggle like the character Roseanne, a real female protagonist, played by Roseanne Barr. Douglas believes that more women like Roseanne should be portrayed on network television.
Douglas asserts that as women were heading off to college and the workforce like never before in the 1950s and 60s, women in television were still stay-at-home moms and blonde bombshells. The media illusion at that time was that women weren’t making it when, in fact, they were.
Now, she says, “the media illusion is that equality for girls and women is an accomplished fact when it isn’t. Then, the media were behind the curve; now, ironically, they’re ahead.”But wait, I thought. That’s good, right?
Chandra Wilson as Dr. Bailey on Grey's Anatomy
Isn’t it good that young girls turn on the TV and see powerful women holding important positions, like Geena Davis as president in Commander in Chief, and Chandra Wilson as powerful, sharp Dr. Bailey in Grey’s Anatomy? Isn’t it good that the media recognize and acknowledge the accomplishments women have made in our society?
But change the channel. Flip through tabloids. Click through gossip blogs.
While we see successful women on our television screens, we still see dating programs that boil women down to airheads and sex fiends. We still see “Who Wore it Best” columns, Sports Illustrated bikini spreads, and articles that measure a celebrity’s success based on her weight management.
Why is that? Douglas explains that this disconnect in women’s portrayals exists because, since women have “made it” according to all those network programs, so it’s okay to keep objectifying women in other platforms. It’s ironic and amusing, and, hey, it’s okay, because all those women are successful!
What do you think? Is it the mainstream media’s responsibility to reflect reality or simply create entertaining shows? Is it better to overrepresent success, or do you think this constant depiction of accomplishment gives other outlets justification to continue objectifying women? Were you ever inspired by a female protagonist on a television show? And are you disgusted by others? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
The Shriver Report – A Woman’s Nation (A Study by Maria Shriver and the Center for American Progress) includes a chapter entitled “Where Have You Gone, Roseanne Barr?”, which discusses more than the offensive depictions of women or the lack of women’s representation in the media. While the chapter’s author, Susan J. Douglas, does talk about those issues, she goes right to the root of the problem:
Why should policy makers pay attention to media images of women? Because the media—and especially (although not exclusively) the news media—may not succeed in telling us what to think, but they certainly do succeed in telling us what to think about. This is called agenda-setting, and thus it matters if the real lives of most women are nowhere on the agenda, or if the agenda promotes the fantasy that full equality is now a reality for all women. And policymaking matters because the news media typically follow the lead of political elites in Washington. (p. 1)
This Ralph Lauren photo recently caused a big stir
There is a stark contrast between women working in the real world and what is represented on TV. As AAUW (American Association of University Women) said in an announcement back in June:
In 2009, women made up more than half the U.S. labor force; yet, the number of women CEOs in Fortune 500 companies stands at 13. In Fortune 1000 companies, only 25 women hold that position. At the current rate, it could take 40 years for the number of female CEOs to equal the number of male CEOs.
Additionally, as I mentioned in a previous blog post, women’s representation in employment as well as ownership of media is pretty dismal. True, while improved representation in employment does not necessarily mean there will be an improvement in how women are depicted and talked about in both the news and popular media, it still would be a progression for women in our society.
Female experts are not being consulted, and women’s voices are not being heard. According to The Op-Ed Project—an initiative that works to see more women represented as op-ed contributors, columnists, and general experts accessible to the media—men dominate 85 percent of the “national conversation.”
What all this boils down to is the issue of accurate representation. As Douglas states in her chapter, “these distorted reflections contain and perpetuate significant class biases by either ignoring or silently ridiculing most women who make less than $100,000 a year and aren’t media-perfect in appearance” (p. 3).
We need those accurate depictions to show what life is really like for women, not just those who have successful careers and are wealthy, but those who aren’t especially wealthy. We need to see more of those women who may or may not be in relationship, those who may or may not have a family, those who may or may not be caregivers, and the list goes on.
Issues facing women in the media are incredibly important because while these issues may seem harmless, they can have long-lasting effects on how women and girls perceive themselves as well as how society in general perceives them. It’s about giving a voice—and representation—to a multitude of experiences rather than seeing and hearing from a select few.
Comedy Central’s new show Secret Girlfriend portrays men as immature, sex-crazed idiots and documents their adventures in douchebaggery. It basically functions as training wheels for harder-core fare; the plot is weak, and the women exist only to look and act stereotypically sexy for the men.
What’s new, right? Well, there’s a twist: Secret Girlfriend gives us a literal interpretation of the misogynistic male gaze. The camera serves as the eyes of the main character, inviting the viewer to take on his perspective and jump into the story. The other characters talk to “you”, and you send texts back and forth, but you never actually speak.
Your bros—Do we ever see women this size starring in fun, confident roles?
You check out every woman in the show, as the camera pans from ass to breasts—after all, you’re a guy, so you don’t have the power to resist sizing up women in this way.
Of course, only conventionally hot, thin girls can be on this show, but the men are average-looking and overweight.
Women’s only valuable characteristic is their sex appeal; if they’re not Maxim centerfold material, they might as well be invisible. In contrast, leading roles for men seem to go to whoever can execute lame jokes about genitalia and sound really pumped at all times.
I watched the first episode of Secret Girlfriend, and that was more than enough for me. I’ll detail the main events and save you the pain of actually watching it.
During this episode, we learn about two main women in your life: 1) Mandy: your psycho, sexy, brunette ex-girlfriend, and 2) Jessica: a new, blonde girl-next-door (in a Budweiser commercial kind of way).
You meet Jessica (your secret girlfriend) while buying alcohol. When she catches you staring at her butt, she says "Excuse me--my tits are up here!"
Jessica says that she doesn’t mind when you choose to play video games and have pizza and beer on your first date instead of going somewhere nice. Totally possible—some girls like that stuff too.
But to show that she can really be “one of the guys”—although remaining very hot and looking feminine, of course—while playing the game (likely Grand Theft Auto), she yells, “Yeah, shoot the hooker in the face! Yeah bitch, eat it, eat it!”
This scene proves she really is cool and knows what chillin’ and being a dude is all about: drinking brewskies, eating greasy pizza, and playing a game where you get to perform acts of violence against women while verbally degrading them!
Another time, when you’re out eating sushi with Jessica and seemingly having a great time, you get a call from your bros, telling you to get to the strip club ASAP! You’re with this amazing girl on a date that is going wonderfully, but you’ve gotta follow the golden rule: bros before hos.
Plus, the ho you’re with is fully clothed and hasn’t put out yet, while there will be many hos at the strip club who are scantily clad or naked and eager to sell you lapdances. It’s a pretty clear choice for you. Factoring your date’s feelings into the equation would be waaaaay too hard.
Luckily, Jessica answers right after you hang up with a playful “you don’t even need to explain, just go!” response, because she’s more than happy to let you ditch her—she knows that she’s not that important to you, and accepts that your priority is to be at the most sexually enticing scene at all times.
Mandy, your psycho ex, is still desperately obsessed with you. Can you say "cliché"?
You’re having a great time at the strip club—until Mandy comes in! She was doing some snooping because she expected that you were going there behind her back. Mandy tells you that she’s hurt that you’re at the strip club because it makes her feel like she isn’t enough for you.
That is an understandable feeling, though in this case it is coming from an ex-girlfriend with obvious issues, so the overall sentiment is really: “Chicks shouldn’t trip about you looking at other chicks take their clothes off, even if you are in an intimate relationship with them.”
Because your ex is not only crazy, but also sexy, her rational course of action is to remove her trench coat to reveal that she is wearing nothing but lingerie! As your “punishment” for going to the strip clubs behind her back, she is going to dance on stage in front of everyone, to show you what you can’t have anymore.
That’ll really put you in your place. I guess in guy dream world it would make perfect sense that women perform a striptease whenever they get mad at you. Therefore, the more of a jerk you are, the sexier she will act!
After her dance, Mandy approaches you and suddenly wants you again because she noticed you watching her when she was dancing on stage! You check out every woman, and that’s all that you have to do to get a woman to stop being mad at you: ogle her—no special attention, care, or conversation necessary.
So what have we learned from this episode? Secret Girlfriend delivers entertainment in the form of lowest common denominator humor, sexism, tired stereotypes, and overall stupidity. Is the show simply satire? Not likely–the tone is off. Is it the generic fantasy of the stereotypical, sexist frat boy? Perhaps. Does it reflect ideas that are marketable to a sizable portion of our population (young, heterosexual males)? Yes—the fact that it’s airing on Comedy Central tells me that it does.
It also tells me that there’s a whole new generation of prepubescent boys who don’t have quite the same grasp on reality as adults, and are learning to view and treat women as objects—worthless unless they look “hot”, and disposable even if they do—through watching this show.
Have you seen Secret Girlfriend? What do you think?
Take action! Let Comedy Central know how you feel about Secret Girlfriend:
Jenni Runyan Director
2049 Century Park East, Ste. 4000
Los Angeles, CA 90067
I love the satirical newspaper The Onion. Their sharp and hilarious cultural criticism makes me laugh and makes me think. A little while back they featured this video about how People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA) uses the objectification of women in their advertising:
I’d always ignored PeTA’s sexist advertising because I agree with the vast majority of the causes they’re fighting for. We do need strong action to end cruelty to animals and promote vegetarianism for ethical and environmental reasons. The causes PeTA champions deserve urgent attention. But other organizations, like Earthsave and Mercy for Animals, don’t use these tactics–so is misogynist advertising the way to go about gaining rights for animals?
Obviously the Onion video is satirical, but there’s a lot of truth in what they say. This PeTA ad was released in 2000 and quickly made sexist advertising offenders lists everywhere:
Ms. Magazine took issue with this ad that targets women who don’t meet a beauty ideal, as much as it targets the wearers of fur.
And if feminists thought it couldn’t get much worse, it has. In addition to a bevy of ads featuring objectified nude women, PeTA has glamorized violence against women with ads like this one from 2007:
PeTA ad portrays a woman in a powerless position
Maybe we should target individuals who wear fur, but is running a series of demeaning ads (most of which were banned) called “Woman in Fur Coat Pees in a Litterbox”, and “Woman in Fur Coat Drinks from the Toilet” helping the cause?
And why do we see so few ads targeting male meat-eaters and leather-wearers from PeTA?
PeTA posts all their banned ads on their website. The one that shocked me most was one called “What if You Were Killed for Your Coat?” where, in PeTA’s own words ,“a man clubs a woman unconscious and then rips her fur coat off her body”.
Maybe the women who pose nude for PeTA in advertising and public demonstrations find it empowering. I won’t argue against that, but the message the public receives seems to be more about reinforcing unrealistic ideals of female beauty rather than promoting the ethical treatment of animals.
Some feminists argue that PeTA is making a clever link, showing how both women and animals are exploited in a tongue-in-cheek way. But I doubt the average audience member would get that message even if that’s the intent. Even the Huffington Post had a poll earlier this year encouraging readers to vote on the “Sexiest PeTA Ad of All Time”. The winner of the poll was this naked picture of NYPD Blue star Charlotte Ross:
Is it feminist if the audience doesn’t know it?
Is treating women like meat ever justified if the cause is important enough? I’m open to discussion, but it seems to me like PeTA could get more people on-side if they worked to make feminists allies instead of enemies.
