Primetime television and the continuum of violence against women

In this post, I will attempt to bring awareness to some of the ways women are portrayed in primetime television by mentioning a few examples of rape culture and women's sexual availability to men from recent episodes. I am sure there are hundreds of examples, and feel free to add any more you think of in the comments.

Private Practice
Addison and Mark, two doctors who have had a relationship in the past, are discussing some recent problems in their lives. Addison mentions that she wishes there was some kind of drug to help her cope, that she wants to put something on top of the pain. Mark proceeds to undress- to which she responds "I said put something on top of it, not put you on top of me." He continues to take his clothes off and talk about how horrible his life has been recently, and she has a change of heart and they have 'great' sex right there on the floor of her office. In this case, no means keep trying.

Numb3rs
A female police officer is sexually harassed by a detainee (who was originally suspected of murder) with comments about her appearance and their potential compatibility as a couple. He persists, even after she angrily tells him to stop. Then, when he is not looking, viewers see her smile as though flattered by his persistence, leaving the impression that women enjoy mens' advances, even when we pretend we don't.

Castle
I don't know how detective Kate Beckett could have given stronger signals to author Richard Castle to back off. She repeatedly tells him to leave her alone, even threatening violence if he comes too close to her. She does not consent to have him nearby, but the mayor gave him permission to follow her on investigations, and she must now accept his presence in order to keep her job. He then goes on to give unwanted comments on her appearance and personality in every episode, and, unfortunately, it seems as though he is slowly winning her over. She is not the only woman who must endure his sexist remarks, as he makes similar comments about most of the hegemonically attractive women on the show, even, on occasion, murder victims.

Mad Men
There have been three rapes on this show now, by my count, and in many message boards, none of them are talked about as rapes. The first was between fiances, so it isn't really rape... it is often referred to as sort-of-rape, nevermind that marital rape has been a crime in Canada for 20 years. The second is often not referred to as assault because a relationship followed the initial attack. And in the third, a woman repeatedly (but politely) rejected a man's advances, even telling him not to come in to her house, but submitted when he came in anyway and forcibly kissed her. What is often ignored in message board posts about this particular event is that submission does not equal consent. I believe that the intent of the writers is to show real situations in which sex can be coerced, and therefore non-consensual. I am appalled (but not necessarily surprised) by how many viewers fail to label it as such.

That 70's Show
This specific scene plays through my mind often, annoying me further every time (especially since it is one of my favorite sitcoms). Kitty (the mother of the teenage main character, Eric) was grocery shopping, when Kelso (Eric's friend and classmate) grabs her buttocks, not realizing that it is his friend's mother because her back was turned. After some harsh words, she smiles and says thank you before walking away with a bounce to her step. This leaves the impression that women not only enjoy mens' advances, but that women like men to touch them, even when we pretend that we don't.

I'm not even going to touch on shows like Dollhouse or crime dramas, that portray sexual harassment and assault in various ways.

There are so many examples in pop culture where women submit to mens' advances after repeatedly telling them they are not interested, or are shown as being flattered by behavior that is actually quite threatening, that it normalizes these behaviors in our everyday lives. It teaches men that it is ok to persist, because we might change our mind, or we actually like it when strangers comment on our appearance when we are walking down the street... I mean, it is meant to be a compliment... we can't expect them to understand the power dynamics or the implied threat involved.

In Surviving Sexual Violence, Liz Kelly talks about violence against women as a continuum. This continuum includes many acts that western culture deems trivial, such as catcalls, pressure, and implied threats, and places them as no more or less severe than other forms of abuse. These acts are all connected to “the everyday aspects of male behaviour” (256) and therefore work to reinforce other behaviors.

All of these examples work not only to undercut women's power, but to limit acceptable forms of masculinity, thereby created a culture in which nobody is exempt from strict regulations on how to do gender.

work space

I had never really thought about the importance of work space before this week. By work space, I mean the office space, work area, and location that is available to workers, or in this case, students. When I was in the Social Work Program, students had a small office in which we could study or read. In sociology, undergrad students only have the library or student center. This may not seem like a problem, but I find that the library has too much going on for me to get anything done, even in the quiet section, my train of thought is interrupted every time somebody walks by.

This week, I spent a lot of time at various graduate programs in the school. Sociology has a small office with a couple computers and a table that is shared by all of it's students. Psychology has even less space, as they had an office taken away last week without any notice- they just showed up one day to find that it had been cleared out.

I went to a graduate room for students in various natural science programs. It was much larger, it used to be a computer lab, and had about 10 L-shaped desks, each with a student's name on it. In this room, each student had their own personal workspace, rather than the have-to-come-in-early-to-guarantee-a-spot rooms or use-the-sign-up-sheet-for-office-hours that most of the social science and humanities students have become accustomed to sharing.

In engineering, each student had a very large workspace, consisting of a desk more than double the size of the science students' desks with built-in filing cabinets and desktop computers. Each of these students has the same amount of work space as the entire sociology master's program must share. It also became apparent that the quality of students workspace is related to funding available to individual students in a given program.

It seems to me that the university really tends to favor natural sciences and business students at the expense of social sciences and humanities (who do not receive guaranteed funding, or even their own desks).

I was talking to a friend in the sciences about this yesterday, who said that it is unfortunate, but because the natural sciences and business contribute to society in a more visible way, they receive more money. I believe it is more that they contribute to the neo-liberal political agenda. My own thesis involves making a post-secondary education more accessible, especially to groups who currently have trouble accessing funding for their education. This also contributes to society in very visible way, as it could help people find good jobs, but because it would require increased social spending in the short-term, it does not fit with the neo-liberal agenda that underpins recent Canadian politics.

And speaking of Canadian politics... professors, please note that I am proroguing any further assignments until after the Olympics... no penalties expected. Thank you.

Facebook colors

I wonder how this facebook color thing started... who was the person who wrote the first letter, and exactly how far did they expect it to go? I think that it is fascinating from a networking perspective that facebook is so influential that most of you know what I am writing about by my title. Today alone I have read more than 25 facebook status updates referring to a color, or simply stating 'none.'

For those of you who don't know what I am referring to, the email I received said:
Some fun is going on.... just write the color of your bra in your status. Just the color, nothing else. And send this on to ONLY girls no men .... It will be neat to see if this will spread the wings of cancer awareness. It will be fun to see how long it takes before the men will wonder why all the girls have a color in their status... HahaI was asked to do this by my good friends daughter so here it goes... have fun

The issue I am having is with regards to how this is supposed to spread cancer awareness when there is absolutely no mention of cancer anywhere except this email that men aren't allowed to see?

I worry that instead of raising any kind of awareness, all this does is give men a chance to picture the women who write their color in their underwear, which is not my idea of fun. I am pretty sure that many of the people who have posted their color would never tell hundreds of people what color bra they are wearing under any other context...

I commented on it in my status, writing "do we actually believe that posting bra colors is going to raise cancer awareness as opposed to just making people think about what we look like under our shirts?" To which I received the response (from a woman) "it's supposed to be a game. you know, fun? and now you just told every guy on your friends' list what the game is. take a chill pill. you really don't need to rant about everything."

I don't need to rant about everything, but I have to love how I am often not only dismissed, but silenced when I give an opinion (pet peeve right now, because it is the second time this week). If I were presenting a dominant opinion, it wouldn't be considered ranting.



The best quote I've read about this topic was found here

"Call me a humourless Feminazi if you like, but this email is not about raising awareness of breast cancer. It's about using a disease that has a devastating impact on the lives of hundreds of thousands of people as a spurious justification for discussing saucy undies. It's about women trying to show that they're uninhibited and up for a laugh by inviting their friends to speculate about them in their underwear rather than to think about them as sentient, intelligent human beings. It's about women objectifying themselves. And for anyone who believes that the updates are really only for us gals I'd invite you to compare the number of updates saying "red satin w little bows" with the number saying "grey cotton (orig. white), straps frayed, bought Bhs 2001"

.



To sum up my opinion, I am not going to 'post my color' nor do I think this has anything to do with breast cancer. Neither do the men who have figured this out, considering someone just posted "things would be much better if women would just post a profile picture"

No title needed...

Brilliant
Apparently said by Senator Mary Ann Tobedo (Republican, Colorado State Senate), said in parliament in 1995...

Also said that minority cultures encourage sexual promiscuity for girls...

Ain't I a person?

According to the Canadian Labour Relations Act 1995 " Every person is free to join a trade union of the person’s own choice and to participate in its lawful activities"

But, according to the current Ontario Work Act
No person shall do any of the following with respect to his or her participation in a community participation activity:
1. join a trade union
2. have the terms and conditions under which he or she participates determined through collective bargaining
3. strike

Community participation activities refer to what is commonly known as workfare, where recipients of Ontario Works must participate in low-waged or even slave labor (sorry volunteer work) in order to remain eligible for benefits. I guess not every person is allowed to join a trade union.... or maybe poor people just don't count as people at all.

Participants are also banned from attending post-secondary institutions.

So, not allowed to participate in many of the activities that will help find 'good' jobs. It's a good thing the program's mandate does not involve helping people become employed or effectively serving people needing assistance.... oh, wait a minute... it does. I guess the mandate to be accountable to taxpayers of Ontario (cheap) is more important.

Gotta love Walmart

found here

What I find particularly interesting about this is how it relates to neo-conservative value systems. This strongly ties into the moral regulation of women, as well as the Madonna/Whore dichotomy, where women are seen as either 'good'- pure, asexual, like a mother or sister, or they are seen as 'bad' women, which is associated with sexual woman. I find it hard to imagine what reason they could possibly give for not allowing girls/women to have access to birth control.

This is having far reaching implications in the USA right now, where Obama's proposed health care changes are not going to cover abortions, and the Stupak Amendment ensures that federal funds are never used (even in private health care plans) to cover abortions unless the woman can prove that she was raped or the mother's life is in danger. And as much as Canadians tend to pride ourselves on health care, we are by no means safe from such changes. For example, my city (of 150,000 people) has only one abortion practitioner than I am aware of, and women often have to travel 4 hours to access to these services and cannot afford the expenses associated with travelling.

Really now, will the whole world fall apart if ALL women had access to birth control?

And the number one answer is....

From a rerun of Family Feud

Question:
Name something they put in beer commercials to (host was cut off by contestant buzzing in)-

Answer:
Beautiful girls

And that was the number one answer, with 91 out of the 100 people surveyed answering "Hot Women"

It certainly says something about our culture when the host doesn't even have to finish the question, but I think the most telling part is that with 91% of respondents giving the same answer, people are aware of the way women are being portrayed in advertisements. People are fully aware that women's bodies are being used as tools to sell items for already rich companies, like those that sell beer. Does this mean that people largely don't think it is a problem?