We must have cross-posted... but yes, I can get behind this.

I posted a picture of my naked chest in Exhibition.

Simple misunderstanding.

Would NOT hit.

Now, I think you're being facetious but I can't really tell because of those missed social cues.

My answer to that is, "No." You can't take one example of one woman and apply it to the entire gender. In HER case it is the MEN who need to be educated ... and she probably needs some kind of esteem counseling at this point because of it.

Let's not confuse nudity and the nude body with objectification (as it is being referred to in this thread). It's true that some objectification is happening with those photographs ... it's inherent in taking a picture ... but that was not the INTENT behind most of those photographs.


With regard to prostitution and the commodification of sex ... there is a difference between exploitative behavior and selling sex as a commodity. IF the taboos around sex weren't so entrenched it might be possible to have better regulation of the sex industry ... and that includes everything from pornography to prostitution. As it stands now ... it's marginalized and guess what? It's rampant with exploitation because of it.

But that's probably a different topic.

Wow. I can't even think of anything else to say.

Don't get me started on the objectification of women in World of Warcraft.

Edit ... I started my post before you finished yours. Mine's not even funny anymore.

Sorry, I should have made it a lot more clear.

To be honest, I'm not even really defending people that say it. I think it's a little disrespectful. I just don't know why people are so bent out of shape about it. It seems so minor in the scope of sexism in the modern world. Why not have a thread about the glass ceiling? Or about disrespecting women in rap music? Or general objectification?
You say that now, but after you see it....

Sorry vanblah, I have a bad habit of editing 1000 times after I submit.

I've never posted a picture of myself nude here. I have posted pictures of myself in my journal and in a couple of threads in which I felt in control of the situation. And to be absolutely honest with you, I have considered posting nude photos of myself before but, call it kismet, everytime I get close to actually doing it I end up in one of these conversations and think better of it.

I develop this illusory conviction that I would be the one controlling it, but that's stupid. I have this silly notion that as a photographer, it would be considered an artistic endeavor and an expression of myself as a woman but I don't think this is the place for that. For me. Not speaking on the behalf of others. Everybody's got their own comfort level.

I see vanblah has addressed this nicely.

We can have threads about all of those things... but this one started first, so why not draw it out, like we do with any other thread on some obscure question/topic? Why the need to minimalize it?

Vanblah--yes, I was being facetious with that question. But the point I was trying to make is that I don't quite understand (sincerely) how you think women "should" be responding to that kind of treatment. I mean, for myself, I walked onto that construction site dressed as plain-jane as I could, got objectified in a way that made me sick, and then walked back off and went about with my PhD research, never having to deal with those louts again, and most certainly never having to work in the canteen with them as the Portuguese woman does.

But the fact that this one woman CANNOT walk away from a place like that, or doesn't have the self-awareness of how to do so (while preserving her job/work visa, as an immigrant in this country), and that she has to put up with that shit every single day until it beats all vestige of self-worth out of her... yes, that offends me at a human (not only sororal) level. I happen to be more privileged than her, so for me, it becomes just a minor offense of the type that Will keeps reiterating. But does that mean I should forget her, and all the other women who are stuck in those situations? Does that mean I should not mention her when these conversations come up? Of course not.

The problem is that yes, one cannot apply the experience of one woman to the whole gender... but the sad fact is that these experiences are still ALL too common for the vast majority of women, especially in non-Western countries. So I don't think it's completely out of line to bring up an example like this in a conversation about this topic.

But you're much, much, much prettier than willravel.

(Sorry, will.)

I posted ONE pic of my ass in my early days here, because I had never done anything like that before (in fact, had never been in any place LIKE this before, where it was even an option). I took it down because I felt like shit about it, once I acknowledged the attention-whoring aspect of the whole thing. I guarantee you that I never intend to post another picture like that of myself again--that's the personal boundary/standard that I had to learn, for myself.

lol, now it's my choice the Taliban or a perpetual Whitesnake video.

I love how you so conveniently sidestep any culpability on the behalf of men, here, there, everywhere. It seems like less a discussion than a provocation.

As far as prostitution goes, that is a personal transaction between two (or more) people. Obviously, I am referring to the objectification that occurs in our popular media.

And that's about the extent of a response I can muster for this post.

+respect

I agree with you on that ... and I think you agree with me that it's not fair to apply her condition to the whole gender.

Like I said, both genders have an equal stake in the education. And I also know that it's going to be harder for men to change their views than it is for women to change theirs.

I'm not saying that women need to stop being offended by it ... because it IS offensive. I'm paraphrasing what MM said ... women (in general) need to really stop putting their self-worth in the hands of men; ie. stop allowing themselves to be objectified. This is not to say that we shouldn't legalize prostitution or make pornography illegal. There is a balance.

The education issue with regard to women I'm talking about for starters is that it's not up to me (as a man) to grant you your self-worth.

I know that it can be tiring ... to hear offensive comments day in and day out ... that's where the education of men comes in. We (men in general) need to learn when the behavior is OK and when it's NOT. That seems to be the main problem.

I think we've got a good start ... but we can't expect change overnight.

And again ... we are talking about one aspect of human male behavior. I can list any number of human female behaviors that are "offensive" at least in my world view. I'm sure you can too. Humans have a LOT to work on.

I also agree with Ustwo and others that we need to lighten up as a whole ...

YES! I can agree with that. I think that's true, for women past a certain age. But when a little girl grows up in that environment, at what point is she supposed to learn that self-worth does not come from men (especially if her father is the type who WANTS his daughter to be that way, and her mother doesn't have an ounce of self-esteem, either)? Yes, once women hit high school age and later, they can take control of their self-worth (though of course many do not)... but by then, the damage is already quite deep, and many women have to do something like the self-esteem therapy that you mentioned earlier, to re-educate them on how to think about themselves. A lot of women just don't have the wherewithal to engage in that kind of reflexivity, for whatever reasons... they don't even know how to value themselves enough to do that. In their cases, where does it come from? Not from men, maybe.. but perhaps other women. I'd like to bitch-slap quite a few of my female friends who put up with this kind of sub-standard behavior from the men in their life, frankly. Right, but who's saying people are going to change overnight? I mean, these behaviors have been socially ingrained in us for millenia... it's a slow crawl out of that developmental hole. I expect change, but realistically, I know that maybe only my grandkids, or their grandkids, etc. will feel a real sea change in this sense. Definitely... just ask my husband about how much I dislike most women, for those same kinds of behaviors that make me dislike most men. I dislike most people, really. :)

However, I'm not going to lighten up. Most people around here know that about me. Just one of my character traits, at least when it comes to topics like these in a setting like this.

Awesome!

I used to dislike people ... back in my Goth(tm) days :p . And then I realized it wasn't true; I dislike most of the people I was around ... the other goth kids. I told myself that I disliked people ... and then I started meeting different people and realized that they weren't so bad. I'm not saying this is true for you ... just that I identify with what you are saying.

I dislike stereotypes ... and for some reason during that time that's all I saw. Stereotypes. But the more people I met the more I realized that those stereotypes are just really wrong. One example: a few rednecks that I met ... some of them actually liked and read poetry and didn't really mind my long purple and black hair. That's not typical redneck behavior and I realized that I could no longer dislike rednecks as a whole. Only AFTER I met someone could I dislike them.

When I moved to the South I expected nothing but racism and oppression. It's just not true. Sure it exists ... but I saw more racism (white vs. black) in the North Bronx than I do down here. Again, the examples down here tend to be extreme and therefore NEWSWORTHY.

I just couldn't live my life hating humanity anymore.

But I'm rambling. I'm not comparing my life to yours ... I'm just picking up on something you said.

As for little girls growing up in households with domineering fathers ... again, educate the parents. Of course, it's very easy to say it ... it's another thing entirely to actually DO it.

YES YOU ARE. Jeez.

jk

Hey, I don't hate humanity... I'm an anthropologist, after all. :lol: But I guess you might say I have a love/hate relationship with most of humanity, which gets more complicated the longer and more intense my work with various groups becomes. I try to leave a lot of room for people (and myself) to make mistakes and grow out of stereotypical behavior, but that doesn't mean that I am going to condone anything that goes against my personal values when I see it in front of me, you know?
Yeah, I agree with you, but I don't see ANY way of educating the parents, especially when they don't want to be educated (at least, most of those kinds of fathers don't). I don't see that as a very viable solution, really.

Humans, regardless of gender, do lots of things that I find to be offensive. Due to factors like migraine headaches and acute nausea, I can only handle talking about them one at a time.

And even though UsTwo is calling for lightness, I don't think his position can be characterized as 'light.' His position depends on other people 'lightening up' to conform to his viewpoint. That is not being 'light.' That is being manipulative.

No what I'm saying is the stimulation is NOT the issue. Take that away and you can still have full blown sexism, and we are not talking about the Taliban but a large swath of Islamic nations and on a smaller scale some Christian communities. There any stimulation like that gets you put in prison or worse in the Islamic nations and shunned from the small scale communities in the US. Yet sexism exists. thrives, is a cornerstone of these cultures.

I do not think there is culpability here. Men have always, and will always objectify women unless you modify men at a genetic level not to. This is not a pass for subjugating women, treating them as only sexual objects, but when I see a pretty one, I'm going to wonder what shes like naked no matter how great a person she is and how many PhD's she holds. You, as a woman are a sex object to men.

So its ok for a woman to sell her self for sex but not ok for her to advertise it? A woman can't use her body to help sell a car, or look sexy turning letters on a popular game show? To say prostitution is ok and then whine about a thin model on TV seems very hypocritical to me.

Obviously you can find some shocking things in the media, most likely designed to shock for attention, that are over the top, but that in itself does not mean there is a problem with the culture, it just means some add exec wanted to shock you ala abercrombie and fitch.

Well ... maybe educate future parents and then wait for the current crop to die off? Education is really the only viable solution going forward. Maybe not with regard to the current society.

I don't think legislation is the answer ... except in a few key areas where it's already happening ... if we over legislate this we are likely to end up with a society of criminals and victims. In fact, we are headed in that direction now. I have personally witnessed a lawsuit based on the fact that a male co-worker "allegedly" glanced at a female co-workers chest. He denies looking ... she says he "ogled" her. I suspect the truth is somewhere in between and yes ... this is an extreme example. This whole farce sets the entire process back IMO ... not to mention the strain on resources.

So what are the alternatives?

The media has been asked time and time again to tame the sexist behavior ... and yet they continue to interpret that as "don't show us teh boobies."

Ustwo has a point ... objectification is not going to go away ... from any perspective. People should be allowed to use their bodies to sell products ... it's when it becomes exploitative that we have problems.

It's certainly a slippery slope and I'm not sure how to control it other than by saying: "This is NOT real. This is a stereotype and you should not base your self-worth on this" (to both sexes).

Wow, 5 pages of posts in just over 24 hours. Well done.

I don't have much to add, other than that it's interesting to see you all hash this issue out. I think this is an important conversation to continue having.

I am not talking about sexism in general, but rather the saturation of the sexual objectification of women in our media and its effects on our culture. You are not really addressing my concerns with this post, rather you are talking around them. Now, normally, I might take the time to try and bring this around to meet the conversation that I am having, but I have been sitting here all day doing this and I've pretty much run out of steam.

I will say this, I think I'm a fairly rational, thoughtful person and it takes more than just a minimization of my thoughts to 'lighten up' or 'nuh-uh' to engage me in a serious discussion. This is not a summation of how I think about you overall, for I have seen you involved in discussions in which, even though I disagreed with you, I could see that you were really involved and talking about something that was important to you. And then, sometimes, it seems like you are involved just to tweak noses. This doesn't seem like one of those former instances. :)

True, as with all forms of old-school thinking (racism, sexism, etc). As I said, I can see it changing markedly by the time my grandkids, and their grandkids, etc roll around... as long as conversations like this keep happening, and people don't lighten up so much that they don't keep pushing for change, that is. This might work for adults, but not for kids. And that's the problem, again, at least for this generation. Kids don't have a very good system in place for distinguishing between what is real and not-real... and so these things get stuck in their brains, which requires a hell of a lot of work to get them unstuck.

Your point reminds me of the way my parents let me watch rented horror films at home (I was watching Psycho, the Exorcist, all the Freddy Krueger movies by the time I was 5 or 6)... they would offer "parental guidance" by telling me to hide my eyes behind my hands during scary scenes (never mind the sounds), or if I happen to peek and get scared, they would tell me it wasn't real... those were their actual words. "It's not real, don't be scared honey." Right. Off to bed I went, terrified of pretty much anything that went bump in the night, up until I was maybe 10 or 11 years old. I slept with a very bright nightlight in my room because I was so anxious about someone coming to get me (we lived in a very isolated house in the middle of nowhere, huge forest around us). No matter how many times my parents dismissed my fears, they only got reinforced every time they let me watch another horror film... until I was finally old enough to figure out that they really WEREN'T real, and that I didn't have to watch horror films anymore. However, I still hate being home alone at night. Probably always will.

(And now who's rambling, eh?) But just wanted to say, kids really don't know any better, at the time when parents would like to think that they do. We can't depend on the media to intervene, since they base their entire marketing strategies on people getting brainwashed by their crap.

Interesting thing is, in Iceland, nudity is something that most people don't blink an eye at... you see it all the time in ads, in a non-sexualized way (there was a huge billboard here, encouraging people to wear seatbelts, with both people fully nude and only wearing a seatbelt over them... no one cared). You grow up going to the local swimming pool where everyone in your gender gets naked to shower thoroughly before swimming (it's required, because they don't use much chlorine in the pools). Girls get to see all KINDS of bodies--let me say it again, ALL KINDS!!!--and I think it does make them a little bit less insecure about their bodies, than if all they're seeing are models on TV, etc. It's a more realistic, non-sexualized view of male/female bodies in general that I appreciate, here in Iceland.

Alright, done for tonight.

I find this conversation to be insulting.

1st off, you're insulting people who like being sexually expressive, seriously, fuck it.

What do you want? to change the fucking saying to "I'd hit her" ? because "her" isn't "it"? Then we're going into the fun lil violent sounding territory.

2nd off, lets just go ahead and ACKNOWLEDGE right now that girls being the subject of sexual desire is a role that they can participate in, no one HAS to be a model, a porn star, a stripper, or a prostitute, no one has to wear skimpy clothing, no one has to show any skin, in fact, fuck it, lets all move to israel.

3rd, a lot of the view points expressed in this thread (this is no longer just about the "i'd hit it" statement, lets not kid ourselves) are rather insulting to the members of TFP who've participated in the exhibition forum.


honestly, what is the problem here? hot guy with lots of money and big dong comes up and says "i'd hit it" to you, "oh teehee" it's a joke, you'll let it slide.

bum with tiny wang and scary looking features says the same thing? "omg sexual harrassment, unwelcome advance, pig! sexist!"

get over your labels. seriously.

be completely honest with yourself and admit you've probably let something from the opposite sex "slide" under your fem-dar because you had your own interests vested in them at some point.

1st, you just have to shatter the illusion that we're all equal, we're not. I'm better than you at some things, you're better than me at some things, and some people like me more than others, there is no level playing field for any of us and it has nothing to do with me being, white, or a male, or whatever sociology inspired classification you can wall me in to.

secondly, the fight for equality is useless, be it genders, races, social class, religion. all it takes is ONE person to be an individual, to have a varying mindset from the masses, and there you go, you are now inequal. Maybe very similar, but thats it.


Women have strengths that men do not, access to an entire sub culture that men do not.
Men have strengths the Women do not, access to an entire sub culture that Women do not.

thats just the way it is, it's genetic, it's biological, it's social, it's supply and demand, thats life, you can participate or not.
Some girls want the attention, some girls dont, some guys like "i'd hit it" some guys don't.

really, thats it, thats the end of discussion, live and let live.

<object width="425" height="355"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/xHCLdNfZIvA&hl=en"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/xHCLdNfZIvA&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="355"></embed></object>

Owned.

Really?

:)

The point I am making is not to infringe on anyone's desire to be sexually expressive. I whole-heartedly endorse our ability to be expressive in any way, shape or form. What I am talking about is when it's appropriate and when it's not.

Did you see the little back-and-forth that ngdawg and I had during the whole grammar nazi portion of the conversation? There is a time and place for it.

When a woman walks down the street and is the (unwanted) recipient of OVERT male sexual desire (ie, wolf whistles) then it becomes offensive.

It is certainly not a black-and-white issue (no reference to racism).

Ustwo, what's the point? I was talking about swimming pool shower rooms (the part you conveniently left out of my quote), and how they view all kinds of bodies there, in a non-sexual context... and how this helps counteract the usual images on TV.

My point was that Icelanders generally don't give a shit about nudity, at least not the way that a lot of Americans do... and that I think that's a healthy thing. I'm quite sure that this commercial didn't even register a blip on the radar screen for people here.

(Where the hell did you find that commercial, btw?!) :lol:

Waa, poor baby... it must be so hard for you to feel oppressed.. to feel like you can't be "sexually expressive" by saying "I'd hit it" whenever you want. I can't imagine complaining about doing something to make an inroads towards sexual equality. I guess it's too hard for you to compromise.

This is incredibly ignorant. Are women who are raped "participating"? After all, they must've done something to make themselves desirable. Women are subject to objectification and sexual language when it is NOT welcomed, encouraged or necessary. See Abaya's example above.

What kind of women do you know? Why the fuck should someone have to put up with someone harrassing them because they're rich? Surprise! Women deserve to be treated with respect.

There's a difference between equal ability and equal treatment. Think about it.

Do you know ANYTHING about equality? It has nothing to do with equating one another, and becoming clones of one another. It has to do with treating each other FAIRLY and EQUALLY.

And for the record, I agree completely with vanblah on this:

You might take a chance to re-read it before busting into a thread with guns-ablazing, all pissed off that someone is trying to infringe on your right to demean others, .. I CAN BE SEXUALLY EXPRESSIVE WHENEVER THE FUCK I FEEL LIKE IT, GOD DAMNIT! FUCK ANYONE WHO WOULD BE OFFENDED!

By the way, we aren't talking about equality within this context. Generally speaking, there are and always will be differences among the genders and the races.

I am certainly not advocating that we all be the "same." Only that we be TREATED equally with respect and dignity (and many other things that I hope we don't need to go into ... or do we?).

Okay, Jinn, adopting your posting style for a moment:
Have you ever asked yourself why you have to coddle women? Could it be because you actually believe that they are inferior and require your protection? All of this talk about "equality" is actually you being a big strong man, because without a man, women are defenseless. I guess it's too hard for you to admit to yourself that you yourself are sexist.

Seriously, you've gotta calm down. I've noticed that a good point was never made on a forum with BOLD WORDS. Usually they just mean SHOUTING or EMOTIONAL CONTENT that's NOT RELEVANT. It's actually just DISTRACTING. Not only that, but it's ironically disrespectful.

why do people put up with you?

maybe you really do have a stick up your ass, get off the internet you sad jaded man.

Okay dudes, chill out. I'm all for getting up in arms about discussion, but personal attacks are not cool.

I know, which is why i refuse to grace his little attack laced "response" with a serious one of my own, he's already got me pegged through and through as some sexist disrespecting uncompromising ignorant baby, why bother writing a real response to that level of douchebaggery? (oh i referenced a female hygene product, does this make me sexist? oh dear gods, lets psychoanalyze every little thing I type now.)