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Television programs often enforce a detrimental self-image to young women.
- Men are most often the main characters of shows.
- Women on sitcoms are often portrayed as housewives, mothers, and objects of desire.
- When the female characters take only side roles, it affects the women's idea of social norms. It tells young women
that men are more important than women.
Television also promotes unhealthy ideas about body
image and sex.
- Model shows where women compete for beauty reinforces society's pressure to be skinny and attractive.
- Women are eliminated from the show on the basis of appearance. This immediately affects self-esteem.
- Reality shows where women compete for men enforce that women are below men and need to be as superficial as possible
to obtain them.
- The majority of commercials feature attractive women.
Teen Magazines barrage young women with ideas of body image and sexuality.
- Covers feature young, successful celebrity women that young women see as role models.
- Stars pictures are coupled with headlines promoting sexuality and promiscuity.
- Encourages idea that the woman is a sex item, not an individual.
News media's portrayal of feminists is biased.
Four main ways media discredits feminist activity:
- It marginalizes feminist activity, failing to give it proper coverage.
- It portrays feminists as extremists, portraying them negatively and harshly instead of focusing on level-headed,
intelligent women.
- It trivializes females in power by focusing more on appearance than their actions.
- It polarizes women's rights,making it seem there is no middle ground between the brash, harsh extremists and complacency
towards women's rights which promotes the easier route of complacency.
What can teachers do?
- Teachers can support an academic environment containing non-sexist language, as opposed to the sexist
habits the English language has slipped into.
- Teachers can combat the negative effect of the media on female students' self-image by replacing it with a positive
image of females in society. This can include teaching materials with male and female authors and including examples that
students of both genders will relate to.
- Teachers can teach a unit allowing students of both genders to identify sexism in the media, encouraging female
students to become strong, independent women in society.
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