SHE in words : What needs to be discussed
Introduction
The United Nations declared the 8th of March as the international women’s day in 1977. A day set to celebrate womanhood that ranges from being a national public holiday in some countries to passing merely unnoticed in others. First adopted by socialist and feminist movements to protest gender inequality and promote equal rights including suffrage for women, equality at the workplace and the right for representation. As these causes have been, mostly, victorious one might wonder why the IWD is still of important relevance nowadays as there no longer is a “real female cause” on the international scene. As a matter of fact, the cause is still there even though the scene is trying to hinder it. Gender bias at the workplace is a persistent phenomenon that women of color, particularly, are exposed to on the daily. Domestic abuse against women is hitting alarming rates. Female sex workers are acquiring little to no basic care and rights. Female participation in politics is still timid and shyly assertive against long-set social constructs. Hence, the female cause is not abruptly won. It got fragmented to many sub-causes labeled by many as “futile” but that are by no means the less alarming.
The International Women’s Day must keep on being celebrated as a commemoration for the rights long acquired but mostly as a yearly reminder that the path for a fair absolute parity is yet to come to an end.
Misogyny in ads and marketing
Media and advertisement play an undeniable role in creating and molding social identities, shared beliefs, societal patterns, and trends. When it comes to social norms, gender roles are no exception; advertisements are believed to promote and reinforce gender stereotypes.
Seemingly innocuous, social labels stemming from advertisements can define and malleate a consumer’s identity and behavior, leading to long-term notorious effects.
To fully grasp the role played by ads in promoting unhealthy gender roles, one shall first examine the impact of the “Labelling Theory.”
Sociologists and social psychologists have long studied the impact of social labels and their role in shaping one’s self-identity. In social sciences, the “Labelling Theory” postulates that human behaviors are heavily shaped by social segmentation; an individual’s self-concept is significantly determined by the way society labels and classifies them.
Since one tends to act consistently with whom they believe they are, segmentation and labels in ads can pressure a consumer into tailoring their behavior to match their revised self-perception.
For instance, a study conducted by the Department of Psychology at Yale University concluded that, after a first donation, subjects labeled as “Charitable” were more likely to contribute to a second charity than those who were classified as “uncharitable”.
Moreover, in his book, Gender Advertisements, the Canadian-born sociologist and writer Erving Goffman studies and criticizes gender displays in advertisements. His research demonstrates that ads do not only mirror existing gender norms and cues, they also dictate how people are expected to behave according to their assigned gender. Indeed, Goffman believes that ads “depict for us not necessarily how we actually behave as men and women but how we think men and women [should] behave” (Gornick, 1979, p. vii)
Having tackled the impact of depicted social norms on the future of a society, the role played by advertisements in perpetuating gender roles becomes more evident.
Gender-segmentation- the process of dividing potential markets based on gender- also referred to as gender-targeting, might have severe and harmful implications; the specification of female and male roles featured in ads are indeed proven to contribute to unequal gender outcomes.
The proliferation of gender roles through ads is an incontestable fact. A quick skim through modern magazines would only confirm a ubiquitous presence of insidious gender stereotypes.
In fact, women are frequently portrayed in decorative roles reinforcing the “male breadwinner, female homemaker” family model.
According to Kantar’s 2015 “Getting Gender Right” report, in which the British research company analyzed more than 20,000 ads from 9,560 brands in 43 different countries, 98% of baby, laundry, and household cleaner ads were targeted at women and nearly 92% of beauty ads feature female models.
Aside from gender roles, advertisements also contribute to creating unrealistic beauty standards and can alter a society’s perception of attractiveness.
Tiny waists with curvy bodies, smooth porcelain skin with zero wrinkles, tall and thin figures with well-defined muscles, and various other examples of biologically unattainable beauty standards are circulating through the advertising clutter women are exposed to on a daily basis.
Such ingrained ideals placed on women are detrimental to their mental health and overall wellbeing.
A study conducted by Marika Tiggeman and Belinda McGill at the Flinders University of South Australia studied the impact of advertisements on women’s mood and body dissatisfaction. The study posits that the subjects’ negative mood and body dissatisfaction increased significantly after being exposed to full-body advertisements and/or advertisements containing body parts. Thus, as stated by Goffman, ads create “a pseudo-reality that is better than real” (Goffman, 1979, p. 23).
Though modern marketers are slowly becoming aware of their social responsibilities and are gradually drifting away from the traditional depiction of gender-roles and beauty standards, one major issue persists: the hypersexualization of women in adverts.
Hypersexualisation in marketing can be described as the process of depicting and portraying women as sexual objects in order to maximize sales and profits.
The main goal is to create a subconscious, intuitive association between a product that has nothing intrinsically sexual about it, and feelings of lust and/or pleasure in order to attract customers.
Such acts are regarded as devaluing and degrading towards women who are being exploited and are merely reduced to sexual tools.
Hypersexualization in ads can take the form of subtle sexual innuendos, unrealistic sexy imagery, or the use of sexual stereotypes and is extremely harmful to the psychological wellbeing of women and young girls.
In fact, it has been proven that early exposure to hypersexualization can lead to an unhealthy understanding of gender relationships, a distorted self-image, and fluctuating self-esteem.
Thus, it is safe to conclude that despite the huge rise in awareness in our modern era, women’s struggles are still a persistent issue. Though subtle, such depictions of women can only contribute to a social gender imbalance.
Sexual harassment:
Why did she opt for that revealing dress?
Why was her face smudged with appealing makeup? Her appearance was enticing. She asked for it, she craved it… Those are utterances that are familiar to all of us, spout by several individuals when it comes to situations of sexual harassment. We’ve become accustomed to these sentences, overlooking the tremendous amount of misogyny and segregation they harbour. The blame is always shifted to women. When aggressed, women are deemed faulty, because of the way they dress, because of how they look, because of their demeanors. Men are never blamed for their atrocious, inhumane acts. They are perceived as these powerless, serene beasts whose urges have been merely spiked by promiscuous women. These beliefs stem from individuals’ urges to shield themselves from the cruelty of life. They tend to use the “just world” hypothesis, that is the belief that people reap what they sow, to protect their view of the world. They want to believe that the world is a fair and just place, which is precisely why they distance themselves from assault victims, and even blame them. Aggressed women may also blame themselves as a defence mechanism. It could be even more painful for them to succumb to the atrocity of our society. Biases of this sort are extremely dangerous to our society, and to victims. They only serve to perpetuate rape culture, where assault is normalized. They proliferate the assumption that women are wrongdoers, and encourage the lack of accountability for perpetrators. These felons would not get prosecuted for their acts. Aggressed women would forever carry sentiments of guilty and shame within them, because of crimes they didn’t even consent to. However, despite this harsh, agonizing reality, hope prevails. We can still strive towards a more welcoming and helpful society. The first step in this process would be to be aware of what we’re trivializing in our daily lives. Jokes about rape, offensive remarkers and victim blaming should no longer be tolerated. We need to stop empathizing with abusers and hold them liable for their felonies. We also ought to abolish rape culture, and promote the culture of consent, where women can clearly voice their intentions. Staying silent is not the same as saying yes. We ought to organize more campaigns that cater to survivors’ needs, make them feel at ease, and further encouraged to tell the truth.
Domestic violence
Domestic violence (or intimate partner violence IPV) is any abusive behavior the purpose of which is to put down, or otherwise gain power and control over the intimate partner whether in a married or unmarried, heterosexual or homosexual relationship. It includes :
Physical violence: is when a person hurts or tries to hurt a partner by hitting, kicking, or using another type of physical force.
Sexual violence: is forcing or attempting to force a partner to take part in a sex act, sexual touching, or a non-physical sexual event (such as sexting) when the partner does not or cannot consent.
Stalking: is a pattern of repeated, unwanted attention and contact by a partner that causes fear or concern for one’s own safety or the safety of someone close to the victim.
Emotional or psychological violence: is the use of verbal and non-verbal communication with the intent to harm another person mentally or emotionally and/or to exert control over another person.
Not only women but also men may be victims of domestic violence, however we will be focusing only on the feminine side of the issue …
- How big is the problem ?
Domestic violence is unfortunately as timeless as history. All forms of domestic abuse that we witness today such as rape, sexual assault and sexual exploitation have historically been used to demoralize and gain control over women as in on North America-bound slave ships, or in World War II Japanese brothels filled with “comfort women”.
And nowadays, the frequency and severity of domestic violence against women varies dramatically especially during COVID-19 lockdowns as many women and girls have been isolated in unsafe environments where they are at heightened risk of experiencing intimate partner violence making the IPV the most common type of violence worldwide.
In fact, did you know that globally :
· 1 in 3 women experience sexual violence, physical violence and/or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetime and 18% have experienced such violence in the past 12 months.
· Approximately 1 in 5 of those victims needs medical care.
· 1 in 5 victims needs legal services.
· At least 200 million girls and women alive today have been subjected to genital mutilation across Africa and the Middle East where the practice is most prevalent.
· 137 women are killed by their intimate partner or a family member every day.
- The scars of psychological violence:
These numbers above are likely to describe extreme situations, yet it is still domestic violence if the incidents of physical abuse seem minor as if they have only occurred one or two times in the relationship or if they stopped when the victim became passive or even if physical violence has not even occurred.
In fact, emotional abuse for instance is a bigger problem than one may think. Unfortunately, although it is no less destructive, this type of domestic violence is often minimized and underrated even by the victim themselves. Emotional abuse includes verbal abuse such as yelling, name-calling, blaming, and shaming. isolation, intimidation, and controlling behavior are also forms of emotional abuse and the scars may run really deep and be just as damaging as physical violence sometimes even worse.
- The wheel that never stops:
First, the abuser, being abusive, comes over with all the aggressive and violent actions in an attempt to terrify the victim, and that is the first step to put them down: fear. Then comes the feelings of guilt after abuse followed by a string of excuses, but not because of their actions, as they are more worried about the possibility of being caught and facing consequences for their abusive behavior. Next comes the part where the abuser tries to act normally and does everything in their power to regain control and ensure that the victim will stay in the relationship. And it does not end there, the abuser continues fantasizing about repeating the abuse. They spend a lot of time thinking about what their victim has done wrong and how they’ll make them pay for it. Then they form a plan for turning the fantasy of abuse into reality and finally setting the victim up and creating a situation where they can justify abusing them.
And then rebelote.
This cycle may seem very obvious but the apologies and loving gestures in between may make it difficult for the victim to clearly see the bigger picture, and that is what a “good” abuser does, they just manipulate the victim in a way that suits them and serves their primary purpose of gaining control.
- Because Abusive behavior is a choice : IPV incentives:
Abuse is a learned behavior, it is not caused by anger, mental problems, drugs or alcohol or any other common excuses. In fact, it is a willful attempt and a hand-paved way to gain control, and that is proven by the facts that abusers carefully choose when, where and whom to abuse, and they are able to immediately stop their abusive behavior when it benefits them (for example, once the police show up). They often do what they usually do in order to dominate, they need to feel in charge of the relationship by telling the victim what to do, and expecting them to obey without question and that is in some way an attempt to humiliate them and lower their self-esteem or make them feel defective and even useless. The ways are numerous from isolation to threats and intimidation and the purpose is one : wear the victim down and keep them under their thumb.
IPV is a worldwide phenomena whose numbers are increasing everyday especially during the exceptional covid 19 circumstances. Yet, attitudes seem to be changing. In fact, women’s acceptance of being beaten by their partners decreased in almost 75% of countries with data over the past seven years. But laws to address domestic violence are not yet universally available, with only 153 countries having such laws. Gaps are largest in Northern Africa, Western Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, where 43% and 35% of countries respectively have not passed such laws.
Women in politics and their struggles
With American vice-president Kamala Harris making her “glorious” way and stepping into office in early 2021 and all the dreamy slogans that highlighted the Biden-Harris presidential campaign, it might seem to the world, to women and to women of color that the change is already here and that equal representativity is, at last, seeing light.
While partially true, this progressive international political image is still hindering deeply rooted gender inequalities in most regions of the world when it comes to representativity.
Progress is clear as for women’s right to vote. As in 2015, Saudi Arabia granted female suffrage being the last worldly nation to do so and to make it possible for us to say that women have the right to vote in every country of the world which in itself is a huge milestone. However, progress is not as even and obvious as for women’s right to hold office and to step into parliaments. While the legislations do openly and concisely exist within most nations even at flawed forms, women in 2020 still make up less than 23 percent of worldly parliamentarians leaving a gender gap of more than 50 percent. It seems that attitudes regarding female candidates are still largely characterized by ingrained stereotypes. A hypothesis that meets rather valid statistical evidence as the Arab region scores the least as for female parliamentarians with an average of 18 percent while Finland ( and Scandinavian countries overall) is led by a cabinet dominated by women. Hence the importance of gender equality measures solidly incorporated in Northern European policies and barely considered in most of Arab countries.
The stigma against women’s political participation is still alive and kicking as it seems to be valid for us to imagine the uneven seats around the decision-making tables with all the existing legislations aiming for equal representation and a little less given to consider all the hardships and obstacles women face to obtain their few seats. Tackling those barriers takes effort and stepping ahead of every element of society whether it is government, civil society, the media, academia, the private sector, and, even men.
Never than less, the fact that more and more women are willing to run for offices is a positive and promising step especially in Arab countries where the political gender inequality is, least to say, striking. At a recent gathering of Arab youth, part of UNDP’s flagship Youth Leadership Program, young women spoke of the lack of female public figures in the Arab region that they can look up to, and be inspired by; “we would like to see our own AOC in the Arab region, someone we can point to as a positive image of women in politics”.
However a lengthy path ahead, the gender parity in politics and public life is not a delusional dream anymore. The exhilarating content for raising awareness delivered on more and more engaged social media pages and accounts seems to be working miracles all over the world defying an anti-parity social construct and probably even a biological construct that drives male genes to be more politically engaged, as some might argue, but that is a whole other debate.
Written by :
Mariem Ben Romdhane
Aryj Moujehed
Lamiss Boughamoura
Ibtihel Gharsallah