uh oh…
A Thought
I think I’ve come to a conclusion about something. I’ve always tried to make sense of girls’ re-posts of women, more or less viewed in popular culture sexually. There’s been a disconnect in my mind as to why girls .tumblr images in admiration when they are- indeed, we all are- constantly fighting a fight against the unattainable. From a stand point of business and marketing, the fantasy sells and can never be obtained. That’s why it works. But I now look at it another way, and I’ll be as to the point as I possibly can. These images of beauty harken, obviously, on girls’ value on the ideological idea of the ‘proper woman’, conversely the ‘wanted’ ‘right’ ‘subordinate’ woman. But again, there is a paradox, because women constantly try to renegotiate an impossible female image. Then there’s the issue of women being empowered with their hypersexuality- I need only think of girls on the internet taking sexualized photos of themselves today and tumbling them which gets views and ‘likes’ from males and females. The irony of this action is that it makes static what women are, how they are loved, and how they are wanted. Certainly, they can feel empowered, but are they? They are posing for an inescapable male gaze- yes fine, whatever. We all know that. And they only solidify themselves in a space of objectivity so long as their own gender and the opposite praise it without saying, ‘hey, wait a minute.’ The most intriguing thing about these images is that these animated .gifs, pictures of models, whatever, not only stabilize a fantasy female but show us where women assume their power from- their bodies, but in a sexual way, since, I argue, historically, they cannot physically fight for a number of reasons: biological, cultural, anthropological, social, being unlady-like, and therefore undesirable, blah blah blah. What’s the opposite end of this gender spectrum? Perhaps the hypermasculated male. I think, what images to males see and think is a man? Why, the muscular fighting male, of course. The aggressive action hero/ business man. I think Arnold, I think Sylvestor, I think Bruce. Those are examples of physical power that manifest as symbolic and come out realistically (I use that loosely) as powerful. Again, the woman model sexy .gif thing, as I see it, is the manifestation of the action hero, hypermasculine male. It is how women view themselves as powerful (and men too). These things have become, strangely enough, mirrors for us that reflexively stabilize the very stereotypes we try so hard to escape but only disavow when we get involved with each other- when those urges to attract and have relationships rear their primordial, ugly heads. Hetero-normatively speaking.
(Source: femaleboner)
