Voices I Discovered

            My experience at Voices of Discovery has been mostly positive, and it has certainly opened my eyes and increased my awareness of different aspects in our society! I am in the Female-Male and Gender Identity group, which has been fascinating and controversial. We have covered numerous topics so far, including male/female stereotypes, differences in gender identity and LGBT, sexual assault, how women and men are portrayed in media and ads, etc. There were several discussions that stood out in my eyes as especially significant or interesting and that I think are worth sharing (even if the post is a little long!).

            One week we discussed the sexualization of ads and how women and sometimes even men are portrayed in product advertising. We looked at dozens of ads that were not only offending but just ridiculous. If you Google images for “Burger King ad” or “Arby’s ad” you can see some of the ones we discussed. The BK ad is very phallic and displays a woman with her mouth wide open, about to eat a 7 inch sandwich, and is captioned “It’ll blow your mind away.” The Arby’s ad (which is particularly weird for me since I work at Arby’s!) shows hands covering up two large, round, strangely breast-like sandwiches and says, “We’re about to reveal something you’ll really drool over.” There are countless other examples in which sex or implied references are in advertising: for clothing, cologne, magazines, you name it. It was very interesting to realize just how much of our society uses such references to sell products. Apparently, as one person in my group pointed out, “sex sells.”  

A second stand-out conversation was about the February 2015 Sports Illustrated cover. The swimsuit supermodel on the cover is very scantily clad and is actively pulling down her bikini bottom, exposing what I consider to be far too much of her model-thin body. We watched a short news clip in which two women argue whether or not the cover is appropriate. In our discussion we mentioned that the magazine is sold in common stores and placed where children can easily gawk at it, which makes it all the more inappropriate. If our society allows and even expects such magazine covers that exploit the feminine body, what type of message are we sending young girls about their bodies and young boys about how to treat women?

Lastly, this week we watched a short video about how men are expected to be strong, emotion-less supporters. The video exposed numerous phrases commonly used in everyday conversation, like “be a man,” “don’t be a wimp,” “man up,” and “real men don’t cry.” There were some shocking points made, such as that the majority of shootings are committed by men and that men are more successful at committing suicide than women. We discussed possible reasons for those statistics, like the fact that society doesn’t allow men to express their emotions and young boys don’t have safe places to go to express their feelings. It was very interesting to see how norms and stereotypes in our society affect men, as well. I feel as if we often focus on women and many people don’t realize the impacts that are placed on men. Overall, there were some really excellent topics and points brought up in VOD, and I am glad I had the opportunity to participate!