wfn.org | Baha'i news: Media portrayal of women is focus of panel

[Sally Weeks <sweeks@bwc.org>]

>Baha'i World News Service
>http://news.bahai.org
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>Media portrayal of women is focus of panel

NEW YORK - When Jan Floyd-Douglass decided to buy a new car, she
bypassed suitable models from eight different manufacturers - and then
wrote to tell them why.

"I love your car but I didn't buy it because I don't like your
advertisements because they demean women," wrote Ms. Floyd-Douglass,
who is on the board of the Women's National Commission in the United
Kingdom.

She told the story during a panel discussion titled "Portrayal or
Betrayal: How the Media Depicts Women and Girls" held at the UN
offices of the Baha'i International Community. The event was planned
in conjunction with the annual session of the United Nations
Commission on the Status of Women which began on 1 March.

Along with the other panelists, she noted that sexualized images of
women in advertising are so commonplace as to seem innocuous. 

"My message is, if we don't actually do anything about this, we are
complicit in it," said Ms. Floyd-Douglass.

Also on the panel was Sarah Kasule, director of the Mother's Union for
Uganda, who said that the way women are portrayed in the African media
can be equally negative.

"They are depicted as symbols of sex. Or as something to do with
making men comfortable, or giving care," she said.

This trend in the media is a result of both individual choices and
institutional forces, added Dr. Michael Karlberg, who is an associate
professor in the department of communications at Western Washington
University.

"On one hand," he said, "people everywhere are choosing to consume
media that feeds base appetites that we have inherited from our animal
nature. On the other hand, media institutions have been constructed in
ways that purposefully stimulate, reinforce, and exploit these base
appetites."

The result is a "feedback cycle" that has created a media environment
that is "unjust, unhealthy, and unsustainable," observed Dr. Karlberg.

He said any effort to address the problem must consider the structure
of media institutions.

"The assumption is that the media is just another commodity. But the
media is not just another commodity. It is a process that facilitates
democratic deliberations. It is a process that creates culture."

Part of the problem, he said, is that the media's real product is not
content but the delivery of an audience to advertisers. The result is
that the media strives to manufacture audiences in the cheapest way
possible, through a "high-sex, high-violence, high-conflict content.
It doesn't take talent or research or investigative journalism. Yet it
stimulates the appetites, much the same way that a high-salt,
high-sugar, and high-fat junk food diet does."

The discussion, held on 3 March, was moderated by Baroness Joyce
Gould, chair of the UK Women's National Commission. 

She said recent studies show that images demeaning to women are
increasingly used in the mass media and have an unhealthy impact on
the psychological development of both girls and boys.

"For girls, it is about being told they need to be more attractive to
men. And for boys, it is about looking upon girls as sexual objects,"
said Baroness Gould.

Dr. Karlberg spoke of efforts the Baha'i community is making to try to
counter the ill effects of exposure to such images in the media by
offering moral education for children and young people. 

"Baha'is, like people everywhere, are struggling to raise and educate
children," he said. "They are trying to do this in a way that
cultivates their inherent nobility, that releases their spiritual
potential, and that helps them recognize the deep sources of purpose,
meaning, and happiness in life.

"It is clear that such spiritual education can be a very important
factor in making children less susceptible to messages in their media
environment. It is also a very important factor in making children
more likely to make thoughtful choices about media consumption as they
grow older."

Some counter trends in Uganda may be helpful, said Ms. Kasule, who
described how literacy and education levels of women and girls are
rising in that country.

"There are many programs for girls to read and write. This is
important because they will be able to access information, to access
media reports, and then they can respond.

"So I believe things are changing for the better," she said.

To see the article with photographs on the Web site, go to:
http://news.bahai.org/story/761

For the Baha'i World News Service home page, go to:
http://news.bahai.org/