Essay On Miss Representation

Media Presents a Negative View of Women.
In the video “Miss Representation,” the author, Jennifer Siebel Newsom highlights women’s image in modern society. The author shows different viewpoint of how media impact the way that society perceives women in general. Women are suffering what media portrays their body images. Nowadays, social media is used widely in the world. There is a lot of useful information in the world from social media; however, some advertising also presents negative images of women. The advertising from some companies such as Dove’, and Victoria Secret communicate wrong messages about women to people. Young children usually focus on women’s sexy body instead of focusing on another outlook of women. Perhaps the advertising will

harm children’s mind in the future by giving them on bad ideas such as women are not equal to men. The author also provides strong evidence to support the claim that media presents a warped view of women such as influencing to new generation’s perception by portraying of women as stupid, and incapable of competing with men.

The portrayal being women as stupid is the first image that media presents as a contradicting view of women. Based on women’s images from the advertising, the society believes that the most important part of women is their bodies. Many products from advertising introduce women’s bodies instead of showing women’s intelligence. In a documentary title “Miss Representation,” a young girl stated that intellectual women believe it was all about the body not about the brain.” This idea indicates about the women’s job is to show their body instead of using their knowledge to make society grow. In the modern society, people look at the many excellent inventions and talents of men while they only look at women’s bodies. Since the women’s image has been consistently portrayed falsely, society creates a negative stereotype about women. Moreover, Jean Bulkuorine from this video says that boys got the messages women’s value depends on their look. This implies that boys believe that real beauty should be based on looks. Also, social media has perceived women as nothing more than sex objects. In fact, many advertisements reduce the value of women by violent images. For

example, many people often see women dress in a provocative way on commercials, such as women are wearing bikini or underwear and dance, or make a pose for photo shoots. According to Miss Representation, “ American teenagers spend 31 hours a week watching TV, 17 hours a week listening to music, 3 hours a week to watching movies, 4 hours e week reading magazines, 10 hours a week online.” This implies that teenagers spend too much their time on social media rather than study. Media can harm children because they need the book to study rather than watching social media about violent images all the time. When it comes to talk about women, young people think about sexuality and stupidity. In other words, if the ads contain too many sexy images of women, children will inevitably have negative thoughts about women. They may also be seduced from what they see, and what they hear from those ads. Usually, women appear on the media with sexy bodies and less talents. Thus, how media shapes the way people think about women is more about physical outlook rather than their intelligence.
Besides the portrayal of women being stupid, the media affects a new generation’s perception. If at the beginning the ads presents a bad look for women, this will affect future generations. With negative stereotype influence, children who were born as women will have thought they cannot offer anything good other than their bodies. For example, a lot of young girls have learned to make up and diet very early on because they get the message from the boys is their outlook. Media let women go wrong way because they only care about their body. Also, they do not understand their importance in society. Moreover, media can make women become not confident in their ability, but in fact, each person has their own talent. This negative thought is limiting women's power. A stable society is not only thanks to the presence of a male, but it also needs to have the contributions of everyone. If negative thoughts about the woman's image exist in the young generation and then, they think that even if they have tried to work hard, they would have no benefit to society. Because of that, the media is indirectly taking away the talent of the future by women have a thought they never be smart as a man. In addition, “As a culture, women are brought up to be fundamentally insecure and always looking for the time when that knight on a horse will come and rescue us or provide for us” (Ling). This means that women have a thought that they need protection from men instead of being independent. Women may think that they need to take care of home instead of being at the office and becoming dependent on their husbands. Furthermore, they also get that no matter what they do when they grow up or what their achievement is; their value still depends on their look. As a result, media can harm children’s minds by giving them bad ideas about women.
The last image that media presents a negative view about women is incapable of competing with men. According to “Miss Representation,” Newsom stated that women spent more money on pursuit of beauty than on their education. He means that so many people think that women do not focus on education much. For example, some young girls just spend their time for shopping and how dress to look sexy instead of attempts for studying. In fact, their age need to study instead of focusing on their outlook. Because of this part, society believes that women cannot be like men at the beginning they were a child. In addition, from then to now, most of the seats in the Congress are men and they have more power. Based on the number of population, women present 17% in Congress. In other words, the number of women in power is less than men. For example, a video from Miss Representation show a host on Fox News stated: “You will see a photo on the weekend of Hillary Clinton and, what, look like 92 years old woman” and the others say about her breast implant. This means that the media points out a negative side of what women did even they are running for office or president. Moreover, there are also articles with bad comments about Hillary Clinton’s breast implants. This suggests that it is really hard for her to win an election to become president because of the media. However, some powerful women such as Hilary Clinton have changed the mindset of many people around the world. From what Mrs. Clinton has accomplished in recent years, it shows that women are able to hold a power position in our society such as the head of the corporation, company business, even as the leaders in government institutions. However, until today the number of women who have power such as Mrs. Clinton is not much and the media also hide good jobs what women did. Thus, media can bring negative stereotype about women is incapacity of competing with men.
In conclusion, the media presents a wrong view of women through portraying women as stupid, influencing new generation’s perception, and being incapable of competing with man; however, the only thing that stopping women from reaching their value is their own believe that they are not equal to men and their value is their body only. Moreover, Miss Representation wants audience to see women as a part of society with more beautiful in other side. Women were important in the world and their value is more and more over than their outlook. Therefore, being smart and trying to use women intelligence is the way to change societies mind about women. As an interviewee on Miss Representation say “the media is the way that we can change this.”