Gender Inequality In 'Hard Out Here'

In the twenty-first century, media outlets such as YouTube and Netflix allow for ease of access to pop cultural trends through any device with an internet connection. However, the content of modern pop culture evidently reflects on gender inequality because of the disparity between the roles of men and women in popular media, specifically in music videos. Music videos often display men as well dressed dominant figures compared to the women who are likely shown to be half-naked and exhibiting overly sexual acts such as brandishing their buttocks. This signifies current stereotypical outlook towards women in pop culture as inferior sexual beings who serve the purpose of pleasing men’s desires. Lily Allen, in her parody music video “Hard Out Here”,

The scene starts with Allen joining the female dancers, clothed enough to barely cover their genitals, beginning their dance routine. As Allen sings, the dancers are seen performing the twerk, and the video zooms on the dancer’s genitals as the dancers lick their hands and slap their genitals. Allen’s incendiary scene highlights women as needing to be overly sexualized in music videos and performing suggestive behaviors to be a part of pop culture. This scene shows how music videos dehumanize women because women are expected to behave and dress in a specific manner or not be included in the video. Consequently, the viewer’s focus on that specific scene, where women represent sexual beings, because the image on display is designed to grab viewers’ attention of Allen mocking women in pop culture. Viewers can then deduce the role of women in modern pop culture as injustice for the women and start to discard the pop culture that limit women’s role to sexual beings. To support, Cara Wallis, professor of communications at Texas A&M, published a content analysis of men and women in music videos by having individuals watch different music videos to determine individual roles. The results conclude, “[I]mages of female lead performers dancing suggestively or touching themselves in a sexual manner drive home the point that

During the course of the music video, Allen is repeatedly seen in the kitchen washing car rims as a resemblance to washing dishes in the kitchen. Allen’s purpose for presenting these actions in a kitchen shows that women in pop culture serve stereotypical roles because the kitchen stereotypes women as housemaids. Allen suggests that women are constantly playing roles that stereotype women that further reduces equality for women because they are being restricted to specific and inferior roles when compared to men. Women and men should have an equal role in pop culture because equality for women and men apply to music videos, inclusive, while stereotyping women diminishes decades of movements that support equality. The setting automatically grabs viewers’ attention because the setting translates from the dance floor to the kitchen, thus creating a realization that Allen referencing women as being stereotyped. Consequently, viewers are better able to understand Allen’s message of inequality for women. To further connect to Allen’s video, Adichie, in a different TED Talk presentation titled “The Danger of Single a Story”, discusses how stereotyping in literature leads to one group having more power over another. Adichie admits, “An Igbo word…‘nkali’…loosely translates to ‘to be greater than