Media Reflection Paper

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During this course, many societal issues regarding sexuality were discussed in great detail. Through class discussions and assignments, I was encouraged to thoroughly examine in what ways people are perpetuating stereotypes in our society, and how this proves to be damaging. Certain topics led to a shift in my thinking, while others offered support to reinforce my current standpoints on specific issues. Analyzing concepts by looking into the historical context of our society served to be very enlightening. I had several epiphany-like moments throughout the course, and was personally impacted in unexpected ways. A great shift in my thinking occurred during our first guest lecture by Dr. Helms. He presented on the experience of bisexuals in …show more content…

The issue of sexual objectification of women has always been one I was aware of. Sexual objectification is the act of looking at someone as nothing more than his/her sex appeal, or in other words, as a sex object. I have learned that in media, this is often conveyed via the heterosexual male gaze which is a way of viewing society from the perspective of a hypothetical heterosexual male. My media analysis paper allowed me to truly understand how simple details in images, once analyzed, perpetuate various ideas of women as submissive with a purpose to sexually serve men, and men as dominant and all powerful. The images of women in media not only perpetuate the idea of women as sex objects, but also reinforce society’s ideal of beauty. In my second thought paper, I wrote, “I believe that the popularity of using sex to sell products is a major reason behind the pressures women face to reach that standard of ideal attractiveness.” I have always believed that popular media portrays only one type of beauty, and this forces women to feel as though they have to strive to achieve this look, or fail and be ‘ugly’. I now understand that the sexual objectification of women is a large contributing factor to many women’s investment in their looks, as well as the significant connection women- and men- make between a woman’s appearance and

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