By Danny Bloom
CHIAYI CITY, Taiwan — It’s not just television and movies that often portray women in a poor light. Print newspapers and magazines are part of the problem, too.
Many of the important feminist leaders of the 20th century, from Gloria Steinem to Betty Friedan, were Jewish , and this is no coincidence, I think, since the respect accorded to women in Jewish tradition is a strong part of our religious and ethnic culture.
In fact, the equality of men and women among Jewish people begins at the highest possible level: God. In Judaism, God has never been viewed as exclusively male or masculine, and we can view the Almighty as having both masculine and feminine qualities. That’s a good start.
So fighting stereotypes of women in our media is something many Jews can agree on. It has always been important in Jewish culture to honor and respect women. Both the Torah and the Talmud teach us this.
In newspapers and magazines around the world, the photographic depiction of women in many stand-alone photos amounts, more or less, to what might be called newsroom rape. It’s not a pretty picture, and the mindset among editors who greenlight such photos and write the captions needs to change.
Rape and violence toward women does not happen in a vacuum, and the modern newsroom has helped create a culture of media rape on an almost daily basis.
If these photos and captions of scantily-clad “models” and “campaign girls” were of Black men or Islamic men and carried captions such as “Juicy Fruit” and “Get an Eyeful,” things would change very quickly. But depicting women this way is business as usual in most male-dominated newsrooms, from the New York Post to the Esquire magazine.
To raise awareness about gender equality for women in a man’s world is not an easy thing, since so much of modern culture and news media continue to objectify women as sexual objects for men to ogle in movies, magazines and daily newspapers.
In order to really tackle such issues as domestic violence, gender discrimination and the division of labor in modern families– and even gender roles in modern religion and folk beliefs — and move gender equality forward, newspaper editors need to step up the plate and stop printing sexist photos with sexist captions of women, even in standalone photos with brief captions.
Surely, you’ve seen photos of pretty young women with un-necessary cleavage posing for ”promotions” for computers, flower shows, tourist sites and smartphones. Always the cleavage, of course, for the male viewers, and also the snarky headline or caption such as “Juicy Fruit” or “Get an Eyeful” and worse. What kind of culture accepts this kind
of media violence toward women.
Of course, the women who pose for these photos are also to blame, and they must have their awareness raised as well, because if they agree to pose for such sexist photos and promotions at computer shows and tourism sites then the female models and their managers are also part of the problem. The women get paid, their managers and PR people get paid even more. Business, as usual. But this must change.
Rape happens in cultures that portray women as objects to rape, and the more cleavage shown in newspaper and magazine photos, the more these culture create a dangerous atmosphere for women. If newspaper editors would instead find photos that show women in more everyday clothing, it would be a step in the right direction.
And the men who write the coy and teasing headlines and photo captions that show their
male bias and gender brainwashing need to also change the way they write headlines and photo captions.
Rape is not funny, and neither is domestic violence or gender inequality. The culture we live in should honor and portray women and girls in photographs as equals to men and boys.
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Bloom is Taiwan bureau chief of San Diego Jewish World and an inveterate web surfer. He may be contacted via dan.bloom@sdjewishworld.com