The Mainstream Media’s “Representative” Mean

Two summers ago, my friend and I decided to go see Transformers, one of the summer blockbusters of that year.  I enjoyed the movie, but while watching it, I felt slightly uncomfortable.  I almost felt bad for enjoying the movie, and at first I couldn’t figure out why.  My first explanation was that I was just jealous of the two main (and only) females in the movie: the geeky male protagonists’ unbelievably attractive female friend, and a female scientist who is not only gorgeous but also a genius.  As my friend and I left the theater, she began to rant about what a “guy” movie we had just seen.  I then realized what had really bothered me the most – it wasn’t that I was jealous of the women, but that I felt like they were portrayed more as two-dimensional examples of people rather than actual characters.

This experience is, I think, characteristic of what I experience as an average media-consumer.  I love watching movies and television shows, and I actually enjoy sitting through advertisements.  Being in this course, however, has already taught me to look at what I am watching differently.  Thinking back on what I have seen and continue to see in the mainstream media around me, I am now very conscious that there is usually a certain and very distinct way that males and females are presented.  I was aware of this phenomenon before taking this course, of course, but the readings and discussions we have had have made me think more about why these different representations happen and what the motivations behind them may be.  Beyond that, I can now see that the mainstream media is both succumbing and perpetuating the gender norms of society.  My goal here, then, is to use my own viewing experiences to find examples of this phenomenon, and then try to understand why this occurs.

When talking about representations of gender in the media, the first place my mind goes is to the advertising industry.  On New Year’s Day, while watching football games, I couldn’t help but notice the abundance of advertisements for trucks that were playing, and how they all seemed to use a common theme: tough, stereotypically-male looking men driving the trucks down uncharted dusty roads, or using the trucks to compete with one another.   In many ways, the media exists for a simple purpose – to sell us products and make money off of their viewership.  In this context, I think it is easy to understand why certain gender distinctions are continually perpetuated.  In a medium like advertising, the purpose of the ad itself is to present a product or idea to the viewer in as little time as possible with a maximum impact.  This is where a well-trodden gender stereotype becomes useful.  If an advertisement is able to fall upon a gender norm that most people are familiar with, it will not require much thought for the average viewer to accept what the commercial is saying.  So when trying to market a truck to the American male population, one way to go about doing that is to make a commercial that plays on the idea that a “real man”, by these macho stereotypes, would drive this brand of truck.  It works the same way for advertisements that I have seen geared towards selling products to women.  The advertisement reduces women to a single “type” of woman, with the idea that it will be easier for people to recognize (and will thus make the product easier to sell).

It seems to me that blockbuster, high-budget movies have a similar approach as advertisements when it comes to showing males and females on-screen.  A movie like Transformers is focused more on action rather than character development and the development of the relationships between the characters.  The characters in the movie are the tools by which the action can take place, and I think it is because of this that the women in the movie are treated the way that they are.  The female protagonist is shown in various scenes to be a very capable and intelligent woman, and yet in the end of the movie the male becomes the hero, and seems to win the woman as a prize for his accomplishments.  Similarly, every time the female scientist offers up an intelligent statement, the male scientists that she works with have dumbstruck looks on their faces, seemingly reinforcing the idea that women cannot be smart and attractive at the same time.  Both situations reinforce the supposed inherent inequality between men and women, and most importantly imply that men and women can never be equals.

I am not saying that there are no movies that present the men and women characters without emphasizing differences between the two, because there definitely are movies that show that sort of relationship.  It does seem to me, however, that when it comes to big-budget productions, there are a set of stereotypes that are applied to very specifically gender the characters. Like the advertising industry, there is a certain point at which the movie industry becomes all about making money off of the films; and this is especially true in movies that a studio has invested a lot of money into.  When money is the important factor in a movie, the concern then becomes gearing the movie towards an audience that will provide the maximum payoff.  Profitable media, then, requires a recognizable mean around which viewers can try and identify themselves.  If the primary objective of the movie is to make money off of it, then the way to do that will be to appeal to the largest amount of people possible; and to do this, the film needs to adhere to the gender norms which are prevalent in mainstream society.

By following these norms, however, these films and advertisements only help to further ingrain these norms into society.  It is clear to me now that the way that gender is dealt with in mainstream media, as a simple division between male and female, is actually quite harmful to those who do not see themselves fitting in on either extreme.  But is there a responsibility for those who are behind the mainstream media to break the gender norms?  When I contemplate this, I am reminded of the argument of feminists against transsexualism presented in “Transsexuality, Technology and Gender”: “transsexuals represent the extreme, but logical, result of Western culture’s rigid gender codes….cultural feminists see male-to-female transsexuals as producing stereotypical images of femininity that degrade women.” (pg 9)  One could argue that for both transsexuals and those who work in the media, it is necessary for them to fall back on society’s gender stereotypes, whether for their personal identities or for their livelihood.  Yet at the same time, they can be criticized for not going beyond the obvious and thus contributing to a societal norm which is also very harmful.  I believe that the media should be held accountable for what it contributes to the gender norms of society, but I also understand what is keeping those who are making the investments from taking such large risks.

In class, someone asked why we haven’t addressed the issues, such as the gender binary and differential treatment of males and females, that we have been discussing class in the context of pop culture.  The answer I have for that question is that there are so many different representations of women and men across the spectrum that it makes it hard to focus on one specific type of representation and generalize it across all movies.  Despite this, it is vital that we look at movies and television, as they are forms of technology that reach millions of people each day.  What is being broadcast to us cannot be ignored.  The messages within what we are presented with by movies and television are important because whether we realize it or not, society is in some way being adapted by what is being presented to it.