Male Gaze and Oppositional Gaze

For centuries women have been portrayed as “eye candy” for men. The portrayals of women in the media are for men’s pleasure. Men painters and photographers tell women to pose specially for the male audience. This view is known as the male gaze. The male gaze is the objectification of women. It is a portrayal that pleases the male audience, but displayed to both female and male audiences. According to Bergers, the male gaze causes both females and males to survey women. Women are surveyed and judged through appearances and are told to act and look "perfect." The need for perfection causes females to stress on pleasing men. They are so psyched into pleasing men that every time they get a chance to look in the mirror, they make sure they meet the requirements to satisfy the male gaze. This in turn causes the female to objectify themselves. This shows Bergers point in that, we have females surveying themselves, females surveying other females, and males surveying females. Based on pictures from Berger’s Ways of Seeing, paintings of women appear to look at the spectator and their postures are provocative. Paintings created by men make the women in their paintings look like they want to be looked at. There is a sense of vulnerability in the paintings, but that is probably what the artist wants. The vulnerability helps the artist display women as weak, queit, and approachable. Women in the early paintings and magazines today are shown as objects. 

In Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, Laura Mulvey says, “The determining male gaze projects its phantasy on to the female form which is styled accordingly. In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness. Woman displayed as sexual object is the leit-motif of erotic spectacle: from pin-ups to striptease, from Ziegfeld to Busby Berkeley, she holds the look, plays to and signifies male desire” (837). In other words the male gaze creates the illusion that women are to be looked at and judged, therefore they have to look good at all times. They need to maintain the "to-be-looked-at" appearance, in order to get noticed and rewarded. The reward is the male. The woman has to look like she’s there for the men.

            
           In Mulvey’s essay she explains that traditional Hollywood movies use the male gaze to film movies. This is one of the reasons the male gaze is so persuading and wide-spread. This may be cliché but “sex sells” and that is why the male gaze is so pervasive. As discussed in class the male gaze is pervasive because many women have been shot down and deemed stupid by male politicians and other men in power. The male gaze is also so popular because there are more men in power. Since there are more men in power they make the decisions on what’s good and what’s not. They get to make rules and say “hey she was wearing a miniskirt, she was asking to get raped,” “it was not the rapist’s fault it was her fault,” just like how Eve gets the blame for being naked and gets punished by “God.” Why doesn't Adam get punished too? Oh yeah it's cause he's a "dude!" A lot of women are being told they cannot do things. Not only do men tell women they cannot do things (like be president), but women tell women they cannot do things as well. Another reason the male gaze is pervasive is because patriarchy has been going on for so long that women are used to the male gaze. Women are so familiar with the male gaze to the point where they start believing in it and start to do things to please and accomplish the “ideal” look for men. According to John Bergers, “From earliest childhood she (women) has been taught and persuaded to survey herself continually” (46). Bergers is trying to say that women become spectators of themselves and others because they have been accustomed to the male gaze since childhood. Advertisements also play a big part of the pervasive male gaze. Based on Kilbourne’s “The More you Subtract The More You Add; Cutting girls Down to Size,” ads are everywhere and most ads tell women to look and dress a certain way, the male gaze way.

Found in Google Images

This perfume ad basically tells women to buy this perfume so men will like them. It’s a typical male gaze photo. This photo also has the aspect that Bergers mentions, where the female always looks at the spectator, not at the man that’s in the picture with her. (This was also mentioned in class).

Found in Google Images

Barbie dolls are the perfect example to what Bergers was talking about women surveying themselves since childhood. The reason they survey themselves is because of dolls like Barbie. Looking at Barbie is like looking at the airbrushed magazine covers. Since childhood girls are presented to be cautious of their appearance. My six year old cousin always draws girls with long blonde hair and blue eyes, paired with a pink dress because that is what the T.V and advertisements tell her.

            
           The oppositional gaze is a termed used in bell hooks’ Black Looks Chapter 7. The oppositional gaze is the critical gaze. It is the minority perspective on media. It critiques the media with emphasis on both gender, race, and sexuality. Bell hook’s message to her readers is not "don't watch Hollywood films" but watch it as a spectator and critique it. The oppositional view developed because, “Critical interrogating black looks were mainly concerned with issues of race and racism, the way racial domination of blacks by whites overdetermined representation. They were rarely concerned with gender” (117-118). Another reason for the development of the oppositional gaze is because, “Mainstream feminist film critism in no way acknowledges black female spectatorship. It does not even consider the possibility that women can contruct an oppositional gaze via an understanding and awareness of the politics of race and racism” (123). What bell hooks is saying is that the oppositional gaze has to be developed because when talking about race, gender is usually not a part of the conversation and when talking about gender, race does not fall into the conversation. The oppositional gaze puts the two issues together. Hooks brought up a great point when she said that black men had things better than black women because even though they were inferior to white supremacy, they had power over women, even white women. Their gaze gave them power. Therefore, black men were more fortunate because they have more power. Black men were also able to vote before women (white or black). A black man became president before a woman. hooks is saying, in this society men get the upper hand and it needs to change. The change will allow EVERYONE to be themselves, and not be penalized for it. Another point hooks makes is that when feminism is brought up, white women are the ones that talk about it, they do not include other races and this is unfair. Women of all races should have a say on how they feel. hooks also says that a white women cannot represent and display feelings and experiences that black women (and women of any race) have endured. hooks is saying that when talking about equality both race and gender have to be in the same conversation, so both can have equality at the same time.

              
          I’ve come to understand the male gaze as the perverted “Peeping Tom” gaze as Mulvey puts it. The oppositional gaze is the critical gaze, the gaze that everybody is entitled to. The oppositional gaze allows for questions. The oppositional gaze is also for children, children have the right to ask questions and should not be shushed. Before reading bell hooks I did put feminism and race together (my race), but I did not realize that the feminist that are supposed to represent me are majority white. As a woman in this patriarchy, the readings had a great impact on me. It gave me a different perspective with the cinema and photographs. The male gaze is very disrespectful. It's ridiculous how females are seen as inferior to males. It is also ridiculous that females are objectified. Most men would objectify women, even those they do not know. I've dealt with cat calling dozens of times, and every time it happens to me I get frustrated and disgusted. Cat calling can ruin any girl's day. I usually do not do anything when I’m cat-called because I do not know what to do. Bringing this up reminds me of this girl in my high school health class who was harassed in the train. I thought this girl was very brave because while she was in the train a man touched her butt, this angered her off and she grabbed the man’s arm and dragged him out of the train and went to the platform. Luckily there was a cop in the platform. My classmate dragged the man to the cop and reported him. She said that guy was terrified. She was also terrified but she had the urge to fight suppression. (Just an antidote I wanted to share because I thought what my classmate did was awesome.)

          
          Anyways before I end this post, I would like to say that Mulvey’s analysis on why men have to put themselves in power and use the male gaze kind of gives women power. Mulvey explains that Hollywood films have to put a damsel in distress and a male hero to save the damsel because it can help the male feel better about castration and the fear of castration. That explanation gives female power because according to Mulvey's psychoanalysis, men are actually scared of women, they are scared of women taking over. This fear created the male gaze.




Sources

-Berger, John. "Ways Of Seeing Chapters 2&3." Ways Of Seeing. London: British Broadcasting  Corporation, 1972. 36-63.

-Hooks, Bell.  “The Oppositional Gaze.” Black Looks: Race and Representation. Boston: South End Press, 1992: 115-31.

-Kilbourne, Jean. "The More You Subtract The More You Add Cutting Girls Down To Size." Can't Buy My Love: How Advertising Changes the Way We Think and Feel. New York: Touchstone, 1999.128-54. Print.

-Mulvey, Laura. "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema." Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings. NY: Oxford UP, 1999: 833-844.