Post #1 Male Gaze and Patriarchy

Arly Navarro

Calvin Klein, Spring 2016 Campaign

The male gaze as described by John Berger, is depicting women as a sexual object with men as the intended audience. It can be still be seen today in many aspects of art and pop culture such as movies and advertisements. Berger described how in European oil paintings; “nudes” are drawn with males as the intended audience. He states: “In the average European oil painting of the nude the principle protagonist is never painted. He is the spectator in front of the picture, and he is presumed to be a man” (Berger, 54). For the most part, women are the ones being painted naked, however it is men who are painting them. They are painted and viewed as objects for the sole purpose of pleasing men. He makes the following statement: “men act and women appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at” (Berger, 47). As women, we sometimes subconsciously make ourselves objects as well. For example, I used to wear skirts all the time as a kid, but as I grew older, I began to feel like I was being watched. Whenever I wore a dress, I would feel like men would stare. It might have just been me thinking it, but I subconsciously made myself feel like I was an object being stared at. This feeling is embedded in us as we are growing up and we see women being sexualized throughout social media, movies, tv shows, advertisements, etc.
The male gaze is so persuasive in art and pop culture because we live in a society where sex is used to sell. One company who has had a number of controversial advertisements is Calvin Klein. A recent ad from 2016 shows the model posing which reveal up her skirt. In another ad from 2010, there is one female model surrounded by three male models and it shows her being submissive.

Calvin Klein, 2010 ad banned in Austalia

Both advertisements appeal the male audience and depict women as objects. The 2016 ad reminds me of the type of photo one can get while wearing a skirt, walking around, and some man flashes a quick picture of under the skirt from their phone. Comments about the campaign can be found here. The 2010 ad shows like the woman is submissive and resembles a gang rape. Advertisements such as these demonstrate how despite the improvements, we still live in a patriarchal society. 

Bell Hooks describes patriarchy as the “single most life-threatening social disease assaulting the male body and spirit in our nation” (Hooks, 17). She defines patriarchy as “a political social system that insists that males are inherently dominating, superior to everything and everyone deemed weak, especially females…” (Hooks, 18). She describes in her writing about how men are not supposed to show their emotions other than aggression, but it was not lady-like for a female to express rage. This ideology is still taught in society in many instances such as home or school. For example, in elementary school, if boys would argue, that’s just “boys being boys”, but they are also taught that “boys don’t cry”. Even in my own household, when my brother came home crying over his ex-girlfriend, my dad yelled at him. Society is not easy on females at all, but there is also a need for a change of attitude towards men. I honestly never even thought about “male gaze” and patriarchy until I realized how much it has played a part right in front of my face. 

A contemporary argument sprung from the male gaze and patriarchy is intersectional feminism. This makes me think back to when I was taking a women’s studies course. I enjoyed the course, however, I definitely felt like there was a lack of diversity in this course. It mostly discussed women as a whole, but there are issues within different classes and races of women as well. For example, when talking about the wage gap, only the wage gap between white women was mentioned until one student also incorporated how there is an even bigger wage gap with Latina women, for example, but the professor sort of dismissed it. This is more information on the wage gap with Latina women. Intersectional feminism should be included in more conversations and definitely in the university.

Works Cited
Berger, John, and Michael Dibb. Ways of Seeing. London: BBC Enterprises, 1972
Hooks, Bell. Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom. , 2010. Print