Understanding the Male Gaze & Patriarchy 

The male gaze is a description that exemplifies gender roles within society and examines how men act and women appear. The implication is that women are created and displayed in order to soothe the mans preferences and desires. For example, the male gaze is always assumed when creating images. Whether it is for a book, magazine, movie, or even advertisement, the woman used always has some sort of sex appeal that would attract any average male. According to John Berger, "Men survey women before treating them. Consequently how a woman appears to a man can determine how she will be treated" (Berger 46). Women were always treated differently ever since the birth of Adam and Eve. In the story, Adam and Eve both bite the forbidden fruit but Eve is labeled as disobedient and is punished for her actions. After the crime was done, they both realized that they were naked, stemming the phrase "beauty is within the eye of the beholder". Eve is the one who was punished and exiled but Adam received no punishment that was just as severe. Ever since this incident, a women's being is tainted due to the simple action that took place in the beginning of time. Therefore, the world grew up to view women as beautiful, fragile, and emotional human beings that must always subject to the male. Evidence of the male gaze is still pervasive in art and in pop culture today simply because a majority of women care about what people think. Women are more prone to look and act a certain way in order to satisfy not only her needs and wants but also the man's. The judgement of a man, other than her own judgement of herself, is most important to her due to the fact that men are seen as dominant individuals. A women's self-respect is then belittled in order to satisfy the positive judgement the woman is looking for from the man. She decreases her self worth and value to make herself acceptable to a man she wishes to attract. It is often in society you hear phrases such as " Who are you trying to get cute for?" or " Which one do you think he'll like?". Berger states, “thus she turns herself into an object-and most particularly an object of vision: a sight” (Berger 47).  Wether women admit it or subconsciously do it, they seek attention.Women care about the attention she's going to receive from a man. The male gaze is prominent in todays society based on how the media sells beauty. The media gives us an image where women are made to be perfect. They should have curves, do their hair, buy expensive makeup and clothes all for the sake of the man. But how often do you find a male movie director portraying women as having "average beauty" or qualities? There's always that one hot chick everyone admires to be, such as in the films "Easy A " or "Mean Girls". Whether it's looking good for another person or ones self, the male gaze is still prominent in the music, advertisements,  and readings in today's society.

https://storify.com/dondelli/evolution-of-male-gaze

http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_meangirls.png

Similar to the gender roles displayed in the male gaze, patriarchy, according to Bell Hooks, is " a political-social system that insists that males are inherently dominating, superior to everything and everyone, deemed weak, especially females, and endowed with the right to dominate and rule over the weak and to maintain that dominance through various forms of psychological terrorism and violence" (Bell hooks 18). In simple terms, men are dominant and strong, women are weak and fragile. Although this term is not coined in our everyday language, the jobs that are given to each male and female provide strong examples of patriarchy in todays society. For example, men are usually granted jobs in construction while most female aren't. Also, women teachers are most likely hired  in elementary schools compared to men. Jobs that require physically strenuous work are not given to females because of patriarchy, the roles society expect us to play. Because of these gender roles, I feel contained to what I can and can't do as a female. A lot of it is because the media brainwashes us. They tell us what we can do, what we should wear, how we should look but females shouldn't abide by those boundaries. Especially since we know we are capable of doing more. If a mans ego is threatened they become rude and violent. So as a whole we need to stop these gender specifications and do what we want simply because we can. If it so happens that we do it better than the next male in line then so be it. Just because i'm a female should not prevent me from being greater than a man. 

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http://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cvyf14xUEAAJC49.jpg:medium

Works Cited

Berger, John, Sven Blomberg, Chris Fox, Michael Dibb, and Richard Hollis. Ways of Seeing. London, England: British Broadcasting Corportion, 1973. Print.

 

Hooks, Bell. "The Will to Change." Goodreads. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Feb. 2017.