OUGD501 - Essay Draft

The influence of gender equality within mainstream journalism

‘Unless men and women are rigidly rendered apart, this would introduce a small grain of uncertainty within the representation of masculine identity, thereby threatening to undermine it all together…’ (Jackson et al, ibid: 86). This quote suggests that for masculinity to exist it must be kept separate from femininity and must be kept this way in magazines and journalism. This essay is questioning the reasons why gender is portrayed in very separate ways in mainstream magazines and investigating the ways in which men and women are represented in extremely stereotypical forms. It is also going to be exploring influential brands who have taken a gender-neutral scope and accepted gender fluidity as a basis within fashion.

The portrayal of women in magazines can be seen to encourage a ridiculous ideal for young girls to reach and a stereotype which they must aspire to. Angela McRobbie conducted a study in 1964 and 1993 into the British teen magazine Jackie (2007, p. 87). The study concluded that magazines such as this one ‘promote an overarching ideology of teenage femininity’ supporting the point that young girls are constantly faced with an idealism which is unfair for them to be encouraged to reach. This supports the suggestion that these ideals presented within magazines as the only way in which women are supposed to look discourage young women from feeling they can be individual and choose the way they want to look and what they do as hobbies. This point is further supported by the investigation into the magazine Jackie which revolves around two key issues: how to get a boyfriend and how to look good. While these are seen to be the most important things for women to be doing, young men are shown in the magazine aiming to achieve goals. ‘This reinforces conventional ideologies about femininity as focused on the domestic and personal and is mirrored in women’s magazines’ (Ballaster et al. 2007 p. 87). Although this research can be seen to be a little dated, there is still evidence from considering women’s magazines in the present that the information about women taking their careers into their own hands and having financial independence still takes a back seat to the need to succeed in having a functioning romantic relationship. Moving on from the portrayal of how women are stereotyped in magazines to show what they are supposed to be looking to achieve in life, magazines also stereotype the way in which women are supposed to look furthering the ideals for young girls and discouraging them from defining their own gender and who they want to be. A key example of this theory was a study conducted using eighteen photographs of clothing advertisement and fashion editorials from issues of Vogue in 1997. Six or seven of these photographs were shown to different people in the different focus groups in order to find out their perceptions of these photographs and to what extent they felt that they could relate to the models. The photographs were selected to fit the following categories, frontal gaze and eye contact, side gaze: positive, androgyny and gender ambiguity, lesbianism, subordination, licensed withdrawal, sexuality/ pornography, and nudity. The photographs all represented the gender stereotypes that are present in the magazine. In response to the questionnaire one of the participants wrote, ‘even though the fashion editors in the magazines are usually women, I still think it’s not really a woman’s point of view. It’s what a woman thinks a man wants to see or something like that.’ This links back to the point made that women should always be focussing on how to gain the love of a man. Not only are these magazines full of tips on how to achieve this, but the women are posed in a way that is pleasing for men rather than encouraging young women that they can be whoever they want to be. The stereotypes that were presented in these pictures are a prime example of how the two genders are separated and neither do they cater for people of cross gender. These findings suggest that mainstream magazines like Vogue continue to be aimed at a specific gender and inform women of how they should look and act in order to impress the opposite sex. This means that they continue to separate the genders further and don’t allow for the theory that gender is in today’s society much more fluid and people should be able to be, dress and make life decisions without feeling pressure that they should present themselves in a way that traditional stereotypes have been created for the different biological genders.

In the same way in which women’s magazines are extremely stereotypical, men’s magazines are written and presented in the same way instead focussing on the importance of young men being seen to be very masculine and being in control of all aspects of their lives. Once again men are portrayed in magazines such as Men’s Health as needing to have perfect bodies. This is consistently reinforced by the stereotypical perfect pictures of the men spread across the magazines. In the same respect way in which women feel that they must dress and act in order to be accepted within society due to mainstream journalism aimed at their gender, mainstream magazines such as Men’s Health which is aimed at men give the same insecurities to males. This is because it leaves them thinking that they should be sporty and dress in masculine clothing to be fit in with our current society. A research study conducted by Karazsia and Crowther in 2008 asked men to agree or disagree on a scale from 1 - 5 with statements such as ‘I compare myself to sports athletes in magazines’. In the study a number 1 given as an answer was a strongly disagree and a 5 was strongly agree. The results of the study indicated that there is a high internalisation of media ideals present within men of the common college age. This research leads us to believe that the media’s influence on extreme ideals of masculinity is something that young men in the present day are suffering from, as they are far more likely to follow current trends and look up to current icons. The consistent reporting of genders in these stereotypical manners removes the creativity in young people and continues to teach children that they should grow up to follow these rules of their biological gender.

Other influences on gender are magazines such as GQ who is technically a magazine for males but uses images of ‘both’ genders creating a complete separation between the two genders from the front cover. All the front covers of men show these famous males in suits and ties whereas all the front covers of famous women are images of them completely naked. The covers covey both men and women as se objects but in very different formats. Once again this creates stereotypes for people to follow suggesting that can be objectified by appearing exposed and vulnerable but men on the other hand are objectified as they are desired if they appear to be successful and wealthy. GQ has demonstrated that not only can journalism influence the gender stereotypes in how they should dress and what their interests should be but also how they should appear sexually. The covers reinforce gender stereotypes not only because they present women as sexy, but because their demonstration of what sexy can mean for both men and women are so constricted and discourage any kind of individuality.

Although most journalism and brands appear to still follow the gender stereotypes that have been drilled into us within society there are a few influential brands that have tried to tackle the issue. Within the last year John Lewis reported that they were no longer going to use ‘boys’ and ‘girls’ labels on children’s clothing to show that they understand that the complexities of gender and that they support that children shouldn’t have to grow up enforced with gender stereotypes. The campaign got a very varied reaction with some responses being extremely negative. One person wrote about the campaign stating that “You have let us all down John Lewis, if only people stopped pandering to the PC brigade. There are only two sexes, male or female”. Responces such as this show the difficulty it will take to remove these stereotypes that have been so heavily inflicted on us as a society and that a gender neutral take will never be something that everyone is comfortable with. Although John Lewis took a lot of criticism for this announcement there was also a very positive reaction to the gender-neutral scope that the company had decided to take. The Independent wrote an article on the announcement and quoted a particular shopper who wrote on the retailers Facebook page, “So pleased to see the news this morning that John Lewis has scrapped gendered clothing and toys. This is such an important move and I hope other retailers follow! Welcome to the 21st century.” Movements like this have encourages unisex fashion to rise in popularity with icons such as Jaden Smith making bold gestures to show support for gender fluidity. Jaden Smith starred in Louis Vuitton’s SS16 womenswear campaign sending a message to fans that fashion has no gender and that it’s ok to dress in whatever way you want. Some high-street brands also followed in the footsteps of John Lewis taking a gender-neutral approach to fashion within their stores. An example of this is H&M adding a non-gender-conforming apparel to its repertoire by launching a unisex line called Denim United. This line consists of a variation of denim pieces from jeans to jackets. All the items in the line are also made from sustainable material such as organic or recycled cotton. H&M spokesperson Marybeth Schmitt stated “It is very natural for us to launch a unisex collection as fashion is constantly evolving and intersecting and today we see there are no boundaries in democratic style. Fashion should always be inclusive.” The word inclusive is one which should be considered more in the fashion industry and within journalism in general. Gender stereotypes have shown to have a negative impact on people’s lives and create ideals that cause issues and conformity throughout the whole of society. If this were to take a more inclusive stance, then these problems could be avoided and it would allow for those who feel they need to hide away due to seeming different to gain more confidence and realize that they don’t need to be ashamed for not conforming to the gender ideals and stereotypes that have been developed overtime in mainstream journalism and the media.

Leading on from this, there was an article in the Guardian about teenage boys wearing skirts to school to protest against a ‘no shorts’ policy. Due to temperatures being as high as 30°C the boys at Isca academy in Devon asked their teachers if they could sway their long trousers for shorts, but were told no as shorts were not permitted under the school’s uniform policy. When they questioned why girls were allowed bare legs the boys were told that they were free to wear skirts if they wanted too. Therefore, about 30 boys wore skirts in protest of the ruling against shorts. This article shows that the younger generation are becoming more accepting of gender-neutral ideologies and that influential brands such as John Lewis can make an impact on the way that the world of fashion and journalism progress. It should be possible to remove the gender stereotypes and allow for everyone to choose their own interests, sexuality and how they want to dress without the pressure of having to follow rules enforced by mainstream journalism.

The importance of influential acts moving towards a more neutral gender scope for the future are becoming more clear as journalists take more notice of the way in which gender stereotypes projected throughout the media are creating long term effects on people. An article written by Laura Bates explores the reasoning behind this importance of protecting children from ingrained gender stereotypes. The reason that Laura decided to conduct research into the influence of gender stereotypes on children is because she came across an angry tweet from a parent about her daughter’s homework which was a worksheet with some questions to answer about a famous scientist they had researched. The reason that the parent was angry was because the questions were: “Who was he? How old were they when they began inventing? Did they have a wife and family?”. The suggestion that this homework makes to young children is that women could not be scientists. After reading this tweet Laura researched further into the worksheets and homework that is given out to children to see if there are any more gender bias references. Most worksheets included “men pushing van, lifting weights, climbing trees and shooting arrows,” whereas “women were pushing a pram.” The influence of these small details incorporated in children’s everyday lives could have a long-lasting effect causing the complete segregation of the two genders and the discouragement of individuality.

The research into gender stereotypes has proven that they are still heavily projected across mainstream journalism and within the media. It has also suggested that even though certain companies and celebrities have started to look at taking a more gender neutral approach to their branding and marketing it is not going to be easily accepted throughout the whole of society due to the change being a lot for some people to understand. However, the more that gender fluidity is introduced in mainstream journalism such as magazines and articles within the news the larger the group of people will be that accept this as the norm rather than the gender stereotypes that continue to exist.