On the Sexualization of Young Girls

[DutchLiberal]

20. Thanks, and you got it almost all right!

Many of the examples used in this film and critiqued by the writer are "young women (18+)" who have been playing the role of children much too long for their own good. Thus when we see them act as sexual beings, not asexual real life cartoons we have mixed emotions on the subject.

I agree with what you wrote about sexual acceptance and that it's better than repression. That's exactly what I meant to say. However, in my post I was not only talking about what you described as "18+ women" and neither was the video. The video was making the point that teenage girls (below the age of 18) are (also) being 'sexualized' by the mass media. I argued that the mass media isn't needed for men to notice the beauty and the attraction in young girls; that there are biological and evolutionary reasons why they are appealing to men. (Reasons some feminists want to deny because they think it's creepy/perverse.)

I don't see how publicizing a series of photo's of a 16 year old Selena Gomez on vacation, in bikini, is 'sexualizing' her. Nor do I see how the multiple professional photoshoots she did before she turned 18 were 'devaluing' her. Sure, there will always be men who'll see those photo's and only see her as a body. But those are the kind of men who will see all women as objects REGARDLESS. Either you're a jackass or you aren't, is what I'm trying to say. There are men in all shapes and sizes. To say a sexy photoshoot of a 'legal' minor makes ALL men see her as nothing but an object, is both unfair to all men and to the girl in question. I know *I* don't think of her as nothing more but a pretty face/body. I respect her for whom she is and she does. I think it's devaluing of OTHER women to say that she's nothing more than a pretty face/body for doing those photoshoots. Why can't she work hard and make her own career and simultaneously do sexy shoots? Why not walk and chew gum at the same time?

And again: why is it a problem when young girls are being thought of as desirable and not when it happens to young boys? I never heard anybody about the problem of the 'sexualization' of Zac Efron, Justin Bieber (grmbl!) or Robert Pattinson. It's ironic that the same feminists who are fighting the double standard that guys get considered 'studs' when they act sexually pro-active and girls are considered 'sluts' for doing the same thing (and rightly so, by the way, that attitude IS sexist and should be fought tooth and nail), are perfectly okay with ignoring young boys being turned into sexually attractive males, while shaming young girls for doing exactly the same.

I want to stress that I don't underestimate for a second the impact the beauty-, fashion- and advertisement industry has on young girls. I'm no doctor, but I think it's one of the reasons why anorexia is purely a Western disease: young girls wanting to look like ridiculously thin models and starving themselves to achieve it. Wouldn't happen in Africa or Latin-America, I guess. So I recognize that. I just don't think the solution is to ban all media images of attractive young girls. It's better to teach and educate them about the media and to make them aware of the fact that it's unrealistic to want to look like Hollywood stars. Like I learned I would never be a John McClane.

Edit: yep, just as I expected: in one of the feminist forums, a member is already mocking the factually true statement that biology makes men notice attractive young women. Including barfing emoticon! Because noticing a beautiful young woman is just worth puking! And science is just over-rated anyway.