From a normative perspective, hooks’ thesis is that feminism is open to all willing to struggle against a system of intersecting oppressions, including men. On the other hand, there is a historically, politically, and economically determined point of intersection between parts of the feminist movement and the conservative media. This point is precisely the question of men’s participation in the feminist movement. I agree with hooks’ position that the feminist movement could not have been discredited as anti-male if it had paid more attention to finding more emancipatory perspectives on masculinity analysis. She argues that sexism, racism, and homophobia are linked and that all forms of oppression must be addressed in order to defeat them (hooks, 2021). It is also impossible to disagree with this position of the writer.
The anti-male stance of some feminists coincides with the interest of conservatives in portraying feminism as a misogynist movement. On the other hand, male socialization may indeed present a problem from a feminist perspective. However, in traditional society, not only women’s but also men’s status is framed by a set of clichés. If gender equality were to become a reality, men, too, would gain freedom of choice and self-expression.
A key challenge for today’s media is to promote gender sensitivity in journalists, which means being able to see any social problem from a gendered perspective. As long as journalists do not see a social problem, they do not talk about it; therefore, they do not raise it in their stories. Journalists’ knowledge of a problem is the first step toward making it relevant because what the media report on is socially significant. This focus on excluding and exaggerating differences does not lead to reinforcing gender stereotypes. Rather, it can be considered as a new way of looking at the pressing issues of ethnicity, identity, and sexuality.
Indeed, all media not only reflect but also construct reality. Here, it should be noted that modern journalists cannot do without a clear methodology for creating texts that take gender into account. Language is first and foremost a reproduction of power relations, and discursive practices have their footing in intersubjective communication. Consequently, it can be said that changes in language through feminist literary criticism have served as a means of shaping a feminist paradigm of profound societal change. certainly, men and women still perceive and interpret the world differently, which is due to differences in their life experiences. The latter, in turn, is caused by biological factors and the historically established division of labor, but there is no need to absolutize this fact. There are similarities between women and men because they are representatives of the same species; they are, first of all, human beings who tend to think similarly.
bell hooks says that the representation of African-Americans in pop culture takes place in the context of white supremacy and the normalization, the acceptance of that supremacy. The images of movie characters are closely tied to the context, the place and time in which people live, and the values specific to a particular culture. Moreover, the way in which characters are portrayed in cinema is influenced by socially established norms of human interaction. Most often, there are fixed gender roles that enshrine certain behavior, as well as ways of representation of men and women. In this regard, cinema, as a massively popular form of media, can both question stereotypes and affirm them.
Today, there is little scientific research on how gender specifics manifest themselves in journalistic materials’ form and content. For the most part, scholars study gender stereotypes in media coverage of women. There is even less information on the influence of natural male and female characteristics on journalism. In particular, little has been written about how a woman’s need to describe reality manifests itself in her work. However, I think it is safe to judge at this point that the male perspective remains dominant. Unfortunately, there is still little space for actualizing issues of racial, ethnic, and sexual identity.
For example, feminists have not yet succeeded in creating political solidarity with women of different nationalities or socioeconomic classes. hooks believes that a more transformative politics is needed, one that is not so rooted in Western ideology (Bohrer, 2019). The idea of male-female solidarity in continuing sexism deserves special attention (Subašić et al., 2018). Together, it can be possible to overcome the dominance of a single point of view on media events, such as the way women are shown in movies.
hooks talks about the need to develop an oppositional gaze, that is, to deconstruct rather than accept the point of view of the male gaze, not to identify with female objects but to analyze cinema. This is indeed true since it is unacceptable to be content with the way the oppressor demystifies the history of the oppressed. It is important to invent ways to express identity authentically without any distortion. It is widely recognized that the media are transmitters of culture and drivers of globalizing cultures. Consequently, for the media to accurately reflect the state of society in a full and diverse way, the news must be deeper and not just utilize a male-centered, stereotypical view.
References
Bohrer, A. J. (2019). Marxism and intersectionality: race, gender, class and sexuality under contemporary capitalism. Transcript Publushing.
hooks, b. (2021). Communion: the female search for love. HarperCollins.
Subašić, E., Hardacre, S., Elton, B., Branscombe, N. R., Ryan, M. K., & Reynolds, K. J. (2018). “We for she”: Mobilising men and women to act in solidarity for gender equality. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 21(5), 707–724. Web.