Seeing women in bikinis makes men more sexist

Hold the front page! Images of bikini-clad women make men more sexist. Steve Connor reports on a new study by Princeton scientists, while Jeremy Laurance recalls the other academic work that told us what we already know

Scientists have demonstrated something that many women suspect and most men would admit only to themselves: pictures of scantily-clad females turn women into sexual objects in the minds of men. Feminists would no doubt see the discovery as the science of the bloody obvious, but the researchers claim the results demonstrate just how pictures of bikini-clad women affect the inner workings of the male brain.

The study found that the part of the brain that keeps in check a man's sexual hostility towards women is deactivated when he is shown images of women in bikinis. The findings also support the idea that pornographic images turn women into commodified objects in the minds of men, the researchers said.

"It is as if they are reacting to these women as if they are not fully human," said Susan Fiske, professor of psychology at Princeton University, who made the study on 21 male undergraduates using a medical scanner to analyse their brain activity. She told the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Chicago: "I wouldn't argue for censorship, but I would argue that it is important to know about the impact of the images you are showing."

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The study focused on a region of the brain called the medial pre-frontal cortex, just above the eyes, which, when activated seems to damp a man's tendency to express hostile sexist thoughts about women, Professor Fiske said. Men who express the strongest sexist tendencies tend to have a less active medial cortex. It becomes decactivated in men who are the most hostile to women, but only for women in bikinis, she said.

"So basically they are particularly likely to treat these women as objects, at least that is the interpretation of the data we have so far. It is a preliminary study but it is consistent with the idea that they are responding to these photographs as if they were responding to objects rather than people."

It was "shocking" to find that the pictures of scantily clad women deactivates the medial pre-frontal cortex, Professor Fiske went on. "The only other time we've observed the deactivation of this region is when people look at pictures of homeless people and drug addicts who they really don't want to think about what's in their minds because they are put off by them."

The panel of 21 heterosexual male students were first rated in terms of their sexist attitudes to women, using answers to interview questions. Then they were placed in a brain scanner while viewing a set of images of women in bikinis, women in clothes and men in clothes. The scientists also used "sexualised" images, where the head of each semi-naked photograph was cut off so that only the torso was visible. The men were then given memory tests on what they had remembered about each image, with and without the heads.

"Heterosexual men had the best memory for the sexualised bodies of women – this is cutting-off the heads – even though they had seen the bodies for only 200 milliseconds," Professor Fiske said. The findings have wider implications for society because they show how sexualised images in the media and in advertising can dehumanise women by encouraging men to think of them in terms of objects to be acted upon, she said. "There is an avoidance-related dehumanisation or dementalising kind of response. This one is an approach-orientated response. These women are attractive, they are seen as sexually inviting.

"When you have sexualised pictures of women in the workplace, it's hard not to think of female colleague in those terms. It has a spill-over effect in how you perceive plausible women in the workplace and not treating them as agents but as independent people, and not seeing them as a means to an end."

Chelsea's story

Chelsea woke up to the sound of her phone beeping. It was a txt from Brandon. She had met Brandon online a few weeks ago and chatted to him everyday. She was surprised to receive a txt from him. It was his first txt. “I didn’t go to work today. I’m feeling quite down. Can we please meet up? I need someone”, the txt read. Chelsea’s parents were due to arrive from overseas in a day so she refused. “Fine. I don’t ant to bother anyone with my problems. I should have known better” was the reply. Chelsea being the good hearted person she is felt bad and accepted his invitation.

Brandon picked her up later that day and took her to his apartment. They chatted about all their mutual online friends and were laughing the whole way to his place “My brother will be home too”, said Brandon when they reached his apartment. Chelsea found it odd for two brothers to take the same day off but said and thought nothing of it at the time.

Brandon went straight to his pantry and got out a bottle of tequila. He poured two shot glasses whilst Chelsea spoke of Sam, another mutual friend. Brandon introduced her to Brett, his brother. Brett was extremely anti-social. He just shrugged and went to his room. Chelsea showed Brandon her tongue ring and a few pictures on her phone. Brandon was just laughing and telling Chelsea her found her really funny. It was the last thing she remembered.

There was a dark room and a bed. Chelsea was on the bed naked. Brandon was on top of her covering her mouth and pushing her down. She tried to scream but he was too strong. She must have passed out. She woke up later and tried sitting up but Brandon pushed her down again. She was too weak and was passing in and out of conscious. She woke up soon after and vomited all over Brandon. He was sitting on her face. Chelsea cried and cried. She could see someone standing by the bed. He was naked. His erection shone in the darkness.

“Which one is your house?’? Chelsea woke up and found herself in a car. Brett was driving and Brandon was next to him. They were on Chelsea’s street. She could see her house from a distance and muttered a few words to Brett. They stopped the car outside her gate. Brandon opened her door and dragged her out. She got back in the car and they drove off. Chelsea could barely stand, let alone walk to the door. She fell and slowly crawled to her front door. Everything around her was spinning and she could feel she was half naked. She got inside the house and passed out on her bed again.

Chelsea woke up a few hours later. She felt like vomiting. Her body and bed were really sticky and smelt of vomit. Her body as aching. It felt as thought someone had run a tanker over her. She stood up to see legs, clothes and bed covered in blood.

2 weeks later

Chelsea was still bleeding. The doctor told her she had cuts, tears and bruises in her vagina. Brandon didn’t speak to her much after that. If he did, it was only to tell her that everything was her fault, he felt nothing for her and he couldn’t care less about her.


A few months later

Chelsea had been having nightmares every night. Someone always tried harming her. She would run and run but HE would always get her. ALWAYS.

Chelsea started seeing a counsellor. She joined many support groups and met many victims of sexual assault. She soon learned that Brandon and Brett had planned the whole thing. Most survivors of rape were raped by someone they knew.

What happened to Brandon and Brett?

They’re still out there. They had their way of manipulating Chelsea to make sure she doesn’t go to the cops. They know what they did, they know what they are doing but they won’t stop. Their happiness comes from raping women that are weak and vulnerable. They study their victims and carry out their plans accordingly.

And Chelsea?

She will never forget what happened till the day she dies. She did eventually go to the cops. The cops told her the chances of him being convicted were low because there is no physical evidence. She eventually dropped charges.

The memories of what Brandon and Brett did to her will haunt her everyday. Forever. Every man she looks at disgusts her. He could be a rapist in disguise for all she knows. The thought of it all makes her sick. So sick she feels like throwing up. Chelsea knows that the rapists got from her exactly what they wanted and she’s feeling the way they wanted her to feel. Weak. Powerless. Alone. Frightened. Lost. Empty.

I wonder

if men get asked the following when they are raped
- What were you wearing?
- Do you think your clothes could triggered it?
- Why were you drinking so much?
- Why were you walking alone at night?
- Don't you know that you shouldn't be alone at all times? The things that can happen.........
- I've told you not to wear those clothes soooo many times, now look at what's happened.
- You went to a strangers place? What? Oh now I know why it happened
- You asked for it
- You were drugged? What? Weren't you watching what she was pouring? How can you be so careless?
- Well I can't blame her, you did get yourself drunk

“The Earliest Pornography” says Science Now, describing the 35,000 year old ivory figurine that’s been dug up in a cave near Stuttgart. The tiny statuette is of a female with exaggerated breasts and vulva. According to Paul Mellars, one of the archaeologist twits who commented on the find for Nature, this makes the figurine “pornographic.” Nature is even titling its article, “Prehistoric Pin Up.”It’s the Venus of Willendorf double standard all over again.

Ancient figures of naked pregnant women are interpreted by smirking male archaeologists as pornography, while equally sexualized images of men are assumed to depict gods or shamans. Or even hunters or warriors. Funny, huh?Consider: phallic images from the Paleolithic are at least 28,000 years old. Neolithic cultures all over the world seemed to have a thing for sculptures with enormous erect phalluses. Ancient civilizations were awash in images of male genitalia, from the Indian lingam to the Egyptian benben to the Greek herm. The Romans even painted phalluses on their doors and wore phallic charms around their necks. But nobody ever interprets this ancient phallic imagery as pornography. Instead, it’s understood to indicate reverence for male sexual potency. No one, for example, has ever suggested that the Lascaux cave dude was a pin-up; he’s assumed to be a shaman.

The ithyphallic figurines from the Neolithic — and there are many — are interpreted as gods. And everyone knows that the phalluses of ancient India and Egypt and Greece and Rome represented awesome divine powers of fertility and protection. Yet an ancient figurine of a nude woman — a life-giving woman, with her vulva ready to bring forth a new human being, and her milk-filled breasts ready to nourish that being — is interpreted as pornography. Just something for a man to whack off to.It’s not as if there’s no other context in which to interpret the figure. After all, the European Paleolithic is chock full of pregnant-looking female statuettes that are quite similar to this one. By the time we get to the Neolithic, the naked pregnant female is enthroned with lions at her feet, and it’s clear that people are worshipping some kind of female god. Yet in the Science Now article, the archaeologist who found the figurine is talking about pornographic pin-ups: “I showed it to a male colleague, and his response was, ‘Nothing’s changed in 40,000 years.’” That sentence needs to be bronzed and hung up on a plaque somewhere, because you couldn’t ask for a better demonstration of the classic fallacy of reading the present into the past.

The archaeologist assumes the artist who created the figurine was male; why? He assumes the motive was lust; why? Because that’s all he knows. To his mind, the image of a naked woman with big breasts and exposed vulva can only mean one thing: porn! Porn made by men, for men! And so he assumes, without questioning his assumptions, that the image must have meant the same thing 35,000 years ago. No other mental categories for “naked woman” are available to him. His mind is a closed box. This has been the central flaw of anthropology for as long there’s been anthropology. And even before: the English invaders of North America thought the Iroquois chiefs had concubines who accompanied them everywhere, because they had no other mental categories to account for well-dressed, important-looking women sitting in a council house. It’s the same fallacy that bedevils archaeologists who dig up male skeletons with fancy beads and conclude that the society was male dominant (because powerful people wear jewelry!), and in another site dig up female skeletons with fancy beads and conclude that this society, too, was male dominant (because women have to dress up as sex objects and trophy wives!).

Male dominance is all they can imagine. And so no matter what they dig up, they interpret it to fit their mental model.

http://www.reclusiveleftist.com/2009/05/14/oldest-depiction-of-female-form-shows-that-modern-archaeologists-are-pornsick-misogynists/

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2009/513/1?rss=1

Feminism is.....

This is not my work. I found it in a blog I follow and found it quite fascinating. It has all my beliefs and values put together

Feminists:
put women first in as many ways as they can all the time
oppose the oppression of women in all its forms
refuse to participate in patriarchy as much as possible
consider, evaluate, and make the choices that are available to them according to a knowledge that those choices make a difference in the lives of women everywhere
take actions that embody their political beliefs as often as they can
recognize ways in which they collude with patriarchy and actively work to change in those areas
Feminists oppose (among other things):
pornography
prostitution
rape
weight-loss diets and fatphobia
heterosexism
lesbophobia
male violence
violence against women and children
sado-masochism
child sexual abuse
pedophilia
compulsory heterosexuality
heteronormativity
bestiality
coercion
oppression
racism
ableism
ageism
anti-Semitism
slavery
Feminists support:
accountability
responsibility
safety
friendship
respect
community
consensus
connection
love
consensual, non-violent, non-commercial sex
creativity
clear, honest communication
working through differences
ethics
knowing what feminism is and is not
women
holistic health care
equal access
sustainability
revolution

http://feh-muh-nist.blogspot.com/2006/07/feminism-defined.html

The harassed strike back: I have determined no longer to mutely ignore the uninvited sexual advances of strangers

[A wonderful statement of emancipation by a young British women writer and art critic, Bidsha]


I am completely average. Average face, talents, life. Accordingly, I take the amount of sexual harassment I suffer to be average too. That's pretty much every day since I was around 13, by males of all ages, nationalities and types, singly and in groups, usually on the street, in parks or public transport. The harassment takes the form of leering, jeering, tongue-clicking, hissing, nudging, comments in my ear, following, physical blocking and gropes. Every woman I've spoken to, of whatever country, whatever age, knows what I mean.

I decided on a new strategy, after I was groped by two groovy young South Americans and then commented on lewdly by two Englishmen in their 50s - see, it's just like a Benetton ad - on the same day. Later, I was perusing the peppers in Sainsbury's when someone hissed "Hello, sweetie" into my ear. I turned to see a thirtysomething Middle Eastern guy with clear features and bright brown eyes, wearing a neat shirt and pressed chinos. He must have popped out of the office to bug a woman and pick up some snacks."Why do you think it's OK to harass women?" I said calmly, loudly. The man froze, then a look of fear washed over his features. He shrank like a worm. "What?" he snivelled, his eyes sliding to the floor. "I didn't say anything bad ...""It doesn't matter what you said, I didn't say that you could speak to me. It's not OK to whisper in a woman's ear when she's going about her business. "He didn't walk away so much as dissolve, and I marvelled at my new method. How could a compulsive irritant's bravado be deflated so easily? Do they rely on their victims mutely accepting it?Of course there are degrees of seriousness.

On Sunday I was jogging in Hyde Park when two boys of 18 or so rode up on bikes alongside the jogger in front of me. One of them reached out and squeezed the woman's bottom before making away slowly with his friend. She went rigid with shock, and stopped running. I saw the strength drain down her into the ground as she began to shake.I asked her if she was all right, and suggested that we run together, since the boys had come back into view and were blocking their bikes around two other women who were walking along a parallel path.We did so, but there was no way to avoid these boys and no way I was going to let them get away with groping three women in two minutes.

As we approached I told them I'd witnessed everything, I was going to call the police, how dare they. The boys were well-spoken, and the perpetrator wasn't afraid. He whipped his mobile out of his pocket and tried to give it to me."I'm not calling the police on your phone because they'll think that we know each other and that it's all a big joke," I said coolly. "The police are back there, I just passed them. The longer you stick around the easier it is for me to give them a description. There are CCTV cameras all over the park. Can't you see them? You should leave now."

It went on; he was enjoying himself at first. He knew that men who assault women get away with it. We four joggers were walking slowly in a line, like an army, and I shouted righteous things as the boys finally edged their bikes away. As we parted the women jokily congratulated me, their she-knight in sports shorts.I went on ahead and then, as in a nightmare, I saw the boys again up ahead, watching me languidly. My muscles filled with adrenaline and, fuelled by decades of rage, I began to pursue the boys like a killer cyborg - or a killer midget cyborg in bottle-end specs. They freaked on instinct and pedalled hard but there I was, powering across the park and shaking my fist, miraculously keeping up.It's comical: two cycling harassers fleeing from a bionic art critic.

They were scared by the colossal, muscular force of my anger; but what was I going to do, stand on one chap while I biffed the other? And once the amusement at my own ridiculousness abated, the grief returned. The street harassment, the job harassment, the jokes, the exploitation, are all part of the same thing. Thousands of years into "civilisation" and a woman can't even jog in peace. It's a shame, because endurance sports are the only thing I'm above average at.

______________________________________________

I found that article quite interesting. Similar comments have been passed at me whilst I've been out shopping, partying, eating out and even on public transport. When I do say something to these men they usually say, "fuck of", "bitch", "slut" or anything else to make themselves feel better. Some funny things these men have said when I have retaliated include, " How dare you say that to me?" I'm quite tempted to smile back and say, "And what makes you think I'd be the least bit interested in you?" But I say nothing. I remember a guy once telling me "Fuck you bitch. Fuck you. You're a fucking bitch" when I refused to speak to him when he told me he found me hot and decided to follow me to the cafe so he can get o know me. Sigh. When will men understand that it's NOT OK to pass comments at strange women.