My Daughter Rachel's Essay: Women’s Role and Representation in the Media By Rachel Raps Second Place Oratorical Speech

Turn on the TV, look at the walls of young teenage girls, or open up a magazine and what do you see? In this day and age, movies, television, advertisements, books, and basically anything else pertaining to the media, is compiled with images of women as either completely and unrealistically idealized or just portrayed in a demeaning and stereotypical matter. For example, think of any low-fat food (e.g. yogurt, salad) commercial you’ve ever seen. More often than not, women are flashed across the screen eating the product being promoted and not men. Why? The answer to that question is simple: That’s what sells.

90% of women in the United States are unhappy with at least one aspect of their physical appearance. Statistics show that over 50% of ads in women’s magazines relate to improving appearance with makeup or dietary products. Seeing someone on TV who is considered to be an “ideal” woman, someone with straight teeth, thin, fit, nice skin, etc., motivates or taunts women who feel as if they are incompetent at assuming the idealistic physical appearance that women sought after to buy the product being promoted. This is causing a serious issue, especially amongst adolescent women. The ratio of women with disordered eating attitudes to men is 5:1. Every year, approximately 1,000 women die due to eating disorders. My main point here is the idealized portrayal of women has become all but routine and is literally killing girls due to the pressure of aspiring to be just like the models and celebrities they’ve been surrounded with since birth, which leads me to my next point.

Now, you may want to ask me, “Who’s to blame for this?” Well, it’s not just one single group of people or one single gender; it’s a mixture of the two. Female celebrities in the current media are objectifying themselves and their bodies. For example, have you seen the music video to the song entitled Anaconda by female rapper Nicki Minaj? If so, you would know that is basically a three-minute video of Minaj in little to no clothing on. This isn’t sending a positive message to young girls about the steps necessary to achieve fame of any kind. Their basic understanding is that they need to take their clothes off to make it anywhere in life. Other celebrities such as Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, Rihanna, Lady Gaga etc. prove the same point. Two of the celebrities listed above, Miley Cyrus and Selena Gomez, were previously Disney stars, which make them more accessible to young children, having seen them on television themselves.

Stepping away from body image, I want to talk about another unforeseen aspect of women in the media. Ever since the 1800s, women have been fighting for their rights to perform and participate in the same daily activities as men. In modern society, it is perfectly normal to see a female doctor or lawyer working alongside male colleagues. They achieve the same amount of work, shouldn’t they earn the same salary? Not the case. Every year, studies show shocking statistics in the gap between male and female earnings. In 2012 the median salary for women working year-round, full-time jobs was $37,791. The median salary for men was $49,398. Another example of the gap between women and men’s salaries is shown with celebrities Angelina Jolie and Robert Downey Jr., the two top-paid movie actors/actresses of all time. Robert Downey Jr. earned a mind-boggling $75 million for the role of Iron Man in the super-hero action film Iron Man 3. For the action-thriller film Salt, Angelina Jolie earned $33 million; the average amount earned for male celebrities Denzel Washington and Liam Neeson per movie.

This behavior isn’t only being displayed on the big screen. For another example, women’s representation in the newsroom hasn’t improved since the 90s. In the year 1999, the amount of females editing and writing for the newsroom was 36.9% of the total staff. Today, that statistic has remained essentially stationary at 36.3%. Following this, in the early months of 2013, women were quoted in less than 20% of news articles, making men over 3.4 times more likely to be quoted on the front cover of The New York Times than women.

These statistics are shocking, if not flat out startling. This goes to show that women indeed are being portrayed unfairly and unequally. Hopefully, in the near future, these numbers will level out, and the unrealistic portrayals of women will be changed to a more sensible and attainable image. I encourage you to resist these representations and instead address the ongoing issue that is weakening the self-esteem of women and girls all over the world.

Rachel Raps
11/19/14
English 8BOratorical Speech