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Nauseating and demeaning
CHANDRIKA R. KRISHNAN
S. LakshmiSudha’s article “The social threat” (Open Page, December 30) raises a pertinent point. Why are such negative portrayals of women so rampant? I too often wonder what the women’s liberation activists are doing when they witness advertisements like the New Axe and Numero Uno jeans, where hordes of nubile semi-clad girls thoroughly debase themselves to throw themselves at a solitary man!
A young chemistry teacher completely loses her cool and her handwriting goes haywire all because she has a whiff of some perfume. We have a brief clad man having lipstick mark all over his body. A few years back there were KFC advertisements where double entendre made headlines, which was something to the effect, “Do you want breast or thighs?” The list can go on and on.
Coming back to the original question, “Why are the activists keeping mum over such amazingly obscene display of flesh and complete lack of grey matter?” It is nauseating and demeaning to all educated women folk.
It is practically primitive to highlight that women go only for something inane like perfume, underclothes, particularly in an age when women have made great strides in their lives. Most serials continue to depict women as simpering fools or wily vamps. There does not seem to be any moderation in the stereotypical portrayal. Why can’t advertisements, serials and movies deal with “feel good” factor rather than appeal to raunchy tastes?
The whole problem results from our lack of understanding between the sensuous and the overt sex appeal. Our filmmakers and the advertising moguls lack the ability to demarcate between the two. The former makes a woman revel in it and the latter makes the skin crawl. I blame the multi media for such a lopsided stance. Most pictures depict girls doing a complete volte-face when the hero is persistent enough. The message that girls don’t know their own minds is reinforced time and again through the various channels.
Maybe, that is why a common man is unable to accept that molestation is wrong. He gets too many wrong signals depicting women as willing and available and possessing brains of a chicken. There are any numbers of news reports of youth killing or harming girls just because she does not reciprocate his feelings.
It would be unfair to blame only the media without referring to the adults who are equally to be blamed for this social threat. The recent case of the untimely death of a schoolboy due to video games is a wake-up call for all we adults.
We have parents and other adults having an escapist attitude. The parents too are very happy and beam with pride when their little ones dance to the raunchy tunes gyrating like their role models. We have grandparents and parents glued to the “idiot box” sending wrong messages to their wards. Gone are the days where myths and legends were told to the children as a bedtime story. Sad state of affairs indeed!
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