When looking at an example of media in terms of gender David Gauntlett references the film 'click' as an example, the film has been described as featuring both 'gross' humour but also a number of arguably touching moments. When looking at gender roles Gaunlett states that 'Clicks' protagonist isn't 'conventionally masculine' character from the focus of the narrative revolving around strong family values and emotions, however this could be contradictory as this same character uses his fictionally acquired abilities to his own advantage of means of pleasure which involves the objectification of women.
Leading characters within film show us the standard equality being presented in media, Gaunlett states that although there is a balance in terms of ability there is an obvious imbalance with conferring those roles into film, this is proven as there is evidence that proves there to be more male roles given over women's, as well as this the typical stereotypical concreted roles are still imposed within the context of roles,
Gaunlett refers to actors like Harrison Ford, Sean Connery, Michael Douglass and Bruce Willis as examples of how men are given a much more positive treatment in media in terms of age representation with men as they are allowed to be older and still remaining successful in hollywood roles, maintaining the stereotypical hero figure while women are required to be attractive and older women's roles remain as the most underrepresented in film to date.
In contemporary advertising sexism isn't always obvious, however Gauntlett observes that outdated gender roles are still utillised as a legitimate technique in current media and have been used as recently as 2007, it remains unclear where a male equivalent of this seems to be in modern society.
Gaunlett evidences the imbalance of gender in his observation of modern advertising and the presentation of women, what was shown is that they were more likely to appear in domestic product commercials compared to men, although this doesn't revel the complete context of the commercial, as in the nature of the role, it presents us with the evidence that there is a lack of change within representation, looking at culture and attitudes towards gender in general the data remains irregular as little growth as little been shown.
Although Gauntlett thinks obvious stereotypes aren't seen as much in the current media he addresses a definite deception in the medias portrayal of women, following the significant change between the 70's and 90's there seemed to have been no real change since. Women now are often expected to be shown being confident, attractive, and and a 'kitchen slave' to no one although this seens positive Gauntlett uses Macdonald's quote around the change in the late 80's and 90's and and how advertisers created a sense of illusion of a non sexist society this benefited branding, and by the 90's liberation and 'freedom' were no longer used to fight against the patriarchy were now doing so within beauty products.
When discussing selling beauty Gauntlett questions the amount of focus that researchers tend have on gender in terms of advertising in comparison to other selling techniques, as there are much more focus on things like tv as with ads we only see for a much shorter time span. But makeup and advertising have a close coupling as capitalists have produced the content to highlight insecurities and then sell things to 'fix' them.
Germain Greers talks about the amount of spending and the message that beauty advertisements conveys to its customers "the beauty industry takes 8.9 million out of women's pockets" Greer goes on to state the fact that magazines are funded by the beauty industry and as a result teach young girls how much they need makeup and how its used, establishing a life long struggle of a reliance on beauty products. Since Greer's 'The Female Ennuch' written in the 60's she believes things have gotten worse, and women are now 'infected' with the idea of perfection.
However this issue doesn't just effect women as Greer points out that its an issue with people. In 'the new feminism' by Natasha Walter (1998) looks at a survey that suggests that men may have more body image issues compared to women and notes that we're often too quick too assume that only women have to deal with these beauty standards.
However Greer thinks that women face much more pressure within their makeup and clothing, although, however Walter states that many people derive pleasure from the use of beauty products and fashion and refuses to see the advertising as a conspiracy.
A study from the university of Glasgow from 2001 revealed that women were ten times more likely to be unhappy with their bodies than men, the author of this Carol Emise stated 'Images are still of very thin women are desirable body shapes, there is still an association that beautiful women are thin and for men the images are more varied'.
Another study from 2003 showed that Hargreaves and Tiggerman asked teenage boys between the ages of 13-15 to list their top ten characteristics which they would choose in a partner, interestingly what came as the top results were 'personality' and 'sense of humor' and a 'slim figure' low on the list.
Greer observes that magazines aimed towards female readers featured a slimmer model whereas when aimed towards men the models were a lot curvier. Whatever level of weight is shown it definitely has an impact.
When it comes to emerging sexualities on tv, the lgbtq community have remained hidden for a long time, even as recent as 1990 even the sight of a gay couple prompted homophobic behaviour from viewers. One of the first tv shows to feature gay characters was an Australian series in the 70s, unfortunetly it later axed its gay characters for its american development, there were also the accosianal stereotypical characters. The 70s saw little growth of lgbtq representation, but when moving into the 80's there were gay characters in television but without any intimacy shown at all, gay characters still remained scarce. The 90's saw change in this as lesbians became more visible, in as in Britain there featured an intimate relationship on a main stream soap, this hopefully dispelling stereotypes and ignorance.
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