Enlightened Sexism Essay

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The book I chose to read was The Rise of Enlightened Sexism, by Susan J. Douglas. This was an extremely interesting read, and it really hit on everything we have discussed throughout this course. Although women have come such a long way and overcame many battles when it came to sexism, we haven 't come as far as we would like to think. This book exemplifies the struggles, achievements and varieties of sexism brought out through sources like the media as well as the influence that we have on each other. The term enlightened sexism refers to a subtle or “nice” form of sexism that is created mainly through the media for a laugh since this concept made it alright to restore degrading sexist personas of women. This idea is perceived to be okay …show more content…

A large part of the book focuses on the movie Mean Girls and the message that goes along with it, that women are the problem. Through whimsy banter this movie shows the true side and background of the animosity and vengefulness of how females treat one another. “Mean Girls shows how the tyranny of narrow, unforgiving standards of femininity and hotness compel girls to police themselves and punish those who fail to live up to these standards”(Douglas, p.236). The worst part of the concept of sexism is that women are competing with each other instead of empowering one another to be better individuals. This book picks apart the rational and mindset of these girls, and shows that it is brought on through a competitive nature to constantly be “better” and more desirable than other women. Douglas emphasizes that because of this competition many females go to extreme lengths, like life threatening plastic surgery, spending countless amounts of money on beauty products, and hurting themselves through extreme dieting in order to attempt to make changes to their appearance to please others. “By creating a certain type of message, media can manipulate people’s attitude and opinions”(Wolska). Messages through the many sources of media, even light humorous ones, do not depict equality and happiness like they claim they do, instead they push women to go to extreme lengths to attempt unachievable

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