Greetings classmates,
The article I have chosen for this assignment is titled "Dove's 'Real Beauty' Backlash" by Jennifer L. Pozner. The question in specific I have chosen is the final, namely, "Characterize Pozner's tone in this selection, particularly in her comments regarding male critics of Dove's ads. What effect does it have on your response to her essay?"
That being said, I would primarily characterize her tone as that of anger, bigotry, and hypocrisy. My response to her essay is that of disgust, revulsion, and dismissal. She openly refers to Richard Roeper on page 195 as a sexist "who wears gender-based bigotry as a badge of pride." To boot, while Richard was certainly impolite in his comments that she quoted, in no way did he ever state that heavier women are inferior nor did he "demand that women be displayed only in the hyper-objectifying images they feel is somehow their due," (196). He only stated that he was not aroused by the images of heavier women and that he prefers thinner women. Ironically enough the only person in this article who used demeaning language against women was Pozner herself, who refers to thinner women as "the bags-of-bones in competitors' campaigns," (194). Exercising a preference is not demeaning. And while Richard's preferences are not representative of all men, he is certainly more qualified to make such statements than Pozner a woman. If exercising a preference as Richard has is an insult, then certainly women themselves are more to blame for this than men. The average male will encounter rejection in his life far more than women will ever encounter from men. Otherwise there would not be mass shooters like Elliot Rodger who left behind an entire 151 page manifesto explaining the role that rejection played in his life and the pain that women caused him.
Being thin is actually a very easy thing to do. With the exception of disabled people and those with certain medical conditions, the majority of people can do it through diet and exercise. This is in stark contrast to the insanely high standards that are placed upon men. Not only do you have to have the perfect muscular body, but you also have to be extremely wealthy, tall, and possess confidence, charisma and wit. Pozner continues her diatribe on page 196 when she states "Certainly, these men so quick to demonize 'the Dove girls' show no understanding that those 'fantasy babes' of traditional ads have a profoundly negative impact on the health of girls and women in America." Are the the same 'fantasy babes' that she earlier refers to on page 194 as "bags of bones"? I have been short my entire life and no matter how much I diet or exercise that is something I will never be able to change. I receive no sympathy whatsoever from women like Pozner for that. Yet weight is something that is perfectly within the control of most individuals and women like Pozner expect sympathy from me.
Pozner commits a logical fallacy on page 196 when she states that because the women in these advertisements are actually "smaller-sized than the average American woman" that it must mean they are healthy. In Latin this is called the Argumentum ad Consequentiam, it means to suppose that because a proposition would have negative consequences that the proposition must not be true. In reality though the consequences of a proposition have no bearing upon whether or not it is true. It is perfectly conceivable, for example, that the majority of average American women are unhealthy, and thus the arguments against these sort of advertisements as normalizing an unhealthy lifestyle of obesity are perfectly legitimate whether Pozner likes it or not.
In conclusion, I believe that if Pozner had not resorted to personal insult, demonized men like Richard for exercising a preference, and openly insulted smaller women as "bags of bones" while simultaneously expecting sympathy for larger women she could have formulated a valid argument. She could have argued that featuring heavier women is a positive simply for the sake of diversity, but instead this was lost through anger and insult.
James.
Hey James, I Can agree with your statement that the average man will encounter more reject from women than women from men. I also think that Ponzer did make a statement that she wasn't as qualified for over Richard because he is male; however, Richard does not speak for all men. I think that substantial reason there are stereotypes and gender bias' is because people chose to use confirmation bias to believe in what they see. Because women see Ponzi's statement, they will use that as a reason to believe the announcement and follow in that mindset that creates bias. And with Richard, the same thing, men will use this as confirmation bias and correlate that to every understanding they have. Bias and gender stereotypes are what creates the society we are in and what influences generation after generation when they are exposed. Children especially develop these when they are susceptible to change. In conclusion, agree and disagree with you but the matter is the same no one can speak for an entire gender just their individual opinion that could matter or not.
ReplyDelete