These concerns about looks intensify as girls grow. On entertainment TV and in magazines, girls see how much of a celebrity’s life and appearance is scrutinised—their hair, boyfriends, children, make-up, skin, weight, clothes, accessories. Aware of this scrutiny, girls begin to take themselves apart. Anxiety is good for business, because it keeps girls purchasing.
Slowing cognitive development
With girls spending more and more time in their bedrooms worrying about how they look and what to wear, they are missing out on the invaluable life experiences needed to develop, and to draw on in difficult situations. Neuroscientist Susan Greenfield is now seeing eleven-year-olds two to three years behind in cognitive development than eleven-year-olds were fifteen years ago. Girls need human interaction, nourishing food and play, and to be directly engaged in life, for their brains to develop. Without these factors, Susan Greenfield believes, their ability to make sense of the world and express themselves creatively will continue to decline (BBC News, 2006, September 12).
Plummeting self-esteem
Anxiety and a lack of maturity make girls more vulnerable to marketers and peers. This, and the constant emphasis on how girls look, are major contributors to the concerning growth in self-loathing amongst girls. ‘Eight years ago when I did my training as a psychologist, the sexualisation of girls wasn’t such an issue. Now girls, even young girls, desperately want to be sexy and beautiful. I’m seeing a lot of young clients struggling with body image and self-esteem,’ Gina, a mother and child psychologist told me. ‘I see girls at primary school, some in the early years of primary school, worried about looking fat and not being pretty’ (Interview with MH, September 3, 2008).
Natasha, a high school teacher, agrees. ‘My daughter’s only thirteen, but already she takes ages to get ready for school in the morning, doing her hair and everything. She’s really picky about what she’ll have in her sandwiches. She won’t have things like tuna, because she’s worried about “tuna breath”’ (Interview with MH, September 3, 2008).
As global marketing guru Martin Lindstrom (with Seybold, 2003, p. 196), points out, ‘Although this may be the most affluent generation to walk the planet, it also has the dubious distinction of being the most insecure and depressed.’
When life’s all about appearance, there’s no incentive for girls to value themselves or their unique talents. ‘I’m seeing such an increase in troubling situations around girls. Already I’m concerned that the problems we’re facing will become more widespread and severe. Girls of twelve and thirteen, who are more artistic and individual, say that while they don’t want to conform, they feel they must, to have some chance of surviving at high school,’ Gina, a child psychologist informed me (MH Interview, September 3, 2008), adding: ‘We need to work with kids to let them know it’s okay to be unique, to have your own ideas, as that’s how you have a much happier, healthier future.’
Self-harm
As well as a growth in eating issues we see an alarming rise in self-harm. One in ten teen girls is now ‘cutting.’ Psychologist Lisa Machoian (in Reed, 2007, The Wellesley, January 11) goes so far as to describe teen girls self-harming as a ‘contagion.’ Girls who cut use a whole range of tools from razors and knives, to scissors and glass, or whatever they can find. Girls, some as young as twelve, cut or burn their skin, pull their hair out, or mutilate themselves in other ways to relieve the pain they feel inside.
I self-injured, starting at around 13, but only causing serious damage much later. Cut myself, burned myself (heat or chemical, either). I will always have the scars. I have stopped, but I still want to, regularly, when I’m sad enough or scared enough, or having trouble coping with how I am doing (Wolfa, February 23, 2005).
Cosmetic surgery
Worried about their looks, an increasing number of girls are turning to cosmetic surgery. Cable reality TV shows such as The Swan and Extreme Makeover don’t help by making cosmetic surgery seem normal, straightforward, risk-free. Here the suggestion is that the best way to deal with body issues is to slice away those parts of the body that don’t work, and/or acquire parts that do. Little attention is paid to the pain and discomfort of surgery, let alone the danger that any operation poses or the psychological consequences.
As more celebrities resort to surgery, it doesn’t take a huge leap of imagination for teen girls to equate figure enhancement with success. When Bliss magazine surveyed girls aged ten to nineteen, more than a quarter of fourteen-year-olds had contemplated plastic surgery (Meikle, The Guardian, January 6, 2004). Girls elect surgery in the hope their lives will improve, but as teen cosmetic surgery is relatively new, it’s too early to gauge the long-term effects of these procedures. However, one long-term study of over 2,000 women with breast implants is less than encouraging, as these women were found to be three times more vulnerable to suicide in the immediate years following their surgery than those without breast enhancement (Smith, 2004).
Sexualised pre-schoolers
The impact of our sex-saturated culture on girls exposes younger and younger girls to language and behaviours they are not ready to deal with. A growing number of pre-school and kindy teachers report unacceptable sexual behaviour and language from pre-schoolers. They talk of a range of behaviours from tongue-kissing and inappropriate and determined exploration of each other’s bodies, to the use of words such as ‘sexing’ when talking about love and affection. Many parents express similar concerns. One mother of a five-year-old recently told of her daughter’s distress at constantly being pressed by a little friend to play ‘vagina to vagina.’ A day later, the mother of another small girl in a different city was battling this same issue.
‘Puberty issues are happening much younger. Some girls are now fashion-conscious as young as three or four,’ reflected Debra, a community liaison officer and mother of two girls (MH Interview, September 3, 2008). ‘We’re now seeing six, seven and eight-year-olds involved in coercive, manipulative sexual behaviours, because there’s a confusion around what sexuality means,’ said Dr Joe Tucci of the Australian Childhood Foundation. ‘This can be very traumatic to the child they’re doing this to’ (in Hamilton, 2008, p. 53). He went on to explain how the victims often have to undergo intensive counselling to deal with their trauma.
As adults we have been frighteningly slow to realise what is happening to little girls. However, teen girls know intimately the pressures small girls are under, and hate what they see. ‘They’re like so young and innocent and they should be doing what little kids should be doing, but it’s like parents and the media influencing them so much,’ Missy, fifteen, told me (in Hamilton, 2008, p. 17).
Girls socialised to be objects
This overwhelming focus on appearances is real and intense, and increasingly is compromising girls’ confidence, empathy, and sense of self-worth. The more girls are treated as objects, the more they see themselves this way. When we see teen celebrity and former porn star Jenna Jameson applauded for being ‘the single person who’s most responsible for bringing porn into the mainstream’ (http://www.askmen.com/women/models_250/262_jenna_jameson.html) and hip-hop/rap superstar Snoop Dogg, dubbed as ‘America’s Most Lovable Pimp,’ it’s not surprising girls think it’s cool to be called a ho or slut (Rolling Stone, 2006, November 28).
A growing number of professionals who work with girls are concerned about the objectifying way in which many girls now view themselves. ‘What troubles me is that it’s like girls don’t feel they have any rights,’ one high school teacher told me (in Hamilton, 2008, p. 148). ‘It’s like they want to be objects to be desired.’ When I spoke to Poppy, twelve (MH Interview, August 8, 2008), she articulated what many girls now believe. ‘You just do all this sex stuff with boys—you don’t have to love them or anything.’
When parents are unaware of how girls’ lives now differ from their older children’s, and from their own experiences, their girls have to find their way through an endless barrage of sexualised images and messages alone. The fallout from th
is neglect is tangible. ‘When I first started teaching in 2000 there was a sense of wanting to be sexy, but it wasn’t common for girls to be having sex at twelve—it was more likely at fourteen,’ one young teacher told me (in Hamilton, 2008, p. 158). ‘Now it’s more common at twelve. It’s like they want to be wanted and loved in that moment, and that’s enough.’ Dominque, in Teen Form (September 14, 2008) confirms this: ‘…Okay we have dont [sic] this every day this week…its jus sex no strings attached jus sex after sex, maybe a movie, and more sex.’
With the shrinking of childhood and the collapsing of valuable life experiences, girls are even more vulnerable to doing whatever it takes to be accepted. This same teacher spoke of one student aged fourteen, who took off with a friend in a car full of boys. During the ride the girl was pressured into taking her top off. She complied because she didn’t want to look ‘silly.’ The boys then took a photo with their mobile and sent it to other kids. When the girl told her teacher, she had no sense of being violated. ‘Girls are terrified of being isolated and not being seen as cool,’ this teacher explained. ‘It was like the girl could only see herself as how boys were seeing her’ (in Hamilton, 2008, p. 148).
‘There is a huge desensitisation around sexualised images,’ agrees one clinical psychologist, who heads up a sexual assault team at a major hospital (MH Interview, September 3, 2008). ‘The boundaries have become blurred not just for girls, but their parents, and the whole of society. You can’t drive down the street without seeing this material. If these images were put up at work, they’d be seen as sexual harassment, but we constantly see women in pornographic poses on buses and billboards. So, why are we surprised that young girls are participating in rainbow parties and having anal sex? It’s been sold to them as empowerment, it’s a great con job.’
Performance culture
With ready access to the internet and popular culture, girls are more public about sex, more adventurous about what they’ll wear, and what they’re prepared to do. Once acts such as oral sex were available only from sex workers. Now they are mainstream. ‘For young people it’s an almost universal practice now,’ says Basil Donovan (AAP, The Sydney Morning Herald, 2008, September 16) professor of sexual health at the University of NSW. ‘Among teenagers it’s the new abstinence in the Clintonesque sense, because it’s a way of having sex without having sex, and there are obvious contraceptive advantages too.’
‘We’re seeing a collapsing of childhood,’ warns another psychologist who supports victims of sexual assault. ‘Younger and younger children becoming victims of sexual assault. In our performance culture, ‘performance’ is part and parcel of what’s going on with girls.’ In their desire to perform for peers, girls are putting themselves in increasingly risky situations. ‘Oral and anal sex are now just like kissing. To girls it’s not really sex. When their relationship with a boy begins at this level, then the expectations are that they’ll be up for a whole lot more’ (MH Interview, September 4, 2008).
Teen culture suggests girls need to be primed and ready for sex at all times. And as competition for attention is fierce, the sexual boundaries continue to be pushed. Some girls who are keen to add to their ‘repertoire,’ access porn for new ideas. Others are getting together with girls, kissing and touching each other, purely to get boys interested. Along with faux lesbianism, teachers talk of a growing interest in threesomes. ‘From what the girls say, the boys will think nothing of asking, “Can I have sex with your friend at the same time as well,”’ one teacher told me. ‘The way things are, it’s like it’s prudish to say no’ (in Hamilton, 2008, p. 145).
Unwittingly, adults have contributed to the burgeoning performance culture. ‘Young girls grow up with their lives captured on camera and video by friends and family,’ one psychologist pointed out, ‘It’s only a relatively small step for them or their peers to capture more intimate details of themselves and their life’ (MH Interview, September 4, 2008).
‘We’re seeing a growth in girls being encouraged to take photos of themselves, which can then be used for bribery,’ this psychologist explained. ‘With threats to tell their parents or new boyfriends what they’ve been up to, these girls can then be groomed to take more and more explicit photos of themselves. The trauma from these situations can be as bad as physical assault for girls, causing sleeplessness, flashbacks, not wanting to go out—the symptoms of post traumatic stress.’
Sexual assault
While sexual abuse of girls has always existed, according to experts this too is taking new forms. ‘We’re now seeing girls vulnerable to the same range of risks adult women face—being harmed on their way home by taxi drivers, by boyfriends,’ one professional told me (MH Interview, September 3, 2008).
The burgeoning performance culture doesn’t help, ‘Sexual offenders have less empathy,’ this psychologist explained. ‘They see their victims as objects. So, the more we encourage girls to view themselves as objects without depth or difference, the more we place them at risk.’
‘Personally I have huge concerns. Young girls are now being targeted by older boys,’ admits one senior clinical psychologist, who heads a sexual assault support team at a major hospital (MH Interview, September 4, 2008). ‘We see a lot of twelve to fourteen-year-olds, targeted by boys seventeen to eighteen years. These are young girls wanting to be grown up, who’re still very young and trusting, who fall prey to pre-planned situations. They’re plied with alcohol, and possibly drugs, and often raped anally. In the past it was rape by one boy, but now it’s two or three boys, and often filmed. The severity of assaults is also growing.’ Whitney, eighteen, concurs: ‘In some ways it’s a bit of a worry porn is what sex is meant to be about. It takes expectations of boys to the extreme. I think that’s why rape and sexual abuse is more common now. Porn expresses women in a very different way. I hate the way they like represent themselves like so skankily’ (in Hamilton, 2008, p. 147).
The portrayal of girls as objects can have concerning outcomes. One teen actress who appears in a regular TV show, was alarmed recently to discover that the scene of an abduction in which she starred as victim, is now doing the rounds on the internet.
It’s no surprise that when talking with many teen girls, they sound as if they’re in a war zone. They speak of ‘sticking together’ and ‘watching out for each other,’ making sure they’re never alone, or their drinks are left unattended. They tell of pretending to drink to look part of ‘the scene,’ so they won’t be made fun of, and of making sure they all leave together.
The very nature, intent and language of marketing is that of seduction. Adults who are marketed to, know this. Girls, particularly young girls, don’t. This, along with rapid changes in society, and the explosion of high-tech devices, are having a devastating effect on increasing numbers of girls, because parents and educators haven’t caught up.
It’s time we stopped focussing on how much money we can make from girls, and look instead at what girls need, to feel confident, to thrive, to be genuinely empowered.
References
AAP (2008) ‘Oral sex is on the rise’ The Sydney Morning Herald, September 16.
BBC News (2006) ‘Is modern life ruining childhood?’ September 12, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/5338572.stm
Gregory Thomas, Susan (2007) Buy, Buy Baby: The Devastating Impact of Marketing to O-3s. Houghton Mifflin, Boston.
Hamilton, Maggie (2008) What’s Happening to Our Girls? Viking, Penguin. Melbourne, London, New York.
Houghton, Des (2008) ‘Sex attack seen as “childhood experiment” at Queensland school’ The Courier Mail, September 12.
Jameson, Jenna (accessed Sept 2008) ‘What We Like About Her.’ AskMen.com, http://www.askmen.com/women/models_250/262_jenna_jameson.html
Lindstrom, Martin with Seybold, Patricia B. (2003) BRANDChild: Remarkable Insights into the Minds of Today’s Global Kids and Their Relationships with Brands. Kogan Page, London.
Meikle, James (2004) ‘Teen girls just wanna look thin’ The Gua
rdian, January 6, http://society.guardian.co.uk/publichealth/story/0,,1116982,00.html
Reed, Brad (2007) ‘“Cutting” on increase in teens, say experts’ The Wellesley Townsman, January 11, http://www.townonline.com/wellesley/homepage/8999010672477995007)
Rolling Stone (2006) ‘America’s Most Lovable Pimp,’ November 28, http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/snoop_dogg_at_home_with_americas_most_lovable_pimp
Smith, Afsun (2004) ‘Can bigger breasts buy happiness? No, say scientists: Just the opposite’ Talk Surgery Inc, May 21, http://www.talksurgery.com/consumer/new/new00000119_1.html
Teen Form (2008) September 14, http://www.goteenforums.com/forums/peer-yyypyoe-support-a.html
Wolfa (2005) ‘I wanna be Angelina Jolie,’ February 23, http://wolfangel.calltherain.net/archives/2005/02/23/i-wanna-be-angelina-jolie/
Womack, Sarah (2005) ‘Now girls as young as this five year old think they have to be slim to be popular’ The Telegraph, Sydney, March 8, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/03/08/nbody08.xml
Sex on the Street: Outdoor Advertising and the Sexual Harassment of Women
Lauren Rosewarne
In preparation for my PhD dissertation and subsequent book, I spent much of 2003 photographing outdoor advertisements. For one year, I photographed every billboard, tram stop advertisement and bus shelter poster that I encountered during my daily commuting. My book, Sex in Public: Women, Outdoor Advertising and Public Policy (2007), details the findings of the analysis I conducted on these photographs. For the purposes of this chapter, my central finding was that women tend to be portrayed as young, thin, white and idle. I found that the vast majority of women were in the sixteen to thirty year age category, were in the two slimmest body-shape categories, had white skin and were portrayed doing nothing other than posing. Young, thin, white and idle describes the female characters in outdoor advertising but also describes the women commonly featured in pin-ups. While at the most basic level, the constant display of stereotyped and homogenous representations of women reflects the media sexism that feminists have long bemoaned. Of greater concern, it demonstrates the strong link between advertising images and pin-ups and thus establishes the connection between sexualised outdoor advertising and sexual harassment.
Getting Real Page 7
