A Japanese videogame invites players to simulate rapes of a single mother and her two young daughters in a Tokyo subway. The game player who is described as a ‘public nuisance’ captures each female, raping and ‘breaking each respective target’ to his liking. After that, the player is instructed to move into another part of town where the game involves raping other women and children at random. The game also has a multiple-player option that provides young men the opportunity to learn gang-rape-via-videogame (Fenelly, 2009).
Prostitution is normalised for children by ‘soft‘ or ‘amateur’ pornography like Girls Gone Wild and by videos that mainstream prostitution and prostitution-like activities. For Girls Gone Wild footage, Joe Francis takes his film crew to clubs where teenagers are partying. After drinking and partying, Francis persuades and entices girls into being filmed. Francis has been jailed on charges of child abuse subsequent to his production of child pornography.2
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1 In 2008, the Australian press reported that a group of six-year-old boys had coerced girls into prostitution-like sex acts. http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/630867/trio-of-schoolboys-ran-sex-club
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Sexual boundaries have disappeared on many Internet social networking sites, increasing the vulnerability of children. Popular sites MySpace, Facebook, Flickr, Stickam and Yahoo host adult pornography, child pornography, and solicitation for prostitution. MySpace, for example, lists thinly veiled prostitution advertising such as ‘Find a Booty Call’ (Criddle, 2008). Stickam, another socially risky website used by teenagers, encourages them to post live webcam sexual behaviors (Stone, 2007).
Espin-the-bottle, a social networking site aimed at teenagers, is advertised as a sexualised ‘flirting and dating’ site for those aged 13 to 57. The Espin site accepts advertising from companies that promote ways to help children hide their Internet use from parents. The site targets children with quizzes that encourage sexualised responses which are then posted on the site (Criddle, 2008).
Another site, MissBimbo.com, encourages girls to compete to become the ‘hottest, coolest, most famous bimbo in the whole world’ (Criddle, 2008). Girls are adversely impacted by images of their own sexualised commodification and by images that trivialise sexual violence (Kilbourne, 2000). They internalise media messages about themselves. The early sexualisation of girls means that sexual activity begins at a younger age, that risky sexual behaviours increase, and that pornography is considered a fun activity. Summarising these effects, physician Linnea Smith and colleagues commented that ‘the media acts as an advertising agent for prostitution’ (Smith, 2005, p. 40).
Sexual exploitation of girls occurs in many forms of music but the exploitation is particularly toxic in the misogynist, racist lyrics of hip-hop in which all women are considered ‘ho’s’ and ‘bitches’ who deserve men’s contempt and violence (American Psychological Association, 2007; Armstrong, 2001). African-American girls have been especially harmed by rap culture which glorifies pimping and stereotypes them as hypersexual, sexually irresponsible, and uninterested in emotionally committed relationships (Davis, 2004).
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2 See Ariel Levy (2005, pp. 7–17) for an extended description of a Joe Francis shoot. See also Associated Press (2008) ‘Florida: “Wild” Girls Founder is Set Free;’ CNN.com (2008) ‘Spitzer escort’s “Girls Gone Wild” videos surface Via Associated Press’ and TMZ. com (2008) ‘Ashley Dupre Gone “Wild”—Legal or Jailbait?’
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Playfully imitating the commercialised hypersexualisation that they watch on the Internet, girls may be unwitting participants in their own sexual exploitation. Learning from pornography, children attempt sex that is casual, non-relational, and without consequences or commitments. Young women are taught the sexuality of prostitution which means that they ignore their own sexual feelings (or lack of them) and learn that their role is to service boyfriends who have also learned about sex via pornography. Thirteen-year-old girls who are Jenna Jameson fans attend her book tour for readings from How to Make Love like a Porn Star (Paul, 2005). Fifteen-year-old girls ask CosmoGirl sex advice columnists if they can get pregnant from anal sex—a query likely stemming from their boyfriends’ pornography use. Girls assume that anal sex is as commonplace in real life as it is in pornography (CosmoGirl, 2007). Yet an actual response from CosmoGirl only addressed the physiology of anal sex. What should have been discussed was whether the relationship was egalitarian, how much choice the young woman felt she did or did not have to assert her own sexual preferences, and a consideration of the possibility that she may have been experiencing sexual coercion because her boyfriend was learning from pornography.
Today, some young women have embraced their own degrading objectification (Levy, 2005; Gold, 2007). Seeming to have abandoned the hope of real equality with men, women and girls enact prostitution. Pole dancing, once the exclusive province of women in strip clubs, has moved to women’s homes and exercise classes. Lap dancing and pole dancing have become mainstreamed as women’s and girls’ sexuality. Classes in pole dancing are now advertised as fitness exercises to girls as young as seven (Yamine, 2007). Stripper-chic apparel mainstreams prostitution for young women and girls. In the following example from an Internet teen-dating advice column, a girl is taught how to perform a lap dance for her boyfriend:
Question: hi jen, well i have a lil problem its not really a problem but it is for me.. i wanna giove my boyfriend a lap dance, bc he wants me 2 and i think it would be fun but i cant dance and have no idea how to lap dance, i cant go and buy ne videos or ne thing bc im not 18 so i would have to use my parents credit card to buy it online and that wouldnt work and i dont wanna buy it at some store and i dont think i would be able to buy it. please help.
Answer: Hey Holly, well to give a lap dance you have to feel sexy. so wear your sexist undies and bra, and provocative clothing. you should start by giving him sexy looks and winks and little teasing kisses. its all about dominating. put on some music you can grind too. you start off infront of him and just dance kinda of dirty. if you can’t dance and can’t get a friend to show you, just rub yourself infront of him. spread your legs slightly and rub your chest your neck, down ur stomach and ur inner theighs. lick ur finger, look really sexy. thats when you start stripping. start with shirt. after you take it off, get on top of him and rub your chest all in his face and roll your body against his. *he has to be sitting up* have your hair down and flowing around, so it looks wild. and continue from there. everytime you take something off, make sure it looks sexy and rub against him like ur life depended on it. make him want you. give him a hardon by watching you strip and rub against him. get on top of him kiss down his body. do everything and anything you want. remember you are in control and thats why your making him want you. its your show, make him beg. hope i helped bye bye love Jen (Allexperts.com, 2005).
Middle school students at a 2005 career day in California were told that stripping and exotic dancing were excellent careers for girls. A job counselor explained to a group of students that strippers earn very good salaries, especially if they have breast enlargement surgery. ‘For every two inches up there, it’s another $50,000’ he enthusiastically told the girls (Kim, 2005).
Focusing on anatomy, physiology, and pregnancy, sex educators spend too little time teaching children about non-exploitive sexuality and intimate love relationships. Much of children’s sex education is left to pornographers and pimps. According to one survey, Australian teens were receiving most of their information about sex from Internet porn sites rather than from their parents or sex education programs: 97 per cent of girls, and 100 per cent of boys had viewed pornography before age fifteen (Sauers, 2007).
Yet children tell us about their need for education in how to develop intimate relationships. They don’t want to know only about the anatomy and physiology of sex. An Australian boy complained that his sex education class did not teach him anything about sexual intimacy. He commented, ‘They should warn you in s
chool about how bad you feel after a one-night stand!’ (Scobie, 2007).
Children today need media literacy education so that they learn to counteract toxic messages about their sexuality. It is possible to teach children how to assess the sexually exploitive messages that are lodged today in a range of technologies from video games to cell phone applications to Internet pornography. Technical and media consciousness raising are essential—first for parents themselves, and then for parents to teach children.
Media literacy resource material must include not only resources on sex stereotyping, but specific education on the damaging effects of the media’s sexualisation of children with recommendations for ways to discuss these issues with children of different ages. Like parents everywhere, US President Obama worries about the flood of commercial messages that sexualise children: ‘I worry that even if Michelle and I do our best to impart what we think are important values to our children, the media out there will undermine our lessons and teach them something different’ (Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, 2009).
Linnea Smith suggests that parents and paediatricians challenge corporations that promote the sexualisation of children (Smith et al., 2005). Other educators provide teaching models for evaluating and deconstructing common myths in the media about sexuality and love (Galician and Merskin, 2007). Media Awareness Network provides extensive resources for educating children about pornography and sexual advertising. MediaWatch offers a feminist analysis of sexism and violence in the media.
There are many tools available to decrease or eliminate the toxic intensity of media sexualisation of girls. If utilised, these resources could raise awareness about sexual exploitation, and children could grow up with a sexuality that is their own, rather than one imposed on them by a culture dominated by pimps and pornographers.
References
Allexperts.com (2005) ‘Teen Dating Issues’ accessed April 25, 2008 from http://en.allexperts.com/q/Teen-Dating-Issues-849/lap-dance.htm
American Psychological Association (2007) Report of the APA Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls. American Psychological Association, Washington DC.
Armstrong, E.G. (2001) ‘Gangsta Misogyny: a content analysis of the portrayals of violence against women in rap music 1987-1993’ Journal of Criminal Justice and Popular Culture 8 (2), pp. 96–126.
Associated Press (2008) ‘Florida: “Wild” Girls Founder is Set Free’ New York Times, March 13 accessed March 27, 2008 from http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/us/13brfs8216WILD8217_BRF.html?scp=13&sq=&st=nyt
Bloom, Julie (2008) ‘Arts, Briefly’ New York Times, August 5, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/05/arts/05arts-SALEOFGRANDT_BRF.html
Brathwaite, Brenda. (2007) Sex in Video Games. Charles River Media, Boston.
Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (2009) accessed May 11, 2009 from http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/
CNN.com (2008) ‘Spitzer escort’s “Girls Gone Wild” videos surface via Associated Press accessed April 4, 2008 from http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/03/18/dupree.girls.gone.wild.ap/index.html
CosmoGirl (2007) Accessed April 19, 2008 from http://www.cosmogirl.com/lifeadvice/sex-questions/talk-about-sex-oct07
Criddle, Linda (2008) ‘Human trafficking and the Internet’ accessed April 26, 2008 from www.look-both-ways.com
Davis, Thulani (2004) ‘New study on “hip-hop sexuality” finds anti-woman strain even among young women’ Village Voice, March 17 accessed May 22, 2005 from http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0411/davis.php
Familysafemedia.com (2008) accessed April 26, 2008 from http://familysafemedia.com/
Fenelly, Gary (2009) ‘Exclusive: Amazon selling rape simulation game’ Belfast Telegraph, February 12, 2009, accessed February 12, 2009 from http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/amazon-selling-3d-rape-simulator-game-14183546.html
Galician, Mary-Lou and Merskin, Debra L. (2007) Critical Thinking about Sex, Love, and Romance in the Mass Media. Lawrence Erlbaum, Mahwah, NJ.
Gold, G.K. (2007) ‘What is liberation? Feminism past, present and future’ accessed January 1, 2007 from http://sisyphe.org/article.php3?id_article=2551
Hanon, A. (2009) ‘Teen girls trading sex for favours’ Edmonton Sun, April 1, 2009, http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2009/04/01/8959961-sun.html
Herbert, Bob (2006) ‘Why Aren’t We Shocked?’ New York Times, October 16 accessed February 2, 2007 from http://select.nytimes.com/2006/10/16/opinion/16herbert.html?hp
Kilbourne, Jean (2000) ‘Killing us Softly: Advertising’s Image of Women’ accessed March 22, 2008 from http://www.mediaed.org/videos/MediaGenderAndDiversity/KillingUsSoftly3
Kim, Ryan (2005) ‘Bump, grind your way to riches, students told’ San Francisco Chronicle, January 14 accessed January 14, 2005 from http://www.fradical.com/Pimping_at_school_career_day.htm
Levin, Diane (2008) ‘So Sexy So Soon: The Sexualization of Childhood’ speech given at Consuming Kids: The Sexualization of Children and Other Commercial Calamities. Campaign for a Commerical-Free Childhood 6th Summit, Boston, April 3-5, 2008.
Levy, Ariel (2005) Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture. Free Press, New York.
Media Awareness Network (2008) http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/tools/main_search/search_results.cfm accessed April 13, 2008.
MediaWatch (2008) http://www.mediawatch.com accessed April 13, 2008.
Merskin, Debra L. (2004) ‘Reviving Lolita? A Media Literacy Examination of Sexual Portrayals of Girls in Fashion Advertising’ American Behavioral Scientist 48(1), pp. 119–129.
Paul, Pamela (2005) Pornified; How Pornography is Transforming Our Lives, Our Relationships, and our Families. Times Books, New York.
Sauers, Joan (2007) Sex Lives of Australian Teenagers. Random House, Sydney and New York.
Scobie, C. (2007) ‘Wild Things’ The Bulletin, Australia, June 2.
Smith, Linnea, Herman-Giddens, M.E. and Everette, V.D. (2005) ‘Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in Advertising’ in Sharon W. Cooper, Richard J. Estes, Angelo P. Giardino, Nancy D. Kellogg, and Victor I. Vieth (Eds) Medical, Legal, and Social Science Aspects of Child Sexual Exploitation: A Comprehensive Review of Pornography, Prostitution, and Internet Crimes, Volumes 1 and 2, GW Medical Publishing, St Louis.
Stone, B. (2007) ‘Using Web Cams but Few Inhibitions, the Young Turn to risky Social Sites’ New York Times, January 2 accessed June 20, 2007 from http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/02/technology/02net.html?_r=1&ref=business&oref=slogin.
TMZ.com (2008) ‘Ashley Dupre Gone “Wild” - Legal or Jailbait?’ accessed April 4, 2008 from http://www.tmz.com/2008/03/19/ashley-dupre-gone-wild-legal-or-jailbait/
Wolak, J., Mitchell, K., and Finkelhor, D. (2006) ‘Online Victimization of Youth: Five Years Later’ National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Report #07-06-025. Alexandria, VA.
Yamine, E. (2007) ‘Girls gaining fitness or losing innocence?’ Daily Telegraph, Sydney October 8 accessed February 24, 2008 from http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22545912-2,00.html
The Harmful Medicalisation of Sexualised Girls
Renate Klein
Social scripts
It is almost unavoidable these days for girls not to be drawn into the sexualisation industry. From billboards on their way to school to the ubiquitous TVs at home, girls are bombarded with multimedia messages about seductive looks and behaviours. They spend a large part of their days and nights in cyberspace using msn, meebo chatrooms, exploring the ‘hottest bands, sexiest celebs and fresh new videos’ on bebo and YouTube and updating their Facebook pages which, if they so wish (or are not careful), can be shared with the whole world. Without looking for it, pornography is just a click away. It’s not surprising then that surrounded by so much grown-up stuff, many girls perform these roles in real life as they do in cyberspace where their looks and identities need not match their ‘real’ selves.1
The social script tells girls that in real life and cyber life they must attract boys. There is n
othing new about this message, but what has changed over the past years is that the pressure to attract boys is now applied at an increasingly younger age. So is objectification: many young girls try to be thin and sexy, strut and pose like pole dancers, and wear ‘I’m a Pornstar’ T-shirts in order to be popular with boys.
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1 For a detailed analysis on the problems with multiple identities and disembodiment in post-modern cyberage see Klein (1996, 1999). Norman Doidge (2007) writes about net pornography’s influence on the plastic minds of young men (p. 103).
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Being sexualised early leads to sexual behaviours. Servicing boys with oral sex is increasingly common and discussed in girls’ magazines (Levy, 2005; Tankard Reist and Maggie Hamilton, this volume). Upgrading to the ‘real’ thing—sexual intercourse—is becoming normalised and perceived by many—girls and boys—as ‘no big deal’ and a necessary ingredient of being ‘cool.’
Sex for adults has long had its own ‘health’ industry. This has now been extended to girls—a market expansion surely applauded by pharmaceutical companies. Considering having sex means having to deal with contraception, a possible sexually transmitted infection, a possible pregnancy, a possible child, a possible abortion. In a short time, a girl may thus not only be sexualised, but medicalised and in the hands of multiple ‘experts.’
The following scenario illustrates my concerns.
Emma, an Australian girl, aged 14, struggles over her popularity with the boys in her class. She thinks she’s too fat and her mother doesn’t buy her the right clothes. She has taken to throwing up after eating, but is pleased when her emulating of Dolly’s beauty advice gets her a boyfriend. She is keen on having the three Gardasil injections so she won’t get cervical cancer from sex—that’s what she has been told this vaccine does.
Getting Real Page 13
