Gender Inequality Is A Thing Of The Past Essay

The issue of female representation in Hollywood is one of the biggest issues in the film industry. Sexism, discrimination, and a lack of jobs for female filmmakers has been a problem in Hollywood since its early days, and recently this problem has been analyzed using many different genres. The Women of Hollywood Speak Out is an editorial written by Maureen Dowd of the New York Times. It is about difficulty for female filmmakers to break out and direct big budget films for Hollywood. Celluloid Ceilings: Women Directors Speak Out is a video created by Bloomberg about the issues with sexism and discrimination that female filmmakers have faced. These two pieces will be compared to discover how this topic can be discussed using different genres

Women are deemed as a “minority” yet make up 51% of the world population and in 2014 made up only 12% of protagonists in films. And that is just on-screen, the percentage decreases as you go farther and farther into behind-the-scenes positions such as directors, cinematographers, and writers. Add race and ethnicity and those characters' percentages decline even more (Lauzen, 2015.) Women in film and television are often portrayed with emphasis based on their body type and in advertisement are largely objectified. The large objectification and misrepresentation of women in the media has led to an offset psychological view of women from growing up to adulthood.

Horror movies throughout history have been known to have their cheesy storylines or continuous bad acting. Especially horror movies. People nowadays could easily spot the flaws in a film and judge them drastically in reviews. Yet, little do people notice the ongoing discrimination between genders. Horror films tend to portray males and females substantially differently because of stereotypical views. There seems to be a pattern in which each gender takes a certain role in a movie continuously. Females are shown to be “objects” such as sex and emotional symbols, while males are shown as strong or powerful and moreover as the main bad guy. Although some of the newer edition films of the horror genre are displaying each gender more and more equal throughout the ongoing years, the gender discrimination dilemma still exists and can be seen by the statistics in the movie industry in general.

In 1985 the Bechdel test was created by Alison Bechdel to test if a fictional piece had a significant amount of female involvement (Bechdel). The test is as followed: two women, who are given names, must converse with each other about anything excluding a man. Surprisingly many movies throughout the history of film fail the Bechdel test. Currently in Hollywood the test highlights a problematic situation, the lack of equality regarding male and female roles in film and females constantly being portrayed as secondary characters. Many scholars have taken this into account, analyzing this issue and discussing potential reasoning for this

The Bechdel test determines whether or not a television program or movie uses the presence of women appropriately and it serves as a helpful reminder to viewers that maybe the programs they’re watching don’t influence them in the appropriate way. Moreover, the exposure to these sources of entertainment that don’t pass the Bechdel test prove to be discriminatory towards women and to other minority groups. As represented by Anita Sarkeesian in the YouTube video “The Bechdel Test for Women in Movies”, many well-known films have not met all the criterias of the test and could therefore not be considered as a pass. To follow on the experiment that Anita Sarkeesian has done with films, I have tried the test with some television shows that I watch

Another interesting finding showed that female speaking characters are slightly more likely to appear in General audiences (G) rated films of about 31.6% than in Parental guidance (PG-13) rated films which is of about 26.5%. The percentage of girls and women in Parental guidance (PG-13) rated films (28.9%) does not deviate from the other ratings by 5%, criterion for documenting a meaningful difference. Thus, as the ratings increases for PG-13, the girls move out (Smith, Choueiti, & Pieper , Gender Roles & Occupations: A Look at Character Attributes and Job-Related Aspirations in Film and Television, 2012, p. 2).

Freedom and equality are ideas this country has had for centuries that have evolved over time. In 1776, what Thomas Jefferson meant by “all men are created equal”, is that white males are dominant in society. Women are treated worse than men and slaves treated worse than women. People that weren’t of the “superior” race/gender of a white male were typically treated as if they were less. Women and African-Americans aren’t being treated as bad today, but they’re still being treated worse than the white males of society. Even today, when white males are typically the leaders of society, it’s not always race and gender that creates inequality; sometimes it’s money that creates the issue. Not just from past evidence, but from present

The film industry has created the conventional gender roles of society into their movies. A majority of films have supported some of the male and female stereotypes. In the history of the film industry, the role of men is primarily that of the stereotypical working class man or hero, while the roles of women are primarily portrayed as being somewhat inferior to men. In the 1930s through the 1970s, men held the leading roles in films while women played smaller roles. In terms of jobs, women were given mostly family roles and rarely were shown outside of their homes, while men had successful careers and did many activities outside of home. “Women were shown doing housework and men were the beneficiaries of their work” (“Women’s roles in the

Film scholar Louis Gianetti says, “In the field of cinema, the achievement of the Women’s Movement [of the 1960’s] has been considerable, though most present-day feminists would insist that there is still much to be accomplished in the battle against patriarchal values” (428). Gianetti’s words are an understatement. Women in Hollywood are underrated, underrepresented, and generally shoved into the background of the film industry. However, with film becoming one of the most pervasive and influential art forms of the 21st century, women’s leadership in the film industry is vital not only to the feminist movement, but to the perception of the modern female overall.

Filmmakers use traditional gender stereotypes to produce characters audiences can easily identify with by portraying conventional images of a person with identifiable characteristics. In previous years, the dominant representation of a women in film has been the passive, subjugated protagonist. However, through the development of female empowerment and added feminist representations of film, the female heroine transformed to become strong and independent women in her own right, as an individual character.

In the 21st century, many people believe that we have overcome the obstacle of gender inequality and evolved into a society of fairness and righteousness. As many know, females can be just as proficient and qualified as males at any task. Though some efforts to off-set this gender imbalance is in place, it is still commonly acknowledged that many careers are stated to be a male job such as lawyers, and female jobs such as secretaries. Gender inequality is a visible fact in our society and in this essay, I hypothesize that gender inequality still exists as a result of factors such as post-secondary education differences of the two genders, role of females in families, female objectification, career choice differences of the two genders, and

The concept of gender denotes the distinction between culturally driven and created roles of masculinity and femininity. These specific and normalized attitudes and behaviors transcend and effect how differently men and women live their lives. Based on society’s continual re-enforcement of such gender stereotypes, we see an on-going dilemma of gender inequality. Though some may argue that men experience gender inequality, this seems to exist on a much more invasive level for women. As of recently, the awareness of gender inequality in the workplace has increased. With the fight for equal pay and equal respect, society is already making strides towards the equality of women. With that being said, one aspect of gender inequality that seems

It is only recently that sociology has begun to explore the topic of gender. Before this, inequalities within society were based primarily on factors such as social class and status. This paper will discuss gender itself: what makes us who we are and how we are represented. It will also explore discrimination towards women throughout history, focusing mainly on women and the right to vote, inequalities between males and females in the work place and how gender is represented in the media.

for different social classes or statuses for various individuals within a group or society. It usually refers to people of distinct genders, ages

The simplest way to increase gender equality is by creating more roles for women. According to 2007-2012 film statistics reviewed by the New York Film Academy, the “average ratio of male actors to female actors is 2.25:1.” With less females onscreen than males, men continue to be the majority in movies. It is important to portray realistic representations of everyday life in where “women comprise 50 percent of the population” (Green, Women In Film Los Angeles). It is also important for women and young girls to have a variety of role models to look up to. With more women in movies, young girls will begin to understand that being a woman does not limit what they can do. Organizations such as Women in Film were created to help by “promoting equal opportunities for women, encouraging creative projects by women, and expanding and enhancing portrayals of women in all forms of global