The Male Gaze Today

The male gaze in art/pop culture, is the male point of view of what many men gaze at when a woman is involved. It is the way in which male think without even noticing that they are thinking in such a manner. A manner that isn’t taught but yet learned as young adults grow up, learning such customs from older friends, family, and society. The male gaze has become an issue that all commercial, movie, shows, or bill board, take advantage of. Being that the beautiful features of any woman attract most men, men will give their undivided attention to art and the pop culture whenever they use woman to do so. Men, from their childhood are raised to be strong, masculine, impassive, and hard working. But the male gaze is one of the many weaknesses that unfortunately take over the male gender. However, the male gaze isn't specifically about the male gender, it can also refer to women seeing and judging another female because of the difference between the two, and the jealousy, which bothers her the most.

This is a picture of a famous actress, Megan Fox. She is known for her attractive body and looks. This specific picture is from the movie Transformers, where she is trying to figure out what is wrong with the car, but the movie producers portray this scene as attractive as they can with the lack of clothing and the way she bending over.

As Bell Hooks stated, “They were taught God was male. These teachings were reinforced in every institution they encountered- schools, courthouses, clubs, sports arenas, as well as churches. Embracing patriarchal thinking, like everyone else around them, they taught it to their children because it seemed like a “natural” way to organize life”(Hooks 18). Hooks makes a valid point here, men all around the world have been taught from day one that they will be raised to do the important things while woman stand behind them cook, feed, clean, and pleasure them. They are raised to stand behind them and do as they ask, how they ask. She uses how churches use God as one of the main reason, that he is a male, so male are the more dominant gender, which isn’t very accurate. However, using God as the male example, the world has realized that world is too far past gone to change how women are portrayed through today’s art and culture.

This is a commercial poster of a Calvin Klein cologne. This ad does a wonderful job of making a fragrance a need, as opposed to a want, a tool rather than an accessory.   

Women approving of doing this shows that a great percentage of the worlds women, have set their piece with it to be a part of the society. I have noticed in many movies after speaking and learning of the male gaze, how the world uses ideology over so many things through the attractions of women. Hooks states, “The recollection of this brutal whipping of a little-girl daughter by the strong man, served as more than just a reminder to me of my gendered place, it was a reminder to everyone watching/remembering, to all my siblings, male and female, and to our own grown-woman mother that our patriarchal father was the ruler in our household. We were to remember that if we did not obey his rules, we would be punished even unto death. This is the way we were experientially schooled in the art of patriarchy” (Hooks 21). This quote has so much true meaning behind it, mainly where she talks about how the family has to follow the rules of the strong man to live under his roof and if you don’t, he can punish you. The male gaze has just not caused men to look at women differently, but to also treat them different because of the lack of power women show. Men assume, without them, women are nothing, where we know how strong women really are than men, if not physically, than intelligence for sure.

This is a life Savers from two different time periods but by the same person. Both by Mel Ramos, the one on the left was "Life Savers" from 1965 and the one on the right was "Lifesaver Lil" from 2009.

Coming from a Middle Eastern family, our point of view of men in society are marginally different. Woman still to this day are strictly raised to cook, clean and serve for their men in every way possible. The only women to be sent to school are the families that have a little more money and whom can afford sending their children to school. But yet there aren’t many grad schools for woman, because these Middle Easter counties don’t believe in women being educated. The male gaze isn’t only male looking at the female due to attraction but also, the male gender treating them unequally. Judging their ability to make any difference in the world. The male gaze has been proving to take great affect on the women gender and as of now all we can do to fix it, is little by little show that the woman gender is a lot smarter and intelligent than the male gender can imagine.

For more information:
 On the term male gaze and how/where used, you can visit the website below.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MaleGaze


Male Gaze Video Links:
This Link is a video of the scene from transformer portraying the male gaze in it. You will see what the camera focuses on second my second, which is different parts of Megan's body.
Another example of the male gaze can be seen through pressing on the link on your left which views what attracts males and kind of an over exaggeration but it will get the point across. 

Work Cited:

Berger, J. (1973). Ways of Seeing (pp. 45-64). London: British Broadcasting Corporation.

Hooks, B. (2004). Understanding Patriarchy. In The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love (pp.17-33). New York: Atria Books.