Sexism In The Modern World

Misogyny is definitely not a new problem in society. It has been around for millennia. In today's day and age women are able to get jobs, occupy positions of power and be independent but however, the increasing cases of mistreatment and violence against women make this a cause for alarm. Sexism is still a problem in the modern world, although women have spoken up about sexism being an issue with movements in the 1960’s and 70’s, women today are still facing unequal pay, objectification and sexual harassment.


An example of sexism in the modern world is that most women are being paid substantially less than men. Congress passed the equal pay act in 1963. However major gender pay disparities still exist more than 50 years after that act was passed. Although there are great variations among individual salaries, on average women are being paid just 79 cents to every dollar a man makes. This makes things like paying off student debt harder for most women. Men and women both pay the same amount of money for tuition, automobiles, houses, and yet women are being paid substantially less than men, this makes it more difficult for women to gain financial independence. Some politicians argue that equal pay acts already made it illegal to discriminate on gender, and that any further legislation is unnecessary. Others also argue that women are taking lower paying jobs than men so this statistic is misleading.


Another reason that sexism is still a problem is that women are being objectified. An actress dressed in a black crewneck and jeans videoed herself walking around New York City for ten hours. “Over one hundred instances of verbal street harassment took place within ten hours, involving people of all backgrounds. This doesn’t include the countless winks, whistles, etc.” After the video was uploaded the actress received numerous rape threats online.


The Huffington post interviewed New Yorkers about their experiences with verbal street harassment and being harassed. Some men in the video tried to justify their verbal assault, saying “If you have a beautiful body, why can’t I say something?” The women in the video explained how uncomfortable and how unsafe being verbally assaulted makes them feel. One woman commented “I think there should be a more respectful way to approach women”. While they were interviewing a young women about being verbally harassed on the streets, an older man came up and grabbed her shoulder, the women responding “Sorry sir” and trying to get loose from his grip. Only after one of the interviewers went up to the old man, he let go of her.


Verbal harassment on the streets is an under researched topic but it’s clear from the few studies that exist that it is a significant and prevalent problem. In 2014, SSH had commissioned a 2,000 person survey in America. The survey found that over 99 percent of the female respondents said that they had experienced some form of verbal street assault and or harassment - only three women out of the 916 respondents said they had not.


Many women are being taken advantage of and are raped. The death of the gang rape victim in Delhi on December 2012 had sparked a collective outrage against sexual violence in india, with month long protests wide spread around the region. Even after all the protests and laws against sexual harassment women and girls are still at risk. A new campus sexual assault survey from the Association of American Universities finds that one in four female undergraduates in a new survey of 150,000 students at 27 colleges reported being a victim of sexual assault or misconduct.


Does a women deserve to get raped because of the way she dresses? Photos of scantily dressed women on Facebook were accompanied with accusatory comments. One of the many were: “She’s asking to get raped… don’t blame the rapists” and “Most of the time, the victims asked for it”. This shows that the people leaving these comments have the mentality that rape is acceptable, as long as the victim was “asking for it”, it reinforces the notion that it is not the rapist's fault for raping girls but it’s the victim's fault. In parts of the world victims of rape are being blamed and punished. The fact that not only some people, but some countries have this ignorant mindset is unbelievable. A victim of rape is not responsible for the rapists actions, and should not be held accountable.

Flowers for Katniss

People want to be loved, people want to be looked after. At the bare minimum we all deserve to be treated as equals. “Flowers for algernon” by Daniel Keyes is a book about Charlie Gordon, a mentally retarded 32 year old man, is chosen by a team of scientists to undergo an experimental surgery designed to boost his intelligence. Algernon, rat with a high IQ that scientists had done surgery to improve his intelligence, starts to deteriorate. Charlie remembers his past and comes to the realization that life is now what he thought it was like, and that not everyone will accept him. The entire narrative of Flowers for Algernon is composed of the “progress reports” that Charlie writes.

Suzanne Collins future dystopian story ‘The Hunger Games’ takes place in Panem (North America). In Panem there are 12 districts, each providing resources for the capitol and the people of Panem. The actual hunger games takes place in an arena inside the capitol. Primrose Everdeen, a 12 year old girl from district 12, gets chosen for the 74th Hunger games. Katniss Everdeen (Prim’s sister) volunteers herself to take Prim's place in the hunger games and now has to fight for her life in the arena with 23 other tributes. In “Flowers for Algernon” and “The Hunger Games” we see two characters being controlled and manipulated, they are being treated as animals, something less than. Collins and Keyes show how Carlie’s and Katniss’s identity’s change and what makes them realize that they are not being treated fairly.

At the very start of “Flowers for Algernon” Charlie Gordon is being treated as if he was below the scientists “If only Nemour would look at me as a human being” Charlie is never treated as a human being, he is always being treated like an animal, no matter how much intelligence he gains or how much he tries to change himself he is never accepted. He feels trapped, in a way the scientists take away his happiness, his innocence. A more extreme version of this would be in “The Hunger Games” “after the war, the capitol destroyed all the [tracker jacker] nests surrounding the city, but the ones near the districts were left untouched. Another reason to keep inside the fence of district 12” The capitol is keeping the people who live in the districts behind fences and bars, almost like a cage. They are unable to escape their never ending starvation and sadness. The title the hunger games could possibly show how desperate the people of panem are. Putting their children's names in a ballot. If the child gets picked he or she will have to fight to the death in an arena with gamemakers moving the children around like chess pieces, all in exchange just for food.

Before “I was determined to feed us. I stole eggs from nests, caught fish in nets, sometimes manages to shoot a squirrel or rabbit for stew and gathered various plants that sprung up beneath my feet. I kept us alive.” Before katniss volunteered to take part in the hunger games her whole life revolved around her family and keeping them alive, so far in her life that was all she knows and the way she saw herself.

In Progress Report 7, Charlie thinks about what life will be like when he's smart, and he says he'll never be lonely again. Before charlie had an average IQ he thought that he had a lot of friends, although his relationship with his family was rough he got by on a day to day basis and was generally happy. He saw himself as happy, he had goals but was willing to work towards them. After he became smart, so smart that his knowledge bypassed the scientists charlie realizes that he was being treated unfairly, who he thought were his friends never actually liked him, instead they made fun of him. Now that he realizes this he becomes sad, depressed no longer innocent (no longer innocent meaning that he has come to the realization that life is hard and is not easy, that being happy takes work) 

Charlie gordon starts to surrender and accept that he feels inferior to the scientists and lets them keep him from being happy “The lines and boxes are too straight and I thought you’d join me in erasing them” Charlie is letting the scientists put him down and he is trying to cope with not being happy. Only later in the book charlie “wanted to get up and show everyone what a fool he was, to shout at him: I'm a human being, a person — with parents and memories and a history — and I was before you ever wheeled me into that operating room!” It’s only later when charlie finally understands that he is more than what others think of him, he is more than an experiment.

In “The Hunger Games” Katniss starts to rebel back against the capitol “I want to do something, right here, right now, to show them, to make them accountable, to show the capitol that whatever they do or force us to do that there is a part of every tribute that they can’t own. “ Katniss is fighting back against the capitol and the game makers. She is showing the people of panem that she is more than “a piece in their games”.

Collins and Keyes have shown through their work that everyone isn’t just what others think of them, everyone is unique and should embrace that. No one should have to change themselves for anyone else. Whether it’s to show the capitol why you should win the Hunger Games, whether it’s to impress some scientists so they can use you as an experiment or if if its for some new people you want to make a good impression on. Everyone should embrace who they are, if the people do not like who you are, they just are unable to see how special you are.

Unrealistic Beauty Standards In The Media

Unrealistic beauty standards have resulted in a number of young girls and women to develop eating disorders, mental and physical health problems.

With almost all magazines and media photoshopping their models to have thigh gaps and fixing all their ‘flaws’ These outrageous beauty standards in the media affect almost all children, especially young girls and teens. Showing them that this is what society expects them to look like and if they have ‘flaws’ or don’t fit into a certain weight category it will effect them in a negative way. With a lot of dangerous diets and ‘cleanses claiming that this will make you look 100 times better, ’ there is a result in a number of young girls and women developing some mental and physical health problems. Within the last couple of years society has supported the idea that the ‘thigh gap’ since then there have been a number of dangerous diets to try to achieve the thigh gap.

“I wish that I had a thigh gap” “Have you seen this model's flat stomach? I wish I had a flat stomach” “I hate my body” A young girl, who will remain nameless (age 9) Her mother responded “I think that it's heart breaking that young girls and women hate their own bodies because the media has brainwashed them into thinking that they need to look a certain way”

Unrealistic Beauty Standards In The Media

What shapes our perception of beauty? When we answer that question we tend to think about models with unattainable standards of perfection. Why is that?

Earlier this month 19 year old australian model Essena O’Neill had released a video called “Why I REALLY Quit Social Media” In the video she talks about how all the photos in her instagram are not ‘candid’ and how it was not real life. She goes on to talk about how she had an unhealthy obsession with looking perfect and ‘beautiful’ when the beauty standards in the media are so unrealistic. “I was measuring my self worth by the number of likes and followers I had, I was measuring my own self worth on someone else's opinion” She said in the video.

Young adults and the media are obsessed with looking a certain way or being a certain weight to be considered beautiful or pretty. This is unhealthy and pressures people, especially young girls to look like all the unrealistic beauty standards. The media tells us that this is what an average girl should look like.

This impacts a lot of young girls self esteem and feeling of self worth. Lexie Cohen, only 9 years old would ask on a daily basis “What’s wrong with me? Am I too fat? Am I too skinny? She is easily influenced and not very confident. It’s heart breaking because she is only 9 years old and she is already obsessed with what others think of her. When we were 9 years old we would go play outside all day and hang out with our friends, we were not always behind a screen looking at models and movie stars that have ‘perfect bodies’ and think to ourselves ‘why don’t I look like that?”

Every day we see ads and models on magazines that have been photoshopped or had gone through hours of hair and makeup to look the way they look. Kids are being affected by social media at very young ages. Society makes you think that you must look like models to be confident and love yourself.

“Unrealistic beauty standards are getting out of control, they are pressuring girls everywhere to be a certain weight or to fit a certain size.” says Kimaya Shahi grade 8 student at UWC east, she continues to say “This is unhealthy because some girls are going on dangerous diets or starve themselves to be ‘pretty’” Over the past couple years, a new beauty trend has been to have a thigh gap. Media has claimed that if you have a thigh gap you are healthy and fit, but this is not actually the case.

There have been a lot of extremely dangerous diets circulating that claim that these diets will help you lose a lot of weight in a short period of time. A lot of people that have tried these diets have been hospitalized because they were starving themselves and/or over exercised, Just two examples of these diets are ‘Purging’ and the ‘K-E diet’.

Purging includes making yourself vomit, chewing food and spitting it out, and abusing laxatives. “These unhealthy and unsafe behaviors are not uncommon on college campuses, pose serious health problems, and are the first step in the development of eating disorders,” says Connie Diekman, RD, the director of nutrition at Washington University in St. Louis, where she also counsels students who have eating disorders. Regular vomiting or abuse of laxatives also causes fluid loss that can cause serious dehydration.

One of the more physically repulsive diets that has become popular recently is the ‘K-E diet’. This diet involves sticking a tube up your nose and ingesting your food through the tube. The fluid drip that must be left for 10 days to work and has protein, fat and water. It constantly drips through the nose. These are a lot of dangers with this outrageous diet, having no physical energy, kidney troubles and sometimes kidney failure, in serious cases this diet has caused death. But anything to lose a few pounds, right?

Sadly there are a lot of people that do go on these stupidly dangerous diets just to shed pounds. Is losing weight that important to risk your life?

A shocking example the unrealistic standards of beauty is Abercrombie and fitch CEO Michael Jeffries, he had said that he only wants ‘cool and popular kids’ to shop at his stores, which is why he refused to stock anything above an AU size 14. Imagine being a young kid going into a store and not being able to buy anything because you are ‘too big’. That would hurt your self esteem and make you feel like you have to be a certain weight or size to be able to fit in or love yourself and how you look?

“There are always going to be people that judge you and everyone will have to deal with it in life all the time so there is no point in obsessing about what others think of you, you will be a lot happier if you learn to love yourself and be happy with who you are.” says 13 year old Jee Jee, a grade 8 student at UWC

The media is emphasizing that to be happy you need others approval, because that's all that matters, not your happiness, not your personality, but the number that tells you if you are worth it or not.