Gender roles & Power struggles

Posted by: sj7g09 on: November 30, 2009

• In: Artists | inside/outside & self-directed | Media Analysis | Reflective Practice
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I’m really unsure of how relevant any of these ideas are to what I’m doing, particularly as I’m finding it so hard to come up with anything visual based on these ideas, but I want to document all of my thought processes and links between thoughts.

So, from looking at the 1995 Vogue featuring the photos of Helmut Newton, I looked more at Newton’s work, and this solidified the link between fashion and pornography for me.

images by Helmut Newton

These views are entirely subjective, but I want to express some ideas in regard to these images, even though I’m sure other people will have conflicting views. For example, I think that maybe the top image is seen as more dominating and aggressive than the bottom image, because our schemas say that male/female aggression is detrimental to the woman, even if it isn’t real, because the woman is so much weaker than the man, both physically and emotionally. Contrasting with this, I think maybe the bottom image is seen as less violent because both of the models are women, and so there’s more inherent equality – they may be playing roles of dominant/submissive, but these roles are acting, not reality as with male/female relationships. I think that maybe the image would be seen differently if it was pornography aimed at male viewers, because then the women acting in this way is seen as both of them being submissive to the male viewer – that they’re doing it for the male voyeur. This is something I’ve considered in pornography, as lesbian pornography aimed at men seems to have this effect seeing as the dominant partner may as well be a man – they act like a stereotypical male pornstar, it’s just better for aesthetics for them to be female. I find it interesting that the fear of pornography is based around male viewers harming women, but this ignores any gay or lesbian pornography, which I think bases legislation on gender roles and stereotyping. Gay men won’t be victims of violence because they’re men, they can protect themselves. Lesbian women watching violent pornography (if this ever happens – they are women, afterall) won’t commit a crime because they’re women, and therefore not violent. Maybe there really is the view that it’s only straight men that watch violent pornography.

Another highly subjective account now (which again contains sordid little details about my kinks, so if you enjoy seeing me as asexual, stop reading), but I feel it links to this, and maybe it’ll be useful for me to work out my feelings on gender roles and such like – or maybe it’ll be totally conflicting, we’ll see once it’s written. So, in the past, I’ve engaged in roleplay of my partner dressing up like a woman, and ‘acting like a woman’. I put that in those quotes that convey irony or sarcasm, because roleplay like this can only work on stereotyping – there’s no particular way a woman acts, obviously. Thinking about it, it’s a bit strange really because I don’t tend to define people by their gender, so I don’t see how anyone acts as them acting as though they’re male or female, which is maybe why I need highlighted, accentuated, stereotyped acting to get this across. But anyway, to me, it conveyed a lot more equality – it was a totally different experience that shifted roles of dominance or submission, as I was able to be sincerely dominant without that role being given to me through the permission of my partner. Personally, I dont feel it’s possible to have an equal relationship in heterosexuality – that’s not to say that people aren’t equal in everyday life, but in sexual fantasy I dont think it tends to work like this. Maybe because both me and my partner are rather domineering individuals these power struggles are very pronounced, and so I find it interesting to look at unequal relationships and the switches in roles. I like the idea of looking at fantasised violence through power-games, dominance, submission, and fights between partners to take on these roles. Some times I wonder if I could give a view onto these times in my relationship, whether they would be interpreted as offensive, or indeed genuinely ‘violent’, because I suppose they are genuine, they are real, but at the same time they’re fantasy. It does implement violence, but it’s all in the realms of what’s acceptable for us, and it’s casual, friendly – like in vying for dominance there is often hitting, scratching, shouting, until one of us submits and agrees to take on the other role… We were discussing the other day, whether I’d be shocked or offended if he called me a ‘bitch’ or ‘cunt’, and it wasn’t set up as something within the boundaries of what we do. I realise my relationship may sound rather strange now – who would be seen as the violent partner, who would be the victim, could it ever be balanced in the middle? Using the example of calling me a ‘bitch’ or ‘cunt’, I think that that’s something many people see as unacceptable – I know if my parents knew this, they’d be horrified. I think the very idea of it paints my partner as some sort of abuser because people can’t understand a context in which this is ok – there’s the general view that if I see it as ok, then it’s that I’m wrong and need to have more respect for myself or something. Feminism at it’s best – you can have an opinion, but it must be one that empowers you in a conventional way.