Women from all walks of life in the Southern African region took to the streets three weeks ago bearing signs that protested against the total onslaught launched against them by the men in their respective countries.
Not only did the women proclaim that their bodies were theirs and nobody else’s, they owned them by bearing the slogan ‘my body not your crime scene’ on their physical bodies.
This brought discomfort to many and almost all media houses who covered the Total Shutdown march covered the women’s bodies up in their reporting. This begs the question of how women are represented in the media and how this further perpetuates rape and entitlement culture.
Covering the women’s bodies reinforced the notion that women do not control their bodies and perpetuated the culture of men’s entitlement to women’s bodies as men see themselves as the authority figures on when women should and should not be naked.
The women who chose to bear the slogan on their physical bodies did that to assert their agency and, most likely to take it back after they were sexually assaulted.
They were however met by a media who supposedly reinforced the stereotype that their bodies were in fact not theirs and that they needed to be covered up even if they were attempting to send a strong message.
The Gender and Media Progress Study (GMPS) conducted in 2015 in 14 Southern African countries found that there are more images of women in newspapers at 27% than women as news sources at 20%.
This is very telling of how women are represented in the media as this statistic suggests women are better to look at than to listen to. This reinforces age-old stereotypes that allow for women to be treated as inferior beings to their male counterparts.
The GMPS also found that women’s voices often came through in soft news (entertainment, climate change etc.) and social issues while male voices are heard more in the hard news such as politics and economics.
The media represents women as less authoritative sources on issues that are likely to affect the way in which people’s daily lives function, this reinforces the stereotype that men are more powerful and superior to women.
It furthermore found that television has more women as sources than print publications, this is likely due to the fact that women have more visual appeal which is not as important for print publications.
This goes back to women’s voices being suppressed because they are still regarded as lesser humans who are solely on this earth for visual appeal and reproduction.
Headlines in South Africa involving women who have partners or husbands usually represent them as their partners’ wives before noting their profession or the significance of the news involving them.
This suggests that, before they are an individual they are somebody’s wife or partner and that their achievement or news is secondary to this fact. One of the purposes of media in South Africa is to challenge stereotypes, this is, however, one thing the media is allegedly failing at.
They need to include more women’s voices in the stories published or broadcast and in a non-superficial way that doesn’t place women’s opinions on the back burner while using them for visual appeal.
More work needs to be done in ensuring that the media plays an active and leading role in dismantling rape culture and asserting women’s role in our society.
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