Gender and the 'Male Gaze'

The theory of the 'Male Gaze'

Every musical genre has a concomitant ideology.

The theorist Laura Mulvey argued that most media reflect 'Male Gaze'. The camera acts as a 'male eye' where women are looked at and men are the 'lookers' therefore making the assumption that women are 'objectified'.

In 1975 Mulvey wrote an assignment which she named 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema'. In this essay she claimed that a patriarchal society is reflected in films and the camera acts as a 'male eye' where everything is viewed from a male perspective, which effectively means that women were identified in a rather externalised way. Mulvey referred to this as 'Woman as image, men as the bearer of the look'. Mulvey thoroughly communicated her argument by use of dynamic language such as 'a world ordered by sexual imbalance' and 'she holds the look, plays to an signifies male desire'. While this was increasingly factual at the time is was published, when Hollywood advocates were largely male, the conception of men as watchers and women as the objects being watched unfortunately still applies today, regardless of the fact that there are more female protagonists in films today.

Issues with the 'Male Gaze' 

• Dehumanising women, viewing them as things rather than human beings 
• Impact on society forever more. Not only to men view women as objects but women change their own perception of themselves, impacting society even as the years go on.
• Element of sexual inequality, making one gender seem more powerful/authoritative than the other
• Pressure on female society, to look a certain way - could be the root cause of illnesses such as anorexia etc. 

The ideology of this magazine featuring 'Beyonce' is satisfying the demands of the male population by being viewed from a men's gaze. This is a typical example of  one of the many 'male gaze' magazine front covers clearly portraying the aspects of the female body that are most 'looked' at and these types of magazines attract the largest groups of people.The GQ magazine is a prominent example of a magazine industry that promotes male gaze in order to please its audience and sustain their attention.

All of the women on the various magazine covers above have been amplified in order to look more attractive to men and therefore have been adopted by the concept of 'Male Gaze'. It is not surprising that 'Rolling Stones' magazine has used Jennifer Aniston in an objectified manner, because of the 'rebellious' and 'sexual' reputation that the magazine withholds and sustains throughout its many copies. In fact, the continuing success of the magazine itself may be a consequence of the 'Male Gaze' concept. However it is also interesting to see other magazines that do not have a 'dirty' status or association with illegal substances use the male gaze concept too. For example, Vibe magazine is known for its great Hip-hop reputation and source of pleasure for dedicated urban followers of Hip-hop. Although some may argue that Hip-hop has a similar reputation to the 'Rock' genre, it is intriguing  to see other musical genres chose 'Male Gaze' as a selling point. 

Although 'Male Gaze' is a brilliant way for magazines to be successful financially, I do not think that idealising women is good for society and I will not promote the concept of 'Male Gaze; in my work. This false perception of women could be dangerous socially as girls from younger generations may be heavily influenced and strive to look like the woman on the magazine, when in reality the woman on the magazine doesn't even look like the woman on the magazine. When I make my magazine front cover I will ensure that the cover does not objectify or dehumanise anyone, for the benefit of influence on society.