Miss Representation (2011) - full transcript

The most common way people give up
their power is by thinking

they don't have any.
-Alice Walker

American teenagers spend

31 hours a week watching a TV

17 hours a week listening to music

3 hours a week watching movies

4 hours a week reading magazines

10 hours a week online

That's 10 hours and 45 minutes
of media consumption a day

- [Pat Mitchell] The media is the
message and the messenger.

And increasingly a powerful one.



- [Jackson Katz] People learn from media

than any other single
source of information.

So, if you want to understand
what's going on

in our society in the 21st century,
we have to understand media.

- [Jim Steyer] If you think about
media and technology,

they're delivering content that is
shaping our society.

They're shaping our politics.
They're shaping national discourse.

And most of all, they're shaping our

children's brains and lives
and emotions.

- [Marissa Mayer] If you ask me, there's
somewhere more than a billion people

who use the internet
every single day.

That's just a reach that hasn't existed
before, in terms of media.

- [Jim] Our kids today live on
Facebook and cellphones.

The diversity of the platforms means



that those images
are impacting your kid 24/7

and whatever restrictions existed
when we were growing up,

simply don't exist today.

- [Jean Kilbourne] Girls get
the message from very early on

that what's most important
is how they look.

That their value, their worth,
depends on that.

And boys get the message that this
is what's important about girls.

We get it from advertising.
We get it from films.

We get it from television shows,
video games, everywhere we look.

So, no matter what else a woman does,
no matter what else her achievements.

their value still depends
on how they look.

- [Ariella] There is no appreciation
for women intellectuals.

It's all about the body,
not about the brain.

- "You all saw the famous
photo from the weekend

of Hilary looking so haggard,
and what, looking like 92 years old."

- "Breast implants--
did you have them or not?

Because that's all over the internet
about you and mainstream media."

- "I think if you
waterboarded Nancy Pelosi,

she wouldn't admit to plastic surgery."

- [Jennifer Pozner] The fact that media
are so limiting and so derogatory

to the most powerful women
in the country,

then what does it say
about media's ability

to take any woman
in America seriously?

- [Margaret Cho] The media treats
women like shit

and it's horrible and it's like,

I don't know how we survive it.
I don't know how we rise above it.

♪ [Help I'm Alive by Metric] ♪

♪ I tremble (I tremble) ♪

♪ They're gonna eat me alive ♪

♪ If I stumble (If I stumble) ♪

♪ They're gonna eat me alive ♪

♪ Can you hear my heart
beating like a hammer ♪

♪ beating like a hammer ♪

♪ Help I'm alive my heart keeps
beating like a hammer ♪

♪ Hard to be soft,
tough to be tender ♪

♪ Come take my pulse,
the pace is on a runaway train ♪

♪ Help I'm alive my heart keeps
beating like a hammer ♪

♪ beating like a hammer ♪

♪ beating like a hammer ♪

♪ beating like a hammer ♪

♪ Help I'm alive my heart keeps
beating like a hammer ♪

Miss Representation

- [Jennifer Newsom] There are
moments in life

when you begin to see things more clearly.

When I found out I was pregnant
with a girl, everything came into focus.

But I looked around me
and I was really frightened for her.

I couldn't imagine
that my daughter could grow up

to be emotionally healthy and fulfilled,
given our modern culture.

So I'm compelled to make sense
of all of this for her.

And I know I have to start
by looking at my own life.

The mistakes I've made
and the traps I've fallen into.

Because even though
I've had many privileges,

I haven't been immune to the damage
our culture does to women and girls.

When I was a young girl, I felt secure
in my place in the world.

But as with most girls,
things changed as I got older.

A few days before my 7th birthday,

my older sister, Stacy
died in an accident.

I blame myself for her death.
And out of guilt and sadness,

I tried to be two daughters,
instead of one.

I channeled my pain into
excelling in sports and school.

But no matter how hard I tried,
I somehow felt inadequate.

I became increasingly susceptible
to peer pressure.

And the bombardment
of media messages,

telling me that being strong, smart,
and accomplished was not enough.

To be a woman meant constantly striving
for an unattainable ideal of beauty

and approval in the eyes of men.

So when a trusted peer
and later a coach,

preyed upon my vulnerability
and violated me,

I was so frightened and ashamed.

I completely shut down.

My self worth was at an all-time low.
And I developed an eating disorder

that consumed two years of my life.

It took a lot of love and support for me
to find my strength again.

And although my experiences are unique,
my struggle is all too common.

It's always hard being a teenage girl,
but now the media disseminates

such limiting portrayals of women

and pervades every aspect
of our culture.

Is it any wonder teen girls feel
more powerless than ever?

53% of 13 year old girls
are unhappy with their bodies

Their number increases to 78%
by age 17

65% of women and girls
have an eating disorder

17% of teens engage in cutting
and self-injurious behavior

Rates of depression among
girls and women have

doubled between 2000 and 2010

I want a different world for my daughter
and her generation.

But a lot has to change first.

- [Ariella] We see so much in the media
that there's so much negativity

towards women and their way
and how they look.

And it's just a representation
of the pressure we feel

to conform to men's ideals.

There's this concept of the perfect woman
who looks this certain way,

and because women may not look that way,
they're scrutinized.

- [Urenna] I remember at 5th grade,
I was worrying about my weight.

And now I'm in 9th grade,
I'm still worrying about my weight.

- [Angelina] Me being a small person,
like at my old school,

I was talked to like, "Go throw up."
Or like, "Go get a hamburger."

Because people thought
I was like, anorexic or something.

So, I would like, eat a lot.
So that, people would think

I don't have an eating disorder.

- [Alexis] I straighten my hair,
just so I can fit in,

when I have naturally curly hair.

- [Alexis] I have close friends that
in between like, break periods,

they would go to the bathroom
and put on ten pounds of make up,

and you know, comb their hair and
do all this, you know, pampering,

you know and you're at school to learn.

- [Maria] When is it gonna be enough?
'Cause you know, I have a younger sister

She's like...

She hacks herself.

She cuts herself because
she gets teased in school

because she doesn't have
the perfect body

It's hard for me to see that

What can I do so my little sister
won't be getting hurt by the media?

How long is it going to take
for somebody to take a stand?

How long is it going to take
for somebody to take a stand?

- [Jean Kilbourne] The ideal image
of beauty is more extreme

and impossible than ever before.

In the old days, the perfection
was achieved

through cosmetics and airbrushing.

But now, is it possible for that image

to be absolutely perfect
because of computers?

[camera shutters and clicks]

You'd never see the photograph
of a woman considered beautiful

that hasn't been digitally altered

to make her absolutely
and humanly perfect.

Girls are being encouraged
to achieve that ideal

at younger and younger ages all the time.

They end up measuring themselves
against an impossible standard

and feeling themselves wanting
as a result of it.

Also not surprisingly,
young men who are shown

lots of photographs of supermodels,

then judge real women
much more harshly.

- The most important thing to understand
about all of these images

and how they affect us is that the effect
is primarily subconscious

and that it is very harmful,
but that for the most part,

we're not really aware of that

which is why we need to pay
conscious attention to these images.

- [Jim Steyer] The average child
develops over 18 to 24 years.

And full brain development
doesn't really occur

until you're into your early twenties.

So, the idea that kids at eight or ten
or fifteen have the same level

of intellectual and emotional maturity
as an adult, is nuts.

They have different
interpretative abilities.

They have different
emotional abilities.

And they're a much more
vulnerable class in society.

- [Katie Couric] I worry about, you know,
how much pressure my daughters feel

in a society that features

anorexic actresses and models
and television stars.

We get conditioned to think this
is what women should look like.

So, even people of average weight and size
have body dysmoprhic disorder.

- [Margaret Cho] When I did my first
television show All American Girl,

which was the first Asian-American
family show on television,

I had a lot of problems
with the network

because they were constantly
telling me that I was too fat.

You know, I became
very anorexic trying to

somehow keep this job
that I really wanted to keep.

And you know, they ended up
canceling the television show.

And they replaced it with Drew Carey
'cause he's so thin.

♪ [The Drew Carey Show
theme music] ♪

- [M. Gigi Durham] An aspect of
media literacy education,

that I think many people
aren't aware of,

is the whole political economy
of the media.

Most media get their revenues
from advertising, you know.

so, the non advertising content
of these media

has to support the advertising.

- [Maria] Everybody needs to learn
what the media is really about.

It's really about how they want you
to be something that you're not.

- [Jean Kilbourne] A lot of advertising
is based on making people

feel anxious and feeling insecure.

For men, there's a lot of anxiety
around status and power

and wanting to look
as if you have power.

At least drive a powerful car for women
that you're never beautiful enough.

- [M. Gigi Durham] Which is why you
keep seeing these same body types

over and over and over again,
because those are the body types

that generate the purchase
of all these beauty products

and thus are a futiled pursuit
of this idealized body.

It's a hugely profitable pursuit
for these media industries

and for all of the advertisers.

Advertisers spent
$235.6 billion in 2009

80% of the countries in the world
have GDPs less than that

American women end up spending
much more money on beauty

in the pursuit of these ideals
and these myths than on

their own education, which in fact,
would benefit them more in the long run.

And so under this rather
equipped empowerment,

it's completely disempowering women.

US women spend $12,000
to $15,000 a year

on beauty products and salon services

The number of cosmetic surgical
procedures performed on youth

under age 19 more than tripled
from 1997 to 2007

The average adult facelift
costs $11,429

That's enough money to pay for:
5 years at a community college

2 years at a state university
1 year at the University of California

- [Jean Kilbourne] Not only are girls
seen as objects by other people,

they learn to see themselves as objects.

- [Caroline Heldman]
The American Psychological Association

has found in recent years
that self-objectification

has become a national epidemic.
A national problem.

- The more women and girls
self-objectify,

the more likely they are to be
depressed, to have eating disorders.

They have lower confidence.
They have lower ambition.

They have lower
cognitive functioning.

They have lower GPAs.

How does this connect
to women and leadership?

Women who are high self-objectifiers
have lower political efficacy.

Political efficacy is the idea that
your voice matters in politics

and that you can bring about
change in politics.

So, if we have a whole generation
of young people being raised

where women's objectification is just part
for the course, it's normal, it's okay,

we have a whole generation of women
who are less likely to run for office

and less likely to vote.

- [Jennifer] This is dangerous business.

If the media sending girls the message
that their value lies in their bodies,

this can only leave them
feeling disempowered

and distract them
from making a difference

and becoming leaders.

Women make up
51% of the U.S. population

Yet comprise only
17% of Congress

The 2010 mid-term election
is the first time

women have not made
gains in Congress since 1979

At this rate, women may not
achieve parity for 500 years

Only 34 women have
ever served as governors

compared to 2319 men

- [Pat Mitchell] Here we are. This
massively powerful democratic society

and we are not modeling for
the rest of the world a better balance.

67 countries in the world have had
female presidents or prime ministers

The U.S. is not one of them

The U.S. is 88th in the world in terms
of women in national legislatures

- [Gavin Newsom] If people knew
that Cuba, China, Iraq

and Afghanistan have more
women in government

than the United States of America,

then we'd get some people upset.

- [Gloria Steinem] No wonder we are
in such trouble in this country,

we've been choosing our national
leadership from 6% of the country.

- [Jennifer Lawless] Without more women
in politics, we just don't really have

democratic legitimacies.

Something looks fundamentally wrong
with our political institutions.

- [Cory Booker] We're shortchanging
voices that are urgently needed

in public forums from
ever getting to the table.

- [Condoleezza Rice] Washington is still
pretty male. And it was not unusual

to go into a room and be the
only woman in the room.

Sometimes it mattered when there was
an attempt to change Title IX

and some pressure
from Capitol Hill about that.

I can remember Karen Hughson
going to the President saying,

"You can't do that. Because you
don't know what it was like

to be a woman in college
prior to Title IX

when you had to have a bake sale
to get your sports team to take a trip."

- [Dolores Huerta] If you have any kind
of decision-making board and

there are not any women on that board,
they're going to make the wrong decisions.

Because they don't have
the women's perspective,

the women's insight,
the women's experience--

- [Sen. Barbara Mikulski]
"It's an absolute scandal that

America's women continue to earn
just 77 cents for every dollar men earn."

- [Sen. Amy Klobuchar] "In nine states,
in the district of Columbia,

women who are victims of domestic abuse,
who have been victims of domestic abuse,

can be denied health care coverage
because domestic abuse

can be considered
a pre-existing condition."

- [Rep. Carol Shea] "We go to
the ladies room,

the Republican Women,
and the Democrat Women,

and we just roll our eyes at them,
to be instead out there.

And the Republican women said,

when we were fighting
on the health care bill,

'If we sent the men home,
we can get this done as quickly.'"

[crowd cheers]

- [speaker] "The United States is the
only major industrialized nation

without paid family leave."

- [Sen. Olympia Snowe] "If women didn't
speak up on these issues,

and didn't become front and center,
in making sure they're on the front burner

of the legislative agenda,
they simply wouldn't happen.

I feel if it wasn't us,
who would do it?"

- [Marie Wilson] Women have been actually
creating the best public policy in America

in every state and community
of this country.

The living wage campaigns,
Micro-Enterprise, safety,

everything that needed different thinking,
women have been doing it,

so we gotta get them
in the tables of power.

- [Condoleezza Rice] Well, two things
have to happen when you talk about

women moving to the next rung
or minorities moving to the next rung.

First, we have to have the candidates.

You have to have people
who are in the pools

from which these positions are drawn.

But you also have to have a kind
of psychological breakthrough

or can an American see a woman
born African-American in that position?

Now I think with women,
we still have a bit to go.

- [Jennifer] I knew these obstacles
still existed from my generation,

but I wanted to find out
if things were any better

for young women
seeking leadership positions.

So I spent time with an exceptional
young woman named, Devanshi Patel,

who aspires to have
a career in public service.

- [Devanshi Patel]
"Well, welcome to Bill Hearing.

Tonight is the bill hearing night for

The Central Silicon Valley YMCA
Youth and Government Delegation."

So, first time I ran for public office
was in 4th grade.

My parents award with me.
We made all these flyers

with all these cute little slogans
and we campaigned all over the school,

and I was actually the runner-up
by a handful of votes.

I think everyone is born with something

that they have to do
and for me, this was it.

Every time that I could run for something,
I didn't run for anything less.

I didn't run for Vice President
or Treasurer. I ran for President.

- [Ranna Patel] I asked her one day.
I think it was in 5th grade.

I said, "Devanshi, you always want
to be a leader,

but do you know what a leader is?"

She says, "It's very simple, Mama.
They are just servants to people.

Leaders are just servants to people."

- [Devanshi] I loved the Youth
and Government program.

The best way I can give back
is by running for Youth Governor.

- [speaker] How would you solve
the California Budget Crisis?

Starting with Ms. Patel.

- [Devanshi] I would cut
unnecessary spending.

Well, when I was running for office,
there were a lot of--

if not outward shows of sexism,
little remarks here and there, like

you know, "Oh, she speaks well
for a woman.

She's smart for a woman."

There were also a couple instances
with some of my friends

when they were going to speak
in front of a large audience

and the only thing people could
focus on was their body,

what they looked like,
what they were wearing.

I thought, you know,
"We're better than this."

Devanshi lost the election to one of
her male opponents, coming in second.

- [Ranna Patel] She said,"Mama,
looks like I'm another Hilary Clinton."

- [Oliver Mittelstaedt]
Guys will vote for guys.

And girls would vote for guys,
but some other time,

girls have a harder time getting
the girls do vote girls because

I feel like, girls are
kinda harder on other girls.

65% of the 2000 teens who vote
in California's YMCA

Youth & Government program are girls.

- [Jennifer] Devanshi's story made me
think about how early

girls face a deep gender bias.

And how things have not changed
as much as we'd like to think.

- [Gavin Newsom] One of the first things
I did when I became Mayor of San Francisco

is I appointed a female police chief
and then a female fire chief.

When they both show up at the podium,
in a disaster, a lot of national media

would look there and say,
"Well, where is the police chief?"

"She's right here."

"And where's the fire chief?"
"Well, she's right here."

People thought I was trying
to make some grand statement,

when in fact, I was actually just hiring
the most qualified two candidates.

The incredible opposition
was coming mostly from women.

And those that feel it's much
too soon, too fast,

they never would've question
at how they've been men.

- [Caroline Heldman]
Little boys and little girls

when they're seven years old,

an equal number want to be
President of the United States

when they grow up, about 30%.

But then, you ask the same
question when they're 15

and you see this massive gap emerging.

So, we have this gendered socialization,

where politics is considered
to be for men.

Leadership is considered to be
a masculine pursuit

and women are discouraged
from pursuing ambitious positions.

You can't be what you can't see.
-Marian Wright Edelman

- [Carol Jenkins] I think what happens is
that if you do not have women there,

then girls do not see
that they can be that.

So, it's really what you see
that inspires your idea of

what's possible for you in the world.

- [Krystal Ball] "I do disagree
with Sarah Palin on a lot of issues,

but seeing her up on stage there
with her young family

and her young baby was just beautiful.

And I thought, 'You know what?
Maybe I could give this a shot as well.'"

68% of viewers were more likely
to accept a female president

- [Marie Wilson] Having this opportunity
to see women, to see women leadership,

to see women's leadership in reality
and on the screen

and on the television,
is huge for women. Huge.

Because you don't have that
many women really in leadership.

So the way that it gets done
to a certain extent

and way problems get solved
often have to do with Hollywood.

And the films that get made.
The documentaries, the television shows,

start where people are
and people are watching television.

- [Jennifer] There are some examples
of films and TV shows

that portray powerful women.

But in general, the situation
in Hollywood is pretty bleak.

CANCELLED AFTER ONE SEASON

I decided to pursue acting
professionally at the age of 28.

And was hopeful I could find
complex roles to play.

My first reality check came when
my agent told me to lie about my age

and remove my Stanford MBA
from my resume

because it might be threatening.

Well, I didn't do either.

But my confidence was really shaken.

My second reality check came when
I learned that there were very few

multi-dimensional roles
to even audition for.

I shouldn't have been surprised.

Because when you really look
at Hollywood

and the films that are being made,

you see the same stereotypes

being portrayed over and over again.

♪ [Golds Guns Girls by Metric] ♪

♪ All the gold ♪

♪ And the guns ♪

♪ And the girls (Couldn't get you off) ♪

♪ All the boys ♪

♪ All the choices in the world ♪

♪ I remember when we were
gambling to win ♪

♪ And everybody else said
better luck next time ♪

♪ I don't wanna bend like
the bad girls bend ♪

♪ I just wanna be your friend
Is it ever gonna be enough ♪

♪ Is it ever gonna be enough ♪

♪ Is it ever gonna be enough ♪

♪ Is it ever gonna be enough ♪

- [Ilian] Women are never the protagonist.
They're the ones who,

if they are the protagonist,
it's something drama about

getting a guy or something.

It's never really about
finding your destiny or whatever,

how they stayed for the guys.

Like in the Star Trek, on this
is your destiny and you know,

being powerful,
being the captain.

But for girls, they wouldn't say that.
And then, what's weird about it

is that it seemed normal for us,
like, we don't question it.

We don't say, "Oh, why isn't the girl
being the protagonist for this?

Why can't a girl be powerful?"

Only 16% of protagonists
in films are female

- [Geena Davis] I hear this all the time.
Well, things are getting better.

I mean, things are getting better,
you know. But, they're not.

- [Caroline Heldman] Mainstream movies
are genuinely stories of men's lives

which revolve around men.
And then we have this sub-genre

called, Chic Flicks, which are stories
of women's lives,

which when you look at them
a little more closely, you realize that

they generally revolve
around men's lives, too.

They revolve around trying to get a man,

trying to get love, get married
and get pregnant.

- "It's my fault that I'm
alone on Valentine's Day.

My closest relationship is
with my Blackberry."

- "Right."
- "Thank God it vibrates."

- [Geena Davis] Between 1937 and 2005,

there were only 13 female protagonists
in animated movies.

All of them, except one,
had the aspiration of finding romance.

- [Lisa Ling] As a culture, women are
brought up to just be kind of

fundamentally insecure
and always looking for the time

when that knight on a horse will come
and rescue us or provide for us.

- [Caroline Heldman] When it comes to
female leaders in entertainment media,

we see the bitchy boss who
has sacrificed family and love

to make it to where she is.

- "I said to myself, 'Take a chance.
Hire the smart, fat girl."

- The whole movie is about
bringing her down a peg

and this is generally done by someone
who is under her, a subordinate,

typically a male, so that image
doesn't bode well,

when it comes to ideas
of women in leadership.

- [Paul Haggis] We had many more
interesting characters on screen

in the 20s, 30s, 40s
than we do now.

And we allowed women to really
embody all the conrtadictions

that make up a human being
back then.

They could be the femme fatale

and then turn around
and be the mother.

And then turn around
and be the seductress.

And then turn and be the saint.
And we accepted that.

They were complex human beings.

Now we really like to put people in boxes.

- "The only two choices for women:
Witch and Sexy Kitten."

- "Oh, you just said
a mouthful there, sister."

- As men, we do it because
we don't understand characters

that aren't ourselves and we are yet
willing to put ourselves

in the skin of those characters
and women, I think, terrify us.

We tend not to write women
as human beings.

It's cartoons we're making now.

And that's a shame.

- [Caroline Heldman] Throughout any type
of mass media there is,

we see the widespread acceptance
of women as sex objects.

In rock videos, rapping, hip hop videos.
in all the summer blockbusters,

women are basically just body props there
for young male viewers.

- [Joshua] I think when they
do put in the part,

she's used as a sexual object or the
object of desire a lot toward the men,

which I think should change a lot

because there's still a lot more
to women than just a body.

- [Jackson Katz] We're socializing boys
to believe that being a man,

means being powerful and in control.

[thud]

[kissing sound]

[slapping sound]

- "Brianna."

- Being smarter than women
or better than women

or our needs get met first
in relationships with women

that's not genetically predestined.
That's learned behavior.

- "You don't think I can be a surgeon?
I can be a surgeon."

- "Surgery's hard core."
- "I'm hard core."

- "You won't last the first year, babe."

- [Caroline Heldman] We also see
a new incarnation of this,

where women appear to be empowered.

They are carrying a story
they're the action hero.

But again, when you peel back
a layer or two, you discover that

it's not really about their agency

and I call this archetype,
the fighting fuck toy.

[missile fired]

♪ Ooh. Don't speak, even whisper ♪

[explosion]

- "Now that's a bad ass chick."

- Because even though she is doing things
supposedly on her own terms,

she very much is objectified
and exists for the male viewer.

- [Geena Davis] In G rated movies,
the female characters are just as likely

to be wearing sexually revealing clothing
as in R rated movies, which is horrifying.

"Ratings Creep" shows that
movie ratings categories

contain MORE violence, sex
and profanity than a decade ago.

- [Jane Fonda] The hyper sexualization
that occurs in Hollywood, it's toxic.

There's no question.
It affects all of us including

young girls who are seeking an identity.

More than 20% of teens
have sex before the age of 14

- [Pat Mitchell] If the message is
that women are objectified,

objects that that's
their primary being,

that's a very tough and challenging
message for young women.

To think that's their paths to power.

Laurence Fishburne's Daughter
Released a Sex Tape Because of

'How Successful
Kim Kardashian Became'

- [M. Gigi Durham] You know, they'll say
Madonna is tremendously empowered

or Angelina Jolie, but they all embody
that exact same definition of sexuality.

I mean, when you really
think about it though,

Hilary Clinton's tremendously empowered.
She's Secretary of State, right?

Or you know, you think of
women CEOs, or you know,

there are women who are empowered
in lots of different kinds of ways,

but you don't see them represented.

You don't get that message
that you don't have to use your sexuality

to attain empowerment in the world.

- [Gloria Steinem] A male dominant system,
our patriarchal system,

values women as child bearers period.

So, it limits their value to the time
that they are sexually active,

reproductively active and become
much less valuable after that.

- [Martha Lauzen] What we see
on broadcast television

is that the majority of female characters
are in their 20s and 30s.

That is just a huge
misrepresentation of reality.

And that really skews our perceptions.

Women in their teens, 20's and 30's
are 39% of the population,

yet are 71% of women on TV

Women 40 and older
are 47% of the population,

yet are 26% of women on TV

It's like when a female
reaches 39 or 40,

she simply needs to go away.

- [Daphne Zuniga] One day, I got the call
that I had heard about others getting

and that was this.
I had just gotten a series

and it was presented to me
by my managers,

"Daphne, you're part is secure.
But would you consider doing

a little Botox or collagen or something?"

Well, just like them,
I didn't know what the hell it was.

"What do you mean Botox
or collagen or something?"

And I remember lying in this chair
with this fat bald man injecting,

needles in my forehead,
bleeding and I'm crying

and I'm feeling guilty for crying.

I remember lying in that chair
just thinking,

"There's something wrong here."

It really made me feel less
spiritually whole person,

less of a woman with integrity.

I felt like I was cheating and lying
with this stuff in my face.

So maybe I'll stop working.
I don't know.

But just right now I have chosen
not to do it again.

My mother was furious.
Wanna hear what my mother--

the hippie in Vermont said?

"You tell those fuckers
to get penis implants."

[laughs]

- [Jane Fonda] This is not new, you know.
I started out in the business in the 50s.

My very first movie,
I played a cheerleader

and Jack Warner was the head
of Warner Brothers

and he sent word down
that he wanted me to wear falsies

and my director, Josh Logan, asked me
to have my back teeth pulled out.

You know, I wasn't good enough
the way I was.

- [Jennifer Pozner] I really truly
believe that reality TV

is the contemporary cultural backlash
against women's rights.

- [speaker ]"Ms. Blondie... "

We have to watch out
for her body, too.

Her body is a little thick.

- I think one of the worst stereotypes
in reality TV is this notion

that women exist to be decorative.
Women exist to be stupid.

Women are considered gold diggers.
Women are considered bitchy, catty,

manipulative, vindictive, not to be
trusted, especially by other women.

"You are a piece of [bleep]
and you're a stupid blonde."

- "I think you look like a ho."

- "Slap me, bitch."
- "Or what?"

- "You motherfucking whore!"

- This notion that women
are natural enemies vying for

the prize of being more beautiful
than the rest or the love of whoever,

is so counter to women in real life.

- "Please, pick me, pick me, pick me.
See how beautiful I am."

- [M. Gigi Durham] There's a really
unequal power relationship going on there,

where it's the girls whose bodies
are on display and the boys

get the power to arbitrate and judge,

whether their bodies
are acceptable or not acceptable,

desirable or not desirable.

So, I think there's
a whole lot going on there

that actually puts girls in
a really disempowered position.

- [Jennifer Pozner] These shows over
the course of the last decade,

have tried to portray a world in which,
the only options available to women

mimic the 1950s model of femininity,
in which women's only power

was her beauty, in which women
not only had no choices,

but shouldn't have even wanted any,
in which men wore burdens

with the responsibility of being
the prince charming,

who comes in and whisks women away
to happily ever after.

Then has to provide for their
financial security.

Nobody wins in this model, but
women particularly, lose in this model,

where they're expected to look
like Miss USA, have sex

like Samantha on Sex and the City
and think like June Cleaver.

- [Jennifer] And here's something I find
even more disheartening.

Watching the news.

So many female journalists
are objectified or sexualized.

- ♪ [CBS theme music ] ♪ This is the CBS
Evening News with Katie Couric.

- "Hi, everyone. I'm very happy
to be with you tonight."

- [Carol Jenkins] Katie Couric was
the very first national experience

we had all together viewing.
The woman who was not entertaining us,

but whose presence and presentation

was vital for anything information
that we needed.

- [Katie Couric] The three major
evening newscasts had been

dominated by white males.

They had very similar faces

and very similar backgrounds
for the most part.

I thought this is an opportunity
to mix it up a little bit.

I also thought it was an important message
that a woman could be as confident

as a man in an important powerful role.

- [Carol Jenkins] And I remember
in the early days,

when I would get calls
from reporters about,

"Ah! That we have our
first woman anchor.

What do you think about that?"

Inevitably, the questions
that they would ask first, were,

"What about those legs?"

"Do you think she was
showing too much leg?", or

"What about that winter white,
wasn't that a big mistake?"

They were all observations
that had to do with her physicality

and not really about the content at all.

But again it's because
as I've always said,

"We are a nation of teenage boys."

We don't know, you know,
what to make of this woman

sitting in front of us and so you know,
we look at her legs, her boobs,

her hair, her whatever, you know.
Then maybe way down the line,

we'll get to listen to what she's saying.

- [Rachel Maddow] Ever since
I've been in media at all,

even since, you know,
the first morning show that I was on

in Holyoke, Massachusetts, you know,
I was this sidekick newsgirl.

There's been like
a really consistent proportion of--

I don't even know if I call it criticism.
Essentially, it's hate mail.

As I've become sort of better known
and I get more feedback,

the amount of
"I hate you, homophobic.

I hate what you look like.
I'm gonna kill you."

Like threatening mail stuff,
it's like the proportions

has stayed exactly the same.

It's always 14% of the feedback
and it's almost all of the hate mail

is about gender and sexuality.
I mean, who has the time

if that's really what you think
and you really are that bad a speller,

like you really, you're still gonna
take this time to let me know

what you 'thunk' about--
[laughs] about what I look like?

- [Lisa Ling] It's the scrutinization
that women get

that far surpasses
the scrutinization that men get.

I don't ever see gossip columns
or tabloids reporting

on Brian Williams' personal life,
yet Katie Couric

and what she is wearing
or who she's dating is headline news.

- [Katie Couric] I think whenever there
are two women who are working

in similar professions, it's
automatically positioned as a cat fight.

Diane Sawyer and I were pitted
against each other as if, you know,

we were gonna be in a mud wrestling
competition on the weekends.

And you never saw that with say,
Tom Brokaw and Peter Jennings.

- "Take it away with the red hot boys
in blue, which--"

- "I got this one down."

- "Okay, good."

- Sometimes I look on
the cable news channels.

I see women wearing very low cut shirts
and lots of makeup

and you know, their hair is kind of
tussled and they look like

they're working as cocktail waitresses,
instead of newscasters.

It's just a very mixed message.

- [Jay Leno] "Folks, we're gonna
play a game.

I'm gonna show you
a photo of a woman.

You have to guess,
whether she is

a professional newscaster
or a Hooters waitress.

Are you ready? Here we go."
[audience laugh]

- [Jennifer Pozner] The local news
anchorships look like,

you know, somebody's grandfather
and his second wife.

- [Katie Couric] Television's a
very visual medium, obviously,

and it's kind of how do you
walk the fine line

of looking pleasing and attractive,
but also looking professional.

I look back on my Today's Show
interviews then I think,

"Geez, my skirt is way too short."

I sometimes worry that I started
this thing with my legs and everything

that I have sort of started this trend
of trying to look, you know...

I don't know.

- [Lisa Ling] There is so much pressure
to look a certain way.

When I'm on television, I never try
and explicitly dress sexy.

I don't want to distract from
the stories that I'm telling.

- [Rachel Maddow] I want you
to focus on what I'm saying.

There's a lot of words in my show
and I work really hard

on getting them in the right order.
[laughs]

For some people, I will always be

too hideous a creature
to be on television. That's fine.

But if you can get over that on day one,
it's gonna stay the same

for the whole time that I'm on the air.

- [Katie Couric] I think it's really hard
for women today.

- [Jennifer] The emphasis on
women's appearance affects

more than just women on screen.

It's affecting women's ability
to participate in the political process.

Ironically, the more power women gain,
the stronger the backlash against them.

- And this phenomenon is most evident

in the way the media disrespects
our female leaders.

- "She's irresistibly cute.
Let's put it that way.

In the way she presents herself,
obviously, she's attractive and all that."

- "Sarah Palin looks
really hot in that hat.

She's just sad that she
doesn't know how cars work.

Aww, that's crazy.
Have you seen the hat on her?"

- "Both you and Sarah Palin
are good looking women.

I mean, you're attractive, young,
relatively young women.

-"Kagan is gonna put on the
US Supreme Court

as there's such a thing about
the aesthetics of the appointee.

Let's put that here that so
she's not your type of face

you'd wanna see
on the five dollar bill."

- "I think I'm gonna send
Sotomayor and her club

a bunch of vacuum cleaners

to help them clean up
after their meetings."

- "Cynthia McKinney, the former
congresswoman from Georgia

was another angry black woman."

- "Look at these ugly skanks who make up

the big female leadership
of the democratic party."

- "You know that ugly hag,
Madeleine Albright, remember her?

A psycho. She was the Secretary
of State under Clinton, remember?

Like a fat moron."

- "And now we have the wicked witch
of the west, you know, that Nancy Pelosi."

- "I think if speaker Pelosi were still
incapable of human facial expression,

we'd see she'd be embarrassed."

- "Nancy Pelosi, that--
Get another face lift, lady.

Another reason why it's very rare.

The final woman worthy
of serving in political off--"

♪ Ding dong, the wicked witch is dead ♪
- "And it's bye bye, Pelosi."

- "And Hilary Rodham Clinton,
her thighness, is no better

than Dumbo with the big ears."

- "When she raises her voice
and when a lot of women do, you know,

it's as I say, it reaches a point where--
- "Yeah, well, look, you know what?"

--with every husband in America
has heard it one time or another."

- "You get a woman in the oval office,
the most powerful person in the world,

what's the downside?"

- "You mean, besides the PMS
and the mood swings."

- [Pat Mitchell] There's probably
no more powerful influence

in the way we view power than
the way media treats power.

And media treats power
as defined by men,

because it has been
throughout our generation

and the ones before
generally define that way.

- [Erika Falk] When press representations
of women who are, you know,

running for the highest office
in the land are focusing, for example,

on how women look,
instead of what they've done

or their issue positions.
That's got to impact the audience

in terms of how they evaluate
and judge those women.

One of the things it does
is it trivializes them.

It makes women seem less powerful.

- [Jennifer Pozner] During the
Democratic National Convention in '84,

when Geraldine Ferraro was running,

she was introduced on
national television as,

"The first female vice presidential
candidate. Size six!"

So this is not new.

- [Debbie Walsh] My colleague did a study
looking at Elizabeth Dole

and her race for President,
she was coming in second in Iowa

at the time after George Bush
and there was much more coverage

of her appearance than there was of the
substance of what she was talking about.

- [Jennifer Lawless] When I ran for
Congress, I was campaigning

at grocery stores and a woman came up
to me and she put her arms around me

and she whispered, "Don't worry,
you don't look nearly as fat in real life

as you do on TV."
The week before the election,

a man came up to me and he said,
"You know, you seem great,

but I don't feel like
I could vote for you for Congress.

I feel like I should hire you
as a babysitter."

- [Nancy Pelosi] When I first ran for
public office, which is now

over 20 years ago, although my
youngest was a senior in high school,

the question I was most
frequently asked was,

"Who's gonna be taking care
of your children?"

And of course it's one of
those questions that

I don't think a man has ever been asked
when he has run for office.

- [Erika Falk] If you look at
the women who ran,

who had honorary titles like,
Senator Clinton,

if the press drops that title and
instead refers to them as Mrs. Clinton,

this is a way to kind of diminish
some of her accomplishments.

In John Boehner's first four weeks
as Speaker of the House

he was on the cover of five
national weekly magazines.

In Nancy Pelosi's four years
as Speaker of the House

she was on the cover of zero
national weekly magazines.

- [Dianne Feinstein] There is such a thing
as a media bias.

For example, media will write in the
same way about a man and a woman.

Senator X is a woman,
complained that--

and in the same thing,
Senator Y, stated that--

So the man will get the stated

and the woman will get
the negative verb, complained.

- [Erika Falk] Women were twice as likely
to be described emotionally as were men.

And by painting women as more emotional
than men, we perpetuate this stereotype

that women are emotional.
Therefore, they're irrational.

Therefore they can't handle a crisis.

Therefore, they should not be
in leadership positions.

- [Condoleezza Rice] I remember
so many times during the campaign,

people asking, "Will she tough enough
to be Commander-in-Chief?"

Well, I've know plenty of men who aren't
tough enough to be Commander-in-Chief

and nobody asked that question.

- "Making sure that these kids
have a shot at the American dream...

[sobbing]
...my God, it's important."

- "Gosh. What do you think
they would have done to Nancy Pelosi

if she hadn't gotten all worked up?
They would've said she's unstable,

couldn't do the job.
Ooh, yes. Welcome to America."

- [Pat Mitchell] A woman in power
is often seen as a negative thing.

We associate all the worst aspects
of power and we translate those

to a woman seeking to achieve power.

- [Caroline Heldman] One of the key ways

in which media played a role
in the primary, was to talk about

Hillary Clinton's ambition
as though it were a bad thing.

- "When Barack Obama speaks,
men hear, 'Take off for the future'.

And when Hillary Clinton speaks,
men hear, 'Take out the garbage.'"

- "When she reacts the way she reacts
to Obama with just a look,

the look toward him,
looking like,

everyone's first wife standing
outside a probate court."

- "I don't know what they're
getting at here, Tuck.

But what do you think are
they saying about Hillary?"

- "I don't know, but that is so perfect,
a guy would have often said." [both laugh]

"When she comes on television,
I involuntarily cross my legs."

- "I know you do."

- Hillary Clinton had hecklers
following her saying, "Iron my shirt."

- "And some people think
- [Hecklers shouting] "Iron my shirt!"

- we bring about saying, I--"
- "Iron my shirt! Iron my shirt!"

- She was frequently called
a bitch in mainstream media.

- "She's a stereotypical bitch,
you know what I mean?"

- "Obama did great in February that was
because it was black history month.

And now Hillary is doing much better
because it's white bitch month, right?"

- "If she knew how it made her look,
so alternately sappy and bitchy,

she'd stop it, but she can't
help herself, can she?"

- Her credentials were
constantly questioned.

- "Let's not forget and I'll be brutal.
The reason she's a US Senator,

the reason she's a candidate
for President, the reason she may be

a front runner, is her husband
messed around." -"Yeah, but--"

"That's how she got to be Senator
for New York. We keep forgetting it.

She didn't win there on her merit."

- [Carololine] Sarah Palin presented
a very different image.

She is the first national high profiled
female candidate

who presented herself in very
feminine terms as a "real woman."

- "She's the American dream.
Women want to be her.

Men want to mate with her.
I wanna lay her next to me in bed."

- There were pictures shot
between her legs of folks

at the Republican National Convention.

In a nutshell, she was
pornified and ditzified

"I don't wanna say she's a ditz,
but last night,

my stripper's fake name
was Sarah Palin." [crowd laughs]

- "Yo, let me tell you somethin'
'bout Sarah Palin, man, [all laugh]

she's good masturbation material."
- [Together] Oh! [all laugh]

- So, Hillary Clinton tried to be
properly masculine

and properly feminine and she lost.

Sarah Palin puts out this different image
of, shall we say hyper femininity,

and she gets beaten up in
really degrading gendered ways.

- "But tonight we are crossing party lines
to address the now very ugly role

that sexism is playing in the campaign."

- "An issue which I am frankly, surprised
to hear, people suddenly care about."

[crowd laughs]

- "Reporters and commentators
stop using words

that diminish us, like pretty,
attractive, beautiful--"

- "Harpy, shrewd, boner shrinker."

[crowd laughs and applauds]

- [Cory Booker] My worry is now that
there are millions of people watching

Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton...
I could talk to about a lot of women

there in New Jersey politics.
There are millions of young women

watching this and the messages
that they're getting are just not

conducive to encouraging them
to put up with this kind of abuse.

- [Gavin Newsom] When you're not
treated the same, you are dehumanized.

When you're not given the same
opportunity, you're dehumanized.

When people look at you differently
because you happen to be a woman

and you happen to be in a position
of some influence that someone who is a man,

would naturally be in based
on tradition or history

and people question your qualifications,
that's dehumanizing.

- [Thomas] Empowered women in general,
threaten men because they feel

that an empowered woman
is just putting down a man

as opposed to trying
to sort of raise herself.

- [Jackson Katz] As women have been
challenging men's power, in business,

in the professions, in education,

and in politics and other areas
of social life,

the images of women that have
been flooding their culture,

have been showing women
as taking up less space.

They're less threatening.
They're highly sexualized.

And therefore, a certain kind of power
has been taken away from them,

which is a power of being
a whole person.

And I don't think those things
are coincidental. I think that the way

that the symbolic realm has been acting
as to take power away from women,

while women have been challenging
men's power in the concrete realm.

- [Jennifer] It seems we become numb
to the insidious ways

the media holds women back
when it misrepresents them.

I can't help but wonder, who are
the people behind the scenes

making these crucial decisions
about what we see?

And what are the consequences
for my daughter and her generation?

- [Barbara J. Berg] The media
has always been,

overwhelmingly,
in the hands of men.

Women own only 5.8% of all television
stattions and 6% radio stations.

- [Jennifer Pozner] As you go up the ranks
in media, fewer and fewer women

and people of color exist
at every rung of the ladder.

Women hold only 3% of clout positions
in telecommunications, entertainment,

publishing and advertising.

- [Carol Jenkins] That means that 97%
of everything you know about yourself

and about your country and your world,
comes from the male perspective.

It doesn't mean that it's wrong,
it just means that in a democracy,

where you talk about equality
and full participation,

you've got half of the population,

more than half of the population,
not participating.

- [Pat Mitchell] Many years ago, I said,
"Why don't we just create our own network,

other than continuing to try and get our
stories told by other people's networks?"

So, we put together an idea.
We went to various distributors,

including the broadcast networks,
the cable companies, etcetera,

pitched the idea
and one person said to me,

"Well, why do we need
another women's network?

We already have one.
We have lifetime."

Meanwhile, there are
22 ESPN sports channels

- [Martha Lauzen] There's a fairly
pervasive sense of denial

about the status of women working
in both television and film.

Peter Bart wrote a column in Variety,
talking about the glass ceiling

and how it no longer exists.

Putting that kind of information
out there is really troublesome.

Women comprise only 16%
of all writers, directors, producers,

cinematographers and editors.

And only 7 % of directors and
10% of writers in film are women.

- [Lisa Ling] For so long it has been
an industry dominated

by men who just don't leave.

- [Lindy DeKoven] People who employ
other people tend to hire people

who are a reflection of themselves.

- [Barbara J. Berg] This impacts hiring.
It impacts the news, directors,

the journalists, the people who are
gonna cover the news,

and of course, who reports the news?

Very much is the factor
in what kind of news is reported.

The average number of news stories
about women and girls is less than 20%

- [Martha Lauzen] When any group
is not featured in the media,

they have to wonder, "Well,
what part do I play in this culture?"

There's actually an
academic term for that.

It's called, symbolic annihilation.

[nuclear explosion]

- [Geena Davis] All of Hollywood
is run on one assumption

that women will watch stories about men,
but men won't watch stories about women.

And all the decisions are made
based on this concrete fact

and nobody's ever really proved
that that's true.

I think it's a horrible indictment
of our society, if we assume

that one half of the population
is just not interested in the other half.

- [Catherine Hardwicke] The first couple
of scripts that I wrote, of course,

had a female, you know, as a lead
character and people will look,

"Well, there's hardly
any bankable actresses."

So, they can't carry a film.
So, it has to be super low budget

or we wouldn't bankroll it and no one's
gonna show up in the theaters

and I finally wrote the lowest
budget movie I could ever write.

I co-wrote Thirteen
with a 13-year old girl

and it was about people
of lower income.

They could wear my clothes.
We could shoot in my house.

We could use my car.
We made the movie and it went on

to Sundance and it went on to win awards
and get international distribution

and I think it was the same
like, with Twilight.

Two major studios turned it down.
Finally, a new upstart company showed me

the project and it turned into
obviously, a phenomenon making

over half a billion dollars so far.
So, it is proved the theory

that girls and women
wouldn't go to see a movie,

but they did go see the movie in droves.
And over and over and over.

And bought the DVD
and even bought pillowcases.

But there is a flip side to that,
which is kind of astonishing to me.

On the next two Twilight,
they've hired guys.

They did not seek out a female director
and on the same side,

I've gone after some jobs that I've been
told flat out to myself and my agent,

"Oh no, we think a guy
should direct this."

And to me, I think,
"Okay, can a man direct, you know,

Sex and the City, Sisterhood of the
Traveling Pants,

the Miley Cyrus movie?"
Nobody ever questions that.

But I, a very successful female
director, cannot direct a movie

that should be done by a man.

- [Jennifer Todd] But nobody says,
"I'm not gonna hire a female director."

On their list, there's just 25 names
and none of them are women.

- [Paul Haggis] What happens is,
these studio chiefs who--

or people like myself, you know,
writer, producers or directors,

we see the world in a certain way

and we don't really challenge that often
and so we just replicate the world

that we grew up in without
really asking why we're doing it.

- [Martha Lauzen] What is the first thing
that they tell people when they're,

you know, in a screen writing class?
Create what you know.

When you have greater diversity
behind the scenes,

not only do you get more
female characters on screen,

but you get a different kind
of female character.

You get a more powerful and
multi dimensional female character.

- "You should have seen the way
those men looked at me."

"For them, they discovered,
I was fearless!"

- [Rosario Dawson] That's why it's
extremely important for women

to be writing their own stories.
Truly crafting those stories,

writing them down, directing them,
and giving them to people

to really emotionally become impacted by
because when my mom tells me a story

or my grandmother tells me a story,
I'm riveted.

[women laughing]

- [Geena Davis] None of us had any idea
what the response was gonna be

to Thelma and Louise.
One time I was at a red light

and I heard this honking
and I looked next to me, and it's

a car full of women who are
popping out of all the windows

and the sunroof and going,
"Whoo-hoo!"

[laughs] I'm like,
"Well this is certainly never been

a reaction to my any of my other movies."

Then the very next movie I made was
A League of Their Own, where I had

13 or 15 year old girls coming up to me
with the same kind of reactions,

"Oh my God. You have no idea
that movie changed my life.

I played sports
because of that movie."

And it really struck me how few
opportunities we give women to have

that kind of experience
watching a movie.

- [Katie Couric] The media can be
an instrument of change.

It can maintain the status quo
and reflect the views of the society.

Or it can hopefully awaken people
and change minds.

I think it depends on
who's piloting the plane

- [Jennifer] I don't want it undervalued,
the tremendous progress

women have made in America.

But if we look closely at the way
our history has been recorded,

we start to understand the crucial role
media has played

in defining who we are.

- [Barbara J. Berg] Patriarchy really
is America's default setting,

where men hold the positions
of privilege and power.

And where women very often
are treated as second-class citizens.

It's always been problematic
in American society

when women have gained power.

♪ [Jazz music] ♪

During the World War II,
6 million women were pulled

into taking care of the factories
in the absence of the men.

By the time the war was going to a close,
80% percent wanted to stay at their jobs.

When the returning GIs came home
within two days of victory in Civic,

800,000 women were fired
from the aircraft industry

and other companies
began to follow suit.

We needed a huge media campaign
to get these women back into the home.

1947 Newsweek prints, "For the American
girl, books and babies don't mix."

Bestselling Modern Woman states,

"An independent woman
is a contradiction in terms."

One of the most effective ways to do this
was through television.

So, the television was part
of the re-domestication.

1948 1 million homes in the U.S.
have TV sets

1948 Father Knows Best

We had television shows sponsored
by numerous commodities.

The gleaming appliances that
June Cleaver would use in the kitchen.

These commodities were being
linked to the good life.

Women rush to their new shopping centers
in their brand new cars and loaded up.

They didn't realize that they were
actually doing this in the service of

the strong governmental imperative.

The notion of the commodity boom
was linked to Capitalism,

which our government was supporting.
These evade the threat of Communism.

1959 CBS becomes the largest
advertising medium in the world

So, you really see the linkage
of advertising on TV,

the pushing of Capitalism, and then
our government pushing Capitalism to it.

♪ [I Want it All by Jules Larson] ♪

Now, fast forward to the once where we--

♪ Well, I can't help myself ♪

♪ I want it all ♪

♪ and I start to fall ♪

♪ I can't think at all ♪

♪ 'cause I want you ♪

♪ want you ♪

♪ want it all ♪

♪ And I'm standing tall ♪

♪ So don't make me crawl ♪

♪ I just want you,
want you ♪

♪ want it all ♪

Women went from being bard accessed
to the institutions of higher learning.

Not allowed to participate
in most of the well-known professions

within life in a decade.

Women gained tremendous,
tremendous power.

♪ I want it all ♪
♪ (I want it all) ♪

♪ and I start to fall ♪
♪ (and I start to fall) ♪

♪ I can't think at all ♪
♪ (I can't think at all) ♪

♪ 'cause I want you ♪

♪ want you ♪

♪ want it all ♪
♪ (I want it all) ♪

♪ And I'm standing tall ♪
♪ (And I'm standing tall) ♪

♪ So don't make me crawl ♪
♪ (So don't make me crawl) ♪

♪ I just want you,
want you ♪

♪ want it all ♪

Then, we get to the great
reality check of 1980s.

There was a huge well-funded
message machine

of conservative bankers and the
de-immunization of the word 'liberal.'

If you took an oppositional view,
New World, almost un-American.

And who were the great targets
of this media machine?

The Women's Movement and Feminists
because we were seen as posing

the greatest threat to the
social order of America at that time.

"The feminist agenda is not about
equal rights for women. It is about

a socialist, anti-family
political movement

that encourages women to have

their husbands, kill their children,
practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism

and become lesbians."
- Pat Robertson

"Women's lib is a total assault
on the role of the American woman

as a wife and mother and on the family

as the basic unit of society."
- Phyllis Schlafy

"America's decline as a world power
is a direct result of the feminists'

movement for reproductive freedom

and equal rights."
- The Christian Voice

1982 The Equal Rights Amendment
fails to gain ratification

- [Jackson Katz] Anytime you move forward
in a culture, there's gonna be a backlash

that's gonna try to move backwards
or stop the progress.

And so it's a constant tension
between trying to move forward

and advance the project of human,
you know, happiness and equality

and justice and everything else.

And at the same time,
you attempt to maintain

the existing power structures
and that tension is a constant tension.

- [Jim Steyer] Starting in the 1980s,
ruling under President Reagan,

we started de-regulating the
media industry in the United States.

And the same people who hung their hat
on the mantle of family values,

were the same people
who de-regulated the media industry.

The Chairman of the FCC, Mark Fowler,

in those days, referred
to the television set

as just another piece of hardware.
And therefore it should be regulated

or not regulated in the same way
that toasters are or washing machines,

but you're talking about images
and messages that shape

our entire society, our culture.

And to cut back on the
regulatory structure

that oversees that, led to a lot of
unforeseen consequences when it came

to messages and images for young people,

particularly for girls
and young women.

What you saw was
more and more content,

fewer and fewer limits on that content
and a lessening of standards.

By the time you got
to the Telecomm Act of 1996,

you had the chance
to potentially re-regulate, if you will,

the media industry.
But in fact, that did not happen.

- [Barbara J. Berg] We have huge corporate
conglomerations controlling television,

radio, cable, news papers,
movie theaters, theme parks,

huge amount of power in this country
and most of these conglomerates

really operate with an eye focused
on the bottom line,

not on fair and balanced reporting.

- [Jennifer Pozner] You have Fox News
on Bill O'Reilly,

developing an entire strategy to corner
the market in sensationalistic news

just to sell us, get eyeballs, etcetera
and then all the other major news outlets

on cable trying to compete,
so that who gets to shout the loudest

becomes a standard
for the news practice.

- [Rachel Maddow] I could be delivering
the same script with the same graphics

in the same studio
wearing the same thing,

but on two different days.

I could be delivering it like this, or
"I could be delivering it like this!

And if I'm delivering it like this,
I'm gonna get double the rating."

Okay, so that's why people yell.

- "I know that's a sexist comment--"
- "It totally is."

- "--but it is this truth to it."

- [Jehmu Greene] The rise of punditry
in America is greatly adding to sexism

and bias in the media.

And also, confusing what is fact
and what is opinion.

- [Jennifer Pozner] You have less
and less minutes devoted

to the pursuit of strong, independent,
long-term investigative journalism.

More minutes devoted every year
to celebrity news, to gossip--

Why?
'Cause it's cheap.

Fifteen years ago, it would have been
unthinkable for Britney Spear's panties

to be a breaking headline on CNN.

- "I wanna lead with the Paris Hilton story--

- "No. And you know what?
- "What's happening with Paris?"

- "So does my producer, Andy Jones
is not listening to me.

He's appointed us the lead.
Listen, I just don't believe

in covering that story,
especially not as the lead story

in the newscast when you have
the daylight today--"

- "Can we show some footage of Paris?
- "No! No, we can't.

- We have Paris walking out
of the prison last night."

- So, no. I'm gonna do the news now."

- "I haven't thrown it-- There she is."
- "Look at that strut."

- "Oh, look at that. She's so humble."
- "Like a reformed woman."

- "Yeah, she was reformed."
- "She's shy."

- "Alright, to the news now."
- " 'cause she found Jesus."

- [Jennifer Pozner] Just months after
Telecomm '96 passed,

Access Hollywood debuted
and E! news debuted.

These are two of the most sort of
fat-shaming, info-taiment outlets

we have today, where they follow around
women who have eaten a muffin

and then circle their stomachs
with graphics and point to them and say,

"Baby bump? Are they pregnant?
No. Sorry. She just ate a bagel."

- "After photos of the singer performing
in her trademark Daisy Duke jeans shorts

showed off an unflattering belly bulge.
Jess' reps were forced to publicly state,

'She is not pregnant.'"

- This notion that these media companies
are just giving us what the public wants.

No. They're giving us what the
media companies want.

They're giving us what the
advertisers want and they're

packaging it in such a way as to make it
sound like it's our fault and it's not.

- [Caroline Heldman] This is the
first time in human history

that marketers have dictated
our cultural norms and values.

And this is made possible by
the relaxation of rules on advertising

in the 1970s and 80s.

1980 Congress weakens the
Federal Trade Commission's power

to stop "unfair" advertising.

And then it amplified
relaxation starting in the 90s.

1990s Studies find a steady increase
in explicit sexual images in advertising.

- [Lindy DeKoven] This is all about
Capitalism.

The television industry
targets men 18 to 34

because it's harder to get men
to watch television.

Women watch television so the advertisers
encourage the networks to come up

with programming for men 18 to 34,
so they can sell their products to them.

- "Great!"
- "Hate!"

- "Less filling."
- "Great taste!"

- The exploitation of women's bodies
sells products, magazines, etecetera.

- "Can you open this?"
- "Sure."

♪ Isn't it wonderful ♪
[woman moaning]

- There has been some discussion
that advertisers

are themselves, men
who are 18 to 34.

They are saying this is the
kind of programming we want.

If you show a woman scantilly clad,

maybe that's an opportunity to get
more viewers to your show.

- [Marissa Mayer] And right now,
advertisements are really

the best way to support
a business on the internet.

- "Click on me
and let the show begin."

Sometimes, what will draw the most
eyeballs at least in the voyeuristic sense

is something that, you know,
might be more salacious.

[woman moaning]

- [Jim Steyer] In the old days,
there used to be a thing called,

the family hour, which was
a voluntary agreement

of the three broadcast networks.
Remember those days?

When you couldn't air anything
inappropriate for children and families

before 9 pm at night, where,
in return for the free airwaves,

they felt that they had a very major
public interest commitment.

It's actually enforced by the
Federal Communications Commission,

the FCC. That is gone today.
Period. End of story.

Today, it is the wild, wild west.
It is a free-for-all.

And there's no sense among folks
who run the media and tech industries,

perhaps with the exception
of older broadcasters,

who remember the good old days,

that they have an obligation
to public interest.

"We have no obligation to make history.
We have no obligation to make art.

We have no obligation
to make a statement.

To make money is our only objective."
- Michael Eisner

- [Malkia Amala Cyril] It's a myth,
that we live in

and under and with
a democratic media. We don't.

- [Jim Steyer] When it comes to
the politics of all this,

in the last 25 years, our law makers
have essentially been absent.

Out of the picture.

1972 Surgeon General's
report cities link

between screen violence
and aggressive behavior.

1976 American Medical Association

calls TV violence an
"environmental hazard"

1982 National Institute of
Mental Health says, there is a clear link

between TV violence and aggression.

1985 American Psychological Association

shows link between TV violence
and real violence

1992 American Psychological Association

calls for federal policy
to protect society

when research on violence is ignored

2004 The Centers for Disease Control

finds that media violence
enhances violent behavior

2007 The FCC unanimously recommends
Congress regulate TV violence

2007 Congress holds special hearing
on the prevalence

of women's sexualization
in music videos

2009 Studies prove exposure to sexually
implicit video games and music videos

is linked to men's acceptance of rape
myths and sexual harrassment

Despite all of this,
there have been no policy changes

You got a situation where
the law makers

who you would hope would represent
the broader public interest

are in a sense--
I hate to overstate it,

but are largely in the pocket
of the media industry.

Because their fortunes
as politicians are dependent

upon the media coverage
as well as their ability to buy time

in those media stations
when they're running for office.

Media has not been held accountable
by our elected representatives

and it's not a liberal
or conservative issue,

it's an American issue
and an American problem.

- [Malkia Amala Cyril]
Without a media sense,

when that's publicly accountable,

what you have is not only
widespread content bias,

but what you have is a completely
inaccessible public conversation.

- [Jim Steyer] For years,
the media industry

hid behind the label of censorship.

It's not censorship to say
to a media company

that's producing an image or a website
that's really offensive

and really inappropriate.
That's the essence of free speech.

But in a world of a million channels
like we have today, people try to do

more shocking and shocking things
to break through the clutter.

And often times, they resort
to violent images

or sexually offensive images
or demeaning images,

'cause they know it'll get attention.

The problem is, kids are exposed to that
with very little or no mediation.

- [Jean Kilbourne] These images are part
of a cultural climate in which women

are seen as things, as objects.

And turning a human being into a thing
is almost always the first step towards

justifying violence against that person.

13-year-old girl gang raped
by three classmates

7-year-old girl raped on
school bus by teenager

Two-year-old girl raped at SeaWorld

1 in 4 girls experience
teen dating violence

1 in 4 women are abused
by a partner in their lifetime

1 in 6 women are survivors
of rape or attempted rape

15% of rape survivors
are under the age of 12

Rape survivors are more likely to
Suffer Depression

Abuse Alcohol and Drugs
Contemplate Suicide

- [Jennifer] If the cards are so
heavily stacked against young women,

how are they supposed to achieve
their potential and become leaders?

We can't turn a blind eye
to how the media impacts our culture

and harms both our daughters
and our sons.

1 in 18 men in the U.S.
is behind bars or being monitored

- [Jane Fonda] We have to help our boys
when they're really young.

Five or six, when they're just
entering formal schooling.

Help them not bifurcate
their head from their heart,

not become emotionally illiterate

and feel that they can't show emotion,
that their sissies if they cry,

that they can't be expressing love.

- [Jackson Katz] If a man is taught that
he's supposed to be smarter than women,

he's supposed to make
more money than women,

he's supposed to have
more respect than women,

yet it's not true in real life,

you know, his boss might be a woman,
his doctor might be a woman.

The woman might be making
more money than him.

The girl next to him in class
is smarter than him, etcetera...

What does it mean to be a man?

- [Kirk] If guys don't show this masculine
side, then they're criticized for it

and they're kind of another looked
upon as less of a man.

- [Jackson Katz] Now,
how do we expect our sons

to be men of integrity
and of conscience

and to be social justice advocates
and just treat women with respect

and to speak up when they see women
being treated with disrespect,

if they don't see their fathers doing it,

if they don't see men in the
public culture doing it,

it's not fair to put the burdens on the
shoulders of boys or even young men.

Even though, they're part of the solution,
there's no question.

This is about adult men.

- [Calvin] I definitely am not one
to conform to the--

we need to be hyper masculine and
we need to be misogynistic stereotypes.

It really puts a lot of pressure on me
when I have relatives who have grown up

with this phenomenon, who attempt
to put me on that path,

but I'm not ready for it.

- [Cory Booker] I remember sitting down
having this conversation with a woman

far wiser than me
and stories to talk about,

"Oh, how bad it is for women in America,"
and she just looked at me

and listened to me
for a while and she said,

"Well, I have to tell you, Cory,

I actually think it's really bad
for men in America."

And I go, "What do you mean?"
She started talking to me

and really putting the spotlight on me
and talking about how emotionally

constipated men are taught
to be very early on,

how we don't have-- haven't learned
how to express ourselves in healthy ways,

it often does manifest itself in such
awful and violent ways.

But she talked about a spiritual healing
that was needed for guys.

- [Jennifer] I've been trying to imagine

a better world for my
daughter's generation.

And I'm beginning to get some ideas.

"The numbers of women
in leadership positions

in our country are still very low."

We have to find a way
to change this culture.

We need to shift our focus
from the bottom line

to one of social responsibility.
We need to challenge

the media conglomerates
to value women

for more than their youth,
beauty and sexuality.

And we must hold
these companies accountable.

We need to encourage women

to discover their true power,
so they can become leaders.

And we must support them
on their journey.

70% of women in the workforce
are mothers

yet we have no national paid family
leave, childcare or flex time policy

And ultimately, we need to live our
own vision of what a woman can be.

Be the change you want
to see in the world.

- Mahatma Gandhi

- [Condoleezza Rice] We make a mistake
when we say, you have to find

role models who look like you.

If Sally Ride, my dear friend,
first female astronaut had been waiting

for a female astronaut role model,
she would never have done it.

And so, I'm a big believer
in finding your role models

wherever you can find them.

In people who inspire and
stimulate you for whatever reason.

- [Jan Yanehiro] Growing up,
there was nobody

who looked like me on television,

so I never dreamed
that I could be on television.

I would love to say, "Yeah, there were
some great women role models back then."

Actually, there were none.

Years later, Connie Chung went on
television to report in Watergate,

and I would say to her,
"Connie, you're my role model."

She would say to me,
"Jan, but I'm not that old."

And I say, "Yeah, you're a year
older than I am, Connie

and that's good enough for me."

- [Katie Couric] In terms of my
role models in television news,

of course, Barbara Walters,
Lesley Stahl,

and believe it or not,
Mary Tyler Moore.

I grew up watching that show
and the notion of a woman

making it on her own
and working at that TV station,

I think was, very, very influential.

- [Rachel Maddow] One of the things
that really surprised me

was the number of women
in positions of power in television

who reached out to me and said,

"Can I take you out to breakfast?"
"Can I take you out to lunch?"

"Can I make sure that you have
my phone number or my email address,

so that if anything comes up--" and
it definitely wasn't like a gender mafia

going on in the media,
but there was an over effort

to both welcome me and make me know
that women who had gone before me,

who had fought to get where they were,
were both happy that I was there

and wanted to be resources to me.

And there's an expectation that
I will be a resource to other women.

- [Jennifer] When women mentor each other,
it can be incredibly powerful.

I got to know a talented young
journalist named, Jessica Shambora.

Jessica was covering a story for
Fortune magazine about mentorship.

That really proves the point.

- [Jessica Shambora] I just wanted to
introduce myself to you, guys.

I'm Jessica Shambora. I'm with Fortune,
and so we'd be covering the event tonight.

Mini-mentoring is a program
that a couple of the women

from Fortune's most powerful women
Summit came up with, in order to reach

a larger group of young women
who really have this desire to be mentored

and get advice from successful
professional women.

They would have sort of like,
a speed dating night,

except for substitute,
mentoring for the dating.

- [Dee Dee Myers] The most important
thing that should drive decisions,

especially when you're young is

what really get your
heart pitter-pattering.

- [Candy Crowley] In the end,
here's the deal.

You wanna be so good at what you do,
that they can't ignore you.

- [Dana Perino] Turn off the
television and read.

One hour of reality TV can be fun.

Four hours is like destructive.
[others laughing]

- [Susan Molinari] To thine own self,
be true. Know who you are.

Know what is best about you.
Have confidence in yourself

and don't try and be anybody else.

- [Dana Perino] On Tony Snow's last day,
when he was leaving the white house

and I was taking over officially as
the White House Press secretary,

he came into my office and he said,

"You are better at this
than you think you are."

- [Susan Molinari] I hope you will
remember that you will help

that next generation of women a lot.

It is far overdue that we, women,
stop criticizing each other,

the decisions and the life decisions
that we make and instead say,

"Alleluia, sister. Whatever gets you
through, I'm there to support you."

[cheers and applause]

- [Lisa Ling] You know, if women
don't stand up for each other,

then no one else will.
No one's gonna look out

for the interest of women,
except other women.

- [Katie Couric] If women spent
more time helping a sick neighbor

or volunteering at a homeless shelter,
or focusing on how to use

all their energy to solve
some of the world's problems,

if they spent a tenth of the time thinking
about those things than they do thinking

about their weight, I mean, I think,
we'd solve all the world's problems

in a matter of months.

- [Dianne Feinstein] We're here for
an instant in an eternity.

And all that really matters
is what we do with that time

- [Pat Mitchell] We have enormous power.
Eighty six percent of the

purchasing power in this country
is in the pockets of women.

Well, let's use it. I mean, let's use it
not to buy those tabloid magazines

and not to support the
tabloid television shows.

A consumer's voice is maybe

the most important,
powerful voice we have,

other than as a citizen
and using our vote.

- [Nancy Pelosi] Women in America
will be more encouraged

if they could see young women
who share their experience

raising a young family, speaking for them,
identifying with their aspirations.

- [Rosario Dawson] We're creating
new leaders and they're going

to not look like how they always did.
An older white male.

They're gonna look like a woman and
they're gonna look like people of color

and that is the true reflection
of this country and of this world.

- [Marie Wilson] I got this
little letter one day.

"Ms. Wilson, do you realize there has
never been a woman president?"

And then she said, "I will make a
great president. I'm practicing my piano,

I'm doing my Math and my name is
Alexandra, which means leader of men."

- [Jennifer] Look at the eyes. Oh, honey.
- Oh, oh, oh.

- Hello.

[giggles]

- Hello.

Oh, she's smiling.

On September 18th 2009,
I began my journey into motherhood.

My husband and I have the same wishes

for Montana that any parents
have for their child.

We want her to pursue her purpose
and passions in life

and to understand
that what's really important

is who she is on the inside.

And it's critical to us
that all girls grow up in a world

where their voice counts,

where our culture embraces them
in all of their diversity

and where they're afforded
equal opportunities to succeed in life.

I keep coming back to my early years.

Too often, we girls and women
don't recognize our own internal strength.

I now know that we can't let anyone
or anything take our power away from us.

What do you think, Montana?

Are you ready?

- If we really want things
to change around you,

here's what you can do.

Text REPRESENT to
1458
01:24:38,484 --> 01:24:41,236
- Measure yourself by accomplishments
and not by how you look.

- If you and I, every time
we pass a mirror,

downgrade on how we look,
or complain about our looks,

if we remember that a girl is watching us,
and that's what she's learning.

- Reflect on the ways you
may contribute to sexism.

- I include myself in this.
We scrutinize the women.

"God, look how old she's gotten,
look how gray she's gotten.

What is she wearing?"

I think that as women, we need to stop
that destructive behavior

that we inflict upon each other
and ultimately onto ourselves.

- Support media that champions
accomplished women.

- We need strong women role models who
in the media because they did something,

because they're doing great work,
not because they have

the most bangin' body
and they're sexiest woman of 2010.

They're the best philanthropists.

They're the best in the medical field
and it's not about the way they look,

it's about who they are inside.

- Boycott magazines, TV shows and movies
that objectify and degrade women.

- Speaking your mind and criticizing
media companies when you think

they're doing things that are
inappropriate at your children,

is not just your God-given right
as an American, as a parent,

but it's also entirely consistent
with the First Amendment.

- Go see movies written
and directed by women.

- And it's important to go on opening
weekend and Friday is best

because these are the numbers
that Hollywood tracks.

- Write your own stories
and create your own media

about powerful women
in non-traditional roles.

- My daughter, when she was nine,
she wrote this little screenplay

and she shot a movie you know,
with our little video camera,

with her you know, casting her friends
and it was just so much fun for her

and it teaches them that the media
are a construction.

And they start to understand

that these are stories that people
are telling them and they can come up

with their own stories to tell back
and very often, they can be you know,

subversive stories, resistant stories.

- Teach those around you
to look at the media critically.

- Well, one thing that I do with my kids,
is I watch these shows with them,

I say, "Hey, did you notice
there's only one female in that group?"

and, "What if that character
had been a girl, instead?"

and, "Why is she wearing that when
she's trying to rescue somebody?"

- Ask your school to start
a media literacy course

focused on gender issues.

- We need media literacy as much I think,
as we need to learn to read.

Our responses should be, "Whose
perspectives are framing this story?"

"There are always more than
two sides to every story."

"Are we being sold here?"

- Don't be afraid
to challenge your friends

if you hear them saying
derogatory things about women.

- King said it very eloquently, "The
problem today is not the vitriolic words

and the evil actions
and the bad people,

it's the appalling silencing
and inaction of the good people."

- Find healthy role models
and be a mentor to others.

- Encourage women to become leaders
- and support them in the process.

- If we see women who we think
would be excellent at any political job,

whether it's dog catchers,
school board member,

or member of Congress,
we need to make that known.

- "Whatever women do, they must do
twice as well as a man

to be thought of as half as good.

Luckily, that's not too difficult."

Miss Representation
would not be possible

if one woman had not
initially believed in another.

Thank you Regina for your trust
in me and our team.

May we all make empowering
other women and girls a priority.