THE NEW AMERICAN WOMAN

Since the 1960’s women have been struggling for their place in society.  For the right to vote, for equal pay, for the right to make choices about their bodies.  We’ve been treated like “girls” in the workplace.  We’ve had to endure all kinds of sexist remarks and jokes.  The entire time sucking it up just to hold our own in the world we lived in, a man’s world, just to earn their respect because of what we can bring to the table. 

Finally after what seemed to be a break, after seeing women reach positions of importance in government, communications, science and business, we seem to be spiraling back to the dark ages.

In the recent years the new generation has been pushing women back to a time when we were just sex objects, and homemakers, only now its worse.  The new generation only want to be seen as sex objects.  They have no intention of being homemakers.  Their offerings are physical. Perky breasts, shapely butts, flat abs, puffy lips, eyebrows “on fleek”, and anything else that makes them look like a centerfold.  Nothing of real substance or permanent, just the visuals. 

Rappers refer to them as “bitches and hos” and incredibly enough they refer to each other, and themselves the same way. They accept this as a compliment, or their reality.  Pitbull sings about slapping their ass and having them rub up against him, they love it and eat it up.  Their clothes are revealing to show off all their wares.  There is no need for anything on a mental level because “ain’t nobody got time for dat”.

At what point did these young women lose their self-respect?  Where did the situation take a turn for the worse?  Many of these women were raised by strong single moms who worked and were the bread winners for their families. 

In my opinion this loss of self-respect is partially a product of what is presented to our society by Hollywood.   Hollywood has been at the forefront of liberalism for a long time, if not always.  New ideas, new concepts, any thoughts and changes that need to be entertained are brought to us in our living rooms and big screens over and over each night.  I refer to it as the brainwashing of America. There are positives and negatives to this.  I think the negatives outweigh positives.  I think we need to look towards the ulterior motives for everything that is presented to us as a society.

The glamorization of drug use was brought to us by Hollywood through movies and shows like Scarface and Miami Vice, among others.  The oversexualization of women was presented to us through music videos showing young women shaking everything while the rappers and hip hop artists felt them up in their videos treating them like tasty treats to have at their beck and call.

Despite the ads on television warning of the dangers of AIDS and the easy transmission of STDs, sexual activity with multiple partners continued to be portrayed in a progressively more graphic manner on television shows.  Sex became an open topic and the more you had, the better.  All the progress made by strong, self-reliant women is slowly disappearing, and again the upcoming generation is pushing things back to square one.