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| Smiley face - mine, Photo - Jessica Yatrofsky |
Warning: this link contains nudity. The girls over at The Core posted a really interesting feature on artist, Jessica Yatrofsky. Ms. Yatrofsky displays male nudity in an attempt to equalize the overwhelming emphasis on the female body in popular culture.
'Jessica Yatrofsky: “My work has the underlying desire to make male nudity more visible in our cultural landscape. Plus: dicks are more easy on the eyes, right?! Our society is always eager to construct and depict the sexuality of women, but actively avoids the sexuality of men, except as voyeurs. Our generation should be challenging these inequalities.” '
While it is true that women are overly sexualized and put on display in advertising and movies, does the remedy come in the form of subjecting men to the same scrutiny?
Or is the point moot? Do women have the same physical reaction to male nudity as men do to female nudity?
Is this reaction inherent or a result of societal conditioning?
Initially, did the provocative displays of the female body offend the senses and shock people in the same way that Ms. Yatrofsky's photos do? Are they less shocking because we have become desensitized?
If we are desensitized, I would argue that it isn't a good thing. Just as inflation occurs when the market is flooded with currency, thereby devaluing the currency; the flooding of public space with scantily clad women may lessen the value of the female body.
Many argue that it empowers women, because they have the choice to do with their bodies what they will. I would never say that anyone should mandate how women should dress, but as a woman - making those decisions for myself, could modesty add value? The overwhelming availability of female nudity subjects each woman to endless comparison. Eating disorders and plastic surgery and rampant consumerism are the destructive forces threatening women from the teen years through adulthood.
The shape of a woman's body which once was hers and hers alone to share, is now held to some standard set by the public market. In the attempt to escape a patriarchal control, have we gone too far?
What do you think?
