• Dr. Johann FosterOP
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    210 months ago

    I didn’t actually put this picture together. I just found it online. I have watched the show and am aware that it is not a celebration of chauvinism or a glorification of the era it represents (but perhaps you know the quote attributed to Truffaut that “there is no such thing as an anti-war movie”). This shot, though, besides being beautifully composed, is clearly a literal depiction of the Male Gaze.

    The quoted text comes, not from some incel manifesto, but from a fairly standard social psychology journal article on gender in marketing (coincidentally, or not, a subject of the show): https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1349954

    I reserve the right to take things out of context regardless of authorial intent, because Roland Barthes said I could. But here, for your enjoyment, is a more unironic example, from a director who was a huge influence on Mad Men, but not feminist.

    • Dr. Johann FosterOP
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      310 months ago

      Or this, much more current example, from a much lesser director

    • @AnaisRim
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      210 months ago

      The male gaze is all old school, going back at least to Lacan. Perhaps earlier.

      Thank you for your post. Some of us get it.

    • @[email protected]
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      110 months ago

      If you have the right to take things out context I have the right to put them back into context and I don’t need to hide under the petticoats of any author, filmmaker or philosopher to do so.

      The quote is used incorrectly to imply that misogyny is good when in fact it’s about the implicit power imbalance in the male gaze the is the gateway to things like rape and murder and all manner of female victimisation by men. A valid quote used in such a manner invalidates the authorial intent.

      • Dr. Johann FosterOP
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        310 months ago

        Sorry you didn’t like the Roland Barthes joke. My intent is not to seriously promote misogyny.

        Sometimes we eroticize things we fear or hate or otherwise consider evil or disgusting, like feeling pain or inflicting it. This is just kink for me. I posted this on a dedicated NSFW server in a community dedicated to that kind of kink.

        The person who created the image also did not intend it to promote misogyny or kink, but to educate people about feminism (hence the quote from an ordinary journal article).