Women images, in media are always stereotyped. The roles they perform, the way they are presented are all traditional and had been the same way for decades now. Women are always prioritized for their physical beauty, sex appeal, submissive and suffering character. Be it advertorials or soap operas, women always are portrayed in their stereotype images.
Women in Advertorials
Despite women's pro-active movement and Code of Commercial Advertising on Doordarshan, the Code for Self Regulation and Code for Advertising Practice of the Advertising Standard Council of Pakistan and the Indecent Representative of Women (Prohibition) Act 1986, the fact remains that both Print and Electronic Media continue to portray stereotype images of women. They focus on sex appeal or physical beauty of women to sell a product. In spite of some good work being done by NGO's like Media Watch, Amnesty International and some select UN committees, the assessment of the content and portrayal of women by media have remained a neglected area of research and a matter meriting redress by the regulatory bodies.
In most of the advertorials, Women are portrayed either as housewives obsessed with cleanliness, personal hygiene, fragrances and liking for products to keep home dirt and germ free or as a sex object focusing their physical beauty, well-set hair, perfect body shape and teeth, shining skin, etc. to sell products. Woman's beauty and bodily charm is used to sell cosmetics and physical fitness products.
Even the advertorials depict women as submissive characters and dependent on men for their rescue while most of the men in the advertisements are more masculine and strong and comparatively successful. Advertisements showcasing successful and competent women are lesser than the ones with housewives and beautiful bimbos. The ads that feature women in the lead and central role are the ones for kitchen and home appliances, sanitary, cosmetics, baby care, domestic help and detergents. Some ads also show women crying out for help unless a man comes to rescue. Such ads portraying man as strong and central character often promote products for man's use. The ads for cosmetic products show women obsessed with her physical beauty and trying to make her look beautiful in order to attract a man.
A study of women in advertisements shows that women's appearance in personal hygiene product adverts are seven times more than those of the adverts in other categories. Seventy five percent of all adverts portray women for products used in the bathroom or kitchen; fifty six percent of adverts portray women as domestic helps or housewives. While men are presented in forty three professions concerning their roles, women in comparison are presented in eighteens of them.
Adverts, thus, stereotype women image portraying them as dedicated housewives or beauties in order to attract men.
Women in Soap Operas
Another stereotype entails depicting women as a wife or a mother or shy, submissive and suffering women or someone meant exclusively for home and in certain cases, another woman's enemy. This type of image is usually seen in the daily soaps. Women here are showcased as wife or mother or a daughter-in-law or a domestic help suffering through all the trouble for the sake of the family welfare, fighting with the evils, usually another woman portrayed as villain. Though she is attractive, she is home centered and contented. Although, the central character is given to the lady, the male characters are usually successful and often competent. No matter how competent the woman is shown in the soap at the beginning, as the series proceeds and she gets married, all women turn into the submissive and suffering housewives. All her, dreams and aims are shattered and she ends up having only one aim in life that is, to beget children and nurture her new family. Almost all of the prime time soap operas fall into this category. No matter how competent she was at the beginning, she ends up herself into middle of the domestic trouble.
The aim of each woman depicted there is to get married and beget children. These soaps are about companionship and relationship. In them relationship between women among themselves are important but not so important as between a woman and a man. The woman is left to serve the world inside her home while the outside world belongs to her husband or sons, similar to the traditional society. Most of the soap operas showcase traditional families with women busy in household chores and tensions and also are dressed in traditional attire, usually a sari covering their heads with a Pallu. Most of our prime television soaps fall in this category. Only few of the soap operas show women as competitive and working lady. However, a woman who pursues her career at the expense of her men-folk is shown to come to grief for her audacity and unnatural aspiration and also displayed as a failure. Any attempt on her part to challenge the accepted stereotype image of a woman whose success and achievement depend upon her working with men does not find favour with conventional audience. Hence, the soap operas, too, stereotype women's role.
Women in Film Industries
The film industry is not an exception. The actresses in the movies are usually the sufferers and waiting for their hero to come and rescue them. Old movies where the lady had a strong character were rare as woman stronger than a man was not acceptable in the society. However, few movies did break the stereotype. So far, the Western market has overcome the traditional pattern of portraying women however the Eastern film market still revolves around the same line with very few exceptions. Women still are weak and dependent over their father or their boyfriend/husbands. They usually are the easy target for the villains and it is the hero who rescues them. They are usually obsessed with their looks and make up. One of the best example is the Bollyhood movie Tees Mar Khan where Katrina Kaif's character is so much obsessed with being an actress and looking good that the only thing she does in the entire movie is make up and overacting. The actresses are either simple villager or a super glamorous city girl but always weak and dependent on a male.
Women as Media Professionals
Also, the media as a profession for women is more or less difficult. They are always left behind in terms of major decision making or control of the management. The important decision makers are usually men and also the major or the important role and responsibilities lies on their hands. Women are more often in front of the camera reading news or leading some programs. The presenters, as we see them, are beautiful ladies with perfect physical features. Women are judged not just by their talent but also their beauty and good looks in the media. Be it a mainstream media or other, women with good looks could be found dominating the cameras. Not just adverts and daily soap operas but also professional media outlets, broadcast stations prefer women with good looks and facial features than a plain one. In the media, women are judged more by their looks then their intellect. This, however, at present, is changing and we can see few women enjoying the important and decision making posts in the media houses.
Media, as a result, has not been doing justice to the role of women in society. However, for media to promote balanced and non-stereotype portrayal of women in their multiple roles, it is imperative that government, media, NGOs and private sector should come together and forge joint strategies to promote gender equality and gender justice. However this presupposes gender sensitivity among media owners and managers. In its new-found expansive role, media should foster a broad ethical content and moralizing impulse in the society so essential for the emergence of a civil society. Moreover for the society’s abiding benefit media must nurture and transmit humane values of civilization. They must take upon themselves the proactive role of a protector and a promoter of human rights, gender justice and democratic order. Thus, the stereotyping of the women in the media should be removed and they should be treated and characterized as equals and in their present status and role. However, in context of portraying women in a fair manner, Eastern media (especially Nepali) still has a long way to go.
