We learn that the objectification of women and animals is marketed largely in a way that is appealing to anyone who finds women or animals/food in relation to women entertaining. After the past few readings in this course and learning how much america, media, food and pretty much anything can be related or symbolize as a woman and vise versa, the more i start to notice it. The sexualization of women and animals is just a bit weird to me, we all have heard the phrase “I’m not a piece of meat” but I have seen many advertisements that had sexual suggestives, but for some reason I never really connected the two unless it was very obvious, I am more aware now.
In the bundle of photos I chose to analyze the following three, a picture of a pig wearing leg stockings with its rear exposed standing upright, wearing makeup, a skirt, heels, and holding a glass of wine… clearly resembling a woman. In this photo the pig is feminized, but I don’t know exactly what the ad is for, all I know is it may intrigue men more than women, I know that I for one do not want to be referred to or related to a pig.
The second photo was a baked chicken, with bikini tan lines.. Men usually don’t wear bikinis so again in reference to a woman. Chicken is interesting if you think about the parts being labeled “breast, thighs, legs” MOST other meats aren’t labeled this way. Why is it chicken breast, and not chest? Why do they have thighs, why can’t it just be legs? The more I read into things that we have come so accustomed to the more my brow is raised? How did this all start?
The third photo was a pork rib advertisement, with a man in the middle with a rack of ribs on the table in front of him and two large breasted women on each side of him, with the title “we’ve got the best racks”. An obvious play on words, but the simple image of a man with a rack of ribs in front of him wouldn’t have been enough. How easily to intrigue a man than a nice rack of ribs and two women with a “nice rack” I’ve always wondered why people refer to women’s breasts as “racks” and how it all began.
In the Antennae reading it wrote “Colonizers evaluated other humans according to their relationship with the other animals. Europeans assumed that those who controlled animals were more advanced than those who tilled the field” which I believe was a view transferred onto woman and their relationship with men. Men were and are still likely to be viewed as the one who is in control, the one who knows more (controlled animals) who also in most places control their wives. Women are likely to be viewed as those who tilled the field. They take care of the foundation in order for the man to do as they please with whatever is taken care of for them. How is it that men got to remain as humans and women fell with the animals? My best guess would be that when men were providing food and doing dangerous things they were sought out to be the caretakers, but they cannot survive without the food they bring home or their women who ensure the food is there to keep them alive. I believe this all boils down to sustainability, who and what are you sustained by.
Antennae 2010