How do you feel about a country, where women are objectified in just about every visible commercial, wagging the finger at other countries with poor track records on women's rights?

I am gonna go out on a limb, but that sounds a lot like the good ole’ U.S. of A.

Not just the U.S., but western culture in general.

This, I think, is relevant to the Q.

I feel like I might be living in such a place.

That being said, I think you’re comparing apples and oranges.

Using sex to sell is a far cry from denying women basic human rights – as in making them legal property of their husbands, for example.

Because other countries are worse when it comes to those things. Doesn’t mean we should overlook our own problems, but other countries are doing things that are much worse. Putting a woman in skimpy clothing in a commercial is not quite the same as saying you can kill them if they cheat on you.

Just because you have problems doesn’t mean you can’t point them out in other establishments. Otherwise, no one would point out anything wrong going on. We are all flawed in some way. The problem is refusing to address your own problems.

I don’t know but I find your avatar far sexier than the other dude you had before. My brain is confused. :)

I think a country where women actually have the right to choose whether they want to appear in commercials like that, and often even write them, produce them, and profit from them is far superior to a country that treats women like possessions with zero rights.

The right to an education should be a mitigating factor, since well educated men and women are less likely to be swayed by that kind of exposure.

i say “let’s see those jiggly bobs, ladies” as i turn off the news.

Women in this country work, vote, wear the clothes they like and are treated as unique individuals rather than property of a man.

The US isn’t perfect in their track record but I’d say they have some valid points.

Western women are free to make that choice. I don’t think it’s fair to judge women for someting that we all seem to consume. They are hardly victims either, and women enjoy objectifying the male body too.

Though, I agree that sometimes it’s a bit much. Just because you can sell products with boobs, doesn’t always mean you should.

@oratio so selling products with “pecs” or “six pack” is OK?

@YARNLADY stop talking about my work, geez….~

@YARNLADY Sometimes. Not always. Depends on the product, and the concept IMO.

@eponymoushipster I didn’t know you were a photographer? Awesome!

At least those objectified ladies in the commercials get paid (and paid well) to be objectified, and the money is theirs to spend or save as they wish.

And I really don’t mind if you want to try to sell something to me with a nice set of six-pack abs. I won’t buy the product but I will admire the image. But silently, so my kids don’t know their mother is a sexual being.

@shilolo har.

Coincidentally, the Victoria’s Secret catalog showed up in my mail today.

If a woman chooses to be ‘objectified’, I’m all for it. More power to her!

@augustlan and i’m all for page 32 of the spring ‘03 Victoria’s secret catalog.. just sayin’

People, all the time and everywhere, practice one form of hypocrisy or another. I’m not immune to it. You’re not immune to it. The United states isn’t immune to it. Nothing in the world is immune to it.

With that said there is a HUGE difference between paying a girl to prance around half naked to sell beer and forced, female, circumcision.

Whenever there is a cattle call for women for the purposes of objectification they fight each other to get to the head of the queue. Why should anyone feel guilty about that?

Anais Nin said something I that have always related to:

We don’t see things as they are, We see them as we are.

It would appear that I don’t see things your way.

We may be objectified on occasion but at least we aren’t forced to cover up or strip down.

It is a choice here.

@asmonet i choose to imagine you stripped down :)

Me too.

Me three.

Me four.

I don’t feel good about it

@SeventhSense me too

@Blondesjon agreed, with a few provisos, that we do not let the more unpalatable cultural differences, distort our entire perspective of them and leave us somehow unconcerned and totally complacent of our own, more insidious, treatment of women.

What is this “insidious treatment of women” of which you speak. At least in Western societies, no obvious obstacles are placed in the path of women, and the societal expectation is that women are EQUAL TO MEN (though there is no doubt that a glass ceiling still exists, but not in all arenas). Equality means equal voting rights, property rights, marital rights, employment rights, and so on. In Western societies, women can be lawyers, doctors, businesspeople, entrepreneurs, and politicians. In the more close-minded Arab societies, women are expected to be subservient to men, and in some geographic regions, are actually bought and sold like property. That is abhorrent, and you can present all the spin you want about the objectification of women, but women in Western societies are still 1000x better off.

@mammal
I see now said the blind man.
Ok, so being an asshole is not synonymous to being a guy. I think women think that if they were only respected for their thoughts, ideas and not objectified as being sexy then they can be transgender.

But a women pretending to be a guy still comes across as a women or as an asshole guy. It’s not that they are objectified for being a women or disrespected for their ideas, but an attractive woman actually gets more repect, not less. How do we know? Because a man saying some of the things that women say would be trounced or dismissed. A woman’s idea about what it is to be a man is way off, because they’re not men. Likewise a man can never truly know what it means to be a woman. For example, I’m a big guy and I can kick some ass, but I can’t use that. If I do then I’m a bully or at worst a criminal.
My only outlet is to be a dick which I sometimes relish :) But it beats incarceration for manslaughter.
But we all have to be who we are.
I think the boys at South Park said it best in their Team America movie. Perhaps the funniest movie in the last decade:

“Pussies don’t like dicks, because pussies get fucked by dicks. But dicks also fuck assholes: assholes that just want to shit on everything. Pussies may think they can deal with assholes their way. But the only thing that can fuck an asshole is a dick, with some balls. The problem with dicks is: they fuck too much or fuck when it isn’t appropriate – and it takes a pussy to show them that. But sometimes, pussies can be so full of shit that they become assholes themselves… because pussies are an inch and half away from ass holes.”

@SeventhSense allow me to summarize your existence

@mammal that’s a pretty funny clip. my favorite Leary bit is about Jim Henson’s funeral.

No I’m a dick. At least be accurate.

@SeventhSense explains the hole in the top of your head, why you stand up when a woman enters the room, and your hairy feet.

Those are my balls..

@SeventhSense Those are my balls that i am busting a little bit ;)

@mammal
Truce…/——-<@

@SeventhSense peace be unto you