It's because…it's the woman's…choice? A woman can wear what she pleases, and if a man objectifies her body, that's on him. If a woman is portrayed with unrealistically large boobs, a tiny waist, and an inhumanly sized ass in a video game, and she is canonicially just the "sexy" character, then…yeah, it's objectifying. Here's an example:
Scarlett Johansson poses nude for a shoot. People go crazy for it. That's fine, she's controlling her body and her narrative.
Joss Whedon writes in the script "Black Widow is standing there, looking sexy and gorgeous and her boobs look great." Before going on to say "Iron Man, the super intelligent hero" etc. Not fine.
See the difference?
Alright, yeah, I see that now. And really, it does really get on my nerves when I see characters whose main defining trait is "they're sexy", whether it's in TV, books, games, anything. Like can you please just… Make good characters? Instead of simply drawing boobs and calling it a day? Please???
Walking out of the helicopter is SHIELD AGENT MARIA HILL, SEXY, FIERCE AND DETERMINED.
TALL THUG is in the middle of a brutal beating on NATASHA ROMANOFF, a SLEWING, FOXY, UNBELIEVABLY SEXY SPY.
Check out the subreddit r/menwritingwomen, it's hilarious. A lot of men, especially in the past, were unbelievably sexist when they wrote women. It's tragic but leads to some funny stuff.
SJSDJHSHJ I WILL NEVER NOT LAUGH AT BREASTED BOOBILY TO THE STAIRS
I REMEMBER SEEING THAT ONE
I kinda agree with you about the porn/smut thing. I think a lot of it does objectify women, or fetishize other underrepresented members of society. But that same argument can be argued for tons of media. Comic books often objectified women's bodies. Video games. Etc. So really I think the problem isn't the medium, but the audience with the taste for such things.
It is the same thing no matter what the media is. Porn is porn in pictures or videos or books.
It's because…it's the woman's…choice? A woman can wear what she pleases, and if a man objectifies her body, that's on him. If a woman is portrayed with unrealistically large boobs, a tiny waist, and an inhumanly sized ass in a video game, and she is canonicially just the "sexy" character, then…yeah, it's objectifying. Here's an example:
Scarlett Johansson poses nude for a shoot. People go crazy for it. That's fine, she's controlling her body and her narrative.
Joss Whedon writes in the script "Black Widow is standing there, looking sexy and gorgeous and her boobs look great." Before going on to say "Iron Man, the super intelligent hero" etc. Not fine.
See the difference?
Whether or not the woman chooses to be objectified it will still happen. So “being in control” (whatever that means in commercial industries where sex is the best selling thing) has nothing to do with whether or not it is objectification.
In a perfect world a woman could walk around naked and not be objectified. But we don’t live there. At least in a book it isn’t exploiting a living person, but it still helps fuel the narrative that women equal eyeball sex toys for men.
It's because…it's the woman's…choice? A woman can wear what she pleases, and if a man objectifies her body, that's on him. If a woman is portrayed with unrealistically large boobs, a tiny waist, and an inhumanly sized ass in a video game, and she is canonicially just the "sexy" character, then…yeah, it's objectifying. Here's an example:
Scarlett Johansson poses nude for a shoot. People go crazy for it. That's fine, she's controlling her body and her narrative.
Joss Whedon writes in the script "Black Widow is standing there, looking sexy and gorgeous and her boobs look great." Before going on to say "Iron Man, the super intelligent hero" etc. Not fine.
See the difference?
Whether or not the woman chooses to be objectified it will still happen. So “being in control” (whatever that means in commercial industries where sex is the best selling thing) has nothing to do with whether or not it is objectification.
In a perfect world a woman could walk around naked and not be objectified. But we don’t live there. At least in a book it isn’t exploiting a living person, but it still helps fuel the narrative that women equal eyeball sex toys for men.
K, but there's still a difference between a woman feeling comfortable in her body and whatever she wants to wear, vs a man capitalizing off of an unrealistic representation of a woman as a sex object. If a man still objectifies a woman for wearing less clothing, that's on him, as I said, not a fault of her own.
Well of course. But men do that. And it is destructive to everyone involved. And purposefully creating porn, no matter what media, helps fuel the cultural narrative that women are sex objects for men. And I think that is hella messed.
So that’s my problem with smut.
But that's not what smut is ever in a book? It may be a version of porn, yes, but its not the shit you see on PornHub or whatever.
Its consensual, and echos reality not some weird shit about (insert icky porn expletive here), you know what I mean?
Most smut is also written by women so the smut is generally non-objectifying of any character. (I mean there ARE some that get a little cooky with the male…parts… but I mean every girl can dream)
In my years of reading smut, I've never once felt that women were objectified.
Now. This is COMPLETELY different than books that have smut/sex as a bad thing ie: trauma and the like. But I assume you are not talking about that since it is technically an act of violence and is supposed to be viewed that way by readers.
Smut is just sex. Sex isnt bad.
Personally I think smut is only bad if it is feeding into harmful ideals and/or stereotypes (like 50 Shades), although smut in general isn't really my thing.
It's not everyone's cup of tea. Which is completely understandable. But as Jynnie and I have discussed before, I do think it should be more heavily regulated in the rating of books.
Yep which is why New Adult needs to exist again
If someone intentionally picks up a smutty book then it's fine, I only have an issue with it if it's being made readily available to minors (like books with explicit sex being shelved in YA sections)
