Do you see me?

June 1, 2017June 1, 2017

Do you see me?

Do you see me? I don’t think you do, so let me shed some light and quote Nayyirah Waheed,”Never trust anyone who says they do not see color. This means to them, you are invisible,” and this invisibility cloak extends to gender.

I asked a simple question about women’s roles in movies. Most of the people referred to movies produced in the last two decades spanning approximately 12,000 A-listed films. From the titles listed by my family, friends, colleagues, and acquaintances, a list of about 45 movies was compiled where the woman is the strong protagonist, not a comic book character, not bitchy, and not looking for romance. People listed movies, TV series, short films that expanded well beyond A-listed films and was encompassing a base of closes 50,000 movies and only about 45 tiles could be conjured up.

On average, most people watch 5 hours of TV daily. According to IMDb since 1900 an average 2577 movies are produced per year. In the past 10 years, things have exploded from 4584 in 2005 to 9387 in 2015.

Do you see me?

In 4,370 speaking/named characters on screen (good/bad/indifferent):
100 top‐grossing films of 2015
68.6% male
31.4% female
Gender ratio of 2.2 males/1 female.

There has been no meaningful change between 2007 and 2015.

Of the 100 top films of 2007- 2015
32% depicted a female lead/co lead
5 films portrayed female leads/co leads 45 years of age or older
26 films portrayed male leads/co leads 45 years of age or older.

When you do see me, what am I?
from 2007-2015
12% Women protagonists
30.2% women in sexually revealing clothing
7.7% men in sexually revealing clothing
29% women nudity
9.5% male nudity

100 top‐grossing films of 2015
1,365 directors, writers, and producers:
81% men
19% women.
107 directors
92.5% men
7.5% women.

2007-2015 in 800 films and 886 directors
4.1% women directors
Gender ratio of 24 men/1 female.
3 Black women directors
1 Asian female director

Women-directed films had 6.8% more females on screen
Women-written films had 7.5% more females on screen

The above data is from, Stacy Smith: The data behind Hollywood’s sexism

Why is the film industry important? Because the growing body of psychological research and theory on gender and leadership note, there are role incongruities and prejudice toward females and female leaders when it comes from the social information people receive from their daily lives. Storytelling is important. Women are being left out of that history, left out of the dialogue, and portrayed in sexualized and trivialized ways. What we see on-screen and what we see in the world, does not match. Stories tell us what societies value and they offer us lessons.

Prejudice is learned, and to white men of privilege, they do not see women. Therefore, women, you need to share your stories of strength and preserve our history.

#Womeninspirechange #doclead #bywomen #WICCD

MOVIE LIST: woman is the strong protagonist, not a comic book character, not bitchy, and not looking for romance

Helen Keller
Corrina, Corrina
The Blind Side
Tracks
Driving Miss Daisy
Erin Brockovich
Sister Act
A League of Their Own
The Help
9 to 5
Mame
Contact
Gravity
Hidden Figures
Denial
Temple Gardin
The Iron Lady
Elizabeth
Anne of Green Gables
The Legend of Billie Jean
Joan of Arc
Julie and Julia
To Kill A Mockingbird
Philomena
Matilda
Gorillas in the Mist
Silkwood
Norma Rae
Panic Room
“Merkel” – yet to be released
Alien – Saga
Victor Victoria
Orphan Black
Million Dollar Baby
Silence of the Lambs
GI Jane
Sister Cities
Extremities
Dead Calm
Brokedown Palace
Changeling
Mad Max: Fury Road
Agora
The Whistleblower

April 29, 2017April 29, 2017

A riddle

A Riddle –

A man and his child are driving on I-95, and they’re in a terrible accident. The father is killed. The seriously injured child is unconscious and airlifted to the nearest Level I Trauma Center. As they’re bringing the child off the helicopter to the arriving trauma team, the Trauma Surgeon-in-Chief runs up and says, “I can’t treat this kid, that’s my child.”

How is this possible?

A conversation between two women.
WHITE WOMAN (WW): All women face the same oppression as women. All women are similarly situated in patriarchy, and therefore all women have a kind of intuitive solidarity or sisterhood.

BLACK WOMAN (BW): I’m not so sure. Let me ask you a question. So, when you get up in the morning and you look in the mirror, what do you see?

WW: I see a woman.

BW: You see, that’s the problem for me. Because when I wake up in the morning and I look in the mirror, I see a black woman. To me, race is visible. But to you, race is invisible. You don’t see it.

And that’s how privilege works. You see, privilege is invisible to those who have it. It is a luxury. Privilege is invisible to those who have it!

As I have quoted before;
“Never trust anyone who says they do not see color.
This means to them, you are invisible.”
― Nayyirah Waheed

Men are invisible. “What?”
When people hear the word “gender,” they think it means women, gay, lesbian, bisexual. Until women can confront a men’s sense of entitlement, I don’t believe that we will understand why a great number of men resist gender equality. Men don’t have a gender. This is one of the ways that dominant systems maintain and reproduce themselves. Rarely is a dominating system challenged to think about its dominance; that’s one of the keys to power and privilege, the ability to go unexamined, lacking introspection, in fact, being rendered invisible. White men in the United States and Europe are the beneficiaries of the single greatest affirmative action program in the history of the world; they are invisible.

The lack of speaking out is silence, and isn’t silence a form of consent and complicity? We have heard that before in male rhetoric around female violence. “She didn’t say no”. That leads to the next question, why are men left out of the term, “female violence”?

“In the end, what will hurt the most is not the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends.”
― Martin Luther King

Humanity needs more adult men with power to start prioritizing these issues because gender equality is good for men. Young men want lives where they have a marvelous relationship with their child; where their children are safe from predators. They expect their partners to work outside the home and be just as committed to their careers as they are. When men participate in housework and childcare, their kids are happier and healthier. When men share housework and childcare, their wives are happier. When men share, they live longer, are happier, have daughters with high esteem, sons believing in gender equality, and they themselves are more successful and more profitable in business.

The World Economics Forum was reporting that it wouldn’t be until 2133 until Equal Pay would be a reality, but with recent global changes, it has been pushed back to 2186. Sadly, it will take 7 generations until that female Trauma Surgeon-in-Chief, the child’s mother, will be paid equally.
PS: Alternatively, it could have been one of the child’s two dads. Upholding equal humanity.

#womeninspirechange #HeforShe

April 5, 2017

Wednesday Wreading: The Story of an Hour

The Story of an Hour | Kate Chopin

A woman is given the news that her husband has been killed in a train accident. Over the next hour, she thinks about what her life will be and experiences a range of emotions.

Read Here