Last night I read something that REALLY hit me between the eyes (because of a particular situation that I can't discuss at the moment). She writes:
Can I just say that I too have recognized this horrific trend and am sick to death of being assaulted? May I also say that I am growing more and more angry at the thought of what our daughters and grandaughters are having to guard against?I've watched an unsettling trend develop over the last decade, and I'm convinced that it is the result of this "early hypersexualization." * In the previous generations, the girls who were the most insecure and desperate and the least likely to set boundaries and practice self-respect were normally those with a background of sexual abuse or misuse. We were the ones who settled for so much less in our relationships, caved to pressure, felt like we always had to have a boyfriend, and acted like no was all but missing from our list of multiple-choice answered. Over recent years, a growing number of middle and high school girls who have never been inappropriately touched have taken on these same characteristics. After watching the disturbing trend too long to shake it, I finally realized that our whole Western world is under sexual assault. Whether or not a girl is physically touch in sexually inappropriate ways, the visual impact of early hypersexualization is still significant enough to dramatically shape her self-concept and sexuality.
Our world system is shouting no louder lie to its female population that this: To be desirable is to be valuable, and to be sensual is to be secure. These are the attributes that guarantee you will always be loved.
* A term used by author Cooper Lawrence in her book The Cult of Celebrity. She writes "It's not all in your head: There is a difference between celebrity media images girls see now and what you were exposed to as a child. Highly sexualized images of younger and younger women are becoming the norm."
More on this later...
4 comments:
It would seem the value of womanhood and the beauty of femininity has been reduced to body parts and how well they are "packaged". Even at Claire's age the vast majority of fashion screams "...to be sensual is to be secure...". What we're guarding against becomes easier to do though within the community...when not just the young women, but the young men as well, are being trained with a Biblical world view in these matters.
Sorry for such a wordy response...I guess your post just resonated with me as a mother of four daughters.
=) I love your words.
I like that Lawrence points out that it's "not in our heads" - sometimes I'm looking at the girls I teach thinking, "were things like this when I was in high school?"
I like that she points it out too...makes me feel like I am not going crazy. =)
How's baby Harrison coming along?
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