Women, Violence, and the Media: Readings in Feminist Criminology

Chapter 10. Running Out of Oxygen: Is "Television for Women" Suffocating Women?

chapter  RUNNING OUT OF OXYGEN Is “Television for Women” Suffocating Women? Emily Lenning and Darrin Kowitz The social sciences have long wondered whether reality reflects television or whether television reflects reality (Baehr, ). That it is difficult to sort out the relationship tells us how ingrained television is in the structure of modern society and leads us, as feminist critics, to place the question of reflection at the center of our work. Do the images that flicker across our television screens incorporate masculine ideologies, reflecting a patriarchal reality? Alternatively, do such images offer an alternate reading that identifies feminine ideologies, opening rather than closing doors to women? What justifies our question is that television is simply unavoidable . In Dow’s words, it is “part of life” (Dow, , p. ). In fact, . of all households had basic cable, and . of those households subscribed to pay channels, in  (Wright, ). Moreover, . million Americans subscribed to the Lifetime channel, making the women’s network one of the top  cable networks in the – period (Wright, ). Given the importance of women’s cable networks, we focus on made-for-television movies—a staple feature of their programming —to work toward a feminist film critique. Literature Review Feminist Approaches to Film Criticism Feminist film criticism that concerns this project entails debates over the interpretation of film images. On the one hand, feminist criticism focuses on the negative effects of masculine ideologies. Freeland (, p. ) asserts that feminist criticism can essentially be summed up as ideology critique inasmuch as it functions to expose “a false or distorted belief system that sustains the interests of the dominant group, males, over the·  · subordinate group, females.” Feminist researchers, for instance, have argued that the negative or hostile gender stereotypes perpetuated by the media serve to restrict the interpersonal, social, and political advancement of women (Baehr, ; Gunter, Harrison, & Wykes, ). On the other hand, an alternative approach to feminist criticism has emerged, as represented by the work of Freeland () and Shaw (). Feminism is a belief system that seeks to change the interests of the dominant group. By ignoring the ideological framework of feminism, Freeland () argues that feminist film critics succeed in pointing out the negative aspects of sexist ideology but fail to provide an alternative cinematic purpose. Moreover, “the negative critique of masculinist ideology” is “old hat in intellectual circles” (Shaw, , p. ). A more desirable approach involves “offering positive redescriptions of films” and promises to “do more to further the feminist cause” than prior criticism based on exposing masculinist ideology (Shaw, , p. ). Kozol () claims that the media may not fail the feminist vision; they may set out positive gender representations. Films and television programming sometimes embrace the victim’s standpoint and may be the basis for an audience to gain a broader understanding of victimization. Rapping points out that television movies that are concerned with social issues such as domestic violence (e.g., The Burning Bed ) should be viewed in part as propaganda, made effective because “they combine a strong ideological component with an equally strong appeal to emotion” (Rapping, , p. ).1 In addition to the debate over critical standards, a second school of feminist thought, which bears on our project, focuses on films in relation to the gender of those who create them. According to feminist standpoint theory (Harstock, ; Smith, ), stories about women and for women must be told by women in order to be something other than a reproduction of traditional patriarchal ideology. The meaning of the term “by women” may have to give way to the realities of ownership and management as well as to gender variation in decision-making roles. Because corporate ownership is removed from day-to-day filmmaking, the gender mix of creative talent may influence films. For example, if the writer is a woman and the director and producer are men, we can ask whether the resulting film would necessarily reproduce patriarchal ideology. The answer would depend on the film’s content. running out of oxygen·  · Women’s Cinema Over the last decade, feminist researchers have analyzed the content of television and film (Cooper, ; Harris & Hill, ; Rapping, ; Rich, ). “Women’s cinema” is an emerging arena for feminist criticism . Women play a substantial role in its production. Feminist critics argue that women’s cinema exercises more favorable influences on the lives of women.2 Rapping (, p. xi) notes that women’s made-fortelevision movies have their...