Erin Andrews: Women in Power as Sexual Objects
July 21, 2009
by Amy Siskind
|A frequent topic on our blog is the sexualization of our teenage daughters and the danger that lies therein. But it is not just our young daughters, objectifying woman is a true cultural phenomena. Scary thing is how acceptable and celebrated that it has become.
ESPN's Erin Andrews
Erin Andrews of ESPN is the latest victim. Reports are circulating that Erin was the victim of video voyeurism after someone shot video of her in a private moment through her hotel room peephole.
Maggie Hendricks at Yahoo writes:
Sexual assault — and, make no mistake, Andrews was assaulted — will. Voyeurism isn’t “boys will be boys,” or realizing that men are ogling your (clothed) picture. Voyeurism is about taking safety and security from a victim in a place they should feel comfortable.
I agree with Maggie that this is a sexual assault of sorts. Here’s a brilliant and knowledgeable spokesperson in her field who has been degraded into a sexual object. And this type of sexualization and objectification of women has major impact that reaches far and wide. It’s not only our media personalities, it’s our women in politics (Sarah Palin for example), business and every other realm.
I experienced this type of sexual put down time and time again on Wall Street. While I was co-head of a department at Morgan Stanley 8 years ago, I recall interviewing a young man for a sales position. After I met with the interviewee, my co-head Mike went in to interview him next. Mike came out of the interview red in the face and looking ready for a fight. Apparently, the first comment this young man had made in the interview with Mike was a sexual comment about me. Needless to say he didn’t get the job; but it’s a terrible feeling as a woman to be objectified this way.
And we need more Mike’s that will stand up for women against this onslaught. It is such an easy thing to diminish women by making them into sexual objects. It’s one of the oldest tools in the woodshed in the degradation of female power.
This is part of the Next Wave. We need women and like-minded men to speak out against this type of stuff. We need mothers and fathers to say – hey – Erin could be my daughter and I don’t like it! We need, collectively, to make this type of behavior unacceptable.
And this is a teachable moment for those of us who are parents on this blog. And not only to protect and fortify our daughters, but to explain to our sons what are acceptable parameters for judging our women in positions of power and in everyday life.
Sounds like a criminal invasion of privacy, not a social movement.
I doubt that anyone has either accepted or is celebrating this. Or has ESPN been running the footage on a continuous loop while the male anchors play a shot-drinking game? (I don’t watch sports, so I wouldn’t know.)
Given that Erin’s violation by an electronic stalker anchors an almost totally unrelated fugue on workplace harassment and public sexism in the media, I’d say this is the second time Erin has served as a target-of-opportunity for someone else’s “agenda.”
I think the “reports are circulating” is the connection. This business of degrading successful and well-known women is more like a social movement than voyeurism.
Agree with John. StrangeAppar8us, you don’t get it.
It was actually reviled this morning that the most likely candidate for videotaping Ms. Andrews is another member of the sports world due to the fact that there are actually several videos in existence at different hotel locations. This was either a fellow journalist or a member of a sports news crew that would have been attending and/or covering the same events.
I love how they call it voyeurism, as if gender neutral. It’s not. The majority of men consider it an agreeable past time to invade the privacy of women.
And yes, it is a social movement because we are sick of it.
According to the one source, it is believed that the creep that taped her is someone who travels with her, i.e, another ESPN employee because they were very aware of her schedule. That adds to the creepiness factor, stalker material or just malicious? Oh, and by the way, the state laws for punishing this sort of crime is either nonexistant or the penalties are very light.; probably because the vast majority of victims are women. These laws need to be revisited.
Don’t you think comparing someone making a sexual comment about you and someone videoing this poor woman through the keyhole of her hotelroom is going a little far?
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