Fairly recently I subscribed to Life Magazine's mailing list because I'm a photographer and was interested in seeing the type of work they have on the site. I only got a few emails from them which were all nothing really exciting.
Today, however, I got one with something that caught my eye. At the bottom of each email, Life lists the "popular photos" which they define as "The photos that made our readers click like crazy". In this category were the following headlines: "Civil Rights: Rare Photos", "38 Cute cheerleaders", "The Real Women of 'Grey Gardens'", and "Crazy Miliary Parades"... all in that order.
That's right, "38 Cute Cheerleaders" came right after "Civil Rights"...
Anyway, after looking at the photos which are pretty soft porn-y - especially the line of cheerleaders bending down... not even kidding - I wrote a complaint to the list and unsubscribed.
The photos are here.
I thought, as a photographer, that Life Magazine was supposed to be about something more real and sunstantial... how do you go from showing the conditions that people were in during the Great Depression to this sexist bullshit??
If you are so inclined, please write to them and let them know that it offends you.
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Life Magazine can't control what its readers think are its best photos. Why would you get offended?
I was thinking the same.
And if your issue is why have the pictures in the first place, then we're back to the whole thing about not allowing people to post ANY photographs of women unless they are unattractive? That only marginalizes women more and oppresses women.
If you're an attractive woman you can't win. If anyone ever takes a picture of you, it's sexist. So you can't get your picture taken. When oppresses you bigtime IMO. I've never understood this.
The title of the set is "Cute Cheerleaders."
A title says a lot and somewhat determines how the viewer is going to approach the material. This particular title automatically makes it informal and sexist, and undermines any of the "sport" aspect. They wouldn't dare title a set of football game shots as "Cute football players."
By giving it this name, Life is responsible.
My first post was meant in response to pleco.
I think the real problem is that cheerleaders are inherently attractive and sexy by default. They have to be in order to make the team. That is what makes it offensive.
Of course it would be ridiculous to deem any photo of an attractive women showing any skin as "offensive," but it has everything to do with the context. This is a set of ONLY attractive women. I don't see much variation. It's pretty much all skinny, beautiful, white women. That's a little offensive.
Not to mention the fact that they decided to title the set "Cute cheerleaders," which only reinforces the idea that cheerleaders are merely objects to be fawned over.
I have mixed feelings about this set. There are actually quite a few photographs in there that aren't very "sexy" and show the women working hard as athletes. I appreciate that. Even the soft-porn shots (of which there are many...) are remarkably un-photoshopped. How rare is that?
I am no expert. Maybe they were photoshopped, but their bodies weren't morphed in the process. I see muffin-tops and rolls of fat when they bend over... the kind almost every body has, except for the bodies in magazines.
But yeah, it's pretty obvious LIFE magazine put this set together as a gimmick to get people to click and see boobs and ass. For a magazine with a reputation for serious content, I would expect better than that.
It says a lot here about how society distorts women's body perceptions, even the body perceptions of feminists.
You saw "rolls of fat" and "muffin tops" on those women.
I saw unusually skinny women athletes, with almost no visible body fat at all.
Obviously, society trained us to look at women's bodies VERY DIFFERENTLY - which accounts to your hyperperception of non existent "flaws" on these women's bodies, that were and are invisible to my eye (but then again, I don't see body fat on a human body as a "flaw" - especially on a woman's body, because women need body fat for their reproductive systems to function optimally)
I don't think that's what Sabriel meant. Do you see the folds when the women are tilted one way or the other? Skin rolls over itself, and we don't have many ways to describe that. It's "fat rolls". S/he wasn't saying that they are fat or lard-asses or something, s/he was commenting on the lack of Photoshopping or other digital manipulation.
I don't think this is a case of societal training - I think it's just a word misunderstanding.
Maybe this is just me, but I hate the whole "women need fat to make babies", because to me, it just kinda reinforces the idea that that's what women are for and that's how they should live their lives. What about, people need fat in their bodies for their brains to function properly? It's just as true.
Er, you do know that by linking to and clicking on that link, you're further skewing the results, right?
They could have titled it better than "38 cute cheerleaders" (reminds me of that christmas song...partridge in a pear tree) and I thought life magazine had higher caliber photos. However, there are also other categories like the creepy mascot one that I didn't think were of the caliber I associate with Life either. I did somehow expect more from Life, but I don't think there is anything wrong with posting pictures of cheerleaders per se and agree that they looked unairbrushed, which I liked. I didn't think they were that artistically very good though and I agree that this was a gimmick to get people to click and it obviously worked.
Call me a sexist, but I loved picture #3. It was just amazing photography, and I loved the effect of her hair and the droplets of water flying around. It just seems so free. It's an insanely beautiful photograph.
Oh, and I also liked 13, 24, and 32. LIFE is about really astounding examples of pictures taken at exactly the right moment, and although there were a few objectifying pics, quite a few of them were superb examples of good photography.
Are we looking at the same photograph?
Because when I see a title like "Cute cheerleaders" and then look at #3, I can only think of how overly sexualized they make the woman look. It looks like a still from a porn film.
I agree it's a very beautiful shot, but in the context of a football game, where she is on display for men, I can only see this is reminiscent of porn.
Well, if you are unable to get past the cheerleaders-are-sexy stereotype and actually view these women as human beings, that's your problem. I don't see #3 as overly-sexualized or porny at all. I recognize that she's a sexual being, obviously, but in this picture she looks free and beautiful. If you are unable to see that because you immediately think "ZOmg, pr0n!", that's your deal. Not mine.
"ZOmg, pr0n!" ....That was hardly my reaction.
Well, if you are unable to get past the cheerleaders-are-sexy stereotype and actually view these women as human beings, that's your problem.
I have issues with tradition cheerleading (though radical cheerleading is awesome). Cheerleaders ARE hyper sexualized in our culture, whether you like it or not. It doesn't have to do with the way I am specifically interpreting it. Society in general views cheerleaders as eye candy. Men go to football games, the icing on the cake is the sexy, hot cheerleaders in tiny outfits.
There is a difference between being a sexual being and being a sexual object. Sure, in your world (and mine) it would be ideal if these women were seen as real people with real feelings, but the majority of the time, in this environment, they are not.
I don't deny that cheerleading is a VERY difficult sport that requires enormous amounts of skill, but as far as I'm considered, its origins are to create a spectacle to accompany a team in hopes of a win. (Do female sports teams have cheerleaders? I'm not familiar). Of course, cheerleading has progressed to a stage where it has become highly competitive and athletic, but the women generally have to fit a certain stereotypical mold to be accepted.
Just for a little comparison....
1950s football players
Modern day football players
Okay looks pretty much the same.
Now the females.
1950s cheerleaders
Modern day cheerleaders
Hm.. yep, that whole "cheerleaders are sexy" thing? ALL in my head.
(I wonder why the dudes aren't wearing hotpants?)
You're off-base here, Tinyturk. Cheerleaders, especially professional ones, are by their definition sexy and sexual. The photos represented that, and I saw no sexism or misogyny portrayed.
What about the "cute" headline? I think that's pretty insulting. Some of those pictures look strong, or spirited...but cute? WTF, man. Cute is for pets and humans under the age of 8.
"ZOmg, pr0n!" ....That was hardly my reaction.
Well, if you are unable to get past the cheerleaders-are-sexy stereotype and actually view these women as human beings, that's your problem.
I have issues with tradition cheerleading (though radical cheerleading is awesome). Cheerleaders ARE hyper sexualized in our culture, whether you like it or not. It doesn't have to do with the way I am specifically interpreting it. Society in general views cheerleaders as eye candy. Men go to football games, the icing on the cake is the sexy, hot cheerleaders in tiny outfits.
There is a difference between being a sexual being and being a sexual object. Sure, in your world (and mine) it would be ideal if these women were seen as real people with real feelings, but the majority of the time, in this environment, they are not.
I don't deny that cheerleading is a VERY difficult sport that requires enormous amounts of skill, but as far as I'm considered, its origins are to create a spectacle to accompany a team in hopes of a win. (Do female sports teams have cheerleaders? I'm not familiar). Of course, cheerleading has progressed to a stage where it has become highly competitive and athletic, but the women generally have to fit a certain stereotypical mold to be accepted.
Sorry for the double post.
I'm going to put myself out on a limb for a moment here........
There seems to be a fair amount of criticism over the fact that cheerleaders are mostly thin athletic looking women. But really, if someone were to spend say three hours a day at practice, likely since she was a child, and have reached a level were she is on a professional team, would she not in fact be fairly lean and muscular?
It's kind of like asking why there are no overweight Olympic athletes (except maybe in sports like weightlifting where bulk may be an asset).
What's wrong with cheerleaders?
Now, unfortunately, there were only 4 African American women, one Asian American woman, and (apparently) no Latinas, Native Americans or South Asian American women in the photo array.
And yes, these women were all conventionally attractive and many of pictures showed them in cheerleading moves that would be sexually arousing to many straight men and lesbian women.
But does that make the pics in and of themselves sexist?
I don't think so.
And that's not just because of pic 13 - by far the most amazing pic in the set - which shows a Houston Rockets cheerleader doing a slam dunk (something that a LOT of so called "basketball experts" say that "women can't do"!)
Cheerleading is a recognized amateur sport in America - there is a national championship at the high school and college levels, and these women are legitimate athletes in their own right. It's one of the few youth sports that's largely led by women, and it's had a positive impact on the lives of many young women in this country.
So what's wrong with a photography magazine running pics of cheerleaders?
For that matter, what's so innately terrible about the caption writer saying that they are cute?
Actually, from the height and angle of her approach, it appears the cheerleader doing the slam dunk is launched from a springboard, something which is commonly done during the exhibition segments at basketball games.
And while cheerleading is a recognized sport, competitive teams often have male members, something which is lacking in professional sports team cheerleaders.
I would agree that a picture in and of itself is not innately sexist. Sexism factors in when one examines the purpose of displaying the pictures. It may be that the sole purpose of displaying the pictures was to sell magazines; however, one could also make a claim that they serve a political agenda as well.
Yeah, I kind of figured that too.
But, then again, at the Slam Dunk Contest at the NBA All Star Games, they use a springboard for the guys to dunk too, so it's not that surprising.
I would expect to see those pictures in Sports Illustrated, not Life.
I would say 3 pictures did look suggestive. Unfortunately, a majority of people will go along with mainstream media. Mainstream "it" thing is being scantily clad with suggestive poses to titillate the male audience. Ironically, don't see male cheerleaders scantily clad. Why doesn't that surprise me? And some say that is not sexist?
I can see how a series of pictures showing cheerleaders mid-performace could be taken by some as not being sexist.
IMO, the litmus test for offensive lies, as others have said, with the title. If Life (or any sports magazine, for that matter) ran a series of photos of male athletes, and the word "cute" came anywhere near the title, people would be offended. They might say that it belittles and/or minimalizes the athleticism on display and focuses too much on the physical appearence of the athletes.
Yes, cheerleaders are hired for their conventional attractiveness. Yes, cheerleading has also evolved into a real sport in its own right. The photo spread in question is sexist because its title emphasizes the women's attractiveness and downplays the athleticism.
wow thanks for all the comments! i joined this group months ago and i havent been around since i posted this so i wasnt expecting all the responses!
what i wanted to add after reading everyone's comments was that i'm a photography student, and as such i've seen, well, heaps and heaps of images. i plan on it being my full-time profession at some point so i know photography. i study it as an artist, not as an advertiser. life magazine started off as photo journalism with a rather socialist view of showing the conditions that people were living in, especially during the great depression. some of these images were so amazingly captured and had a lot to say about american culture and what it was becoming at the time. 'life' left it's mark on me after i went to a photo exhibit which had original photos and pages from the magazine for display. they were trying very new and exciting things with the medium as a truly unique art form.
and the photography that i frequently see today is based on the ideals of advertising instead of on anything, well, real. it's true, these photos do no appear to be photoshopped and they may not be. the women are, however, wearing so much make-up, i dont think photoshop was "necessary" (assuming people believe that photoshop makes them look somehow BETTER).
now, i do find the photos offensive and, i believe, anti-feminist (whether you all agree or not). however, the thing that REALLY offended me and prompted me to post this article was that i do think that type of material is inappropriate to for life magazine. it just comes off as gimmicky and really lazy. the photographs in the post is really easy and really kitsch -- any good photographer will tell you that. if you go to their main page there are a bunch more articles based on our ideals of "hot" women.
and, well, i've taken plenty of portraiture photos in my stint as a photographer. mostly they're of my friends being themselves. i think they're all beautiful people, but chances are they'll never be in any magazine's "cutest" or "hottest" list. and i dont really think that's fair: why does a small minority of people (namely, advertisers) get to decide what the rest of us deem to be sexy or beautiful?