Radical and Post Feminist Views on Sex in Music Videos and its Concerns

Representations of men and women in music videos hugely differ, and perceptions either follow radical or post-feminist beliefs, alongside the reception theory of Stuart Hall and theories of the effect on the audience such as Copycat, Cultivation and the Hypodermic Model.

Radical feminism - belief that men dominate society. A militant approach. All the videos are for the benefit of men. All the sexual dancing and revealing clothes on the woman.

Post feminism: belief that feminists have won and acheived equality. They believe that it is in fact men who are exposed by the woman.

Stuart Hall - "encode vs decode" Reception theory.
This theory indicates that it is up to the audience as to how they interpret information from the video. The producer may want to potray a certain belief, but audiences could possibly not understand the producers point of view and interpret as something else.

Copycat Theory - people (especially younger or vulnerable) imitating what they see in the media.

Hypodermic model - media "injects" attitudes or beliefs into the minds of the audience.

Cultivation Theory - people are influenced by "opinion leaders." Anyone they admire or aspire to be. Media is one of the many influences.

Generally in music videos, women are presented as 'disposable' and potrayed as slaves and seem to be fragmented or dehumanised. Men on the other hand, are portrayed as powerful as they are being served by women, they are the centre of attention and are fully clothed as opposed to women.

Government concerns include social problems (teenager pregnancy, eating disorders, rape, domestic abuse). That is to say that teenagers are imitating behaviour shown in music videos, for example it may encourage men to treat women as objects. not human beings and this may result in disrespect, anger, frustration when women do not behave this way and it may lead to sexual violence.

However, statistics show that there has been quite a large drop in teenage pregnancies regardless of the fact that music videos are increasing sexual content.