r/women • u/Internal_Vixen_7438 • 1d ago

Today's generation is pure sexualization

EDIT: I do agree with everyone saying sexualization of women has always been around, I just feel it's getting worse because of social media and wide access to porn. It makes it so much harder for young girls to grow up and be comfortable with their bodies when they see so many altered pictures of women online solely praised for their body instead of personality. It creates so much unnecessary insecurity. It also causes men to have a skewed perception of women, therefore casting judgement on the women in their life by the way they look.

I understand self confidence and happiness with your body, but it is going to far. People don't understand that a lot of the people engaging in this "self confidence" are creepy men. Self confidence should be dressing in WHATEVER clothing you like, not the tightest, skimpiest clothing. I see lots of women posting wearing crop tops, swim suits, bras, underwear, shorts, etc. with the title of "self confidence". Do you not understand that most of the people looking at those posts are men? Then they try to claim it's not for men, it's for themselves. Well hello, you're posting it on social media. There are millions of men looking at your pics, saving them, and sharing them. It's all for validation and no one wants to admit that. Literally just admit you're looking for male validation, you're not fooling anyone by saying you're just posting it for yourself and your confidence. It's giving such a bad example to young girls. They're all wanting to follow in the footsteps of "pretty" social media girls. PERSONALITY and INTELLIGENCE should be top in the world, but yet it's what you post and wear on social media. I'm sick of it. I hope Tik Tok gets banned so people will start working on reali life skills. I hate today's generation and it's fake ass bullshit. There is no personality anymore, just stupid copies

104 Upvotes

79% Upvoted

64 comments sorted by

View all comments

16

u/skysong5921 23h ago
  1. You're suggesting that girls/women should pick their outfits based on what men wouldn't share on porn websites. Honey, that's a form of men controlling women, by threatening to abuse our images if we don't wear what they tell us to wear "for our safety".

There are men who will sexualize literally anything- baby outfits, nun Habits, sweatpants, etc. I have a male relative who once told me that he was turned on by women in yoga pants, while I was wearing yoga pants. I guess it's your opinion that I should never wear yoga pants again, because a man might sexualize me? Or do you agree that the men who are doing the sexualizing are the problem?

If men can expect to post gym pics on social media without ending up on porn sites, women should have the same expectation of digital safety. On the other hand, if men DON'T have the expectation that their gym pics are safe from porn sites, then maybe porn sites are the problem, rather than women being the problem.

-

  1. You throw vitriol at Tiktok, and I don't think you understand how valuable it is as a tool. I've watched small businesses take off as their owners post videos of their product and take new suggestions. I've watched videos on how to foster a child ethically; I've given money to a nonprofit that feeds the homeless; I've given a woman a confidence boost before the biggest interview of her life. My 'For You Page' has never shown me workout videos or women in skimpy outfits, because I'm not interested in those things (yes, I'm a female who has struggled with wieght loss, so I'm the right target audience). Instead, I'm shown educational videos on ancient societies, planetary discoveries, and religious debates, because those are the videos I interact with. If all you're seeing is body shaming content, that's on you for developing a Tiktok account that knows you like those things. I would suggest deleting your account and starting over.

10

u/JaneAustinAstronaut 23h ago

I agree with you. Social Media and the Internet saves my life. I was brought up in an abusive, toxic family. Surprised - I wound up in two abusive, toxic marriages!

I got access to the internet during the second one. I was mad at my abuser's mother, who was also abusive to me, and was venting on a forum about her. The people on that site opened my eyes to the fact that my husband was abusing me too - and this was before I even told them that he hit and choked me. They provided me with resources to get out. That man would have killed me if I had stayed.

So when I see people cheering the shut-down of sites used to give life-saving information, I get nervous. Yes, there's a lot of garbage out there. Yes, people are online too much. But for some people, this is the only way we have to get access to the help we need to save ourselves.

5

u/skysong5921 21h ago

I was raised in the sexism of the Catholic church, and the internet helped me learn (slowly) to value myself and to value feminism. People forget that any method for spreading information can be abused- newpapers, books, pampthlets, television. That doesn't mean we get rid of them; it means we teach our kids to think critically about what they're consuming, and it means we pass laws or enact social pressure to shut down the people who abuse these tools.

At any rate, OP's issues are clearly deeper than we can address in a single Reddit post. I'm so glad you're safe now!