Laura Mulvey focuses on women and their representation in media. She argues women are used in the media as objects to be looked at and enjoyed. She calls this "the male gaze" She argues that this can be in two forms.
- Voyeuristic: When you gain pleasure from looking at these women.
- Fetishistic: The sexual desire to have something, seeing these women portrayed in the media as sexual objects of desire.
She states that the constant exposure of women as idols of desire have created a mainstream culture where this is now the norm. By challenging the concept of the male gaze in music videos is to go against what is anticipated. Especially if the genre of music video is known to idolize this concept.
These two music videos are designed to fit the ideals of a male fantasy, by using hyper-sexualized women and provocative performances to entertain the heterosexual male viewer.
Niki Minaj, uses her sexual appearance in order to attract male viewers to watch her music videos. Even though she looks like a dodgy knock off barbie doll that was repeatedly chewed by a dog and left to sit in the sun too long and then have a 5 year old colour her in with crayons. Her recent explosion in popularity has shown this concept to work. Because we know it was not her singing that made her famous.
Genres such as RnB are renown for having skimpy women in their music videos. If they were to stop this practice they will risk alienating the fan base of that genre. Often even without listening to the song it is possible to watch a RnB music video and still know its genre with out prior knowledge.
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