By-Two Kaapi in an oilfield

It's commonplace to talk about how women appear in popular media, and rant about society's skewed view, about feminism, about sex. True. There's too much sex in TV, movies, internet and PC games.

I stumbled upon a brilliant web essay which talks about the male gaze, fashion ads and the pose. An excerpt from the introduction

... these claims seem to imply that there is an obvious "thing" called beauty or sexual attractiveness, and that the question is simply whether or not the media should display so much of this "thing."

The following web essay casts doubt on the belief that there is such a simple, self-evident "thing" as beauty. It looks at beauty as a cultural construct, at how beauty is defined, at how fashion magazines cultivate a very particular notion of what it means to be attractive or beautiful. And it suggests that this particular notion may be less about sex, less about actual human sexual behaviors, than it is about power.

An amazing essay which makes you realize stuff that you never would have on your own.

What made me think was a quote by John Berger which went so,

Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at.

Really wonder whether the second is true. (No comments about the first one!) Feminists will bring the house down on this one. However, the point of discussion is whether women get a kick out of being watched and admired?