There's an unsettling trend of depictions of women Getting Sexier in ways that are objectifying and sometimes just plain
creepy. It's not that there are suddenly all these sexual libertines out there, or that Women Are Getting More Naked, More Often--it's just...we're being portrayed less like people and more like sex toys on display. "Yessir, boys, that right there is a grade-A Pussy-Containing Device with D-cup breasts and built-in suction!"
Just for an example, I'm going to use the book
Powers That Be, by Anne McCaffrey. (Yes, I know. I'm totally high on Anne McCaffrey lately. Just go with it.) There are a few minor spoilers, but the book was published in 1993, and I've deliberately left out The Big Reveal, so you're just going to have to Deal With It.
This, as far as I can tell, is the original cover image, sans cover. There's an uncomfortable amount of Yellow Spandex, but this was the early 90's, and Yana complains in-book about how horribly ill-suited for Petaybean weather a lot of Intergal's clothing and supplies are, so I can deal. (This is apparently a pet peeve of women on ice planets: Magda Lorne and Jaelle n'ha Mellora of Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover series have a similar complaint regarding Terran Federation uniforms.) Besides, this artist, unlike 90% of the comic-book industry, understands that Spandex Is Not Body Paint.
I get the odd feeling that the rock pools in the foreground were drawn before Yana's legs were, and either Yana or the artist is sort of tucking the leg to one side to make it fit. Overall, however, it's a very good painting. There's enough oddness in the background to draw you in and start reading, but not enough that you're distracted from the character. Yanaba Maddock looks like the 30-something, half-Navajo that she is (this becomes relevant later in the post), and her strong personality definitely shines through in her expression. This cover definitely gives a good impression of What The Book Is About, and yes, it's just a wee bit sexy, what with the tight clothing and all. Sexy, in and of itself, isn't bad. It's
how you do sexy that's important.
Another cover image. I'm not sure where this fits, chronologically, but it doesn't appear to be a very common one. Google Image Search turned up far more results for the other two. This is probably an early paperback-edition cover, maybe mid-90's or so. It certainly doesn't look much later than the late 90's in style.
This fails the Male Gaze argument, but that's probably one of the reasons it wasn't used as the cover for very long. There is one person here, and we can't be certain who it is. The character is facing away from us, riding into the Petaybean wilderness. Points for being interesting, but let's face it, this doesn't draw us in as much as an actual face, smiling or screaming or beckoning. We may want to follow this person, but we need more of a reason to peek inside this book or pick it up off the shelf. Sexy Yana did a much better job of that.
And
this, ladies and gentlemen, is the 2005 cover image, which was on a copy of the book that I recently purchased secondhand because I knew I would want to re-read it to death. (I originally checked it out from the library, with the original Sexy-Yana cover image. I had a thing for books about strong women, because I wanted to be strong too.)
I like the confused swirls of color--Petaybee's unusual nature is kept hidden from off-world characters and the reader until well into the novel, and the confusion that results is very well-represented by those vivid purples and greens. The wintry scene at the top is nice too, and I like the curly-coat head, though it looks at first like it's a whole creature running with Yana, not a giant disembodied head.
Yes, folks, that really is supposed to be the same character that was depicted in the first cover image. A
combat veteran with a no-nonsense attitude, a Navajo bloodline, and a deep desire to Get To The Bottom Of Things Before More People Get Hurt. No, really, come on. That girl looks about 15, and has no more Native American blood in her than I do. I have to give props to the artist for remembering that Aisling made that awesome blue latchkay shirt (seriously, the artist actually
read the book), but it wouldn't be
hanging off like that. Yana must be freezing her tits off. Also, I'm not sure why her leg is bent quite that far, or why she's not wearing a bra, or why she's still skeletal at a point in the story where it says she's pretty much fully-recovered.
But notice something else. Yana isn't looking at the viewer at all. She's got sort of a pleading expression, as if she's hoping for someone to come rescue her. And we can see a good bit of her left breast. Combine that with her out-of-canon youthfulness and painfully-thin frame, and you've got a very ugly implication there. I'm not saying that the artist is
deliberately playing on stereotypical "traditional" male desires to rescue or rape a young woman. But Yana looks very weak and powerless in this image, an impression that the original cover and the book itself DON'T give of her at all.
This is a problem, y'all. When women are portrayed as powerless Slabs O' Meat, deliberately or otherwise, that message gets internalized by girls. Don't be strong, or boys won't like you. Be pretty, or boys won't like you. Act helpless and sexy, or boys won't like you. And if boys don't like you, or you don't like boys, you're worthless. The messages internalized by boys are just as bad, if not worse: Women are there to look pretty and to sell things to men. Women have no agency or feelings of their own and only have to do what
you want. Women who don't look, act, and dress sexy all the time aren't worthy of your attention. You should go out and have sex with lots of beautiful women, because that is the best thing you can do, and if you don't want to have sex with women that look
just like this, then you're worthless.
Well. That got very rant-y, very quickly. To get things back on topic, does anybody have other examples of female characters or book covers who are genuinely empowered at first, then get more and more objectified over time?
