Then a female member posted the above picture of Kyra Gracie and the conversation shifted to the sexualization of female MAs. And again, the comments from the ladies were well-thought out head nods in agreement or equally as well-thought arguments to the contrary. Not everyone thought alike, but how they expressed it was civil.
Then a few male MAs chimed in and my head almost exploded.
For the record, although BJJ is not particularly my cup of tea, I have mad respect for any woman who suits up and trains in anything martial - be it boxing, karate, Krav or Jujitsu. From what I understand, Ms. Gracie is quite the powerhouse with a reputation for being one of the best in her art. Note that I am tossing confetti and cheering loudly for her accomplishments - but I'd be lying if I told you that the above pic doesn't totally rub my feminist sensibilities the wrong way.
One guy in particular - a BJJ practioner - argued that Ms. Gracie has inspired many women to begin training AND that she is really a role model because she is beautiful, skilled, beautiful, feminine, beautiful and very good at what she does. Did I mention he thinks she's beautiful? To further illustrate his point, he later posted at least three pics of women in booty shorts, full makeup, low-cut sports bras in psudeo-sexual poses. All the pics, he said, were excellent examples of women in martial arts because they show beauty and health. When I argued that the main problem with the depiction of female MAs is the sexualization, objectification and the lack of diversity (where are the brown women? The over 40 women? the non-size 2's?), he told me that my disdain smacked of jealousy and was, in fact, degrading to women.
So there is no ambiguity here, this is what I tried to say on the thread in a nutshell: I have no problem with beautiful women who train (afterall, I AM a beautiful woman who trains! Not to toot my own horn, but I think every woman is beautiful). What I do have a problem with is the idea that the photographic representation of female martial artists is always petite, white, 20-somethings in sports bras and exposed bellies or in skin-tight dresses and heels holding exotic weapons in their manicured hands. When someone's ideal of a female martial artist reduces us all to eye-candy, realism goes out the window, IMHO. I don't care if said MA has gotten the whole world excited about the art she studies, if you push pics of her in a push-up sports bra that dips to her navel and gi bottoms below her hips, her "role model" factor will always take a back seat to how she looks. Period.
Since forever, beautiful women have been used to sell everything from floor cleaners to anti-depressants, using some advertising executive's idea of feminine/sexy to convince the world that the product or service they're hawking is necessary. But what it really ends up doing is making us all feel inadequate because we don't look like that (heck, NOBODY does these days as even leggy supermodels are Photoshopped to death). Statistics show that the self-esteem of adult women drops significantly after they spend just 10 minutes thumbing through a fashion/pop/celebrity magazine and too many girls as young as eight have considered dieting to loose weight. Perhaps there is a connection? I'm just sayin'...
I don't know personally anyone who trains in a pink gi, much less a skimpy sports bra and leggings, no matter what art they study - not that there is anything wrong with that, but to me, being a woman is more about draping myself in pink or wearing anything form-fittingly unpractical when I TRAIN. On the mat, I wear a gi - just like my male training partners and my sensei. In the gym, I wear bike shorts and a sports tank top, not to show off curves but to get my run/lift/crossfit on without dehydrating. Is it too much to ask folks looking for images for their karate equipment websites, catalogues and karate websites to aim for a little realism? Gheesh...
I'm totally with you on the annoyance factor of these kind of photos but unfortunately these kind of women let their egos get in the way of common sense by posing for the photos - no one forces them to do it. However, they do make it harder for the rest of us to gain serious credibility in the MA world. Most of these posy women tend to be in the sports side of MA. You don't often find them in the traditional arts.
ReplyDeleteWe can only hope to force out this stereotyping by showing the people around us in our clubs that we are serious martial artists and not eye candy. This way we gain the respect of men rather than their roving eye. Though it's annoying we shouldn't feel threatened by it because we have our self-respect to fall back on - these girls just have their tits!
You are totally right, Sue. The problem is deeper, though - meaning that women might actually do shots like this because they KNOW they sell. The real bottom line is that even the best BJJ or kickboxer or boxer in the world is not going to take home 1/10 of what a male in the same art will for one of his fights.
DeleteI have no problems with endorsements, but the objectification is an issue. What the heck is being sold here? Because when I think of MA in general or BJJ in particular, this is not what I think about.
If we do not take ourselves seriously, no one else will, either.
I find the photo's pleasing to view as a male but I believe [input your entire post here].
ReplyDeleteExcellent post.
That's the other thing, Mr. James - the photo is meant to appeal to you (and other straight males), not female MAs or women interested in possibly getting into martial arts. OK, she looks great, all sweaty and exposed (did I say that?!?), but this would in no way, shape or form get me to start training in BJJ or train harder in my own art. And when this becomes the representation of women on the mat, that's a problem, IMHO.
DeleteAnd actually I think images like that would put many women off martial arts - they would assume that the other women training could look like the above, and feel self-conscious of their normal body and of wearing an old t-shirt and pair of sweatpants.
DeleteI concur with you Felicia. It is the way in the west is it not?
DeleteYou make some very good points here, particularly about the lack of diversity. And while being a young male in my late 20's does make me predisposed to appreciating Ms. Gracie's picture, I do wonder how many more women would enroll in martial arts if they knew that female fighters can be more than just sex symbols to grace the pages of black belt magazine.
ReplyDeleteAs it were, a few months back I wrote a blog article on the very subject of female fighters. I hope you like it.
http://kyokushinblog.com/?p=116
-Brett
Hi, Brett. I remember reading your post not too long ago. I, too, love women in action flicks (Kill Bill is my altime favorite flick!), but that is not all there is to female martial arts, as we both know. Even in the clip of Rina Takeda training shows her kicking booty IN A GI, not a cropped top and skin-tight pants. That latter is fantasy, not reality. I just wish the idea that women who fight/train dress like pin-up models would just go the way of the dinosaur already...
DeleteThe very sad truth is that what we see in media is tailored to appeal to our primal instincts of sex, race, greed, and fear. It taps into our lizard brain and strokes it, rubs it's belly, and tells it that it's a "good boy" if it will buy their stuff - without regard to our societal need to break free of decades (or centuries) old ideas.
DeleteRandom thought - there is an excellent (IMO!) movie called Hanna, which is one of the very few films which (again, IMO) has a real kick-ass female lead who is not over-sexualised. In fact there is only one vaguely sexy bit in the whole film, which I won't spoil for you. I really recommend checking it out if you've not seen it already :)
DeleteBrett, what you just said doesn't make sense in the martial art world - at least not to heterosexuals! If you want to use the primal instinct approach to attract women into martial arts then surely we need to see sexy half-naked pictures of men not women! No woman wants to enter a dojo where she feels in direct competition with some sexy young bimbo so these pictures are counter-productive in that sense.
DeleteThese kind of pictures are really aimed at men and the girls posing for them are just selling their souls to make a few extra bucks!
Thanks, I should have been more clear: when I said "our primal instincts" I was talking about my fellow guys. Wasn't trying to say that the sexy pictures are for women.
DeleteAnd pictures like the above, we both can see, aren't aimed at attracted women to MA. There are, of course, pictures aimed at women. But these are typically the "tough chick" kind of pictures or the "dont be a victim" type that you see in Krav publications and similar SD articles.
Kudos to the post. As a women stuggling for decades just to earn as much money, much less the level of respect, as men in the workplace, it irks me to no end that people STILL don't get it.
ReplyDeleteSome never will, Narda. How unfortunate is that?!?
DeleteDue to my nidan grading yesterday, my head was elsewhere for a few days and I didn't get back here to moderate the comments as I usually do. Two folks (stalk much?) from the message board felt it their duty to comment and say what a lame, in accurate, afraid of intelligent dialogue coward I was for posting this entry. How ironic that both ended up in my spam box, huh? For the record, Mr. BJJ did not post the original pic (changes made to the post accordingly), but it is NOT true that I mis characterized his comments or took them out of context. He DID say I degraded women by actually saying "sex kitten" and " boobs" in my posts. He did chastise all the women for not reading a book review he posted on another part of the forum (news flash: many of the women only log into the "Women Martial Artists" forum and probably missed your review altogether - I know that's my reality) and he did "respectfully decline" when I asked him to honor the original poster's request to let the women comment about their thoughts/feelings and bow out. Hard to misinterperet that - which is why I included the actual link to the thread. You may be able to bully women on the thread into not commenting/expressing themselves for fear of being attacked like I was - because the moderation ann the forum isn't that tight, but that crap won't happen hear ON MY BLOG. If you do not like what you read hear, don't read it. Your sexist rjetoric is not welcomed here and, just so you know, further comments will also not be published. Have a great day...
ReplyDelete*here* and *rhetoric* I hate it when my iPad spell-check thinks it's smarter that me :-)
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete*Namaste*
ReplyDeleteJust thought you should be acknowledged, my friend.
Thanks, Narda :-)
DeleteI sometimes wonder if BJJ is more subject to this problem because of the nature of our positions. You don't even have to strip a woman down in jiu jitsu for it to look sexual...I've seen guys flock to just watch two women rolling.
ReplyDeleteAt the end of the day, most men don't want to see anything off about pics like the ones of Kyra (love her though) because it makes them happy and they'd prefer training with nothing but hot women...sure...it MIGHT be nice to not get squashed by the 300lb guy who likes to rub his hairy belly in my face and if every guy looked like Dwayne Johnson or Hugh Jackman, but my time in the gym is very much related to connecting with people of all kinds.
I honestly don't know if seeing beautiful women helps recruit more women and girls to the sport for any length of time. BJJ is probably the LAST MA any woman would want to try and I'm not gonna lie...it's hard. Any woman that's going to be drawn to a sport because she can be pretty while practicing, well, jiu jitsu is definitely not the place to start and they probably won't last long. A girl at my church...she started because she saw other women and girls practicing...normal women and girls. THEN she saw Kyra and wanted a pink gi because she realized the sport she enjoyed could be more effeminate.
What's funny though, is you never see men drooling over the pics of her with the cut face and bandaged fingers.