Lecture Notes

Unlike audio-recorded music, music videos play to the ear and the eye. Young female artists have brought energy, sexuality, and individualism to the young music audience. Music videos have also objectified and degraded women by focusing solely on their sexuality. Video games often provide images of unrealistically shaped and submissive women in degrading scenes. Men, in contrast, are often revered as unrealistic, violent figures whose primary purpose is to destroy and conquer. Games, such as the Grand Theft Auto series, are won by rising through the ranks of criminal underworld by conquering a city and women through crime and violence. Though many of these video games are rated M or Mature by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board, they are both popular and accessible to young people. From their very inception, motion pictures have dealt with sexuality. Sex is often used in the cinema to overcome aesthetic merit of the film as a way to lure moviegoers to view the film. Movies are not that dissimilar from television in their portrayals of the consequences of unprotected sex, such as unplanned pregnancies, or STIs, including HIV and AIDs. Although it is not wise to confuse education with entertainment, it should not be forgotten that the media serves as a source of information for youth, regardless if the information is accurate or not.