UpDate - Vol. 12, No. 11, Page 3                       
November 12, 1992                                      
Professor suggests link between MTV and sexual abuse   
                                                       
     I don't want my MTV." This may be the feeling of many who watched
the video Dreamworld: Desire, Sex, Power in Rock Video (1990), which
explored the portrayal of women as passive, willing objects of male
sexual fantasies in rock videos, and the possible link between such
images and violence against women in our society.            
     Dreamworld was part of a film-discussion presentation entitled
"Images of Women on MTV," during the University's Sexual Assault
Awareness Week.                                              
     "Women on MTV are viewed as 'things' to be consumed," said
Kathleen Turkel, assistant professor of women's studies at the
University. "In these videos, the world is never viewed from the
woman's perspective."                                        
     This brave new video world is peopled by women whose only
interest is to have sex with any available man, anytime, she said.
Women of the dreamworld compete with each other to get and keep their
men.                                                         
     The documentary showed how women in certain rock videos are
reduced to so many body parts, with each part designed to satisfy the
various fantasies of different males.                        
     Among the performers hit hardest by the documentary were David
Lee Roth and Rod Stewart, who was described in the video as the "king
of sleaze."                                                  
     The women in music videos are frequently dressed as they appear
in male sexual fantasies, wearing garter-belts, fetish clothing
(chains and leather) or fantastic, bizarre clothing. One woman
appeared wearing only a guitar.                              
     The type of clothing worn seems almost irrelevant, she said, as
all the women in the video are portrayed as having a deep desire to
strip for the men in the dreamworld.                         
     It was apparent that the dreamworld can quickly become a
nightmare, particularly when the elements of violence are introduced
into the video.                                              
     The crowd of about 120 in the Rodney Room of the Perkins Student
Center became silent when the documentary's director Sut Jhally mixed
rape scenes from the movie The Accused with several rock videos.
     The distinction between the movie's gang rape scene in a New 
Bedford, Conn., bar, and the images of women portrayed in the rock
videos became blurred as the harsh reality of the rape scene blended
with the fantasy world of the rock videos.                   
     According to Turkel, the fantasy world of the rock video is not
innocent or accidental, but it is a carefully designed advertising
technique used to sell CD's, tapes and videos to a target audience of
14-to 34-year-old consumers.                                 
     The danger inherent in this technique, she said, is that women
are reduced to objects, with no inner feelings allowed, and this
objectification makes them vulnerable to assault.            
     The women in the videos are blindfolded, restrained and locked in
cages. Escape in the dreamworld is impossible, because women want to
be caught and returned to their male captors.                
     While explicit violence is a small part of the dreamworld, the
images presented make violence and death appear as normal.   
     According to Turkel, the images in the videos don't work alone
but are part of a larger system in our culture that uses women's
bodies to sell everything.                                   
     "These images are not aberrations but are pervasive in our
society," she said. "They undermine the efforts of women to be taken
seriously."                                                  
     One of the issues raised during the discussion after the
presentation was what to do about behavior that seems to justify
violence against women.                                      
     "Theories of violence against women tend to excuse the attacker,"
Turkel said. "The violence must stop, and men who assault and abuse
women must take responsibility for the violence and for stopping it."
     "Images of Women on MTV" was sponsored by the Solutions to Sexual
Violence Task Force, as a part of the annual Sexual Assault Awareness
Week program.                                                
                                        -Jerry Rhodes