ACADEMIC WRITING

The Oversexualization of
Women
What can be done to help turn the tide?
Dominick Knight

Dominick Knight
Zack De Piero
Organizational Research Paper
The Over Sexualization of Women
In this world it seems, women are the objects that seem to be the most desired.
Advertisers, even entire industries are geared towards women. According to thenextweb.com,
women possess the largest percentage of buying power in this country by a wide margin, nearly
eighty percent and they are catered to in a way that no other demographic is in America and
almost the world. Women are even used to sell products to other women and of course men. The
subtle influence women seem to be able to exert without even saying a word is tremendously
powerful. They can be found on almost any ad from mufflers to mens underwear, the latter of
which almost is mind boggling to think about. But when we look at the way women are treated,
but yet how they are regarded, the inverse of the relationship is staggering. On the one hand
women are highly sought after as incredibly powerful tools to essentially drive growth across a
great many industries, nevertheless they are almost seen as disposable in a world that both relies
and needs them. Nothing else works that way. Women are responsible for 80% of all household
spending and account for 55% of household income on average! But yet there contributions seem
to be highly undervalued. It is because that the language used by an Expert, a woman named
Pamela Madison of the Womens Sexuality Center, dedicated to supposedly help women, writes
in a way that is only general and vague, meant only to sell these women on her books and
services.
Why is that? Well that can be attributed to a host of reasons, not the least of which is the
public images portrayed by the different forms of media among other things. There is a stark

contrast between womens fight for equality and their desire to be taken seriously while
embracing their own sexuality among those who would seek to exploit it. It seems that while the
images that are perpetrated by mainstream media is changing, for the better I might add, there is
a strong almost anti progressive movement that social media, fueled by the very individuals from
these various groups no less, that is beginning to undermine what progress is being made.
Experts have begun to weigh in on this issue, and the language is often harmful and
ineffective. Meant only to be vague and tout a supposed knowledge on the subject, Pamela
Madison writes from the perspective of isolation and personal reflection. While there of course
have been an exhaustive amount of studies about the negative effects that social media is having
on younger people, and more specifically young women, it is harmful to assume that a one size
fits all approach of simple self-reflection without the training, that Madison offers for a fee of
course, is the correct solution. But there is a shift taking place towards finding ways to be more
provocative while maintaining an innocent persona that is becoming more and more prevalent.
And the rhetoric being fed to her clients, through her program materials, most of which is
tailored quite honestly to a specific type of person or woman, is incomplete in its message.
Typically common ideas and phrases are abundant throughout her writing, a kind of pointed
imprecise nature of speaking that never truly gets to the point. Madison, to her own point says
this is because I dont see truth in telling but allowing others to come to their own conclusions.
So that when someone reads what I have to say, they are already thinking of a way to apply to
themselves what it is I am trying to get them to see. In effect, Madison really does nothing but
point down a path, and allows her readers to fill in their own blanks. There is an article called
The Rhetoric of Womens Liberation: An Oxymoron that Madison referred to, she had a small

hand in writing it, something of an advisory role. The main author is Karlyn Kors Campbell, but
in it she addresses an interesting side to this topic, one that differs from Madisons style.
In this article, the argument is made that the rhetoric which is so pervasive in womans
rights debates actually deserves its own genre within the realm of womens rights and equality.
The rhetoric of women's liberation merits separate critical treatment because it is a unique genre
of rhetoric. Its distinctive substantive characteristics arise from the peculiarly intense moral
conflict it generates so that moderate and reformist options are closed to feminist
advocates.(Campbell 2009) That for this rhetoric to be disseminated properly, it requires
distinctive stylistic features such as personal truths and self-disclosure AND self-criticism, with
an emphasis on affective truths and personal testimony, which is lacking from Madisons work
because she does not want to. (Campbell). It is ironic that Madison helped contribute to this
article because it literally makes the exact opposite argument that she does. Madison does not
self-disclose, the impersonal nature with she writes in effect serves to hurt the statement she is
trying to make. By being vague and pointing to more a general approach to the help she wants to
offer women, it delegitimizes what she said. By her own volition, Madison states that she shys
away from using specifics because she does not want to influence the people that coming to her,
but she is doing that regardless. There is no personal attachment or connection that is made of
any kind, simply put it is a watered down, safe way for Madison to market herself to the largest
amount of people possible. It smacks of a business and not a resource, and while that is not
wrong in and of itself, it is not helping anyone. It is safe to say that there needs to be a focus on
changing the message that is being told to young girls and maybe it is time for women to take
direct control of the message that is being sent.

Well there is a major difference between what language is used in, say a social media
environment versus an academic one. Even within the artifacts used for The Womens Sexuality
Center, the dialogue used on her Facebook page for example is much more casual and almost
playful. It actually lacks much of the tone that is prevalent in much of her writing which to say
the least is extremely long winded and of little actual substance. In the majority of what she
writes, she tends to refocus it back on what she offers and not on what she actually may know.
Obviously, and she even said as much, it is never good to simply regurgitate book knowledge.
She feels that true knowledge comes from a combination of wisdom and intellect, and that
writing purely from either only serves to negatively affect your argument, regardless of whether
you are right or wrong.(Madison, 2014) Madison points out that one of the reasons she tends to
write in the style that she does, is because she wants people to see the entirety of what she offers.
So that they will start to look inside themselves for the answers to the questions, and according to
her it helps. She does not feel it all together prudent to be too specific when dealing with the
people that reach out to her. Unless they are ones that she takes a lot of time to deal with, say if
they are personal clients for example, everything else is meant to be for a very general public.
This is the opposite message that needs to be sent however, but she feels strongly that getting
specific to early or sometimes at all, can hurt the people reading and looking for advice. She
claims to never want to influence any one person to heavily with her own ideas of what is
wrong or right.
An article that she wrote is circulating online right now and references the issue of
women and girls posting images specifically actually. In this article, Pamela Madison, who
happens to be a relationship and sexual expert, is writing to essentially plea with young girls to
start a reversion of the trend that is strong on social media of posting risqu and/or scantily clad

pictures of themselves for the world to see. Pamela Madison writes this, not with the intention to
shame or put down girls or women who have the confidence to show themselves to the world,
she simply wants to make the argument that constantly posting pictures of themselves practically
naked for any and all too see is not making them look any better. It creates a stigma about them
that is probably associated with the other overly sexualized girls that are prevalent on social
media. She cautions women as too what message they are sending to the world about themselves
with these pictures. What are they saying about themselves, that they may not be consciously
trying to send? Is it really worth it to cheapen their image for the highly sought after like? That
while self-gratifying, the infamous like is ultimately pointless. It has no real or intrinsic value
what so ever. But yet it has spurred an almost entire generation of women into a cycle of trying
to outdo or keep pace, at least try anyway, with a bunch of other women, they will never meet,
just for the idea of a competition that really doesnt exist nor matter. To be so easily forgotten as
soon as their latest picture is seen, a constant need to stay relevant in a medium with a nearly
unlimited amount of options for others to stare at.
Pamela Madison of the Womens Sexuality Center, is who responded quickly to my
emails about this subject. She specializes in the education and empowerment of women and
couples. She has been published for 15 years and is renowned for her knowledge and experience
with helping couples, but primarily helping women help themselves be a better and more
complete and confident version of themselves and that is from any age. She is foremost in her
belief that womens struggle starts with how they view themselves first and foremost. And I
would have to agree. She spoke a lot of how she writes is how she approaches women in her day
to day activity. That a woman must embrace her sexuality but do so while becoming a more
complete person and not just to do so out of a vain attempt to please someone else. Her language

is always soft and up building, never harsh. She seeks to build women up by making sure they
have a strong mental attitude so that when faced with situations that would normally present a
problem, they are deal with them in a healthy way. When asked what writing style she prefers,
she says that it depends on the audience she is writing to

References
Karlyn Kohrs Campbell(2009). The rhetoric of women's liberation: An oxymoron. Quarterly
Journal of Speech, Pgs 74-86
Walker, E. (2012, January 24). The Top 30 Stats You Need to Know When Marketing to
Women. Retrieved December 12, 2014, from
http://thenextweb.com/socialmedia/2012/01/24/the-top-30-stats-you-need-to-know-whenmarketing-to-women/

. When talking to just women, young and old, it is more of soft tone of voice. She is
seeking more to inform them of what the world does and how it affects them. She points to the
ever growing self-help genre as too what she feels would be the genre she that best categorizes
her work. And that is exactly how her writing style is reflected in her work.
But for Madison one of her favorite communication mediums is email. If she is ever
specific or direct it is typically through email with clients and anyone else that may contact her.
She was not able to provide anything specific for the purposes of this paper, because of privacy
reasons, but she was able to describe them to me in as a great a detail as possible. Because she
has clients and gets media inquiries from all over the world, and in this instance she feels that the
direct approach is best (Madison). It conflicts with her given style of communication and to be
blunt seems almost incredulous to do it this way. The article that she wrote about women and the
images that they post for the world, was a rare example of her actually giving some sound
advice. However to her own point, it feels more like an opinion for the simple fact that she does
not back anything with actual knowledge or facts. It comes off as more of a statement of feeling,
and based off what she wants to be known for, which is more of the comforting mother figure, it
fits. It is a bit contradictory however, but that is the voice that is needed to be taken with this
issue. A soft tone is great for the easily swayed and influenced, and that is who she targets. At
the heart of it all she is selling not just herself, but her ideology and her products. From really
looking at what she is trying to say versus what the rest of the world is saying, her voice seems to
get lost in all of the noise.
However in actuality, there is much that is being done to that effect, not so much the
social stigma but more to buoy up women and support a better self-image. Pamela writes that
women must be able to embrace an image of their own first, before they seek to share that with

the rest of the world. She definitely writes with an Ethos appeal, simply speaking from a point of
view of her being a credible author that is well respected in her field. But it does not seem that
she wants to take real control and help be a voice true solid macro style change. Taking this
initiative isnt just about pictures on Instagram, its about how they take control of their own
destiny. But through reading her articles and materials on her website, she seems more interested
in individual change rather than change as a whole. And while there is nothing wrong with
holistic change, being that her platform could work well for a much larger stage of women
embracing their places in society, she chooses to not be political. She preaches a theme of
individualistic self-awareness, but she says that she writes mainly for a specific audience, and
only them. She feels very strongly that large social change starts with the individual. And well
she would be right.