Shirzai 1

Harris Shirzai

Professor Smyrl

ENGL 123

May 10, 2021

Literary Analysis, Shortcomings

From the beginning of human society, women have evidently fallen into being the

victims of being objectified, disrespected, and mistreated by men. In today’s society, things such

as social media have been able to inform the public of the heinous acts that men inflict on

women by allowing for the easy spread of news, videos, and experiences. In the book

Shortcomings, Adrian Tomine uses fiction to address ways that women are treated in real life.

Tomine uses literary devices such as conflict, style, tone, and character to effectively express the

story and also to inform the audience of the way that men treat women. In our society, we have

seen many men turn into these ‘animals’ in the sense that they objectify and disrespect women.

Even though many individuals are seen to act in these ways, psychology has shown that these

actions and viewing of women as objects stem from issues from childhood and early teenage

years. These men are being turned into these oppressors by the way their environment, the

people they are surrounded by, and the things that they are exposed to, such as pornography.

Mistreating women is in no way acceptable, but in Shortcomings, we are able to witness Ben

become a victim of his environment which translates to the way he treats the women around him.

At the beginning of the book Shortcomings, Tomine starts the book with a scene that shows

the type of character Ben is. Not only does it show Ben’s character, but it shows how he treats

women. This is an important opening scene because readers will understand the type of character

and personality he is and how he views women. “I’m not criticizing YOU. I'm criticizing the
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shitty movie. Am I allowed to voice my opinion?” (Tomine 12). Ben’s girlfriend has worked

very hard in order to put together this festival and Ben does not care at all how his girlfriend

would feel after he voices his opinion. Men have no right to tell their girlfriend something was

horrible after they worked very hard on it. This shows the audience that he is selfish and thinks

his time is more important than spending it with his girlfriend at a festival that she worked

tirelessly on. Men need to realize women are also human beings and have feelings. “What am I

supposed to do ...Put on some charade and act like my judgment is just as clouded as HERS?”

(Tomine 14) The next day Ben meets with his friend Alice. Ben explains to her the situation, but

not only did he explain, but he also talks negatively about his own girlfriend. In this cafe, they

are having “locker room” talk while not thinking anything of it. This portrays extreme toxic

masculinity because even though Ben did something very wrong he gets reassurance from his

friend and does not see the problem of why he is wrong. Locker room talk is very toxic because

at the end of the conversation it adds fuel to the fire by making Ben believe he is not in the

wrong. In order to fix this situation, he needs to have a mature talk and try to find the reasons

why Miko got mad at her. Thinking you are correct all the time portrays a toxic character and

personality.

In order to maintain a happy and healthy relationship, both partners must be able to

communicate effectively with each other. When communicating with your significan-other, an

important factor to keep in mind is to listen and have a good tone when talking so your partner

has reassurance everything will be fine. Unfortunately, this is not the case when Miko tries to

talk to ben. “Look… Let’s not make a big deal about this. If it bothers you, I'll throw them out. I

got them a long time ago, and…” (Tomine 28). After Miko confronts Ben about the

pornographic DVDs he has, Ben does not think about how this might make Miko feel. Ben’s
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tone was very negative when talking to Miko and this makes her feel a certain way. Finding

pornographic DVDs of white women only supports the fact that Ben objectifies women and

views them as sexual objects. Furthermore, it makes Miko as if Ben settled for less because he

could not have a white girlfriend and Ben does not truly like her. “Do you want to go to bed?

Enh… I’m not really tired yet. I slept in today. Well, we don’t have to go to sleep right away.”

(Tomine 19) Miko wants Ben to be in bed to feel his company but is quick to say no. This

happened before Miko found the pornographic DVDs of white women, so this adds to the fact

that in Miko’s mind she thinks he doesn't like her and he just objectifies women sexually. The

biggest factor is that when Ben says he does not want to go to bed with Miko, the tone he uses

makes it seem as if he does not care about her. Using a passive but caring tone, Miko is seen to

insists on Ben going to bed with her because she misses his presence and truly cares for him. But

Ben responds with a negative tone as if he dreads going to bed with her. When in a relationship

everything goes both ways equally, but Ben feels as if he has all the power and that Miko always

has to listen to her.

When in a relationship you always want to keep your partner happy and make them have a

reason to love you, if you act rude and uncaring your partner will not like you anymore. In a

relationship conflict is a big aspect that shows if you guys are meant to be together or not.

Starting unnecessary conflict is very toxic and different versus when there is something

reasonable to start conflict and talk about. But in the book Shortcomings, Ben starts unnecessary

conflicts without reason and thinks he is in the right. “See? THIS is why I said we should leave

earlier… FUCK!” (Tomine 36) Ben got mad at Miko for something he should have not, he is

making Miko feel very bad even though it is not her fault. This shows the oppression Ben places

on Miko and making it seem as if he has all the power to talk to his girlfriend like that.
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Furthermore Ben believes as if Miko is forever hers and can not go anywhere. While Miko is

getting ready to move to New York she can do whatever she wants but Ben does not see it this

way because he believes she belongs to him permanently. “So how's the internship going? You

haven't told me much about it. Oh, I’ve learned not to bore you. But it’s incredible. I’m meeting

so many amazing people.”(Tomine 47) As Ben asked this question he was watching television

and Miko already knows he is never interested so she gives him a taste of his own medicine.

Miko has finally worked up the courage to start a conflict with Ben in order to show him how he

makes her feel. “One person feels disempowered, or is suffering in some way….other person

does nothing either to help or hinder….we have a passive oppressive situation.” (Pearman)

Throughout the book, their arguments have always been one-sided and Miko does nothing. It

seems as if Ben has no clue what he is causing Miko to go through when he starts conflict

throughout the book.

Throughout the book, Ben has always been objectifying women and sees women only as

sexual objects. As mentioned before, when Miko found Ben’s pornographic videos, it only

featured white women. It is known that Ben fantasizes about white women and objectifies them

as sexual objects. “Oh! God I’m sorry I… what about your girlfriend? Oh. I thought I told you.

We’re broken up. Don’t worry about that.” (Tomine 49) Ben only sees Autumn as a sexual

object because she is white and that is his fetish. Ben was raised in a small town in Oregon and

throughout the book, it seems as if he never learned what is right and wrong when being with

women in society. Many times in life no one has addressed this issue when raising their kids and

this causes the problem to keep on getting worse. When someone makes a mistake the best thing

to do is talk to them and let them know what they did was wrong so they do not do it again. “Ah,

it’s for the best. I mean, how could you even get it up for someone how does that kind of stupid
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bullshit…. Oh, I forgot…. She's white!” (Tomine 50). This quote shows Ben is telling his best

friend, who is a girl, about the situation and she does not see anything wrong with what

happened and is on Ben’s side. Not only do men not notice when they sexually objectify

someone, but even girls also don't notice. This is a much bigger problem and shows how

uneducated many people in society can be and clueless to this big problem. Many people may

think girls will instantly know when a man is objectifying a woman but this may not be the case.

“Ben’s Identity crisis is illustrated by his erotic gazes: at his girlfriend Miko Hayashi and a pair

of blonde white women who are objects of his desire.” (Sheffer 124) This quote from the article

written by Shaffer explains the miss leading road someone goes down when someone objectifies

someone and has an erotic gaze towards someone because they sexualize a certain type of

person. When Ben was at Autumn’s house all he wanted to do with her was kiss her or sleep with

her. Ben was so busy objectifying her and thinking about the desires in his head that he saw her

as a sexual object. Ben doesn't realize he can instead hang out with her, and have an actual

interesting conversation with a girl, and have a fun time. But the effects of constantly

objectifying people and no one telling him he is doing something wrong only make his situation

worse.

Men like Ben act as if they own the world and everything that goes on around them. This

creates a personality that thinks they can do whatever they want with no consequences. This

results in oppression and objectivation. Furthermore, the reason people may think this way is

because someone or something put a certain idea in their head and they do not know better.

“Um… I thought maybe we could get lunch or something . Oh yeah. Sorry about that.” (Tomine

69) As soon as Ben opened the door he pulled down Sasha’s shirt. The only thing Ben was

excited for when Sasha came over was that thought that he maybe could sleep with her again.
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This is a very serious and obvious form of objectifying her. A big factor that led Ben to act this

was porn. “In our society, MacKinnon holds, pornography defines women’s role as sexual

objects available for men’s consumption” (Zalta). As Zalta said porn leads to men objectifying

women and only seeing them as sexual objects, that is exactly what Ben did when he saw her. In

addition, Ben now cheated on his girlfriend with her and seemed as if he did not care. The porn

he watches makes him think he is a “player” which is misleading him so instead of being

disappointed, he is happy he slept with a white girl. “Did you fuck her in my bed? Jesus christ

What the FUCK, Ben? Are you crazy?!” (Tomine 95) Ben caught his girlfriend Miko cheating

on him and he is furious. Ben has no right to be mad at his girlfriend because he did the same

thing and cheated on her. He feels as if Miko is an object and he owns her. Ben in fact is totally

wrong, the only thing he wants is to feel as if he is in power.

The sexualizing and objectifying of women is an issue that is present in our everyday lives.

This is seen through things such as advertisements and forms of entertainment. While this may

seem harmless, this has led to an unconscious effect on men in our society. As seen in the book

Shortcomings, Ben is a man who constantly disrespects, objectifies, and puts down women no

matter their relationship with him. The author, Adrian Tomine, effectively uses literary devices

such as tone, character, style, and conflict to portray the fictitious story of Ben and Miko, but

also be able to effectively pass the message of how women are mistreated in our society.

Throughout the book, we are able to see a number of different ways that Ben treats Miko

negatively that shows his true colors and the way that he views women, which is nothing more

than just a sexual object.

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Annotated Bibliography

Gcpsych. "The Passive-Oppressive Relationship." Mysite. Mysite, 11 July 2018. Web. 22

May 2021.

Using this quote from the Gold Coast Psychology Services website, this defines what the

meaning of passive-oppression is. Passive oppression is defined as when one person is felt that

they are not being acknowledged therefore making them feel worthless or disempowered. We are

able to connect this quote and the meaning of passive oppression to what happens throughout the

book. Ben is the oppressor in this case and Miko is the one who is being oppressed. Ben is seen

to constantly say things that passively oppress Miko which essentially makes her feel that she

has no power and makes her feel unworthy of an opinion.

Papadaki, Evangelia (Lina). "Feminist Perspectives on Objectification." Stanford

Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University, 16 Dec. 2019. Web. 22 May 2021.

This quote gives insight into the negative effects that viewing pornography has on people. As

expressed in this quote, pornography portrays women to be nothing but sexual objects. This idea

is evident in the way that Ben acts towards women. In the reading, Ben is caught with a DVD

that holds pornographic content. As Ben’s actions suggest, he sees women as sexual objects and

he treats women this way. He is seen to constantly oppress, disrespect, and negatively treat

women which could be stemmed from the viewing of porn.

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Sheffer, Jolie A. "The Optics of Interracial Sexuality in Adrian Tomine’s Shortcomings

and Sherman Alexie’s The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven." College

Literature 2014.1 (2014): 119-48. Print.

While the objectifying of women may seem like a new topic to some, this has been a prevalent

issue in our human society since the beginning of time. As seen throughout this reading, Ben is

seen to disrespect women by objectifying the women he runs into, which in this instance is

Autumn. Objectifying a person has led to many conflicts in not only the reading but also in our

society. It has led to the over-sexualization of individuals and miscommunication between

people. This quote gives insight into Ben’s personality and the way he views women. He sees

them as nothing more than objects.

Tomine, Adrian. Shortcomings. Mondadori, 2008.

The book shortcomings, written by Adrian Tomine, shows a relationship between an Asian

American couple. The main goal of the book is to show the audience the different aspects and

situations in life women have to deal with. The book really opens the reader’s eyes to understand

what women have to go through. After reading this book it has really made me understand the

many different things women have to go through that many people do not talk about.