Sepulveda 1

Sarai Sepulveda

Professor McCann

English 1302.203

9 March 2022

Title Still in Progress

It is a troublesome revelation when one discovers that deep within their mind, lies a pre-

programmed, motherboard of misogyny. A thread of commands that the average person is yet to

be conscious of for the mind has grown accustomed to the subtle sexism that has taken over their

daily life. The term “internalized misogyny” is often used to describe this kind of prejudice as it

provides a distinction from blatant misogyny. One can never truly know what any kind of

misogyny feels like unless they are a woman because the woman is the one who recognizes it,

experiences it, and suffers through it to continue living a normal life. But the normal life should

not be known of neglected sexism or misogyny as it would then be stealing the infamous title of

the present world. Anywhere one can find a woman, one is also sure to find another who dislikes

her for reasons that can only be explained by the woman herself. Consequently, there are

widespread declarations of misogyny all around the world because unfortunately, sexism does

not stop in America. The media and its branches frequently reach others to educate them on the

problem that continues to persist in other countries as well. The most notorious one of them all?

The film industry: the place that breeds both success and failure at the cost of abuse if one is a

woman. For women in the film industry, they are met with exigent and degrading standards that

today, many have grown tired of. Multiple movements have been initiated to spread awareness of

the situation, but it has begun to feel as if there is no winning. “They are advocating for equal

and fair treatment,” is followed by, “They’re hysterical, they already get paid the same as men,”
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or, “She wants to try directing her own film,” but, “She knows she has a half-naked role to play

in front of the camera.” The mistreatment has taken on different forms throughout countries as

they each attempt to deal with this issue that has been manifesting inside the industry for

decades. I would like to add another sentence here to better connect the thesis and also make the

thesis stronger! The idea that misogyny within the film industry can be restricting, harmful, and

even uniting towards women can be seen throughout multicultural perspectives as well as certain

subgenres of film.

MeToo, IchAuch, मैं भी

The words feminism and misogyny are often seen together, still, they have nearly

opposite meanings that cause turmoil in India’s film industry but unity in Germany’s film

industry. These two countries have long been familiar with “show business” and how things

work around those parts, including the mixed and stereotypical attitudes towards women.

Stereotypes have been seen to grow violent and sometimes sexually abusive within the film

industry when certain people start to take a wrong idea and turn it into something much worse.

After the MeToo movement’s resurrection a couple of years ago, various countries began to face

the influence of the movement too. This social movement where women are given the courage to

come forward about their sexual abusers has sparked feminist groups in India and Germany to

rise for their female actresses, directors, producers, writers, and more. In India, the ignition is

first seen with a prominent female figure in the industry that decided to take that first step, “It

was when Tanushree Dutta, a former Bollywood actress, spoke out in September 2018 about the

sexual harassment and intimidation she faced from a senior actor named Nana Patekar in 2008,

that the MeToo movement began to catch on in the Indian mainstream” (Lakkimsetti 305). This

was the pinnacle moment for the movement and for the women of India because those who were
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suffering in silence suddenly had a great group of people to support them. Lakkimesetti

continues to explain the ironic way the patriarchy gave them a boost in the right direction,

“Along with the acknowledgment that this was the first-time women felt that they could openly

share their experiences of sexual harassment without feeling judged or misunderstood, activists

also had the triumphant feeling that the “conspiracy of silence”—which had kept women from

sharing their experiences of sexual violence even with others they had close bonds with—was

finally broken” (306). There no longer was a need to hide for the tables were finally turning as

misogyny started to turn into the oppressed factor in India. Over in Germany, a feminist film

movement has been in power since the 1890s and with the MeToo movement, the work of great

females in the film industry has begun to gain recognition. Baer states, “Their work has achieved

recognition in the context of feminism’s revitalization in Germany over the past decade--driven

not least by the interface of digital media and protest cultures--and amidst the resurgence of

attention to institutionalized sexism and the marginalization of women in the global film and

media industries, evident in the recent #TimesUp and #MeToo movements” (214). The women

of Germany understand the nature of the MeToo movement and that in reality, there should be

no need for such a thing, but in a cruel world such as this, one should take advantage of the

opportunities life presents you with. There have been multiple successful female artists in

Germany’s film industry such as Maren Ade and her film Toni Erdmann (2016) (215). Her

success has not only gained her fame but attention towards the restriction women face in the film

industry for solely being female. Notes: German and Indian perspectives which detail on the

influence the MeToo movement brought towards feminism and misogyny in each country. The

German perspective talks about how the movement actually brought a lot of women together and

strengthened feminist pride. 

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Subheading

Although the genre of sports films has long been prejudiced towards the participation of

women, this same action from the silent film genre is one that still, extremely, confuses people. 

Notes: Misogyny within the sports film industry and the silent film industry. These two

perspectives focus on specific genres of film but still emphasize how sexism remains a prevalent

issue in either industry. The two genres also focus on certain ethnicities throughout the

respective article so they can both be mentioned to continue the international perspectives.

Subheading

The way in which misogyny tends to fall into small places and mutate until it becomes a

consuming problem is a manner that the Malayalam and Nigerian film industries are all too

familiar with. Notes: Malayalam and Nigerian perspectives could be discussed here as they both

hold similarities in their sexist crimes against women in the film industry. Still, there are

differences in culture and how it consequently affects the views of many on how they depict

women. Throughout each perspective, the articles that touch base on misogyny in the film

industry as a whole can be mentioned to support each international perspective.

Conclusion
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Works Cited

Baer, Hester. “Feminist Film and Media.” The German Quarterly, vol. 91, no. 2, [American

Association of Teachers of German, Wiley], 2018, pp. 213–16,

http://www.jstor.org/stable/44974037.

Lakkimsetti, Chaitanya. “Stripping Away at Respectability: #MeToo India and the Politics of

Dignity.” Feminist Formations, vol. 33, no. 3, 2021, pp. 303–317.,

https://doi.org/10.1353/ff.2021.0052.