The male gaze

     The male gaze as described by John Berger is the perception that women are physically appealing objects or image to which men have the right to view. Or as Berger says "One might simplify this by saying: men act and women appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at." [Berger's ways of seeing page 47] Berger is also implying that the male gaze permeates the psychology of the women being viewed. Because her beauty is being viewed, evaluated and rewarded; we often even now submit to the male gaze while making the viewer (men) feel validation, importance and even fulfillment. It permeates popular culture within the images we see everyday through the media or more popular these days; social networks. We see it in beauty trends and fads and in overall ideals about the female body and the undeniable emphasis on the importance of a woman's physical appearance. The apparent prize for this beauty, is to be owned by the spectator, to be reduced to a luxury item with no interests other than to fulfill her owner's desires.
Another intriguing way Berger describes this is when he distinguishes the difference between being nude and being naked in art, a nude is to be unclothed for the viewer, a pleasurable perceived object. Berger quotes; "To be naked is to be oneself. To be nude is to be seen naked by others and yet not be recognized for oneself. A naked body has to be seen as an object in order to become a nude. (The sight of it as an object stimulates the use of it as an object.)  Nakedness reveals itself. Nudity is placed on display." [Berger 54]

   Patriarchy as i define it is is systematic social order in which men or socially, economically, physically and politically dominant largely excluding women from power. The opposite of this would be matriarchy which has yet to exist in any civilizations that I've heard of. Examples of patriarchy can be easily found in the average home where gendered roles are assigned  to us before were even born. We see it as we distinguish what it means to be a man or a woman we see it when we say we cannot do certain things because we are defined as man or woman. Yet to be regarded as equals is to eliminate these distinctions and idealisms that  deprive men and women the freedom to be human regardless of gender. Bell Hooks describes  patriarchy as a disease which assaults the male body and spirit in our nation.  She goes on to say  that appropriateness engenders is a symptom of patriarchy for example how she mentions her experience when she responded with the rage when she was denied a toy. She quotes "I was taught as a girl in a patriarchal household the rage was not an appropriate feminine feeling, that it should be not only not be expressed but eradicated. When my brother responded with rage at being denied a toy, he was taught as a boy in a patriarchal household that his ability to express rage was good but that he had to learn the best setting to unleash his hostility." [Bell .19]

The symptoms of patriarchy

Sir Peter Lely, Portrait of a Lady and Child as Venus and Cupid, oil on canvas, 123.2 x 157.5 cm