Trigger Warning: This post contains a video with graphic images related to sexual assault, violence, and emotional trauma.
The Women Not Objects campaign is challenging the way women are portrayed in advertisements, aiming to show everyone — not just women — that what we see affects the way we think.
In only a couple short videos, the campaign sends a powerful message that objectifying women in the media hurts everyone. That pain, the videos show, seeps into everyday life.
Scrolling through Instagram, scores of pictures encourage women to change the way they look, from detox teas to waist trainers. As women point out in the campaign video, these images set ideals that are often unrealistic, sending many girls and women into a spiral of self-hatred and a dangerous quest to achieve a look that’s not reachable. See the Kylie Jenner lip challenge for example.
The campaign isn’t only taking on what ads tell women they should look like, but also how they should be treated. Violent ads showing women in trunks of cars, with a noose around their neck, at the hands of men create a culture where those things might seem OK. In these cases, violence against women can be misinterpreted a joke.
Instead, Women Not Objects wants girls and women to know that their worth isn’t measured through their body, it’s measured in their words and actions. The campaign is encouraging everyone to stand up to scary portrayals in hopes that, if enough people reject them, they will become fewer and fewer. If you feel like an ad is objectifying women, you can submit the ad via email or Instagram to Women Not Objects by using the hashtag #WomenNotObjects to call it out.
Of course, nudity in photos can be a source of empowerment for some women, and that’s cool. But the key here is choice and control, and that’s what Women Not Objects is hoping to take back.
