Do you sometimes feel like there are a lot of nearly naked women out there on the newsstands?
How about the TV?
It's not your imagination.
University at Buffalo researchers completed a study -- to be published in September's Sexuality & Culture journal -- using the covers of Rolling Stone from 1967 to 2009, measuring "changes in the sexualization of men and women in popular media over time."
Conclusion: "The portrayal of women in the popular media over the last several decades has become increasingly sexualized, even “pornified.”
Indeed.
The study used four decades of Rolling Stones covers as a way to measure the changes.
“We chose Rolling Stone,” said sociology professor Erin Hatton, “because it is a well-established, pop-culture media outlet. It is not explicitly about sex or relationships; foremost it is about music. But it also covers politics, film, television and current events, and so offers a useful window into how women and men are portrayed generally in popular culture.”
The findings are disturbing and yet entirely familiar: The media is no longer “depicting women as sexy musicians or actors; they are depicting women musicians and actors as ready and available for sex."
We decided to take a look for ourselves and examined the covers of Rolling Stone issues past and...we completely agree.
