Some (actually most) Like It Hot

In discussing ideology, I can't help but immediately think of it in the most simplistic of terms. This is especially true when it comes to gender stereotyping in the media. We are trained to believe that women are meant to be all at once sweet and sexy . . . and men love sex. This is why I wasn't surprised to find a link to vote for the Ultimate Female Hotties: '90s - 2007. On CNN.com no less . . .

I, of course, immediately began flipping through the pictures of the candidates (of which there were 25) and found that the pictures really weren't meant for my personal satisfaction. As much as I like Charlize Theron, I really wasn't turned on by the fact that she was looking at me poutily through a sheer curtain. Obviously, Entertainment Weekly doesn't give a crap what I think about these women, otherwise the article would have been titled, "Ultimate Independent Power Women" and the pictures accompanying each candidate would have shown them in stylish, yet subdued couture, rather than . . . almost nothing.

While the ideology of men loving women and sex ultimately drives the article, a number of other ideologies were at work. While flipping through the photos I couldn't help but notice that the more "ethnic" looking women were often more scantily-clad or dressed down in more provocative attire than their white contemporaries. This played into the ideology that women of a non-European background are often more sexually liberated and more willing to play into a man's naughty fantasies. This was backed up even more by the captions accompanying each picture which proclaimed each candidate's "Ultimate Hottie Moment" which often involved a scene from a movie in which the actress was (surprise surprise) fully or nearly nude. This reveals the ideology that, to be a sexy, a woman must have no clothes on. This ideology also says that saying or doing something that actually makes a statement may not be sexy since almost all of the scenes that were brought up for each candidate involved them being the sexy sidekick or arm candy of a male lead.

What annoyed me through the whole section though, was the downplaying of the "Ultimate Male Hotties" article. Though its premise is pretty much the same, it is definitely under-the-radar in comparison to the female focus. This plays into the ideology that women are less interested in superficial and sexual material. Well, I'm here to say that I'm just as superficial as the next guy (literally).