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QuestionDoes the Male Gaze Sell to Women?
I’ve recently been thinking about this… there are a lot of posts on Twitter about women who go into the gym and perform sexualised routines for male fans… and lots of men ripping into them for being sl*ts and so on.
But then I got onto thinking about something else. There are a lot of REAL female fitness accounts and influencers who usually have promotion videos which are shot by men. Typically they feel very male gaze-y, with less focus on the exercise aspect and more focus on ‘look, 5 shots of this woman’s behind in quick succession’. Personally even though I am a lesbian, I would find this off putting if I wanted to take an influencer seriously over a fitness regime, even if I thought that they looked good. I suppose it makes them look unserious and perhaps self-obsessed. But also the lingering air of maleness would make me back off
So I’m wondering: does this sell to women? And does the male gaze generally sell to women? Have women internalised it to the extent that these things appeal to them? Is there any source out there which discusses whether the sexualisation of advertising actually makes women want to buy different products?