There is a deepening and increasing inequality between men and women
in Italy. The cause of the probelm is being firmly laid at the feet of the Italian Prime Minister, Belusconi.  Equality campaigners have suggested that the continual portrail of women in the media in a demeaning and  sexualised fashion has set back their cause by at least 150 years.

For 50 million Italians, the TV is their only interaction with mass media as few read newspapers. And it seems, day and night, young bikini-clad, almost nude women are featured on all sorts of programmes on both main TV channels – the networks owned by Silvio Berlusconi’s media group.  Their role is to be comically leared at by the male presenters. Much of Italy’s magazines and newspapers follow the same trend on their covers, posters and advertising.

The way women are portrayed on film and media is seen to be utterely “devastating”, according the the editor of the leftwing newspaper, l’Unità.  This attitude towards female dignity puts the position of women in Italy’s society under threat. It doesn’t help that women ministers or politicans are ex-TV starlets of former models.  Italy is at 67th place on the Global Gender Gap Index behind well behind Mongolia, Uzbekistan and Botswana (UK is 13th & USA 27th).

Many women are pushing for a culture of respect for women to make things change. But how long will that take, when there are adverts on TV that blatantly push the idea that ‘Beauty is Talent’.

Tags: Botswana, global gender gap index, Italy, Mongolia, Uzbekistan, women, women's equality

This entry was posted on Friday, September 4th, 2009 at 2:55 pm and is filed under cross-cultural differences, Europe, General, social practices . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.