It's amazing the kind of things you see on Live at the Apollo... one of them was a comedic debate on gender politics regarding Maggie Thatcher and Madonna
The point raised by the comedian (whose name I cannot recall), was that Madonna showed that women could be sexy into their 40s and 50s, yet Margaret Thatcher climbed to the top of the most male dominated profession 'without ever having to shake her ass', as he put it.
Although it was a bit of comedic banter, I remember watching and thinking that there was a real debate behind this. From a feminist point of view, I would definitely have to agree that Margaret Thatcher is the most rational role model, and for exactly the reason he said. Thatcher was the longest serving Prime Minister in the UK in the 20th Century, and not once did she have to objectify herself and the rest of the female population to do so. This, though some may disagree, is exactly what Madonna has done. In making herself a mere object of sexual desire for men, she gave the same image to all women, condemning them if they refused to comply with her new image and change themselves.
Madonna openly encouraged all of this. Whatever happened to natural beauty, and each person being both unique and beautiful? She released a book, entitled Sex, which consisted completely of sexually explicit photos of her i.e. pornography, and alongside it released an album called Erotica. How is it that women actually respect her for all of this? It wasn't until I actually sat down and reflected upon this debate that I realised Madonna is not role model material.
Whilst it is important to both men and women to retain good and healthy lifestyles no matter what age, I think that Madonna's sexual provocation has denegrated both men and women. It suggests that all men desire is sex, and that all women care about is their appearances. What a shallow world we live in if this is the case, though it isn't!
This post is probably a tad biased - I love Madonna's music and films, I won't deny it. But the mistake of idolising her life is one which needs to be rectified. I don't necessarily like Margaret Thatcher, in fact, she made many more people angry than Madonna ever did, but that is to be expected when you're Prime Minister.
Margaret Thatcher run the country, overcame a 'winter of discontent', and no matter what your political views are, I believe that she deserves the utmost respect as a role model to young girls. As a child she lived in a flat in Lincolnshire, and her father owned 2 grocery shops. She wasn't fed with a silver spoon, and she certainly had to work for the position she was given. It is my belief that she fully deserved her time as Prime Minister, and that she is the true role model of the 80s and 90s, not Madonna.
Please let me know what you think in the comments!
For me Margaret Thatcher is probably the last person I would call a role model. It's true as you say that she worked her way up to arguably the highest position in the country and against all the odds. However when she got there, what did she do? In my opinion she did more harm than good. And the harm she did is still evident in our society today. No-ones perfect but if you are looking for role models I think you have to look at the whole picture and as a whole package I would give her 2 out of 10, taking everything into account I think I am being generous here. In regard to Madonna. I grew up listening to her music. And as a full blooded male I enjoyed seeing her looking sexy and acting in a provocative manner. For me personally, and this may be a bit controversial, I see woman as the stronger sex. For me sexual equality is allowing women to be free (within the laws that govern all of us) to chose what they do with their lives. Many women, especially feminists find it difficult to take when women use their bodies in a manner they find inappropriate. I understand and respect this view. However it is up to the individual women to decide what is right for her. If someone had stopped Madonna releasing her book of sexually explicit photos that surely would be a violation of the right to freedom of expression and regressive. For me the problem with some of the feminist agenda is that it in effect it curtails the rights of women who don't agree with or have the same ideas and aims to humiliate or demonise them. When my daughters grow up i would hate it if they became a page 3 model or similar. But
ReplyDeletenevertheless I would always fight for and respect their freedom to make their own decisions.
In the next comment box is an article from the New York times, written by a female journalist (1990) It takes on the debate of Madonna and feminism
I concede the point you made about Margaret Thatcher's long-lasting effects on our society, but looking at her work ethic and how she made so much of herself out of so little, I actually quite respect her and think that she should be seen as a role model. As you said, what she did once she got to the top was quite harmful, but many people (I'm not one) would argue that she also did some very decent things, and to be perfectly honest that's another debate entirely. The main objective of this post was to show that in terms of role models, Thatcher showed that women were as good as men in professional terms and is, I believe, quite inspiring, whereas Madonna showed that to get anywhere in life you had to live up to men's perception of 'sexy', as you've quite clearly outlined with your opinions on her look. I don't begrudge anybody their freedom of expression, but I am astonished that for many women, Madonna is the natural role model, instead of Thatcher, or any other woman with a work ethic and result as inspiring.
DeleteBut who cares what the feminists say anyhow? They have been outrageously negative about Madonna from the start. In 1985, Ms. magazine pointedly feted quirky, cuddly singer Cyndi Lauper as its woman of the year. Great judgment: gimmicky Lauper went nowhere, while Madonna grew, flourished, metamorphosed and became an international star of staggering dimensions. She is also a shrewd business tycoon, a modern woman of all-around talent.
ReplyDeleteMadonna is the true feminist. She exposes the puritanism and suffocating ideology of American feminism, which is stuck in an adolescent whining mode. Madonna has taught young women to be fully female and sexual while still exercising total control over their lives. She shows girls how to be attractive, sensual, energetic, ambitious, aggressive and funny -- all at the same time.
American feminism has a man problem. The beaming Betty Crockers, hangdog dowdies and parochial prudes who call themselves feminists want men to be like women. They fear and despise the masculine. The academic feminists think their nerdy bookworm husbands are the ideal model of human manhood.
But Madonna loves real men. She sees the beauty of masculinity, in all its rough vigor and sweaty athletic perfection. She also admires the men who are actually like women: transsexuals and flamboyant drag queens, the heroes of the 1969 Stonewall rebellion, which started the gay liberation movement.
"Justify My Love" is an eerie, sultry tableau of jaded androgynous creatures, trapped in a decadent sexual underground. Its hypnotic images are drawn from such sado-masochistic films as Lililana Cazani's"The Night Porter" and Luchino Visconti's "The Damned." It's the perverse and knowing world of the photographers Helmut Newton and Robert Mapplethorpe.
Contemporary American feminism, which began by rejecting Freud because of his alleged sexism, has shut itself off from his ideas of ambiguity, contradiction, conflict, ambivalence. Its simplistic psychology is illustrated by the new cliche of the date-rape furor:" 'No' always means 'no'. " Will we ever graduate from the Girl Scouts? "No" has always been, and always will be, part of the dangerous, alluring courtship ritual of sex and seduction, observable even in the animal kingdom.
Madonna has a far profounder vision of sex than do the feminists. She sees both the animality and the artifice. Changing her costume style and hair color virtually every month, Madonna embodies the eternal values of beauty and pleasure. Feminism says, "No more masks." Madonna says we are nothing but masks.
Through her enormous impact on young women around the world, Madonna is the future of feminism.
Hmmm.
ReplyDeleteAll very interesting... My own opinion is that by changing her look so very often, Madonna wasn't actually that comfortable in her own skin. Come on... how normal is it to have a different look every other week?
That said however, I do agree in whole that it is each to their own - I think both were strong role models.. and as I was a teenager in the 80's I both admired & disliked them both at different times.
As in I admired Maggie for her strengths but hated how she used them against the likes of "us."
I loved Madonna for her music and arrogance (for want of a better word) and the way she "threatened" what had always been acceptable/expected/respected. But I did hate when she again "changed herself" and lost every ounce of what I always thought of as "natural beauty." She became more fake and more "manufactured" shall we say... and certainly more crude rather than sexual - and less like the Madonna I had grown up with and so loved.
All in all - I think they were both strong influences - the only difference here truly - is that Madonna more often got the better press! :0)