Ronnie Ritchie of Everyday Feminism wrote and illustrated this insightful comic showing the difference between sexual empowerment and sexual objectification. Here’s a few words about it:
“There’s a long-standing debate in feminism about sexual empowerment: How do we know when someone is being sexually liberated versus being sexually objectified, since they sometimes can look similar from the outside? Well, the answer is simpler than you think: The difference is in who has the power.”
Artist: Ronnie Ritchie
Source: Everyday Feminism
Another difficulty is that the same balancing rocks are not offered to everyone. Also several of these are of the displayers own volition they get turned off and on at will. *I want to dress this way but only certain people may look at me.* *You must interpret this shirt this way and no other way.* This is more prevalent with womens’ appearances but really should be taken into consideration of all variations of human. *The Men must look this way* or *Women must look this way* tropes are super common. When men start to wear makeup it’s not often to cheers. The balancing and juggling acts are seldom based in kindness most often focused on being judgmental and cruel. That being said no matter what clothing you wear your actions should be what are judged.
Not to be confused with intentionally objectifying yourself and then getting cold feet and blaming the world for personal actions. That’s the worst situation to be in, the world is not required to fix it. Say someone goes out on a limb and changes up their entire look maybe even spends money on medical grade changes. Then the world still doesn’t accept someone with open arms. The dream is everything works out perfectly as is imagined. The reality is sometimes the changes big or small don’t reliably gain a person acceptance which is almost always the goal. Female or male or anything between.