Michael LaPenna

"Television and other products of media culture provide materials out of which we forge our very identifes our sense of selfhood; our notion of what it means to be male or female; our sense of class of us and them"( Kellner) MTV last year produced a show called skins. The show is based on the real life everyday encounters that high school students are forced to face. While going to school each character of the show undergoes certain experiences that teenagers are suppose to face. These experiences include fighting, drug use, partying, stealing, and the big one, exclusion in the social circle. The main character is Tony and he going to be used as my point of emphasis. Tony is the good looking, in shape, and charming jock. Tony throughout the season is seen doing many things that represent the Male, as being cocky, ignorant, and naive. Tony has a girlfriend that is beautiful she has long blonde hair a pretty face and a great body. Typical glamorized high school couple if you asked me. As the season goes on their is an episode where Tony tell his best friend that he can have his girlfriend since he can tell he loves her. Tony begins to have sex with almost the entire town as his girlfriend believes that he is being loyal the entire time. Eventually Tony's girlfriend contracts and STD from him. "Recent times have a fiery generational contest where women are the new professionals health alerts about their sexual behavior"(Harris). Tony who is now talking to other girls gives his best friend the okay to lose his virginity to his ex girlfriend. "Their is a fear for girls as the new risk takers"(Harris). Since Michelle has contracted an STD, this innocent girl can be known as the victim while Tony walks away scott free. Tony represents the typical cheating male who is only interested in himself and the women that come into contact with him. Tony represents the typical cheating Male, as his girlfriend represents the passive victim of a sexually charged relationship. Skins overall shows how dangerous a high-school relationship can be, but at the same time exploiting males for not taking sex seriously. Having sex is suppose to be one of the most important moments in a young man and women's life. However when Tony tells his best friend that he can have sex with his girlfriend michelle, he goes ahead and does it. Why is this problematic? "In media and cultural studies escapism for women and could be understood as reproducing traditional women's roles behaviors and attitudes"(Kellner). When Michelle Tony's girlfriend is being cheated on constantly and mistreated by her boyfriend it brings up many negative events that have happened in the past. Men and Women need to respect themselves especially the Man to the women. The fact that someone is taking the sexual term of virginity and throwing it around so lightly shows me something, that losing your virginity has become a word without meaning. The males and females in this show mainly Tony show how irresponsible teens are in sexualizing themselves. Tony who is very good looking shows younger audiences that it is okay to cheat on your girlfriend, have sex, and mock other for still being a virgin. Skins showed me and the rest of its viewers that if you are not good looking you will not have the opportunity to lose your virginity, unless your good looking friend throws a girl at you for sex! I did not appreciate how Tony represents the ruthless, cheating, and sexualized male that has no feelings for others that respect themselves. It also shows how if your not the good looking guy (sexualized male) with all the right moves than you will ultimately not get the girl. After analyzing Kellner I realized that if we are going to constantly put out media that sexualizes male and females, we are going to revisit the past where males were seen as being the dominating man in the household where they get away with everything.

Through my analyzation of the text of have realized that women are being put on TV to make the male look more dominant. Tony as stated earlier is constantly cheating on his girlfriend, who eventually contracts clymidia. The fact that this was taking so lightly shows me that we are backtracking, and showing less respect towards males and females alone. If men are represented as cheaters, virgins as losers, and women as STD recipients, it will be very hard to change the way people view teens when they are growing up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79s4IedJDn0

Works Cited

Kellner, Douglas. "Cultural Studies and Multiculturalism and Media Culture.

Harris, . "The Can-Do Girl and The At Risk Girl."