FEMINIST FRIDAY: Christiane Amanpour’s New Series About Sex Explores Equality & Pleasure

Welcome to another edition of Feminist Friday, that part of the week where we get get our fangirl on about our fave feminist videos and content. This week has a bit of a news-y running theme, as we’re showcasing some interesting videos from Liz Plank’s ‘Divided States of Women’ series, and a video from AJ+ showcasing an important campaign that totally makes sense now that we are living in the era of #MeToo.

But first up, a new CNN Original series hosted by award-winning investigative journalist and long-standing CNN correspondent Christiane Amanpour that takes her into places and topics viewers are not necessarily used to seeing her tackle. Away from conflict zones and the news room, this time Christiane is delving into sex, and what it means for different people across the globe.

‘Sex and Love Around The World‘ runs the gamut about sex, where each episode focuses on different countries and covers areas such as marriage, dating, intimacy, pleasure, and even equality. While the series is not overtly political, according to an interview the Washington Post did with Christiane, she says there is a conscious female perspective favored in the stories being told.

“I wanted to know how far women were prepared to go and what they would do about their right to happiness, and their right to sexual fulfillment, and their right not just to satisfy men in these countries, which are countries that are not known for their equal rights,” she said.

But the male perspective that is explored opens up dialog about how notions of toxic masculinity are slowly being broken down, especially by powerful movements like #MeToo.

“We are in a moment where boys are free to express their emotions — and not to live up to an old, antiquated macho ideal. I think it is a very important social factor right now, and it’s really worth exploring,” she said. Watch a couple of clips from ‘Sex and Love Around The World‘ below, and be sure to watch full episodes on CNN.

The second feature in this week’s column comes from Liz Plank’s Vox series ‘Divided States of America’, which we L.O.V.E! She has covered a whole range of topics in the past including feminism, race, sexual harassment and politics, and this episode is another very important one for America. She looks at incarcerated women in America. It is fairly common knowledge that America has the highest prison population on the planet, for both men and women. While there are technically more men in prisons across America than women, the rate of female incarceration is actually growing at a faster rate.

What is also scary about this statistic is that most women in prison are incarcerated for committing crimes in self-defense, according to the video. This issue became a major talking point with the story of Cyntoia Brown, a young woman who was sentenced to life in prison for murdering the man who had repeatedly raped, abused and forced her into prostitution from a young age. Her story went viral after pop star Rihanna shared it on social media, alerting the masses to the grave injustice that happens within our criminal justice system, especially and disproportionately to low-income people of color.

Watch ‘Divided States of Incarceration’ below to learn more about this issue:

The final video is from AJ+ who interviewed actress and comedian Marcia Belsky who started a project called ‘The Headless Women of Hollywood’, which puts on blast the blatant objectification of women in Hollywood movie posters. Once she started searching for images where women’s whole bodies weren’t shown, just strategic body parts, she found a seemingly endless trove of sexism on full display, where female body parts were literally being used to sell a product to a mass audience.

The project is certainly fitting in the era of #MeToo, but points out just how widespread it is within Hollywood, that it really will take many vigilant and determined people unearthing the problems in order for them to be dealt with. If you care about the issue of objectification of women in media, and believe there needs to be a change, watch the video below to learn why we must hold the creative world accountable for the images they put out into the world.