How are women represented in the 200 most viewed videos in 2019 and 2020 on YouTube?
It is to this question that the Fondation des femmes, associated with Sciences-po, answers in a report unveiled this Thursday, with a title summarizing the results of the document: "Digital: sexism in freedom".
With more than 68% of the content studied presenting gender stereotypes, more than 25% of the videos exposing at least one form of violence and almost 35% of the videos showing a degrading image of women, the findings are qualified as "edifying" .
In 2018, the results were not good, they are worse today
If YouTube was chosen as the field of analysis, it is no coincidence.
Since 2005, this benchmark video content host site has been, according to Médiamétrie, the most consulted platform among 15-24 year olds and the second most consulted, of all ages, in France.
The Women's Foundation study did not start from scratch.
It follows a report from the CSA (Superior Audiovisual Council), carried out in 2018, also in order to establish a diagnosis on the image of women on the famous platform.
The results were already not good, they are worse.
The periods fixed for this study were not chosen unexpectedly either.
2019-2020, the years when the health crisis linked to Covid-19 hit the planet, not sparing France.
Curfews, confinements, teleworking, closed classes, it is also the moment when we were, more than usual, in front of our screens.
First lesson of the report: the most attractive videos (74%) are music videos.
But so far "are art objects themselves, many of them also offer content
touts
and play a very common way of problematic representations of women," alert the investigation.
Only 16.2% of them occupy the main role.
"These videos establish norms, catastrophic social roles"
“It was very important to see how mentalities are forged in our country.
These most viewed videos, aimed especially at 18-24 year olds, set norms, catastrophic social roles, with the macho man on one side and the
lascivious trim
woman
on the other.
However, these degrading images, these humiliations, pass freely on the Internet, thus making the bed of domestic violence, too often fatal.
We want to draw the public authorities to this issue, ”insists Sylvie Pierre-Brossolette, coordinator of this report (and responsible for the precedent for the CSA of which she was a member).
She is also a member of the Women's Foundation and president of the fight against stereotypes for the High Council for Equality.
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Out of 200 content studied, 114 present male stereotypes, which corresponds to 57% of the content.
The most represented are "the hyper-virile", "the protector" and "the macho".
We therefore notice a slight drop compared to the figures of the CSA, for which 62% of the content studied presented male stereotypes.
On the other hand, 78 content out of 200 presents female stereotypes, or 39%.
The images which are most attached to women are "the sentimental", "the doll", "the seductress" and "the vénale".
On the contrary, we note a slight increase compared to the figures of the CSA (34%).
However, if male stereotypes are predominant, they are associated with positive values (power and courage) unlike female stereotypes.
All sexualized characters are women
And when the characters are sexualized (which is the case in 20% of the videos), they are all… women. “We have noted that very often these women are not naked, neither partially nor totally, but their bodies are objectified by much more insidious processes, the most recurring being the camera games directed in order to show the different feminine attributes ( 68%) as well as their erotic movements and lascivious poses (31%). These suggestive processes convey the idea that women must appear and behave in a certain way to be attractive, thus reinforcing the image of the woman-object, ”the survey reports.
As for violence, 37.5% are represented by sexist insults, 25% are misogynistic statements, 15.6% contribute to the culture of rape, 6.3% of violence takes the form of sexual harassment and 3.1% domestic violence. Violence classified in the categories "music", "humor" and "entertainment". As we know, young people hardly watch television, the sequences of which are regulated by the CSA. The report therefore proposes an amendment to the law of September 30, 1986 on audiovisual communication, making it possible to include the image of women on the Internet within its scope of regulation.
Among other possible solutions? Deprive funding for works conveying sequences that are too degrading for women. The Gafams could also undertake to set up a monitoring system on this subject and therefore to remove, if necessary, the most problematic sequences. “A whole range of things is possible,” says Sylvie Pierre-Brossolette. Will one of them at least be studied?