The Image of Women in Mainstream Media

There's this popular genre of movies that many african women enjoy - Nigerian movies. It's everywhere in my community on mainstream tv, on videos, cds, computers, I mean it's everywhere. While I find these movies entertaining, I think they do not help the women's empowerment drive at all. Why do I say this?

Most of the plots in these movies usually portray women as weakling that need to rely on the support of men emotionally, financially and spiritually. The stories are usually of women who rely on men to take them to shops and buy expensive shoes and clothes for them, or women who are represented as sex objects. The women are mostly meek and submissive with hardly any voice of their own.

I just think that given the wide audience these movies enjoy, if they could try inspiring women by portraying empowered female characters, then it could go a long way to help the women's empowerment drive, especially among grassroot women.