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Attitude Online - Thursday 14th March

The difference between the representations of men in the online and the print version of this magazine is that the online magazine shows men as being more buff which paints an unrealistic expectation of gay men to have these body types.

Print cover has a gay man with a moustache which is an intertextual reference to Freddie Mercury. The print cover positions the audience as a gay man who has had problems with bullying from 'jocks' in the past. He is wearing a US Army Costume which may be used to appeal to an international audience. The femininity of the camp hand on hip gesture is a convention that is specific to the gay magazine genre. He is breaking the fourth wall with the direct mode of address with the look into the camera. It presents the gay male on the front as androgynous which he clearly isn't but this is a form of anchorage.

If somebody is a closet-gay then they can view the website so that they don't have to buy to magazine. It may be a way to reduce the open expression of being gay.

Gay culture is exclusionary.

There is an assumption of heteronormativity in society until proven otherwise. In a media product there is this assumption that all the characters in the product are straight unless they are explicitly shown as being gay. With Attitude Online, this assumption is proven as being incorrect which may make some viewers feel uncomfortable.

Stuart Hall's representation theory can be applied to this stereotype that has been shown within the online magazine.

Stuart Hall suggests that the power of the media representations play an important role in defining the ideological thinking of audiences regarding specific social groups. An example of this is when a gay person is introduced into media products as gay to instantly show audience members that they shouldn't make the assumption of heteronormativity in this case.

Inequality in Attitude Online leads to gay stereotypes because there are large financial reasons to make sure that the website targets the large majority of gay audience members that may recognise these stereotypes and read articles on the site. Stereotypes like this can be guidelines for gay people.

Stereotypes happen due to imbalances in power according to Stuart Hall.

Theories around ethnicity and postcolonial theory - Paul Gilroy

(advertising, music videos, online media)

• Postcolonialism is the study of the impact that being under direct rule has had on former colonies. For example, despite being a tiny island, Britain colonised and declared ownership of many countries, including India and Australia.
• These ideas and attitudes continue to shape contemporary attitudes to race and ethnicity in the postcolonial era
• These postcolonial attitudes have constructed racial hierarchies in our society, where, for example, white people are by and large given more positive and important roles than BME people
• Media producers are also guilty of using binary oppositions to reinforce BME people and characters as 'others'

Key work – After Empire

Cultural imperialism - The idea of spreading ideologies


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