As if the other genders never enjoy a gander..
this post was submitted on 06 Aug 2025
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I think it would have been funnier (but maybe less accessible) if the thrower had turned into an absurd comic book character exaggeration of masculinity. Thatβs also the male gaze and would make more sense in the context, but I do get that most people think of the male gaze as something applied to women.
Even though the term has been somewhat bastardized into "sexual objectification" in general, "the male gaze" originally specificallt describes the trope of straight male cinematographers/directors literally framing camera shots differently for women.
The whole point is that the director (traditionally always a man in mainstream movies) views the character/actress as an object of sexual desire, and the camera - and by extension the audience - sees the woman through that lens. Literally forcing the audience to gaze from a straight male POV. This is an inherently sexist and heteronormative, usually subconscious process.
Now I do enjoy seeing Henry Cavill shirtless in a bathtub, but that's not the (fe)male gaze because the director wasn't imposing their personal bias, they were making a conscious statement. It's objectifying fan-service but not sexist nor heteronormative.
I suppose you could argue that the female gaze does exist in media where the authors are overwhelmingly female, such as the boylove genre. But that doesn't apply here because Shen's character here is literally a presumed straight man.
I think you might have meant to reply to the person who replied to me, but my first thought for what would appeal to the female gaze is binging with babish: the forearms, the cooking, and the way he talks seem like things that would work for a broad stroke of heterosexual women (though itβs not actually an example, as itβs not shot by a woman).
Things like Henry Caville in a bath are fan service, not the male gaze nor the female gaze, but things like rob liefeld comics draw men through the male gaze (the origin might have been only for the depiction of women, but just as the original description of the male gaze expanded on Sartres concept of the gaze, idea of the male gaze has been more fully developed and applied to the perception of men). Things like muscles so big thereβs no chance they can reach any part of their own back fall into this.
As for the female gaze itself, yeah, Iβve read fanfiction wherein male body parts are basically directly mapped to female ones (presumably because the author is not familiar with menβs bodies). I think it would be a lot harder for me to recognize a subtler variant of it though, as Iβm a woman. I wish there were a large enough body of work for the female gaze to be explored in more depth.
I get what you're saying but what I'm trying to get across is that "sexy" and "objectifying" are distinct from "gaze". It's about the translation of the author's desire into the framing of the scene. I doubt that Babish is attracted to himself in that way, he just framed it in a way that makes sense with the constraint of not wanting to show his face.
It's semantics, if you want to use objectification and "male/female gaze" interchangeably that's fine (though I'd prefer not to use a gendered term if we're talking about a phenomenon that's not inherently gendered).
But Shen used "female gaze" correctly in the original sense of the phrase here so I don't see why people are getting mad that he didn't objectify the guy as well, it's obviously not a comic that's meant to be read as "female objectification is cool".
Straight men view other men through a lens of heterosexuality, and that is part of what is currently understood as the male gaze. I don't see where shen used βfemale gaze,β but alright.
Or even just an overexaggerated part of the female body, to signify where the stereotypical man focuses his attention.
The way it is now just sorta says "the male gaze is 'guys seeing women'"? Which...okay?
My interpretation is he saw a guy because he had the visor on, but when it came off it's revealed it was a hot woman all along, and the visor was "protecting" him from that view. As in, he doesn't have to deal with his misogyny if he doesn't see women.
Ooooor it just doesn't make sense.
No, no, you're cooking. I can see that interpretation.
I donβt see it when the lady saying βbroβ after he loses the visor. βBroβ is not something ladies really say.
My daughter has entered the chat bro.
Really?
Maybe it's linguistic continuity to show they are the same person from before the visor was removed. Or...
Maybe women can just say "bro".
Edit: I'm not calling you a sexist or anything, but it's a weird deduction to make based on very subjective/anecdotal "evidence". I've interacted with a lot of women online they use "bro" pretty freely.
They can, but thatβs really more a dude thing.
But women can be dudes too
I (afab) call my husband, sisters, and female friends bros, dudes, dawgs, and guys.
Whether Iβm a lady is debatable, because Iβm a little rough around the edges, but Iβm definitely female and wear skirts.
Speak for yourself, bruh. We may not all say it, or say it as frequently as men do, but some of us absolutely have "bro" and its varieties within our regular vocabulary.
Honestly, I grew up using "dude" the same way (it was unavoidable when you grew up surrounded by brothers and male cousins in the 90s.) "Bro" was adopted later on. It has the same gender-coded tinge to it, but since "dude" already made sense to me, "bro" never felt strange to say.
Bro, what.
Damn that's good. Yeah kind of like how we often see men as "default people" so if you're just picturing a person you're often thinking of a man without realising it - without even gendering them.
This is Shen. He's never been very deep. 90% of his comics are literally a generic humanoid called "Life" beating him up and then the comments are filled with "Are you ok, shen?". I thought reddit had enough of him but apparently he's leaking over here now too...
Have you seen any of his comics from the last year?
I don't keep up with Shen comics (besides this bizarre resurgence I've noticed recently) but that was only ever the first few years he was around.
It still happens.
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I think I've liked all his shit, from the concept-people like "life", to the creepypastas, to the more introspective stuff, even to the obsession with women / yuri lol.
Yeah the comics don't go deep, but I like his voice.
The way it is now is an exaggeration of the female body and few women actually look like that. The irony is that you missed that because you're so used to the male gaze. (This is not meant to be an insult, it's literally just the way we were all socialized).
She's built like an Instagram fitness influencer, which of course few people look like. But she also dressed for exercise, so the physique doesn't reasonably transfer to the assumption "all women look like this."
I didn't miss that she's made to look hot, I just thought it could be made more explicit through further exaggeration since most cartoon stylings are already flattering.
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Oh no! Not tHe MaLE gaZe!!1!!!
Itβd be extra punchy, if the frisbee also turned into a π, and the cap into π.
The author doesn't understand what the phrase "male gaze" means.
Edit: on reflection I wonder if in fact the author does understand because the final panel is very much in line with the kind of sexualised representation of females decried by feminists. It may be subtley on the point but meta.
I wondered if the idea was before the visor came off, anyone could have been a dude for all they cared, but once the visor came off, they saw a sexy woman and that changed their interaction.
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How you doing?
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