Women Under Patriarchal Oppression

Over the past century, film has definitely developed into one of the mostindispensable forms of entertainment. Not only promulgating various cultures, butalso focusing on hot issues in society, film wins favor of the public.The American film Boys Don’t Cry in1999is adaptd from the real-life story ofan American girl Brandon Teena, who dreams to become a man through sex change,but suffers brutal persecution of patriarchy. Brandon is beaten, raped and murderedby his male acquaintances after they discover he is anatomically female. A series ofsensitive themes such as crossdressing, transgender, homosexuality and violencemake the film a sensation that year.The inequality between men and women has been a fact for long. In thepatriarchal society, people show more concern over the unfair treatment womenreceive in the public areas, overlooking the misery women suffer in the private areas.From the perspective of radical feminism, the thesis analyzes the film in threeaspects and argues that Brandon’s misery lies in patriarchal oppression of private life,and in the patriarchal society women suffer male oppression both in the public andthe private areas, including their individual sex love. The serious issue should receivemore attention from the common people.The thesis is composed of three chapters. By analyzing Brandon’s sexualitychoice, appearance and temperament, Chapter one exposes the fact that patriarchaloppression of women is conducted through idoelogically stereotyping women,depriving women of freedom to choose their sex life and compelling women tosubmit to men docilely, By analysing the physical violence Brandon suffers,Chapter two reveals the phenomenon that the patriarchal men exert physical violenceon and even murder women when they pose threat to male superiority. The thirdchapter points out that patriarchal oppression of women is not uncommon in dailylife by focusing on the dialogues between Brandon and patriarchal supporters.