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This post explores media messages as they reveal the constructed nature of bodies, both personal and political. Media critic Peter Parisi writes, “Examining news stories as examples of discourse, narrative, olr framing implies that a news report is formulated and narrated out of a virtually infinite number of events and facts. “10 As narratives, news stories reveal assumptions and values, ideologies and politics.l! These ideologies, of course, have a tremendous influence on how we construct ourselves as individuals. Magazines and newspapers not only supply the public with particulars about health and medicine; this knowledge also shapes attitudes, actions, and decisions aboot the risks and benefits of health-related behaviors.

Communication scholar Julia Wood points out how media influence both cultiliral images of gender and individual identities, controlling what we see and k60w, reproducing expectations, values, and ideals, and “pathologizing” the human body. She stresses how “one of the most damaging consequences dfmedia’s images of women and men is that these images encourage us to perceive normal bodies and normal physical functions as problems.”13 With regard to health issues in the media, health communication scholar Athena du Pre is suspicious of the tendency toward sensationalism, while encouraged by the ways in which media can increase the public’s awareness of health-rellated issues.Iv News agencies are quick to respond to stories that examine the medicalization of sexuality because, according to Leonore Tiefer, a scientific perspective legitimizes stories about sex.IS Medical news about sexlin the popular press satisfies the public’s craving for such news and simultaneously remains “clean” rather than pornographic.

As a group, the fifty-two news stories in my sample tell us a great deal about erectile dysfunction generally and Viagra’s impact on how men communicate lab out their bodies and sexuality specifically. Some are written with a great deal of social reflexivity-exposing assumptions made by physicians and therapists, questioning the ease with which Viagra order passed through the Food andl Drug Administration (FDA), and zeroing in on the relational fallout in a “make a pill” society. And yet, other aspects ofViagra’s impact remain unexamined, By examining these news stories-as a group-I locate agenealogy of fadors that produce, maintain, and (for some) transform assumptions of the sex4alized male body. I then interpret these assumptions, exposing the dorninanf discourse of biomedicine. Feminist political scientist Kathy Ferguson I suggests that it is through the lenses of interpretation and genealogy that the social critic can trace the “threads” of discourse. Genealogies not only imply multiple beginnings but also draw “attention to that which has been bmitted.”

The qontent of these articles touch upon five primary subject areas. Specifically, the media messages reveal assumptions and values about (1) pre-Viagra erectile dysfunction technology; (2) the impact ofViagra on romantic relationships; (3) testimonials of masculinity; (4) Viagra and death; and (5) the political economy of healthcare. The ordering of these themes is not indicative I of “most important” or “least important.” Rather, they are thoroughly interconnected and overlapping. I order them in this way in the interest of telling the story about Viagra as reported in our nation’s recognized news outlets and to suggest a genealogy of factors that maintain masculinity’s sexual sodialization. A discourse analysis of the Viagra story as reported in these news sources reveals the creation of a significant cultural narrative, thereby illuminating assumptions, ideals, and beliefs about sexJality and masculinity.