Susan Bordo writes in Hunger as Ideology, “Today, all that we experience as meaningful are appearances” (Bordo 104). Appearances that we are perpetually discontent within ourselves. The same appearances that we see in television commercials or magazine ads and think we will never look “that good” or we will never be “that cool.” Bordo’s idea makes it almost surreal to see how clearly the influence of media advertising has been in not just defining cultural standards for beauty and self acceptance but also changing them over time to do so much as to mold the mentality of its audiences. Worst of all is that the means used to achieve this, subliminal as they may appear to be, are practices such as gender-oriented targeting, casual racism, and hypersexualization that only serve to impart a negative message to an already vulnerable audience yearning to be that which they admire or subconsciously told they should admire. Alternative approaches to advertising could be applied in order to compete with what we have come to accept as the industry standard. These alternative ideas could achieve the same goals without in the end causing peripheral damage to our social structure.
I try to avoid advertisements that constantly infiltrate my internet and television experience. However it becomes increasingly hard to avoid certain commercials that actively try to push the envelope on what they are allowed to market. Usually if this commercial is particularly appalling or insensitive, I might say something like, “there’s no way this stays on the air more than a few days.” I remember saying something similar to this when a commercial for Dr. Pepper 10 first aired. What caused me to so certainly deny the persistence of such a commercial was simply the tagline, which read, “Dr. Pepper 10, it’s not for women.” I sat there a bit stupefied at first because of the sheer sexism and extreme stereotypes about women prevalent throughout the ad linked below.
Maybe it was supposed to be some kind of spoof or parody on marketing campaigns. But sure enough, the longer I thought about it the more I realized it was not as abrasive or blunt as I first took it to be. Dr. Pepper 10, as a diet soft drink, is supposed to be geared towards the demographic of people that will never even touch a diet drink because it’s not “manly” enough. In reality, it was no different from an elegant, “European” model holding a Virginia Slim cigarette to make smoking appear stylish (Bordo 103). The only functional difference between the commercials is the physiological sense that each tends to. One commercial appeases your ears by telling you what you want to hear, “you can drink this and still feel like a man.” The other commercial targets the visual. It shows you what you want to be. You want to be confident, you want to be elegant, and you want to be happy with yourself. So what this ad says is, “you can smoke this cigarette and look like me.” All these ads ultimately display sexism at their core, through the glorification of gender norms, and an unwillingness to acknowledge the tangential effects associated with doing so. When these types of advertisements are subject to exposure for extended periods of time, they may at first serve to promote a product but in the end they only strengthen the negative aspects of society that they portray. How long after that commercial did a boy smack a can of Dr. Pepper 10 out of a girl’s hand because she’s not “supposed” to drink it? Ideally, never. Realistically speaking, it’s possible enough to be worth mentioning.
This type of marketing must have some sort of success rate for it to happen as often as it does and for as long as it has been, but I argue that a move away from it would not diminish that success and still provide a more socially conscious look at marketing. Some things could be easy fixes through minor details, like for example not excluding an entire group of people from buying your product. While other things, like the hypersexualization of women, are so tightly ingrained in the culture of advertising that they seemingly will never go away because sex sells--things that appeal to society’s prurient interests will always grab attention. Even taking down a sexist ad will still be remembered because of the controversy that may have ensued and the attention it received.
The problem is pervasive in commercials selling products that are not remotely sexual. Notable examples include godaddy.com, a domain hosting website that has a yearly “not safe for work” ad stream at the same time of the Super Bowl, and Herbal Essences, a shampoo brand that flaunts a commercial of women making orgasmic sounds while applying their shampoo.
The ideas probably already exist, ready for the industry to take them and redefine what we know as advertising. There should be more media literacy programs in schools to educate young people about this pervasive culture and to encourage these new ideas that don’t reinforce the sexist patriarchy. One can hope that more women getting jobs in advertisement agencies will create more diversity in media but if women have these sexist ideas engrained, they might still put out these images. Certain marketing campaigns, like Geico for instance, are simplistic and straight forward to the point where they allow their commercials to be about pleasing the customer. We already know you can save 15% on car insurance by switching to Geico. That’s the message they try to get out, so what they do for the other 25 seconds of the video is have a gecko with an Australian accent complain about having to walk places. Whom did this commercial manage to exploit besides, maybe, geckos that don’t walk on two legs? I’m sure it’d be much cheaper for a company to hire a couple of funny, diverse writers than it is to research the newest and most advanced forms of subliminal messaging. Maybe if more women were at the forefront, these kind of good commercials would be put out more often. It is also important to call out sexist ads, even if it is on your social media. There is an app created by the Representation Project http://therepresentationproject.org/ that allows people to submit the sexist ads they see. Here’s a link explaining the app: http://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/new-app-allows-call-sexist-ads-super-bowl/
There’s a hashtag trending on twitter: #notbuyingit. If we see exploitation of peoples in advertisements, it is important to not buy the product. You can buy bras and underwear from other places than Victoria’s Secret (which has horrible ads). There are steps to take that could ideally fix the system.
Works Cited
Bordo, Susan. “Hunger as Ideology.” Unbearable Weight. Second Edition, Tenth Anniversary Edition. 99- 133. University of California Press, 2004.
Steinem, Gloria. “Sex, Lies and Advertising.” Ms. July/August 1990: 112-120. Print.
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