Saturday, February 14, 2009

Framing - Sex in Advertising

Posted on behalf of Danielle Pouliot:

After reading Chapter 11, what stuck out with me the most was Goffmans’s theory of framing. His theory came about in the 60’s and 70’s. The framing theory is the idea of how people make sense of their everyday life through their expectations. Goffman theorizes different social cues we pick up on and how our expectations shift without us realizing as we move from different environments and social scenes. He particularly focuses on the representations of women in advertising and the sex appeal they have. We all know that sex sells but the question was asked, “could these representations of women be teaching or reinforcing social cues that have problematic consequences?”(Baran and Davis p 318) The emphasis advertising has put on women to be sexy doesn’t just affect the selling of a product but also sends a message to women on how they should look. Women are used in ads to attract the attention of men by placing women in sexy clothes, and playful positions. Most advertising will only feature good looking women with slender bodies. Goffman uses the term hyperritualization, which is a representation of our social actions. We start to learn social cues from these ads whether we realize it or not. The message sent out by advertisers is if you consume the product being advertised you will then get the girl. “Once learned, these cues could be used in daily life to make sense of members of the same or opposite sex and to impose frames on them, their actions, and the situations in which we encounter them.”(318)

Knowing that sex sells and women’s bodies are constantly being exploited to sell a product or send a message, do you think that men are being used in the same way? Are men developing these same insecurities as women are from these sexy ads? Is there a fair balance between the two?

In 2005, "Spicy BBQ Six Dollar Burger" in a T.V. advertisement has Paris Hilton crawling all over a Bentley taking a bite out of a burger with her signature phrase “that’s hot”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P82hABWq1To

When did it become necessary to promote a burger by using sex? Have ad campaigns crossed the line and gone too far?

There is so much pressure on women today to be beautiful and thin. The Dove Campaign “real beauty” tries to boost girls’ self-esteem and promote true beauty.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ytjTNX9cg0&feature=related

From this video it’s clear that these sex ads and social cues being embedded into our brain do in fact have problematic consequences in our society. Is this something our society should look further into and possibly place a ban or a limit on how much we exploit women and sex in advertisements? When are we going to start sending the right message?

16 comments:

  1. I found myself agreeing with the areas of this blog referring to the representation of women in advertisements. Upon understanding framing and framing theories, an immediate concern brought to my attention pertains to how we frame. Goffman argued that “we don’t operate with a limited or fixed set of expectations about social roles, objects, or situations” (Baron & Davis 316). In reality I see why that would be true, but most times it seems as if we do. For example, the objectification of women can be analyzed in terms of social roles. Particularly in ads women depicted as sex objects is very prevalent in not just the ad world, but media in general.

    Although we do shun this in society and are aware of the negative impact these images are making there is not enough “downshifting” when we see these images. In frame analysis, downshift and upshift mean “to move back and forth between serious and less serious frames” (Baron & Davis 317). Baron and Davis argue that most downshifting and upshifting occur in less serious settings (317), but never the less these shifts “are negotiated using social cues” (Baron & Davis 317). There needs to be downshift in social cues that give the impression these images are unfair.

    Do I think that men are used in the same way? I do think it works both ways. After all, the term “sex sells” applies to men and women. I think there is a difference in the portrayal of men and women. In the ads with men, they normally look powerful and dominating whereas women may look delicate or desirable. Even so, I may not be able to understand the male perspective, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a constant pressure to look like the strong, domineering men. These men in ads sometimes tend to be famous athletes or actors like Tom Brady and Mathew McConaughey reaffirming what appeals to women by using images of already famous figures.

    Unfortunately, there cannot be any bans or limits placed on how we use women or men in advertisements. The real change must occur socially for a major impact. I do think that it is possible to change through the production process of such ads by making a conscious effort to stay clear of objectification, but that would mean taking a risk that it seems DOVE is only willing to take.

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  2. I believe that framing in the media is an issue that we need to look at more clearly especially when it comes to women used in advertising. There is no doubt that a certain type of woman is used to sell products, even when they are trying to sell something as trivial as furniture, beautiful, sexy women are always in our line of vision.

    I believe that the marketing and advertising world has heavily impacted our social cues as defined by Baran and Davis. Social cues are, “information in the environment that signals a shift or change of action” (p. 316) and I believe that the use of women in advertising has programmed us to think a certain way of body image and sexuality which in turn affects our social cues. Some who are exposed to women in some of these advertisements may believe that all women should look like this, which inevitably means that they are taking something from the media and formulating it into their everyday life.

    Men in advertisements seem to show a lot of muscle and be physically fit, but it does not get as much attention as the women in commercials wearing a bikini trying to sell a car. Although it is present, I would agree that women are more exploited in the media world of advertising.

    I commend Dove’s, “True Beauty Campaign” as trying to make a change as to how we view women in advertising, thus perhaps changing how we see women in real life (social cues). I think that it is important for young children especially to be exposed to something as significant as Dove’s campaign in order to show that not every woman looks like those plastered among advertisements.

    I am not completely sure of my stance on the issue of placing a ban on the amount of sexuality in advertisements because, in the world we live in, sex will always sell. However, I do believe that what Dove has accomplished is a truly remarkable step in the right direction.

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  3. I agree with both the lead blogger and Alysse on this issue. I believe women are portrayed negatively in all mediums. Not only do they show women as being "sexually active and fun loving," but these ads send out horrible messages to kids (Baron & Davis 318). These days kids will turn the TV on and see thin, gorgeous faced women and all they want is to be like them. The sad thing is that these kids will do anything to look like those women. But the funny thing is, like I have said before in another blog, half the time those women in the ad don't even look like that in real life! Also some movies, shows, and ads will show the leading woman as being very promiscuous and flirtatious. It sends out a message that if you want to be popular, hot, and attract males then you need to act this way. Like Goffman said, I believe that these mediums have "homogenized how women are publicly depicted"(Baron & Davis 318).

    Along with women I also believe men are depicted in a negative light. I do not believe it is as much or to the extent of women. However, there is more pressure on men to be clean cut, muscular, and dominant. Also there is a stretch that men are no one unless they have a female or a few on their arm. Sometimes these ads are sending out messages about being a player or being controlling. Its a guide on how not to act.

    The saddest part about this whole thing is that we know how bad it is for society and how it is sending out the wrong messages, but we still do nothing. So what will finally make the media change? What did Dove think about when they decided to do their "real beauty" campaign? I believe we need to teach young children that everyone is perfect the way they are. There needs to be more ways to boost peoples self esteem because the media will not change anytime soon.

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  4. The medias effect on women’s body image is a very serious issue today. As clearly shown in the “Dove” advertisement Danielle posted a negative body image and weight complex is a problem so many women today struggle with. The sad fact, as illustrated in the video, is that today girls younger and younger are facing these problems. Who is to blame? Many say it is the portrayal of women in mass media. According to Goffman’s theory of framing the media is at fault. The theory of framing suggesting that we make expectations about everyday life, based on the images and depictions of the world we see in the media (Baran & Davis, 316).

    According to Goffman’s the repeated use of women portrayed in advertisements as sex symbols creates serious consequences to the way women are then treated in the real world. As shown in the video of Paris Hilton, the ad is highly unrealistic. 1. Most women are not stick thin, long legged; blond Barbie’s like Paris. 2. I know no women who would ever wash a car in a swimsuit and stilettos 3. Furthermore how is it possible to eat a burger while washing a car? Not only is this ad unrealistic but exemplifies classic examples of how advertising to men so frequently involves demeaning images of women. I question if the ad was created to appeal to a male point of view, or simply another campaign making fun of Hilton herself.

    Point being we know though studying theories such as framing and cultivation that as a society we are highly influenced by the media. The media begins teaching us about the world from the moment we are born. By framing women as sex symbols have the same effects as framing minorities or gays as stereotypes. Heavy media viewers become socialized to view the world in the same way it is depicted threw television, movies, or advertising.

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  5. Women have been exploited since, well, forever. They have been seen as "objects" instead of people since the beginning of civilization. If a study came out tomorrow saying that there exist cave drawings of a woman posed on a wheel or posing next to a fire to make these discoveries seem more attractive, I would not find this hard to believe. Women were literally property of their husbands or male family members until pretty recently in American history. While this ideal that women are a bit less than human, just pretty things to look at, is embedded into American society, it is harmful. As Baran and Davis state on page 318, if people view these ads on a daily basis and and consider these depictions of women normal, "we could be learning a vast array of social cues...once learned, these cues could be used in daily life to make sense of members of the same or opposite sex and to impose frames on them, their actions, and the situations in which we encounter them." Therefore, how we see women in ads and in the media are the images and ideas which we will compare them to in real life.

    I do not think that there is anything that society can do at this point to eliminate these ridiculous stereotypes of the female species from the media. These images are everywhere. Paris Hilton washed her car in a bikini and heels, and so did Nicolette Sheridan on Desperate Housewives. Perfumes are sold to women by having attractive, slim, gorgeous women in the ads (many time with equally attractive males), and some colognes are sold with similar images to males. Everything from socks to beer is sold with images of unattainable, unrealistic women. I salute DOVE for trying to promote self acceptance and respect with their ad campaigns. It takes many women an extremely long time to figure out that we do not all have airbrush artists following us around and professional staff picking out our outfits, fixing our macrobiotic meals, and doing our hair and makeup. As long as sex sells, and it will, these images will never go away.

    There are also stereotypes and stigmas attached to the male image, but they are not as "enforced" as that of women. Many men hear from a very young age that "boys don't cry." They sometimes are also exposed to images in the media that show "real men" as "men's men," strong, tough, unemotional, solid. This stereotype is often broken though, since some women see men who cry as very much in touch with their emotions, and therefore attractive and attentive, and men who are unemotional as "emotionally unavailable."

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  6. There’s no doubt that there’s a lot of weight behind the slogan ‘sex sells’. Why just the other week another issue of Sports Illustrated’s swimsuit issue came out and there were advertisements being blasted all over the media. For a while now media gatekeepers know there’s a strong connection between men who like sports or are portrayed as a manly men and women who advertise for the things that they in turn buy. I think in regards to a level of attraction through the portrayal of opposite sexes in advertising Baran and Davis were right on, “if coverage is dominated by a single frame, especially a frame that comes from an elite source, then learning will tend to be guided by this frame” (Baran & Davis, 322). In certain aspects we can’t forget what we’ve learned in the previous chapter as we extend into this one because the elites are the ones that make the final decisions as to what is going into advertisements these days.

    Instead of looking at the woman as a sex symbol if we flip the viewpoint around and look at how men are portrayed you can find examples in advertising, although they’re much more subtle. Hanes is even using celebrities such as Michael Jordan, Charlie Sheen and Cuba Gooding Jr. to sell their product:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY152lZHA0c

    But compared to the Paris Hilton commercial this seems much less provocative and exploitive of the opposite sex. In this regard I feel that there is in no way any type of balance, the scale tips almost completely in favor of women using sex to sell products.

    Getting back to the Paris Hilton commercial about using sex to sell a burger the answer to that question is no, we shouldn’t use sex to sell a burger but in a lot of ways advertising sells us what we don’t need, “it (advertising) is intended to encourage consumption that serves the interest of product manufacturers but may not be in the interest of individual consumers. Advertising is clearly designed to intrude into and disrupt routine buying habits and purchasing decisions” (Baran & Davis, 337).

    Even though there is a growing concern in the public eye that women are being unfairly exploited and men are being easily manipulated to think certain things I don’t think this will stop any time in the near future. There was mention of where the line is drawn and if it has been crossed but where does the line begin and who decides if we’ve gone too far? As far as the gatekeepers and advertisers are concerned they’re doing an excellent job in pushing their products as they see revenues skyrocket.

    While it may be true that certain males might misread social cues given by women because of the advertisements they are bombarded with on a daily basis the fact of the matter is that there’s no significant way to measure and prove that this is a call for help and reform in the media and society at large. Further case studies and tests need to be conducted and carried out to prove any sort of relevance to the contrary. We all know that this is having a negative effect on the portrayal of women but until there’s concrete proof to say otherwise this sort of advertising will continue.

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  7. I also believe with several of the other responses with saying that women are being portrayed negatively in all different types of media. Not only is it in advertisements, but it is also in films, television shows and even music videos. Many people think that women are only being portrayed negatively in rap music videos. However, women are being portrayed negatively in all genres of music including country music which may surprise some people.

    However, if there were only more ad campaigns and advertisements such as the Dove Campaign then maybe this shift would change. I think more companies need to take this risk in making campaigns such as the Dove Campaign.
    Unfortunately, with the way the economy is right now, this may not be the best time to be taking risks and trying something new. However, I definitely think that more women would be comfortable in their own skin and wouldn’t be as self-conscious as they are now if these risks were being taken and more campaigns such as the Dove Campaign were being shown. There is so much pressure on women especially young women/ teenagers to be the skinny figure that they see in all of the magazine advertisements or their favorite actress in a movie or a television show.

    According to Goffman’s theory, “we can step from one realm of experience to another without recognizing that a boundary has been crossed” (Baran & Davis, 316). I agree with Goffman’s theory of this because I think it is so easy for our minds to get corrupted by the media that sometimes the line is being crossed and we may not even realize it. I think that if all women really took the time to think about whether or not they really want to be portrayed like most of these women are being portrayed in these advertisements, that they would find they would not want to be portrayed like that.

    -Marlaina Luciano

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  8. Yes, I agree with the blogger point of view of men and women in American society. That women in general are very sexual or sexual object and this how women get guys attention. It is true that these social cues of men and women are being embedded in society especially in the children. According to Baran & Davis in chapter 11 “could these representations of women be teaching or reinforcing social cues that have problematic consequences?” ( 318). This quote refers to framing and hyperritualized representations of men and women in mass media. It seems that from the controversial over sensual Paris Hilton commercial trying to sell a burger. Advertiser might make it hard for women to maintain a serious frame for their actions. Paris Hilton is a stereotype of what people are accustomed to thinking is beautiful, such as blond, thin, blue eyes, and sexually provocative. These recurring stereotypes of women have negative effect on women in society. Not just women are being affected by these framing issues so are young girls which is sad. Watching the dove commercial it was shocking to see young girls worrying about their looks and having low self-esteem. How can girls that young think there fat? By seeing this dove commercial and how this is having a major negative effect on young girls. I believe that society should take more an effort to stop showing women as sexual objects. These sexual images of women are getting ridiculous. We as a society need to make a choice to stop. Dove commercial made a good point “things won’t change until we change them”. This is the only way to stop the vicious cycle.


    Also to the question is there a fair balanced between the portrayal of men and women in sexy ads in the media? My answer to the question is no. I cannot recall any man being half naked selling a hamburger. I do not believe that men are used as sexual object to sells products to women. Only time I might have thought men were used as a sexual object was for the BOD commercials. Theme songs lyrics are “I want your bod”. When there were guys tall, muscular, and handsome training on a football field with their shirts off. This was men showing off their muscular bodies to the women. I thought that was a portrayal of men as a sexual object. But then I realized the commercial was selling cologne to men. So they were not being used as sexual objects to sell a product to women but to men. I think society has to make a conscious choice to show women less as sexual objects for men to sell ads.

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  9. I think that men and women unquestionably develop the same insecurities from advertisements. We tend to forget that there is an equal amount of pressure on men to look strong and masculine as there is on women to look sexy and feminine because it is less socially acceptable for men to talk about their insecurities. While women can be open about how they feel about themselves to other people, it is seen as not masculine for men to talk about their fears or insecurities. It is for this reason that talk and debates about women being exploited in advertisements occurs more often than talk about men.

    In general, advertisements are sending out all of the wrong messages to both women and men. They are the cause of our obsession with being overly sexy and young. Something that bothers me immensely is the fact that the Dove Pro-Age commercial (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vilUhBhNnQc&feature=related) was banned for showing too much skin. The commercial shows older women’s bodies with the caption “too old to be in an anti-aging ad,” alluding to the fact that most advertisers would indeed consider these women too old to be in their advertisements. In the Pro-Age commercial, Dove instead wants older women to learn to love their bodies the way that they are and to be happy with and accept their age. I think it is ridiculous that these ads were banned for “showing too much skin,” but it’s completely acceptable to show the Paris Hilton commercial with her in a tiny bathing suit dancing sexily around a car and pouring water all over herself. This is evidence that our society is more concerned with selling products than sending out the right message to people.

    The only way we can shift our expectations in regards to what is sexy and end our obsession with being young is to start sending out the right messages over what sells. Women and men’s insecurities about their bodies are unquestionably a direct effect of advertisement’s stereotypes of what women and men are expected to look like. While I do not think we can place a ban on certain advertisements, I do think people need to change their attitudes about what is considered beautiful or attractive. According to Goffman, this change is possible if advertisements start sending out a different message. Baran and Davis described how Goffman believes we constantly are reevaluating and changing our expectations for situations. They write how Goffman thinks “we don’t operate with a limited or fixed set of expectations about social roles, objects, or situations. Thus, we don’t have a simple stock of institutionally controlled knowledge as most social constructionists contend. Rather, we have enormous flexibility in creating and using expectations” (Baran & Davis, 316). The Dove “Real Beauty” campaign is moving in the right direction in promoting self-esteem by encouraging women to love their bodies and themselves, however, the ban on their Pro-Age commercial shows that society’s views on what is sexy has certainly not changed as of right now. In order to change our attitude, we need to stop banning commercials that are sending out the right messages and encourage the creation of more campaigns like Dove’s “Real Beauty.”

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  10. I think that the use of women and sexuality in advertising is a really clear way to understand the concept of framing. The fact that we live in such a media-dominated society and are so constantly bombarded with advertisements means that the lines between reality and this false reality that advertising creates are blurred. This obviously relates back to cultivation theory, but can also be applied to framing as, “We can step from one realm of experience to another without recognizing that a boundary has been crossed” (Baran & Davis 316).

    I think that the danger in this lies in the stepping back and forth between the “realms of experience,” because the more time someone is exposed to the unrealistic realm of sex and beauty in advertising, the harder it becomes to preserve our own realistic realm of experience, our normal everyday life. While this “flexibility” is perhaps necessary to navigating our increasingly complicated world, as is “our ability to move effortlessly through daily life making sense of situations and people in them,” there is no way that negative effects are not felt, by women and girls in particular (Baran & Davis 316).

    I remember the first time I saw a Dove “campaign for real beauty” advertisement in a magazine; I could not look away. For the first time I saw women in an advertisement, try to sell a product, whose bodies resembled mine so much more closely than any of the models I was so used to seeing. If an advertisement is supposed catch a reader or viewer’s attention, then I would argue that these ads actually work even better than the ones we typically see.

    As far as the “Consume the product and get the girl” message in a lot of product advertisements geared towards men, I could not help but think of the Axe TV commercials with stampedes of women running through to the grocery store to tackle a good smelling man. Or having sex with an unattractive man in an elevator because he smelled so great they just could not help themselves. I found an even more ridiculous one on YouTube… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgxxAwue7Fs&feature=PlayList&p=1981DA48537BF01D&playnext=1&index=11

    All of these commercials use beautiful women being wildly attracted to pretty average looking men, so much so that they loose control of themselves and turn into animalistic sex machines. Now, we all know this is not realistic, yet I’m sure these ads have helped sell Axe. At the very least, they are quite entertaining.

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  11. Sex is definitely used in advertising more than ever in today’s society. It has been known for a long time that sex sells, but there are so many problems which can branch off of the issue of using sex in advertising. For example, by using thin girls, body image issues surface. By using sex to obtain something like a burger or to attract a man, women may feel as though they need to use sex or sexuality to obtain and keep something for themselves. “Increasingly, frames used in public discourse are developed and promoted by individuals and groups having an interest in advancing certain ways of seeing the social world rather than others” (Baran & Davis, 320). So, if this social emphasis is, in fact, increasing, then body image, self-image, and self-esteem issues are a constant struggle for people in today’s society, and promoting sex as a tool does not help.
    However, I think that more recently, sex and sexuality is used for humor, as well. Paris Hilton’s commercial, although racy, is intended to be partially funny because of the mere fact that she is washing a car, in a bikini, while eating a burger. The randomness of it all is comical. It is also a positive aspect that ads such as The Dove Campaign’s are now truly reaching out help women appreciate true beauty and the way they are as individuals. There is effort being made to help women with issues that stem from sex in advertising. So although some representations of women can be reinforcing what are often viewed as the wrong ideas and values, I think its important to remember that in America, sex sells and is allowed in advertising, and it needs to be taken lightly, because much of it is meant to be portrayed comically. “The most common finding is that exposure to news coverage results in learning that is consistent with the frames that structure the coverage. If the coverage is dominated by a single frame, especially a frame that comes from an elite source, then learning will tend to be guided by this frame” (Baran & Davis, 322). Therefore, according to this research that has been done over the last fifteen years, although sex is extremely present in advertising, perhaps too heavily, it is a good thing that ads today promote strength, confidence, and the proper message to women, because a balance is finally able to be created.

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  12. This topic is certainly one that gets a lot of attention. Being a PR major/Marketing minor (ah! One of the only ones in the class!) I cannot tell you how often sex is used as a tool to create major campaigns around. More often than not woman are put into ads and commercials not as people, but as objects. I tried brainstorming some of the current campaigns using sex as the main strategy for sales and here are some I thought of. Remember the godaddy.com commercials during the superbowl? I have no idea what GoDaddy.com does, but I certainly remember the Go Daddy girls? And what about the newest PETA ads? Check out this one with Alicia Silverstone.
    http://www.peta.org/feat/alicia_psa/images/alicia1.jpg
    I think sex does sell. But it also may present the wrong messages. I agree with Baran and Davis when they say “We might be learning more than product definitions from these ads. We could be learning a vast array of social cues, some blatant but others quite subtle. Once learned, these cues could be used in daily life to make sense of members of the same or opposite sex and to impose frames on them, their actions, and the situations in which we encounter them.” (318) What cues are children, even young adults, learning when they see an ad for PETA with a naked woman spread throughout it? What does not wearing fur, or protecting animals, have to do with being naked? While the taglines may be clever, I see very little connection. And GoDaddy.com (I looked it up for everyone-they sell web domains!) uses sexy woman in almost every ad that they put out? How do website names connect to the sexiness of their ads? What cues are we giving our children, and do we think it is ok that we let them believe that sex and these miscellaneous businesses should go together? I think most would agree on this answer and say “no”.
    With that, I think that we all know that woman are used so often and majorly in advertising that many of us have become immune to realizing that sex is even being used on us as a marketing tool. But are men treated the same way. Throughout this blog some have said yes and some have said no, but my personal opinion is that men are held to just as high of a standard. The push for incredibly good-looking men in advertising and marketing is not a trend, but now a necessity. I think that males are held to the same criticisms as female-many of them doing with body image. I couldn’t tell you the last time I saw an average looking man in an ad for jeans or cologne.
    How does this all relate to framing? Framing is defined by Baran and Davis as “a specific set of expectations used to make sense of a social situation at a given point in time.” (317) Basically, it leads to one point. If we use sex so often and constant in advertising, marketing and media-what expectations are we setting for ourselves? I would say that the expectations are incredibly high-seeing as most of these sexual pieces are airbrushed and fixed anyway? If we constantly see these ads of perfect people with perfect bodies-will we ever be able to live up to them-and in return ever be able to be completely comfortable with ourselves and our bodies in a social situation?

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  13. I strongly agree that the portrayal of the female image has become a major issue of today’s society, and the theory of framing, of ‘setting expectations and living your daily life by them’ comes highly into play. To refer to Alysse’s response about the objectification of women, I agree in that it is now analyzed in terms of the social roles that are put out there for audiences to take in. Not only in magazines ads do we see women’s bodies being flaunted and used as sex symbols, but more and more do we see commercials on T.V. that do the exact same thing.
    I just recently saw a commercial on T.V. about the “ideal” girlfriend. My jaw literally dropped while watching this. This commercial shows a beautiful girl, in a sexy top, with a foreign accent discussing how she would love a “fat boyfriend, who went to the strip club and hung out with the guys all night”.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaeNPZ5IzTI

    Baran and Davis mention the use of the female bodies in their “framing analysis” and state, “They smile, place their bodies in nonserious positions, wear playful clothing and in various ways signal deference and a willingness to take direction from men. Not only are they vulnerable to sexual advances; they signal their desire for them,” (318 Baran & Davis). The media’s message of females is that they are sex symbols, and so our expectations are altered (consciously or subconsciously) to think that these ‘models’ are what all women should look like or act like.
    These social cues that are placed in the ads go for both men and women. Baran and Davis also state, “ Once learned, these cues could be used in daily life to make sense of members of the same or opposite sex and to impose frames on them, their actions, and the situations in which we encounter them,”. We apply these cues to men probably as often as they apply them to us females. I do think that men are also subjected to some pretty bad stereotypes, but their stereotypes often come off as funny whereas ours cause issues such as anorexia and bulimia.
    Men are often stereotyped as beer drinking, meatheads, who sit around eating and watching sports all day.
    I think it is possible that a change can be made, however, I think the effort needs to come from the advertisers that objectify women (and men). It won’t be until they take action that change will come around.

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  14. The fact that the image of women has become the main focus of media and advertising today is disgusting, there are women in the world, many of them, who do not conform to the ideal of "beauty" within advertising and there is nothing wrong with them. The fact that we are told as young children that we should grow up looking like the people we see in the magazines, in movies and on TV is not healthy.
    This image of beauty which is shoved down our throats is something that aids in the eating disorders and body image problems which many young girls and women have today.
    The way we can overcome these types of images is by moving away from the society which idealizes the skeletal model, the society that constantly reminds us that to be happy, successful and loved you must be skinny. The book states,“We can step from one realm of experience to another without recognizing that a boundary has been crossed” (Baran & Davis 316). If we suddenly stop using stick thin models and begin using "real" women and "real" people, the society would have a better self image. There is not even a need to advertise that the change is happening. If all of a sudden clothing companies began using "real" people, there would be no giant uproar from the community, maybe the modeling community because they would be losing their jobs, but the rest of the society would embrace this.
    On the ABC show Ugly Betty, they have a fashion show with "real" people, they find women from off the street and ask them to participate in the show, showing off that real women are capable of living in the world of fashion as well as the stick thin models.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPtwVrjFyQI

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