advertising is the foundation of the mass media the primary purpose of the
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mass media is to sell products
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advertising does sell products of course
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but it also sells a great deal more than
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products it sells values it sells images
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it sells concepts of love and sexuality
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of romance of success and perhaps most
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important of normalcy to a great extent
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advertising tells us who we are and who
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we should be
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what does advertising tell us today
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about women it tells us just as it did
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10 and 20 and 30 years ago that what's
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most important about women is how we
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look the first thing the advertisers do
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is surround us with the image of ideal
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female beauty so we all learn how
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important it is for a woman to be
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beautiful and exactly what it takes
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women learned from a very early age that
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we must spend enormous amounts of time
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energy and above all money striving to
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achieve this ideal and feeling ashamed
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and guilty when we fail and failure is
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inevitable because the ideal is based on
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absolute flawlessness she never has any
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lines or wrinkles
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she certainly has no scars or blemishes
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indeed she has no pores and yet we all
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learn very early on that our breasts are
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never okay the way they are your breasts
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may be too big too saggy too pert too
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flat too full too far apart too close
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together to a cup too lopsided too
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jiggly too pale too padded too pointy
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too pendulous or just to mosquito bites
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but with the depth styling products at
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least you can have your hair the way you
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want it
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men's bodies are rarely dismembered in
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advertising more than they used to be
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but this fad was so shocking that the ad
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itself got national media coverage
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reporters called me up from all around
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the country and said look they're doing
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the same thing to men they've always
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done to women well not quite they'd be
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doing the same thing to men they've
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always done to women if there were copy
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that went with the south that went like
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this your penis may be too small too
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droopy
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too narrow too fat too jiggly too pale
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too pointy too blunt or just two inches
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and believe me this is not the kind of
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equality I'm fighting for I don't want
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them to do this to men anymore than I do
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to women but I think we can learn
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something from these two as one of which
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did happen and one of which never would
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and what they show us very vividly is
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that men and women inhabit very
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different worlds men basically don't
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live in a world in which their bodies
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are routinely scrutinized criticized and
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judged whereas women do now this doesn't
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mean that there aren't stereotypes that
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harm men there are plenty of stereotypes
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that harm men but they tend to be less
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intimate less related to the body it's
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all probably summed up by this classic a
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carrot or more when a man's achievement
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becomes a woman's good fortune so the
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idea that women are just gold diggers as
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in this Winston ad featuring this old
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man and young bride she's after my money
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like I care a much more serious problem
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for men is that masculinity is so often
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linked with violence with brutality with
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ruthlessness boys grow up in a culture
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in which men are constantly shown as
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perpetrators of violence and talking
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communicating is so often seen in our
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culture as a weakness in men do you want
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to be the one she tells her deep dark
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secret to or do you want to be her deep
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dark secret well there's no question of
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course the but that men should aspire to
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be the deep deep language of girls and
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young women is usually passive
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vulnerable get used and very different
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from the body language of boys and men
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so we have women typically posed like
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this and men like this a woman like this
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a man like this and this starts so early
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look at this double page spread from
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Calvin Klein the incredible difference
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all of the ads
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in the March 1999 issues of two
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progressive parenting magazines featured
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active voice and passive girls all of
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them an ad featuring a boy an ad
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featuring a girl a boy active exploring
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the world a girl trying on lipstick this
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sad always makes me sad I still look at
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it and I see that the boy is already
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learning to look tough to have that look
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of contempt the girl has already got the
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smile down pat now I have scores of
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these ads - and they're always the same
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the boy is taller the boy is looking
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down at the girl the girl is looking up
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the girl is smiling always the same
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unless race enters the picture and then
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it's reversed which makes it very clear
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that this is about power and women's
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bodies are still in fact perhaps more
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than ever turned into objects into
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things and of course this has very
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serious consequences for one thing it
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creates the climate in which there's
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widespread and increasing violence
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against women here she's become the
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bottle of alcohol with a label branded
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on her stomach now I'm not at all saying
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that an ad like this directly causes
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violence it's not that simple but it is
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part of a cultural climate in which
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women are seen as things as objects and
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certainly turning a human being into a
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thing is almost always the first step
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toward justifying violence against that
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person we see this with racism we see it
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with homophobia it's always the same
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process we think if the person is less
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than human and violence becomes
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inevitable now this is a problem for all
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women of course but particularly women
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of color who are often literally shown
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as animals dressed in leopard skins and
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animal prints over and over again the
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real message is not fully human and
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there seems to be more of this than ever
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before more ads that imply that women
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want to be forced to have sex an advert
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perfume called fetish and the copy says
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apply generously to your neck so he can
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smell the scent as you shake your head
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no
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making it very clear that we don't mean
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it when we say no that she's again
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asking for it we need to get involved in
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whatever way moves us to change not just
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the ads but these attitudes that run so
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deep in our culture and that affect each
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one of us so deeply where there were
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conscious of it or not because what's at
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stake for all of us men and women boys
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and girls is our ability to have
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authentic and freely chosen lives