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Smokin Hot
While you are waiting the terribly long time that it takes in the waiting room at the
doctor’s office, you reach for the closest magazine lying on the table in front of you. You flip to
a random page and see a young couple half naked lustfully posed towards each other. The idea
of what they want is clearly shown from the positions of their body. You quickly turn the page
in hopes that the old lady beside you, who oddly reminds you of your sweet grandma, doesn’t
see what is currently in your possession. As you resume looking at the next page you see a
woman who is also half naked posed seductively towards you. Suddenly the thought crosses
your mind that someone brought in a playboy and left it, surely the doctor’s office wouldn’t
allow such material to be laid out for the public. You glance at the front cover expecting to see
a girl in a bunny suit, but instead you see your typical celebrity surrounded by the “how to lose
ten pounds” and “7 ways to know he is into you”.
Looking more closely at the pages you begin to realize that the picture of the lustful
couple is really just an ad for your favorite jeans, and the girl posed half naked is not the
playmate of the month, but just a girl advertising a fancy new perfume. When did magazines
become so promiscuous and so full of sexual content? Truth of the matter is simply the fact
that sex sells. One can observe this in the media every day. People are more inclined to be
attracted to a certain person or a certain item if it is sexually appealing. This is because it’s
human nature to be curious about sex. An advertisement is more likely to hold a man or a
woman’s attention if it shows someone displaying more skin than normal, than if they were to
see an advertisement of a fully clothed person. Sex appeal is used to sell many products that we
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see and use every day such as body wash, clothing, cars, and cigarettes. Yes, even sex is used to
sell cigarettes.
One may wonder how even cigarettes are sold by means of sexual content. If you take a
look at the advertisement from Camels “Pleasure to Burn” Cigarettes more closely you can see
just how this is done. When looking at this advertisement you will see many forms of rhetoric,
some of which may or may not be obvious at first. You will see forms that are going to play
majorly on your emotions. It provides forms of Glittering Generalities, Transfer (Glory by
Association), Faulty Cause and Effect, Doublespeak, and even some Euphemism. All of these
have you almost wanting (or maybe you already have) to go out and buy these cigarettes. This
paper is here to show you how one may be suckered into doing just that.
First in advertising one must realize that there are five types of sexual content used to
sell certain products (Reichert, Lambiase 14). The five types that are used are nudity/dress,
sexual behavior, physical attractiveness, sexual referents, and sexual embeds. Advertisers use
the amount and style of clothing such as revealing, tight fitting clothes, even nudity to sell
everyday items. The use of sexual behavior is used with flirting, eye contact, and posturing a
movement (body language). Physical attractiveness also plays a big role because a person’s
body structure and facial features are one of the first things to be noticed. Sexual references
are made towards a certain object. Then there are sexual embeds which is where they include
words such as pleasure, and turn non-sexual objects into something with sexual meaning.
This now brings us to the Camels “Pleasure to Burn” Cigarettes advertisement. The
advertisement shows a young attractive female wearing very few articles of clothing. These
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consist of a thin strapped top, and fishnet leggings. The woman is positioned in a very seductive
pose, smoking a Camel Cigarette. She looks relaxed with a TV remote in her hand and smiling
happily towards you. This picture screams sophistication from the long black silk gloves, to the
long stemmed cigarette holder. The words “Pleasure to Burn” is wrote across the top of the
picture. Companies realize that by portraying seductive advertisements they will catch the eye
of almost every male who smokes, and also to those who don’t. They also realize that the
advertisement will catch the eye of many women.
One word that stands out is “Pleasure”. This would be considered a glittering generality.
This is just another way of using words to make something sound good (Cross 124). By using
these glittering generalities in advertisements, they are making the product sound even more
appealing than just the sexual appeal you are already experiencing. This advertisement is
basically saying if you smoke this type of cigarette you are guaranteed to experience pleasure in
some form, whether this is from literally smoking the cigarette or other benefits from smoking.
For men it may be getting a woman who looks like this, or for a woman it may be in hopes of
achieving a similar appearance. Which brings us to a combination of two different types of
rhetoric being used, one is Transfer (Glory by Association) and Faulty Cause and Effect.
Growing up whether it be your favorite sports team, what books you read, what kind of
car you drove, what kind of clothes you wore, half of the time it was based around what was
considered “cool” at the time. You wanted to be associated with these things that were cool.
This is basically is the main thought behind Glory by Association (Cross 127). This picture
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implies that if you smoke this brand you will be associated with all you see in the picture. This is
majorly tied in with Faulty Cause and Effect here.
Fault Cause and Effect is saying if you do something, something else will happen
because of this (Cross 129). Though this picture doesn’t have many words to go on, the phrase
“A picture can be worth a 1000 words” comes to mind. The ad doesn’t come right out and say,
“Hey if you smoke these certain cigarettes you too can acquire what’s in this picture”, but it can
have a major effect on people. For men it may be saying, “Smoke this brand and you can get a
woman like this”. For a woman it may say, “Smoke this brand and you can look just like this
woman”. Some more Faulty Cause and Effects that can be picked up from this advertisement is
for one the TV remote. This is saying smoking Camel Cigarettes will insure you relaxation. The
long black silk gloves implies if you smoke this brand you will be more sophisticated then if you
were to smoke another brand.
Then you have Euphemisms and even Doublespeak that play into the picture.
Euphemism is basically just a nice way of saying something, or a way to soften a more serious
issue (Lutz 152). A Euphemism that is used in this picture can be found in the small writing that
says, “SURGEONS GENERAL’S WARNING: Smoking by pregnant women may result in fetal
injury, premature birth, and low birth rate”. Using the words “fetal injury” is just a softer way
of saying that smoking can seriously hurt or even kill your baby. Last you have Doublespeak
which is basically a way of masking something bad to hide the real meaning behind something
(Lutz 153). The main point behind this picture isn’t to show you a way to get a man or woman,
look better, be more relaxed, or how you can obtain more pleasure. It’s simply to get you to
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buy these cigarettes so the company can make more money. Yet, when you see this
advertisement you are not thinking that they just want your money, this is because they are
doing their job with excellence.
By looking at the aesthetics of this advertisement, it doesn’t tell the actual facts about
smoking. While it may show positive features, they are not always realistic. Smoking can cause
wrinkles, premature aging, staining of the teeth, and hair, and actually causes a decrease in
sexual activity (“Smoking Facts”). Cigarette companies can manipulate one into buying these
products by sexual appeal, but by the fact that it does change ones personal appearance for the
worst, and decreases sexual activity, this basically defeats ones purpose for buying the product
in the first place.
After reading this paper and examining the picture more closely, you should be angry
with what advertising companies are doing to you. It’s like they are controlling your mind, but
yet it’s all on your own free will. You are no longer the individual that you once thought you
were, but just another lab rat among the mix. You may be thinking that being suckered into
buying new jeans or perfume isn’t so bad, but what about when it comes to being suckered into
buying cigarettes, or possibly something that is more harmful to you in the long run? When
thought of from that perspective, suddenly these forms of rhetoric seem more dangerous than
harmless. Now that you have learned some tricks of the trade, in the future when you are
looking at advertisements, be more aware of what is being said, more than just what you see.
Don’t let others walk all over you by controlling what you think; learn to think for yourself and
prove that you are indeed, your own individual.
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Works Cited
Cross, Donna. “Propaganda: How Not to Be Bamboozled.” Language Awareness: Readings for
College Writers. 9th Ed. Paul Eschholz, Alfred Rose, Virginia Clark. Boston: Bedford St. Martin's.
Pg. 123-133.Print.
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Lutz, William. “The World of Doublespeak.” Language Awareness: Readings for College Writers. 9th Ed.
Paul Eschholz, Alfred Rose, Virginia Clark. Boston: Bedford St. Martin's. Pg.152-163.Print.
Reichert, Tom. Lambiase, Jacqueline. Sex in advertising: Perspective on the erotic appeal,
Mahwah N.J: Lawerence Erlbaum Associates, 2003
“Smoking Facts: The Facts About Smoking - How And Why To Quit.”
http://www.nutri.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=page.facts_about_smoking, n.d, Web. 27
September 2010
http://facultystaff.vwc.edu 27 September 2010
http://facultystaff.vwc.edu/~mhall/advertisements/tobacco_products/pages/camel-pleasure%20to%20burn--various%2099.htm
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