Making Money From Self Esteem : The Case Of Dove Advertising

Jean Kilbourne is an advocate for women and is leading a movement to change the way women are viewed in advertising. She opens up the curtains to reveal the hard truth we choose to ignore or even are too obtuse to notice. Women are objectified, materialized, and over-sexualized in order to sell clothes, products, ideas and more. As a woman, I agree with the position Kilbourne presents throughout her documentary Killing Us Softly 4: The Advertising’s Image of Women (2010) and her TEDx Talk The Dangerous Ways Ads See Women (2014.) She demonstrates time and again that these advertisements are dangerous and lead to unrealistic expectations of women.

In “The Fashion Industry: Free to be an Individual” by Hannah Berry, Hannah emphasizes how social media especially advertisements pressure females to use certain product to in order to be considered beautiful. She also acknowledges the current effort of advertisement today to more realistically depicts of women. In addition, these advertisements use the modern women look to advertise products to increase women self-esteem and to encourage women to be comfortable with one’s image.

I’ve always believed woman have been misconstrued throughout the media, especially in the beauty industry. The Dove Campaign, Onslaught, is a primary representation of this idea which truly stands out. Unfortunately, this one minute ad portrays a younger girl growing up in a toxic environment due to the use of both photo enhancing elements and other factors which can ultimately be detrimental to oneself. However, this is a great insight produced by the company, Dove, and shines light on a topic that is meant to be perceived as what society believes is “normal”, but in reality numerous of the ads we as individuals see are all somewhat altered to an extent, if not completely changed through the use of photoshop and other image altering medians.

The objective of this campaign was to get their customers to buy Dove over another brand but the claim was to prove that all women are uniquely beautiful in their own ways. So in other words, show the attractiveness but at the same time they showed how companies deceive their customers. The Dove Evolution Commercial starts off by showing an average looking woman with no makeup on and natural hair. Throughout the commercial, they fast forward, more and more people come and start doing the woman’s hair and makeup. After this appearance, they begin taking pictures and select one that meets their standard. But they’re not done yet, they take that picture and photo shop it. They change the size of her neck, face, and make her skin look smoother than ever. This shows how companies can use any image and change it into something totally different from the natural self. The product who is a gorgeous model appears nothing like the average woman they showed in the beginning of this commercial. This is called the compare and contrast method, a strategy Dove used the most to show the differences and similarities of something. They first show a natural woman and then after editing, they showed a completely fake person because it looks nothing like the original. Companies who do this deceive society just to gain their revenue but the sad thing is they don’t care

In our society today a business is not a business without an advertisement. These advertisements advertise what American’s want and desire in their lives. According to Jack Solomon in his essay, “Master’s of Desire: The Culture of American Advertising,” Jack Solomon claims: “Because ours is a highly diverse, pluralistic society, various advertisements may say different things depending on their intended audiences, but in every case they say something about America, about the status of our hopes, fears, desires, and beliefs”(Solomon). Advertisers continue to promote the American dream of what a women’s body should look like. They advertise their products in hopes for consumers to buy them, so they can look like the models pictures in the ads. Behind these ads, advertisers tend to picture flawless unrealistic woman with the help of Photoshop. In our society today to look like a model is an American dream and can be the reasons why we fantasizes and buy these products being advertised. “America’s consumer economy runs on desire, and advertising stokes the engines by transforming common objects;signs of all things that Americans covet most”(Solomon).

Advertisements are considered as an art to try to persuade people that certain products can make their lives better. Advertisements have been around in the United States since 1841. Advertisements influence society on what to buy. Advertisements lures society into buy their products. The basic role of advertisements is to provide people with basic information about a product. Companies hire celebrities to be in the advertisement in order to get more consumers to appeal to the advertisement. In Jean Kilbourne’s article, “Two Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt: Advertising and Violence,” she discusses ways how advertisements sexualize women and make them act a certain way to appeal audience to buy a certain item. Advertisements

Jean Kilbourne’s film, Killing Us Softly 4, depicts the way the females are shown in advertisements. She discusses how advertisement sell concepts of normalcy and what it means to be a “male” and a “female.” One of her main arguments focuses on how women aspire to achieve the physical perfection that is portrayed in advertisements but this perfection is actually artificially created through Photoshop and other editing tools. Women in advertisements are often objectified as weak, skinny, and beautiful while men are often portrayed as bigger and stronger. Advertisements utilize the setting, the position of the people in the advertisements, and the products to appeal to the unconscious aspect

What do you see when you look in the mirror? Do you like what you see? In Jean Kilbourne’s article, “Two Ways a Woman Can Hurt,” she discusses the sexualization of women in advertising and how it plays a role in violence against women. Elline Lipkin discusses the causes and effects of negative body images in her article, “Girls’ Bodies, Girls’ Selves.” Although I agree with Kilbourne that advertising and violence can be related, it is important to consider Lipkin’s argument about how advertising shapes body image in a negative way because while a lot of women experience violence, everyone experiences the effects that advertisements have on body image.

This study examines sexualized representations of women in fashion advertising through a theoretical structure identified as visual rhetoric. Documented findings on explicit images of women in advertising have focused on content analyses of these visuals and how they affect women. This investigation asks how sexualized imagery of women utilities rhetorically as part of a branding message designed to sell

Do you remember the last ad you saw in the past 24 hours? Do you remember what they were selling? It was definitely not the item that was mentioned at the bottom of the ad. For years, marketing has been using people 's temptations to make them interested in the ad, or commercial; not necessarily in the product. In Judith Lorber’s piece, “Two Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt”: Advertising and Violence, it becomes evident how many different ways a woman can be negatively affected by the media’s idea of how a sexy woman is supposed to look and be treated. Lorber’s research explains how women are negatively affected in the workforce and within their daily lives due to the constant objectification of women in ads and commercials. Women are forced to

At first glance the ad fully encompasses what it means to be feminine. Most people would see this advertisement as very soft, pure, and joyful. These are important characteristics as these are the characteristics most women want to portray about themselves. There is a definite need for the extra care because of the irritation caused by shaving the armpits. The advertisement also claims to have “Advanced Care with NutriumMoisture”, the advertisement doesn’t go in to much detail about this, and however consumer will likely be assured even further about the product’s ability to provide relief to the armpits. Dove also boasts that this is the ‘best care ever for the armpit”. With Dove’s long history and reputable products consumers will further gravitate towards this product. Lastly, the advertisement depicts a smiling woman raising an arms to show her very smooth armpit. This ad does well to employ, Ethos, Pathos, Logos. The “NutriumMoisture” claim is an obvious attempt at Logos. The smiling woman is used to show Pathos. The used of Ethos can be contributed by the long standing history of Dove and its products. This product for women does a great job at catering to women’s need all while maintaining respect towards

Since the 1960s and the rebirth of the women’s movement, there have been rages against the way women are treated in advertising. Every day viewers will find themselves showered by explicit advertisements, images, slogans, songs, ads, etc., all that which have a major underlying issue within mass media: the objectification of women. Women were suggestively portrayed for the sale of all different types of products and services, from print in magazines to commercials on television. There is an extremely strong focus on women being a sexual object rather than what she is, a female human being.

Media plays a major role in one’s life as it is everywhere you go. Nobody is able to run away from media because it is portrayed through many different techniques such as online, print and broadcast advertising. These advertisements try to show that in order to obtain happiness, you “need” to buy that certain product. In this essay, I will argue how this advertisement plays upon society’s perspective on beauty and the perfect body size, showing that through makeup products and the perfect body, women will feel more confident and welcomed in society. This will be represented through a Tom Ford advertisement, showing the expectations marketers have for women, with supporting evidence from the articles, “Image – Based Culture: Advertising and

In this era, both men and women are obsessed with beauty and obtaining perfect bodies to be accepted by society. The majority of the population can be found on social sites or watches numerous hours of television a year, which contain advertisements and product placement. In fact, Jean Kilbourne states that, “3,000 ads [are] see[n] per day, on average” (Killing Us Softly). The media is responsible for creating the idea of what body image and beauty standards are accepted. Body image plays a very important role in our society in shaping our identities. Advertisements can have both benefits and damaging affects depending on the illustration, model, and message. In the United States, the damages associated with negative body image is a significant

The models look bold and confident. They do not look afraid to embrace their size. Undoubtedly, the models look comfortable in their lingerie and are not fearful to show off their body. In the image shown, the models are advertising for the brand, Lane Bryant. Lane Bryant is a United States retail women’s clothing store chain focusing on plus-size clothing. The image is using a peripheral route of persuasion technique. This route involves being persuaded in a manner that is not based on the arguments or the message content. (Petty). The image chosen have no message content or any facts along with the advertisement. The only words on the advertisement are “ImNoAngel” From part 1, I have mentioned that Victoria Secret models are known as ‘Angels’ and Lane Bryant advertisement is implying that models do not have to be slim or ‘angel-like’ The advertisement is encouraging woman to be comfortable in their size and embrace them. It implies that it is unquestionably acceptable to be a plus size woman. A woman should not feel inferior or compare themselves to slim models to fit in the norm.