Media Effect On Women

In the documentary Killing Us Softly 4: Advertising’s Image of Women by Jean Kilbourne, she talks about how women are depicted in advertisement. The average American will spend 2 years of their life just watching advertisement, and most of these people will make the claim that the ads were not effective to them. Jean Kilbourne stresses that the advertisement companies make their ads quick and cumulative so that they almost seem forgettable. However, the advertisements will still resonate in your mind unconsciously. Kilbourne argues that the objectification of women in the advertisement industry: negatively affects the mental health of women with the societal need to be perfect, encourages the eroticism of violence, and tells women they need

What is it that drives commercials towards their target audience? Commercials can be for a certain age, race, and sometimes even a certain gender. Pop culture has influenced the minority groups and shed light to women 's rights or so it was thought. Lisa Shaffer a fellow student feels otherwise and believes that Pop culture has only defended traditional values and does little to challenge those who already have power . Commercials bring in gender norms and in Steve Craig’s article, “Men’s Men and Women’s Women” he speaks on four particular TV ads directed towards a particular gender. What is interesting is it shows a false image of the opposite sex to the audience being portrayed toward their preferences. It is the image the audience wants to see that appeals to them. This is all in an attempt to sell their products and take advantage of our desires and anxieties. Craig shows commercials brings gender norms that produce the ideas of what a man’s man and a woman’s woman which is why he would agree with Shaffer because it promotes an old way of thinking.

What is it that drives commercials towards their target audience? Commercials can be aimed toward certain age, race, along with certain gender groups. Pop culture has influenced minority groups and shed light on women 's rights or so it may seem. Lisa Shaffer a fellow student feels otherwise and believes that Pop culture has only defended traditional values and does little to challenge those who already have power . Commercials bring in gender norms and in Steve Craig’s article, “Men’s Men and Women’s Women” he speaks on four particular TV ads directed towards male and female audiences. Interestingly enough these tv ads deliver a false image of the opposite sex to the audience catering to their preferences. It is the image of what the audience wants to see that appeals to them. This is all in an attempt to sell products and take advantage of our desires and anxieties. Craig shows how commercials bring gender norms that produce the stigmas of a man’s man and a woman’s woman, which makes it apparent that he would agree with Shaffer because it promotes an old way of thinking.

“We tend not to write women as human beings. It’s cartoons we’re making.” - Paul Haggis. This is a quote that was explored in Miss Representation that especially impacts me. The impact of media on women and men is immense. Media shapes the way the genders view each other and themselves and therefore has the power to dictate how humans act, how they feel, and tell them what they want. I feel that with the constant, unregulated bombardment of media demonstrating the unrealistic and unfair treatment of the women, it’s not crazy to think that young women are harming themselves to fit these roles. The media being uncensored leads to harmful consequences including women being discouraged from positions of power and changing their body.

The use of sexualization also reinforces a pattern of gender roles that are currently circulating throughout advertisements. More often than not, women who are used as ploys in ads are seen doing household chores like vacuuming, changing the toilet paper, or making coffee. Females are rarely ever seen in a work place, and definitely not in a powerful position. In fact, the directors of most of these ads place women below or behind the man to show who has the power in actuality. Women are seen as skinny, fragile, and immobile in high heels, while men are strong and powerful. By setting up such a strong binary between the two different groups, it is obvious that the majority of the American society will not be able to fit into these roles, and it leaves a sense of rejection for the average person. This rejection, accepted by the viewers, manifests

Sexist ads show that society is dominated by the same masculine values that have controlled the image of women in the media for years. Sexist advertisement reinforces gender stereotypes and roles, or uses sex appeal to sell products, which degrades the overall public perception of women. The idea that sexism is such a rampant problem comes from the stereotypes that are so deeply embedded into today’s society that they almost seem to be socially acceptable, although they are nowhere near politically correct. Images that objectify women seem to be almost a staple in media and advertising: attractive women are plastered all over ads. The images perpetuate an image of the modern woman, a gender stereotype that is reinforced time and time again by the media. These images are accepted as “okay” in advertising, to depict a particular product as sexy or attractive. And if the product is sexy, so shall be the consumer. In the 1970s, groups of women initially took issue with the objectification of women in advertisements and with the limited roles in which these ads showed women. If they weren’t pin-ups, they were delicate

It should not be a surprise to anyone who watches television, reads a magazine or spends time on the internet that the mass media representation of women are questionable at best. Jennifer Siebel Newsom’s documentary, “Miss Representation,” explores the abhorrent way women are depicted in the media and a refreshing take on an old-age issue. A central thesis that woman sexual objectification creates social consequences in the effect of materialization and disempowerment of women in our society and legislative process. Siebel creates an alluring narrative of herself, survivor of eating disorders and an acting career in hollywood. She uses her pregnancy to debate in hopes to improve her baby’s future by changing the state of mass media culture.

Advertisements we see it all the time, some of them we ignore and some it gets our attention. Advertisements have many different pictures from food, people, clothing, cars and they are located everywhere in order to sell their product. But what if I told you that they have hidden messages projected throw them in many ways, and that we do not see it right of way. When it comes to advertisement in magazine and commercials, men are often portray as strong and big showing the image of power, but in the other hand women for a very long time have been portray in different ways as weak or a toy for sexual advertisement. In addition Kilbourne mention in her video “Killing us softy 4” they advertise images that show violence, sexuality and health issues.

Advertisements can be found all over in our society. They are on television, in newspapers, on the Internet, and even on the sides of cars and buses. Advertisements greatly influence the way people shop and view products. Many companies use gender stereotypes as a strategy to advertise and sell their products. These advertisements show that men still have a more dominant role over women. Ads are openly sexist and objectifying towards both women and men and usually have a clear gender difference. After looking at many different ads for different products, one thing became clear. The advertisements used for adults and children help guide our society into the stereotypical gender roles we currently have and teach us that objectifying both men and women is acceptable.

In this week’s lecture on culture and media, I learned to identify issues in our society that is usually overlooked. The TED talk, “Killing Us Softly,” by Jean Killbourne, taught us how advertisers began to change the public’s views as they began to overly sexualize women and objectify them in various advertisements. The difference in the way men and women were portrayed were extremely different and is now being continued into the present, while being accepted as a current norm.

In the video “Killing Us Softly”, Jean Kilbourne explains how ads portray women in our world. Women are portrayed as fragile, more vulnerable, and less powerful. Ads are photoshopped to make their bodies the “ideal image” of what women should look like. Ads promote sexual and unhealthy images of women. The pictures are photoshopped making the models body shape and skin color completely different to what her actual body looks like. It changes her face to look more appealing, body shape thinner, white or light skinned, and bigger breasts. Ads also create a climate for violence against women. Ads portray men as strong, big, and more powerful. Men don’t live in a world where their bodies are criticized and judged every day. Men are less likely

In society, women are held to a very high social standard. The pressure to look as perfect as all the models in magazines have driven many girls to an impossible fixation. Not only is it seen as a social norm, but also people do not even realize the degrading images of women in our everyday surroundings. After watching “Killing Us Softly”, this ideal was brought to my attention more that almost every advertisement piece that involves women promotes sexualization, objectification, and reinforces the feminine gender roles in America.

In 2016, the United States spent 190 billion U.S. dollars on advertisements, almost double the amount of money on advertising than the next largest ad market (Statista). These ads advertise a multitude of different products. The ads are exposed to society in many different ways, from the breaks in between songs on the radio, to the ads shown online. Ads are targeted to a specific group of people, usually, the target demographic the brand wants to buy their product. Brands will often use women’s bodies in a sexual way to get people to stop and look at their ads. Over the last few decades, speakers and activists have seen advertisements becoming more sexual and more demeaning towards women. Activist Jean Kilbourne has been analyzing ads and has been bringing awareness to this issue for years through her four documentaries. In her documentary, “Killing Us Softly 4,” Jean Kilbourne asserts women’s bodies are often dismembered, portrayed with an unattainable, “ideal” body type, and despite advances in the women’s movement, the objectification of women in ads have gotten worse. The two images below illustrate these ideas.

Living in a culture with increasing violence against women, the objectification of a woman through advertisements does not help the females’ strive of obtaining equality in a male dominated world. Advertisers sell their products in a particular way by objectifying women. These kind of advertisements not only appeals to the male consumer, but it also appeals to the female consumer making her believe that the ideal women looks, acts, and thinks in the ways a man would want her to. The advertisements presented not only present an unattainable image of how society is supposed to look like, it also leaves messages in your subconscious for the objectification and silencing of women, and violence that men must present to be considered the “alpha”. Jean Kilbourne is the speaker in the 1979 documentary called “Killing Us Softly: Advertising's Image of Women” states that “we are exposed to hundreds and thousands of advertisements on a daily basis” and if the majority of these advertisements somehow objectify women then we, as a society, become “numb” to the actual problem and thinks nothing of these womanizing images. Behaviors are learned actions and even through advertisements, the mind is connecting what it sees and associating it as a

The roles of males and females in society have significantly changed, as opposed to the predominant roles in our history. In the modern culture of today, women have begun to break out of the mold that which society has placed her in. This much can’t be said when it comes to modern gender representation in mass media advertising. It can be safe to state that woman are seen as sexual, fragile, exotic—whereas men are portrayed as tough, in control, and aggressive. This trend can be one seen as an inhibitor to the advancement of our culture, because especially for women, it is hard to pull away from the stereotypes that are continuously represented. As examples of the given trend, the following