Sexuality, Ideologies, And Gender Roles In Advertising
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For as long as advertising and mass media have been around, so has their incorporation of sexuality and ideologies. Day after day we are plastered by articles, images, and audible forms of advertising. I would estimate that the average person encounters between fifteen hundred and three thousand forms of advertising each and every day. Of those fifteen hundred to three thousand, it would be safe to say that more than two thirds of them portray sexuality and socially constructed ideals. Men, women, and children are on a daily basis targets of advertisements. As Susan Bordo hypothesizes in her essay “Hungry as Ideology,” gender roles are the foundation for what the advertising agencies use to promote and push sales (139). They use the societal stereotypes of gender and sexuality and manipulate them so that we, the consumers, want to purchase their product. Sexuality, ideologies, and gender roles are not something new to the advertising world. They have been incorporated in advertising for well over the past fifty years, characterizing the ideal woman as an entity of sexual desire and submission, as well as the ideal man as a person of power and financial stability.
Furthermore, decade-to-decade, the ideologies of the complete woman have changed. With this change have come new products and forms of advertising to sell them. Most women of advertising are tall, skinny, and very seductive. They are depicted as sexual beings and objects, rather than human beings or people (McManus). No matter the product, one can usually find something suggestive or subliminally sexual in every female advertisement, proving how the woman has truly become identified by her sexuality.
There are two ways in which gender roles in advertisements are thrown at the consumer. The first one is how the person in the ad expresses their gender identity. The second is how we as a society deem the activities and actions appropriate of the person and the genitalia they possess (Ideology). I have chosen three advertisements, from three different decades, all depicting how the sexuality and stereotyped gender roles acknowledged by society are exhibited in the media. The first ad depicts the historicized ideology of women being the center of males sexual fantasies. Furthermore, the second advertisement, for Caress Body Soap and panties, demonstrates the commodification of a womans body as a sexual product. The third advertisement, for Candies cologne, makes it apparent that while women are sexual products, they are also sexually submissive and weak.
Womens sexuality has always been something that men have been unable to resist. Starting with the Bible, one of the oldest known forms of literature, it becomes evident that women have always possessed a natural sexuality. It was this sexuality that led Adam to partake in the Tree of Knowledge, giving in and ignoring Gods only instructions. He was unable to resist Eves pure physical beauty that had previously bypassed him; instead, he craved to be intimate with her, and this hunger overcame all common sense (Anonymous).
This awareness of power created by womans irresistible sexuality is something that has continued to develop overtime. With the concept of the Femme Fatale, as well as that of the Amazon Woman, came a solidification of the growth and change in ideals. Men at one time seemed to be solely attracted to women who were pure and quaint. This changed around the 1950s when women began to further acknowledge the power and acceptance of sex appeal in popular society. Women of this kind were now considered attractive and desirable because of their implied sexual ability. They were a desire of all men.
Through the use of sexuality and ideologies, such as those mentioned previously, one can understand how sex, whether subliminal or implicit, has aided in the social construction of women in society and the roles they play. In her essay, Bordo explores how present-day advertisements, drawing on the historical and cultural constructions of gender, shape and define the ideologies of womans sexuality and position in society.
Bordo is a philosopher who focuses on the image of the human body in relation to todays popular culture and society. Her writings are derived from the translations of advertisements that consume the market place and media (Bordo 139). She talks on how our perceptions of women and womens bodies are greatly influenced by the ideals and expectations of the “perfect woman” illustrated in the media. Bordo makes it a point to call out the gender roles and stereotypes embedded in the advertising world and how they shape the way members of society are thought of and accepted both physically and socially. This is clearly stated on page 143 of her essay when she says, “all we experience as meaningful is appearance.”
Advertising and media, as mentioned above, are one of the most successful ways of manifesting and controlling gender roles and sexuality. The three advertisements revealed earlier help further substantiate the effect imagery has on determining who we are and how we are supposed to act. The first ad is for a childrens Texaco cheerleader fashion model, from the late 1960s. This doll is every mans sexual fantasy in material form in a toy marketed to young girls. Secondly is an advertisement from the 1980s promoting Caress Body Soap and their special limited time only mail-in for “silky soft peach panties.” Lastly is an image for Candies cologne from the late 1990s depicting the power it has to rid women of all sexual inhibitions while giving in to mans desire for physical satisfaction.
When one thinks of a cheerleader, the first thoughts and characteristics that come to mind are blonde, skinny, and generally better to look at than talk to. These ideologies are quite common because of ads like this. Undoubtedly this ideology is decades old, for one can clearly see that that those descriptions portray the doll being sold here. This doll, which is marketed towards young children in the 1960s, comes with three different outfits: a cheerleading outfit, an apron, and a vinyl coat. By being marketed as a “fashion doll,” young girls are going to be under the impression that this type of attire is acceptable and truly feminine. Although this advertisement is marketed towards children, it goes on to solidify the expectation of what men feel a woman should be like. A man wants his woman to be both seductive and domestic. The fact that she comes with a skimpy cheerleader outfit as well as an apron implies that even though she is a toy, that she still possesses those sought after qualities. While reinforcing those gender roles, the ad also depicts the preferred image that women of all ages are trying