My Take On Objectification In Advertising

[Lynx122]

I hear some feminists complain about advertising and how women are beeing objectified and it's the most terrible thing ever even though there's tons of ads where the same thing is done with guys but whatever.
I didn't post this to argue about objectification but I wanted to say advertising like this annoys me aswell. Everywhere people are trying to abuse my natural instincts in this case sex drive to sell me shit that I don't want. It's a fucking pain in the ass.

I don't care about cars a lot but this is one of the most obvious examples. I'm sure the guys at the car shows don't think they're beeing affected but they probably are, they wouldn't pay these girls if there was no increase in sales.

Music videos, billboards, tv ads whatever it's everywhere and yes you can resist it but everytime it takes a little bit of effort.
I just read about this. Why is there candy right before the checkout in a store? Because they think that you have already made a bunch of decisions while you were in the store and resisted buying things that you maybe naturally wanted, so they think your willpower will be drained or at a lower level when you get to checkout and you might give in easier and buy some candy just because your body wants it.

And the innitial urge to look at a billboard for instance is only the noticable effect, who the fuck knows how it's subconciously affecting me? I don't that's for sure. Marketing is so clever these days, it's not even funny.

In music videos it's especially annyoing if I see a song that has no creativity and it's just shit but hot girls will sometimes be enough for me to watch that crap anyway. If it's a good song then I don't mind girls in the video :P
I like Kpop(among many other genres), I do honestly like some of the songs but who knows how much the pretty girls dancing is affecting me, I'm sure there's some impact.

It doesn't matter how "satisfied" you are it's always there stuck in your brain, telling you ;" THAT GIRL IS HOT!" it's annoying. I don't spend a lot of money pretty much all of it is food and rent so I haven't made any purchases that I've regretted because of marketing that's not why I'm writing this. I'm just annoyed by the constant bombardment and the effort it takes to ignore it. It's not a huge effort for 1 moment but if it's always there it becomes a pain.

Here's a video made by japanese animators that's about otaku culture (people who are obsessed with anime video games etc.) and how it destroyed the main characters relationship. For me it was very interesting and also spoke to a wider issue of how oversexualization and technology are affecting people. You have to skip to 1:30 before that is all intro. But be warned it's quite graphic a lot of almost nudity.

Guys let me know if you also find this annoying sometimes and of course girls are welcome to share their opinions aswell :)

[Anonymous]

To be honest, I can care less if an ad or tv show or video game or a music video has sexy, half-naked women in it. It doesn't bother me at all and I consider myself a feminist. It's the portrayals of the denigration, belittlement and humiliation of women that rears it's ugly head from time to time that's problematic.

[Lynx122]

Ok :)

[Anonymous]

It's kind of annoying that they always seem to have girls in revealing clothing everywhere. I personally don't really care but it's annoying I don't see it as objectification since the girls agree to do it. If they were forced into it , which rarely happens, then there's a problem.

[Lynx122]

Yes I might have slightly exaggerated the effect :P I think you just get used to it and get better at blocking it out but maybe that's exactly the problem. Before modernisation if a guy saw a pretty girl it was a real girl and it was something special, nowadays you get bombarded with so many sexy girls that it kinda numbs you. In Japan there's a good chunk of guys called herbivore men who don't want girlfriends and just live their lives alone. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that I just think it's a sociatal trend that can't be ignored. Japan and Korea are ahead of the west when it comes to technology somaybe it's a glimpse into our future as a society. Maybe people will become more isolated and less sexual. I don't know I just think about random stuff sry if I bored you :).

[mistixs]

Actually plenty of women are forced to do it despite feeling uncomfortable with it, because there's no way to get represented otherwise.
Lily Allen said she wrote her song Hard Out Here because she was tired of magazines telling her that they wouldn't show her on their cover unless she dressed/posed sexy.

[Opinion Owner]

@mistixs
She still chose to do it on her own. She could have said no and didn't do it but she wanted the money and she must have determined it was worth it.

[Opinion Owner]

Assuming she did go through with it to get on the cover. I have no idea if she does that stuff.

[mistixs]

Women shouldn't have to undress in order to be represented in media.

[Opinion Owner]

@mistixs and people shouldn't have to be famous to get on the cover either. It's all unfair but people can choose or not choose to do it.

[mistixs]

well women shouldn't have to be sexy to be famous.

[Opinion Owner]

@mistixs
They don't. A lot of women are famous because they are skilled.

[Lynx122]

It's the first mytake I did and I didn't take enough time with it. I was kinda hasty because I didn't even know how a mytake is different so a bunch of stuff is together and people are taking different things from it. Pls forgive me :P. If I do another mytake I'll be sure to be more exact and think it through more.
I have adhd so I jump from one topic to the next quickly and don't always make it clear how i got there or don't spend enough time on each topic to explain what I think about it. When I write I just go at 100 mph and then I have to go back and fix everything that doesn't fit together or that wasn't in depth enough etc. So just take it as a thought provoking mess and not as a final product ;)

[mistixs]

"there's tons of ads where the same thing is done with guys"
But it's not an epidemic like it is for women.
Research consistently shows that women are objectified at least 5 times more often than men.

ANNENBERG.USC.EDU/.../...R_FILMS_-_SMITH_2013.ASHX Despite the fact that women make up only 1 of 4 speaking roles, they are sexualized 3-4 times more often than men. Thus, women are literally seen and not heard.
LINK.SPRINGER.COM/.../S11199-007-9278-1#PAGE-2 Female characters are more likely than male characters to be portrayed as sexualized (60% versus 1%) or scantily clad (39% versus 8%).
WWW.BUFFALO.EDU/NEWS/RELEASES/2011/08/12769.HTML “STUDY Finds Marked Rise in Intensely Sexualized Images of Women, not Men.”
NEWS.UGA.EDU/.../ Women are sexualized much more often than men in magazines.
GLORYHOOD.COM/.../GENDER-DIFFERENCES-IN-MAINSTREAM-MEDIA Research found that more than 90% of heterosexual relationships they reviewed, had a more attractive female than male, thereby teaching boys that they’re entitled to attractive girls while simultaneously teaching girls that it’s unacceptable to desire an attractive guy.. Also, despite the fact that females make up only about 1/3 of speaking characters in G, PG, PG-13, R films, and a similar ratio for characters in TV for kids under age 11, females were 5 times as likely as males to be shown in sexually revealing clothing, and more likely than males to be shown with idealistic and unrealistic bodies.
WWW.TANDFONLINE.COM/.../S15327825MCS0503_3 "This research uses content analysis to examine the portrayal of women in 47 randomly selected games from the Nintendo 64 and Sony PlayStation console gaming systems…Of the 597 characters coded, only 82 (13.74%) were women. The Nintendo 64 games had the fewest number of female characters, and the majority of the female characters wore clothing that exposed more skin than the male characters.“
LINK.SPRINGER.COM/.../S11199-007-9250-0 Despite men being given 4 times more representation in video games than women, men are significantly less likely to be portrayed with objectified sexiness. Violence and sexiness was also paired more frequently for female characters than violence and muscular physiques for male characters.

[Berethor]

Most of the serious video games are played by men and men are usually attracted to women and not to other men, so why are you surprised that women are sexualized more then men in most video games? The Twilight Saga is made by woman and is mainly for women, so in the The Twilight Saga men are sexualized more then women, as well as in most Romance Novels. You don't see many people complaining about men being sexualized more then women in most Romance Novels.

tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RomanceNovel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5xXmEO__9E

[Berethor]

Men being given 4 times more representation in video games than women? if women would not be sexualized in video games then men are would likely to have 100 times more representation in video games than women, almost like in Smurfs, no much point in having an woman around in video games who are made by men and is played manly by men if she didn't show some skin, maybe it's little hard to internalize but it's true, also women considered to be prettier sex, so it's much more expected from woman to be sexy.

tvtropes.org/.../TheSmurfettePrinciple

tvtropes.org/.../MenAreStrongWomenArePretty

[steven7890789]

It doesn't matter how much, I posted before how women are hypocrites in this matter like in Magic Mike @mistixs

[mistixs]

@steven7890789 it absolutely does matter how much. It should be done equally to men and women. But right now it happens much more often to women, so we need to start doing it less to women, more to men, or both, in order to reach equality.

[mistixs]

@Berethor so the only "point" of women is to be sexy. That's misogynistic

[mistixs]

@steven7890789 like, "how much" really DOES matter. i don't mind a little sexualization of women (and men) at times in media. too much of ANYTHING - from water to food to sex - gets toxic, and that's where it's at right now with sexualization of women.
if you fed your child mcdonalds every 2 weeks, i wouldn't say anything about it.
if you fed your child mcdonalds every single day, then yeah, i'd be up your ass about it, because that's unhealthy.
the former is where it's at with sexualization of men - it's at a healthy level. the latter is where it's at with sexualization of women - it's at a healthy level.

[Berethor]

If you want it done equality then watch survivor show or dating naked, as long as men are the main demographic of the show then women would get sexualized much more, on the same principle that men goes to female strip club and women goes to male strip club. Also many women don't care about seeing sexualized women as many of them enjoy it themselves, just as many women are watching lesbian porn. Also women are wearing more revealing clothing in real life as well, at least in non-religious societies, so it's kinda realistic. Also there is nothing unhealthy about woman's body, having sex with many men might be unhealthy, but not showing some skin, yes sometimes it's gets very unrealistic like with chainmail bikini, but besides that it's makes a sense.

tvtropes.org/.../DistractedByTheSexy

tvtropes.org/.../ChainmailBikini

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTGh0EMmMC8

[Curiousness23]

I think i got what you mean, like it's not truly annoying to see sexy naked girls and guys it's just annoying the way it's used and the way it makes us behave and affects us, i kinda understand and YEP it's annoying in a way :3

[Berethor]

They are models, they are making an very good money thanks to their body, if less women would be shown in advertisement then women would have less jobs, how is that good for women?

[Lynx122]

I was not talking about that at all but whatever.

[mistixs]

Women can & should be shown in advertisements without being sexualized.
Plenty of men are.

[Berethor]

Then what would stop them from taking man for the advertisement instead? being sexy is one of woman's best cards, without it, there is much less point in taking her for the advertisement.

[Other_Tommy_Wiseau]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaG5SAw1n0c

filler

[aliceinwonderland69]

So you are saying that female objectification is bad for men as well?

[Lynx122]

I think some people have the idea men just want to see female bodies all the time, they like it. But that's not always true.
I mixed some topics together I'm sorry. I switched to a mytake because I have never done one before, next time I'll take more time ;) The main reason I wrote it is because I thought the oversexualisation of today's world is sometimes fun and liberated but sometimes also exhausting and overdone.

That's why I put the japanese video in there. Japan and Korea are a bit ahead of the west when it comes to this development and it has had effects on their societies like the herbivore men. I just think about lot of things and I feel like technology (like the internet, smartphones etc) and the sex sells attitude are 2 things that will affect people and interpersonal contact in the future. Maybe we will become more and more isolated and anonymous.

[Lynx122]

My brain is very active and thinks about a lot of stuff without me doing anything, but I have to organise it and I didn't do a good job this time, sometimes there's a bunch of ideas in my head but I have to formulate them properly and not just throw them out :).

[Walls_and_Doors]

I'm not annoyed.