Blog post 2

I chose the quote that states "Men basically don't live in a world in which their bodies are routinely scrutinized..."
I disagree with this quote, in most ads men are depicted with their shirts off and extremely muscular. Average every-day men are supposed to be held to this standard to be considered "sexy" just as women are supposed to  wear scantily clad outfits and be overly thin to be considered "sexy."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQb_-OY7Z0E

This ad is a very good example of how men's bodies are scrutinized. David Beckham stands in his underwear and poses and this is considered sexy. Men have to live up to the standards people like David Beckham set and if they do not live up to these standards they are scrutinized.

Blog #2

“At the same time that we allow our children to be sexualized, we refuse to educate them about sex. The United States is the only developed nation in the world that doesnʼt teach sex education in the schools. And our children pay a very high price – we have the highest rates of teen pregnancy and the highest rates of sexually transmitted illnesses by far in the developed world."”

I agree with the above for many reasons. If we started teaching our kids about sex and sexual transmitted diseases at an earlier age then the rates would go down. Teenagers would have a better feel about sex, and know how to stay protected bristol-palin-candies-foundation-teen-pregnancy-baby-psa-590khz4710.jpg . This ad stood out to me because it is true. Over thousands of Teenage girls each year get Pregnant at a young age. If our schools taught kids about sex maybe there wouldn't be as many teen pregnancies. There would be no downfall in teaching our kids about sexual diseases , it would be the right thing to do.

Blog Post 2 - Cereal Bondage Bears

Blog Post #2
Steven Wolters
15 February 2012


“When bondage is used to sell [various products], we can say that pornography has become mainstream.”

I Agree.

Declare Yourself's "Only You Can Silence Yourself" American Voting Campaign (Ft Jessica Alba)

In a culture where "sex sells" is distinguished as an effective advertising strategy, I believe the bondage theme is one less preferred. However, the lone fact that such marketing exists is enough to convince me that pornography has indeed become mainstream. Of course not in it's rawest display, but more of a "softcore" version. Nonetheless, pornography is pornography in it's overall explicity.

American Apparel's "Burnout: Meet Jennifer" Fashion Advertisment 

Take into account my favorite example of mainstream pornography amongst teenagers; the R&B / Hip-Hop genre. Not only are many artists' lyrics full of passionate romance, desire, and sexual innuendo's (if not a literal sense), but there is a growing trend of these artists being the most preferred among their competitors. Lady Gaga is a prime example of an artist that successfully sold enough pornographic imagery to win a multitude of awards through a massive fan-base. That's only the beginning of what's accompanied by a marvel of revealing photography and music videos.

Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" Album Photography

Aside from the music industry, advertising pornagraphy in a milder form can be viewed as a harmless attempt to simply have more appeal on it's audience. Most of these ads come in suggestive themes coupled with condoms and sexual enhancement pills. Increasingly, the participating marketing campaigns reveal less clothes in hotter situations that clearly illustrate a sex scene. 



Weetabix's "Alpen Cereal - Sweet. But not too sweet." Advertisement

(Unknown Source)

Cereal Bondage Bears?

Black Coffee Erotica?

What's next?

BLOG #2

I choose the statement “At the same time that we allow our children to be sexualized, we refuse to educate them about sex. The United States is the only developed nation in the world that doesnʼt teach sex education in the schools. And our children pay a very high price – we have the highest rates of teen pregnancy and the highest rates of sexually transmitted illnesses by far in the developed world.” I strongly agree with this statement. A teenagers reality is a reflection of media and all media is selling is sex. Schools scarcely educate teens about sex. We continue to argue whether we should have sex education in our schools and how much of it we teach. But we never argue about how ads and media have publicized on sex. We use sex to advertise everything. Being young beautiful and "sexy" is what really matters. That is what kids see in all ads. Sexuality is taught to be a liberating experience. Ads teach teens one way of being sexy but there is no emphases on sex education, pregnancy and stds, hence the height of teen pregnancy. 

I think the best thing we have so far is the show teen mom on MTV (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEjiM0sESus )It's stories about moms that are product of our toxic culture, who were sexualized but uneducated about the consequences of sex. I think that media sharing these stories and making it a reality show girls can follow season after season gives girls an exact image of how their lives might change and the sacrifices and stress they could go through. I think it is a big step but its far from enough.

I chose the statement,
“On the deepest level, the obsession with thinness is about cutting girls down to size. Now one could say this more vividly than this relatively new size in womenʼs clothing, size 0 and size 00. Imagine a man going into a clothing store and asking for anything in a size zero, but our girls are taught to aspire to become nothing.”

This statement really said something to me, something I completely agree with.  When you look through Teen magazine, clothing catalouges for women, and children for that matter, you see and image, "thin equals happiness." From the time I was a young girl I can remember watching T.V. or looking through a clothing magazine and seeing these ultra thin girls jumping around with beautiful clothes, lots of friends, and absolutely no curves at all, and I would think to myself....If I looked like her I would be happy like her.  Look at how young the audience is www.shopjustice.com  I don't see the cute, average looking child in this ad. Its know wonder seven million women in America have an eating disorder.www.state.sc.us
We need to educate young girls about the effects these unhealthy choices have on there bodies, and teach them to be resilient.

Blog #2

     I don't agree with this ad : “Men basically donʼt live in a world in which their bodies are routinely scrutinized, criticized, and judged; whereas women and girls do. This doesnʼt mean that there arenʼt stereotypes that harm men; there are plenty of stereotypes that harm men, but they tend to be less personal, less related to the body. Men, in general, donʼt experience the emphasis on appearance that women can never escape.”


     I believe that men now a days have become also well aware of the advertisement that are forcing many of them to become physically active and attractive. As it is seen in this Abrecrombie & Fitch Male Ad. Males are also being used as sex symbols to attract male consumers but through possible female consumers. Women could see this add and believe that their significant other should start working out to look as good as the model in the ad. She can then start persuading her significant half to acquire the body of the model to look as good as him. Its clear that the model is also being used to attract the summer line of clothing but he is also being referred as "SUMMER hotter than other" meaning some men look better in these jeans than others but only if you can look as good as him. Therefore I believe that men are equally thrashed by advertisements to encourage them to be better looking in regards to their appearances and become far better than their average no six pack neighbor next door.

blog #2

I strongly disagree with the quote, "Men basically don’t live in a world in which their bodies are routinely scrutinized, criticized, and judged; whereas women and girls do. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t stereotypes that harm men; there are plenty of stereotypes that harm men, but they tend to be less personal, less related to the body. Men, in general, don’t experience the emphasis on appearance that women can never escape.” because if you ever look at any ad with a man’s shirt off you won't see a skinny or even medium size bodies. A lot of the ads that I see with men in it are extremely toned and have abnormal bodies in the sense that many guys don't have that picture perfect body. By saying that men don’t have to have the emphasis on experience really doesn't have any backing because I personally know a lot of men that always want to have the perfect body you see in the magazines and in movies but are highly unlikely to achieve it.

“When bondage is used to sell [various products], we can say that pornography has become mainstream.” I would definitely agree with this quote, certain advertisements use almost blatant pornography to advertise their particular product. This objectification of women not only negatively impacts women, it also negatively impacts men. With women, and girls these kinds of ads make them much more critical of their own bodies, and makes them feel like they are required to expose themselves more to be socially acceptable. With men and boys being exposed to these sexually focused images throughout daily life causes an overly sexual mentality that is now thought of as the norm. The expression "guys only have one thing on their mind" eluding to concept that men only think about sex, is commonly used to warn girls about  "the true intentions" of guys. I feel like males have sex on there mind more often, because they are constantly being bombarded with images designed to sexual stimulate them.