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Advertising and Violence Against Women In class on May 9, Lauren Sharabi, Lindsey Kaplan, Lisette Miranda, and Stephanie Pincar were selected to present to the class on the issue of women and advertisements. They had aimed at showing the class the ways in which women are portrayed in advertisements. We come across advertisements on a daily basis and sometimes we don't realize what is being said subliminally or even straight-out by these advertisements. They showed a number of advertisements of women that shows how women are portrayed as objects that should always look beautiful and strive to be the “norm”. The sexual portrayals of women show that they should act in a certain way. The meaning of what these images portray is really that women are sex objects and are to look perfect and submissive to men. There were also advertisements from the Internet that portray violent images towards women in an obvious manner. There are subtle ways in which advertising reinforces cultural inequality between the sexes. Superiority of men's size, attention and positioning is a common tactic. The portrayal of women in Advertising as victims of violence or as sexual objects, have been found to influence the way in which women are viewed and treated in society. Americans encounter advertising in almost every aspect of daily life. Commercials, Billboards, Movies, Clothing, and many more are all forms in which companies and people try to get their name or image out to the public. Since advertising is such a big part of life, it is only fair to assume that there is a huge impact of the ideas and morals presented in them on society. Negative depictions such as sexual objectification, stereotyping, and violence against women are portrayed too frequently in advertising and media. When women are portrayed as objects, they are represented as available for use, exploitation, and mistreatment. Advertisements that address us along gender lines are powerful due to the ability to connect with us in some aspect of reality. Women are defined primarily in sexual terms and by their sexual behavior. This perspective however, can lead to treating women as less than human. For women, beauty has been traditionally the route to achieving social status. For men, having a beautiful woman by his side is showing his social status in that he was able to “get her”. She must have luxurious items and good overall presentation, becoming an item herself. We can see from advertising that contradictory messages are given to women. They are expected to be perfect and they are made to feel that they have to achieve this ideal, and if not they have failed. The presentation was great and very informative! |