Too much smoke in the Mirror.

Through the readings, most of the authors made similar reference on how women are only view though the male’s gaze. Women and young girls seem to get effect the most by the world of advertisement, while men are portrayed in a positive reflection. Even though some of the articles depicted men as incompetent or as a muscle head, women are portrayed far much worst then men. Women in advertisement are constantly being misrepresented through media and print. If people (especially young girls) are caution and educated about the beauty myth, instead of obsession over the non existing product a.k.a “the perfect you” then maybe there would be more inequality amount all individuals.

The best advertisement strategy is to promote more education towards young girls, and depict women in a positive point of view through mass media. I think young girls are manipulated into believing the beauty myth because they are constantly exposed to enormous amount of negative ads. In the article “Beauty and the Beast of Advertising”, Jean Kilbourne quotes “We are each exposed to over 1500 ads a day, constituting perhaps the most powerful educational force in society” (pp 121, line 4). When you think about the wasteful ads people are exposed to in our everyday lifestyle, you start to wonder is adverting a form of brainwash. Young girls would benefit a formal female gender class because they could think more logical and idealistic view on women instead a Barbie like image. I think its disbursing to learn that young girls don’t have enough positive roles models to encourage them to be successful scholars instead of the tired sex-pop-tart idol. Advertisements don’t seem to really care about creating or changing their approach towards women because it still continues to degrade women and lower their self esteem. Advertisers do acknowledge that young teenagers are the easiest target to exploit and are a marketable product. Jean Kilbourne’s Beauty and the Beast of Advertising, carefully explained “Adolescents are particularly vulnerable, because they are new and inexperienced consumers and are the prime targets of many advertisements. They are in the process of learning their values and roles and developing their self concepts….. Mass Communication has made possible a kind of nationally distributed peer pressure that erodes private and individual values and standard.” This ratification further concludes why young girls of all race and sexuality have to struggle to be part of an acceptable social group, because they aren’t enough money showing women an alternative lifestyle. Women also seem to suffer too much trial and errors in advertising because slogans offend humiliate women and portrayed them in an unintelligent matter. For instance, Cigarettes Company like Virginian Slim and Lucky Strikes were probably one of the most offensive ads toward women because they associate a deadly product to promote independent and weight loss. Douglas Kellner explained (Reading Images Critically Toward a Postmodern Pedagogy pp. 129) “In fact, Lucky Strikes carried out a successful advertising campaign in the 1930s which associated smoking with weight reduction (“Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet”) It is astonishing how women were fool into accepting this type of sexist ads and are seem formidable in any representation. I sure we think now how cheesy the Lucky strike slogan was, but the fact of the matter it was a successful campaign that encourage women to smoke cigarette instead of eating. Eating has become the number one enemy for young girls and women, because the pressure to be skinny has not change, or improves. Ads aren’t providing positive healthy lifestyle or prominent career choices.

Through my experience with the class discussion and articles, I started to question why many girls are not expose to media or aren’t CEO for major advertising companies. I was excited to see a production like “Real Grrl” encourages young girls to make and produce media. I was shock how many of my fellow classmates (including myself) wished this type of opportunity was available to us during our adolescents years. But still, even providing MORE positive influence and female gender education could prevent women over obsession on lemon scented products, and the artificial beauty.