Sexism Sells

 

From politics to entertainment to the workplace, women have made significant progress since the past few decades. However in one place where women should be respected the most because of it’s reach they are often disdained, contemporary media or more precisely the advertising industry. The unhealthy practice of sexualizing products has been in the cosmetic industry for a long time. Our advertisement industry has the tendency to involve gratification of senses while marketing their products. Their ‘mantra’ is to target consumer’s sensual needs to increase the sale of their products. 

A prime example of this would be a popular body lotion ad, aired in 2012. In the ad a girl is seen talking to her friend about how her husband won’t stop touching her ever since she started using the product. The husband is seen getting distracted by the female actor, who is wearing a saree when she was applying the product on her torso. The ad shows that the actor’s skin became visibly flawless and soft so that her husband couldn’t help but get distracted by it. This sparked a particular response of anger and disgust with me but the one thing that pushed me off the edge was the tagline used in the commercial, “Now relationships will also get better with skin”. The same company has a similar advertisement where a woman is shown trying to reach something that’s kept on a higher shelf, she was wearing a saree with her pallu tucked in her waist. Seeing her shining torso, the male actor grabbed her by the waist to lift her

up but it was just an excuse to touch her again. And just like the previous ad this also had a ridiculous tagline “Helps wake love again”. Both of these ads made me question whether this society just thinks of women as objects which can be used to sexualize products and increase their sales. By doing this they are not only sowing wrong opinions in the generations mind but are also exploiting the products. And this ad just portrays the classic impression that “boys will be boys''. 

This is not the only ad, there are many such ads like the common soap brand, where the actor is seen smelling the product while taking a bath in a royal bathhouse. Later in the video she is seen attending a royal event, where the photographers seem to get attracted to the fragrance coming from the actor’s body. Similarly in the luxury brand’ lipstick ad the actress is seen just wearing a shirt as an overcoat while roaming around her mansion. Many actresses are seen keeping the product in her cleavage on the posters. 

All these ads follow the same pattern and the same methods of sexualizing products just to increase the sale. The ads are so absurd that it is trying to imply that moisturizers will help repair relationships. This is not just an unhealthy practice but a trend in the advertising industry to target the consumer’s sensual needs just to promote the product. There are many ads which sell their products just fine without adding naked women or men in an ad, then why can’t the others do the same? If rules and regulations were to be implemented within the advertising industry the society would change for the better. Girls would not grow up with negative images and body standards, their mental health won’t be affected and all men wouldn’t be seen as some pervy monsters. Regulations should be made and followed because these rules will lead us to a place where the media is not home to sexualizing. 

Bibliography

Lancaster. "Lancaster Story: Discover the Brand Made in Monaco." Lancaster, www.lancaster-beauty.com/en/story. Accessed 1 Dec. 2021. Images are taken from this website. 

"Parachute Advansed Body Lotion New Ad." www.youtube.com, 7 Oct. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=04x1d_kPGzw. Accessed 3 Dec. 2021.

"Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille Advertising Campaign." www.youtube.com, 27 Nov. 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXYPQDWdQD0. Accessed 22 Dec. 2021.