Is It Ethical for Organizations Use Sexism in Advertising?
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Organizations have been realized the notion to sexism in society, but why do they keep using sexism as their key tools for advertising? Media has shaped the images and roles of typical women. It has guided women to behave in a way that it is portrayed on advertisement. In 20th century, media first aired commercials on television. Since then, media has taken charge of portraying the roles of gender and reflecting typical characteristic of women. There are shifts in trends of women’s roles and characteristics in commercials from 20th century to 21st century. However, the problem of emphasizing sexuality of women is still remained these days. Organizations have used sexuality concepts as their marketing tool to advertise and sell their products. Women are portrayed as mere sexually traceable objects. Presence of women’s image has no connection or relation to product itself, but it is used to attract people’s attention.
Media takes the greatest portion of people’s lives and it is influential, but crucial way that can alter the society’s norms and values. Since people are exposed to media everyday 24 hours in everywhere, it affects our thoughts, perspectives, and our ways of life. Many commercials portray the images of skinny, thin women as the standard of beauty. It brings up another societal problem of stereotype. Many people tend to judge individuals based on the standard of beauty that media set and discriminate them based on their appearances. Since everyone is subject to those advertisements, organizations should consider and be responsible for what they present to audiences.
http://www.smosh.com/smosh-pit/photos/22-sexist-modern-ads
The link below is a YouTube video that compares the sexism in 20th century and nowadays. This is quite interesting video that explains the improvements on women’s roles in old days and today while explicitly keep using sexuality of women as organization’s marketing communications.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=klgeo37QES0&NR=1
http://www.smosh.com/smosh-pit/photos/22-sexist-modern-ads
http://pinterest.com/ivysays/sexist-ads/