For your viewing pleasure part three

Tag commercials

Lets get naked!

I have always been interested in why women are always naked (or half naked) in body product advertisements and I would like to get everyone's input on these advertisements below.















Some starter questions: Why do you think these women are naked? Who do you think these advertisements are trying to please? Why do you think women buy the products in these advertisements? Would you buy the products in these advertisements? You can add any other input too, I would like this to start a discussion.

For your viewing pleasure part two

Axe Commercials

Alcohol and cigarette advertisements

Alcohol and cigarette advertisements are one of the first places to go if you want to see extreme gender stereotypes in our culture. Women are usually seen as a sex object of are in some sort of situation where they could be taken advantage of. If advertisements were a snapshot of our entire society it would show that alcohol and cigarettes were mostly sold to men by half naked women or reinforced that males need to be tough to be accepted by other people.


Cigarette advertisements have calmed down a lot since the big controversy in the 90s about selling cigarettes to kids and society’s general distaste in smoking. It is interesting to go look at cigarette advertisements before the 90s and try to figure out exactly what they were selling.



There are quite a few issues with this advertisement. Obviously they are using sex the sex appeal of this woman to sell cigarettes to men. If a hot woman with only jeans on is smoking a cigarette then it is the cool thing to do. This woman also gives men and women false hopes about the ideal woman should look like.



This advertisement helps reinforce male gender stereotypes. It shows men how they are supposed to act in out culture. The men in this advertisement are being tough and playing basketball while a case of beer sits in the background. Part of the text on the advertisement actually says, “Like talking to the ladies at the bar is less about opening and more about closing.” Basically implying that men should go to the bars just to get laid and if you don’t act that way then you aren’t acceptable in our society. I also find it very random that there is a picture of a woman’s leg in the top right hand corner. Its like this advertisement is selling the way a male should be and maybe Icehouse beer.



Are those men waiting in line to lick alcohol off of this woman? Does anyone else find this advertisement absolutely ridiculous?



Beer advertisement often include half naked women holding a beer and looking like they are going to have sex with the next thing they see. This advertisement falls right in with the rest but the most troubling thing about this advertisement is the text at the bottom - “Always worth it.” You are left wondering if they are implying that drinking the beer is always worth it or having sex with the girl is always worth it. This advertisement has dangerous stereotypes for both men and women because once again it features a half naked woman with big boobs and who is extremely skinny setting up the perfect body image of a woman which, for the most part, isn’t necessarily what a woman looks like.



This advertisement blows my mind. To make a woman not even a person but a glass of beer to consumed by a man whenever he wants is degrading women beyond belief. Understandable this particular advertisement was published in Maxim, where women are practically naked throughout the whole entire magazines but at least the women in the magazine get to use their real bodies to exploit themselves.



I feel like this advertisement is bad enough that I don’t need to take paragraphs explaining it. All I have to say is how is it controversial to imply that you can peel a woman like an orange? Isn’t that what we present in everyday society? That women are meant to be unpeeled by men for sexual pleasure? When it becomes controversial in mainstream society from a woman to be naked except covered in an orange peel I will throw a party because that means my work and the work of other feminists and media critics across the globe will finally have had some impact on main stream society.



This advertisement tries to flip gender stereotypes by having the man carrying the baby and the women skinny and holding a drink. I have always felt like was one of the ground breaking advertisements published but with a more critical eye there are still other various gender stereotypes in this advertisement. The man is still dressed in the clothing that his gender wears and the dog, better known as the man’s best friend, is still sitting at the man’s feet. The woman is wearing a slinky black dress and is holding a girly drink. I think it’s really cool that this advertisement tried to break gender stereotypes but there are still a few things that need to be worked on.

For your viewing pleasure part one

Here are some interesting TV advertisements from Carls Jr. that offer lots of gender stereotypes. Check them out and comment below!

DolceGabbana Advertisements

Dolce&Gabbana advertisements have been the center of controversy for years. Their in-your-face and bizarre types of advertising, which often feature nearly naked models in obscure poses, often show many gender stereotypes that are detrimental to our society.
Dolce&Gabbana is a company that sells luxury items, including sunglasses, purses, watches, and very expensive clothing. It’s funny because most of their advertisements barely have clothing or any of these other items present.
I have found five Dolce&Gabbana advertisements that I am going to critique in this post. I will point out the major stereotypical issues within each advertisement. You can find more of their advertisements at www.dolcegabbana.com or by searching Google images for Dolce&Gabbana advertisements.



This advertisement has always disturbed me. First of all, the woman lying down looks helpless and passive. This is one of the biggest stereotypes about women in our society, especially in the media. Also, the women that are surrounding the scene are all looking at the man. This makes him seem more important than whatever else is going on in this scene and gives the image that the man has the power in this relationship. The woman in the middle is also is a very sexual position – almost making this advertisement look like they are filming a pornography with clothes on. It also looks like the man is naked, but using the chair to cover up his penis. An advertisement like this gives women the image that they should lay down and be passive to men, as well as let someone else videotape them for sexual pleasure. This advertisement gives men the image that women should be passive to them and that they are allowed to videotape women doing sexual things in order to exploit it. This imagery gives a false image for both sexes and is detrimental to our society because it reinforces gender stereotypes.



This is also a very interesting advertisement. I think the part that annoys me most about this particular advertisement is that the woman in the middle has her head placed where the man’s penis should be. There are various references that this image creates, including that women come from men, that there cannot be women without the penis or that women worship the penis. The man on the right side looks like he is controlling the woman and the knife that is in her hand. Once again the man has the power in this relationship and the woman looks like she is in some sort of pain or anguish about it. Showing images like this to women or men make it look like it is okay for men to be in charge and for everyone to worship the penis.



This advertisement looks like the closest thing to pornography that a company could get away with publishing in a magazine. Not only are the women placed in sexually seductive positions, it looks like one of the women is trying to choke the other woman. This advertisement was made for the pleasure of men and, although the women are wearing clothes, it is impossible to figure out what products they are trying to sell – unless it’s lesbian sex and violence for a man’s pleasure. The women are also made to look plastic, almost like they are dolls. This gives imagery that women are like dolls which can be molded to do anything that a man (or another woman) desires. This imagery is bad for our society because it presents false hopes to both sexes. Men expect women to look like this and that they have power over women to make them do what they want – like they can do with dolls. Women are given the impression that they have to look and act like these women to fit in. People wonder why so many teenagers and children are dressing like adults, being slutty, or having sex already … we present these images to people in our advertisements.



I think this advertisement disturbs me the most because you aren’t exactly sure how far the couple is going in this picture. Granted, they aren’t having sex, but they are making out, and his hands have disappeared somewhere down her shirt. It also creeps me out that the men are watching the couple and probably getting some kind of enjoyment out of it. It also reinforces masculinity stereotypes because they are at a boxing match and boxing is seen as a manly sport and something that women don’t participate in, unless it is to objectify men’s sexual desires. The images in this advertisement make it seem that it’s okay for women to be slutty as long as it’s to pleasure other men. Advertisements such as this one give women and men the wrong impression about how to act in public and how to treat sex as a something casual that you can do in public.



I am not the only person who finds this advertisement insulting; this particular advertisement has received national and global criticism for its nature. Men hold all the power is this advertisement. It gives the imagery of the man trying to rape the woman or take advantage of her with the other men looking on this situation and approving of it. The woman is subordinate to these men; she is obviously a sexual object to them and is portrayed as such to the people who see this advertisement. It gives men the image that it is okay for a man to have power over a woman and take sexual advantage of her. This is not an image that we should be presenting to anyone because it gives a false idea to men and women about how relationships are or should be. People may wonder why there are many domestic violence cases every year, yet we continue to allow images like this one in popular magazines across the country.

Sex vs. Gender

I feel that there are two important terms that I would like to clear up before I begin posting advertisement critiques.

There is a difference between the terms "sex" and "gender." It is very important that these terms are used correctly because the refer to two completely opposite things.

Sex is biological. It is the characteristics that are part of your genes, such as being XX or XY or the genitalia that a person is born with.

Gender is something that is constructed in a social context. It is what a person believes themselves to be or acts the part of, such as wearing nail polish or make up. Gender can be fluid and can change at any time.