Elyana Kadish
Intro to Women's Studies
Padini Nirmal
October 18, 2015 Dr. Randi Garcia on Sexual Objectification Sex sells. This is less of a statement and more of a reality in our society. There is not a single day where I am not encouraged to buy something that has advertising laced with sex appeal or sexual innuendos. However, it is not only the attractive models or the punch line that they are offering to the consumer, they are offering a chance for you to become 'sexy' too. The advertisement industry's employment of sex as a tool to sell more products is successful in my opinion, because it plays into both sex and self-objectification. You too are now selling your own sex appeal through your consumerism continuing the cycle of objectification. …show more content…
Garcia showed the video "Killing us Softly" by Jean Killbourne. While the video examined Photoshop, sexual objectification, the strive for physical perfection, the element that I found most important was the link between turning women's bodies into things and the violence towards women. Like in any case of dehumanization when tension is present violence is common, because it does not feel as morally wrong to the perpetrator. However, in the cases of female dehumanization in the media, there is no tension, so where is this violence coming from? Why is it that a woman as a beer-can, as we saw with the Budweiser ad, is dehumanized to the extent that another woman could be in danger? Personally, I believe that it is due to the second item sexual advertising sells, which is actual sex for the consumer. As I mentioned and Dr. Garcia spoke about, sex based advertising sells a specific lifestyle to the consumer. If you buy a Bud laced with sexual promises and you aren't receiving the 'product' you paid for well then you might violently take what you consider to be rightfully yours. Unfortunately in this case the product many people believe they have bought is women's bodies; they forget though that women are people too and not just a beer to be consumed. This connects back to bell hooks' definition of patriarchy because it illuminates the intersection between patriarchy, capitalism and the consumption/use of …show more content…
Dr. Garcia provided a few different experiments and highlighted the outcomes of these tests. The sweater-swimsuit experiment illustrates how self-sexual objectification leads to negative outcomes due to the way we begin to perceive ourselves. That when we feel objectified we are more likely to also objectify ourselves continuing the damage. This is extremely interesting to me because it made me think about all the times I have objectified myself and after the lecture I could clearly see the catalyst of my objectification. I connected very deeply with the swimsuit-sweater experiment, because in my own way I have performed the experiment on myself when eating a meal after a shopping trip. What I decided to consume relied heavily on how 'successful' I deemed the shopping excursion. According to Dr. Garcia this would be an example of state self-objectification, because I temporarily experienced a preoccupation with my body. However, I would also argue that my self-objectification came from the sexual-objectification I received while shopping, through the advertisements, the mannequins, and the gaze of the other
Intro to Women's Studies
Padini Nirmal
October 18, 2015 Dr. Randi Garcia on Sexual Objectification Sex sells. This is less of a statement and more of a reality in our society. There is not a single day where I am not encouraged to buy something that has advertising laced with sex appeal or sexual innuendos. However, it is not only the attractive models or the punch line that they are offering to the consumer, they are offering a chance for you to become 'sexy' too. The advertisement industry's employment of sex as a tool to sell more products is successful in my opinion, because it plays into both sex and self-objectification. You too are now selling your own sex appeal through your consumerism continuing the cycle of objectification. …show more content…
Garcia showed the video "Killing us Softly" by Jean Killbourne. While the video examined Photoshop, sexual objectification, the strive for physical perfection, the element that I found most important was the link between turning women's bodies into things and the violence towards women. Like in any case of dehumanization when tension is present violence is common, because it does not feel as morally wrong to the perpetrator. However, in the cases of female dehumanization in the media, there is no tension, so where is this violence coming from? Why is it that a woman as a beer-can, as we saw with the Budweiser ad, is dehumanized to the extent that another woman could be in danger? Personally, I believe that it is due to the second item sexual advertising sells, which is actual sex for the consumer. As I mentioned and Dr. Garcia spoke about, sex based advertising sells a specific lifestyle to the consumer. If you buy a Bud laced with sexual promises and you aren't receiving the 'product' you paid for well then you might violently take what you consider to be rightfully yours. Unfortunately in this case the product many people believe they have bought is women's bodies; they forget though that women are people too and not just a beer to be consumed. This connects back to bell hooks' definition of patriarchy because it illuminates the intersection between patriarchy, capitalism and the consumption/use of …show more content…
Dr. Garcia provided a few different experiments and highlighted the outcomes of these tests. The sweater-swimsuit experiment illustrates how self-sexual objectification leads to negative outcomes due to the way we begin to perceive ourselves. That when we feel objectified we are more likely to also objectify ourselves continuing the damage. This is extremely interesting to me because it made me think about all the times I have objectified myself and after the lecture I could clearly see the catalyst of my objectification. I connected very deeply with the swimsuit-sweater experiment, because in my own way I have performed the experiment on myself when eating a meal after a shopping trip. What I decided to consume relied heavily on how 'successful' I deemed the shopping excursion. According to Dr. Garcia this would be an example of state self-objectification, because I temporarily experienced a preoccupation with my body. However, I would also argue that my self-objectification came from the sexual-objectification I received while shopping, through the advertisements, the mannequins, and the gaze of the other