Since the birth of advertisements, there have been a lot of controversial pictures that push gender boundaries. This advertisement presented by Dolce & Gabana in the 3rd edition 2015 Vogue Magazine shows a clear evidence of stereotypical gender issues. Upon further inspection, this advertisement shows a petite, brunette woman in a short skimpy dress being pinned by a man with no shirt who is showing clear domination over the woman. There are also three other men overlooking the woman being pinned down and seem to be approving of this ‘gang-rape’. Throughout this whole incident, the woman appears to have an alienated expression with an absent look. After analyzing, this advertisement shows a clear indication of the passive …show more content…
As a result, the advertisement supports gender stereotypes by perpetuating males with domineering attitudes while women are left to be passive and helpless.
Although the woman may appear to be allowing this kind of behavior, this is only portraying the woman as a target due to her feminine figure being shown in a degrading manner. She is viewed as less than due to the position she is in, all the men are overlooking her and she quickly becomes the target for the men. Jean Kilbourne in the article "Two Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt" goes into great detail explaining how advertisements can affect females in society. Kilbourne states that "It is hard for girls not to learn self-hatred in an environment in which there is such widespread and open contempt for women and girls." which means that other females who view this advertisement are also being judged and critiqued to dress a certain way or else fear not being accepted by society. This is why gender issues in advertisements, are such a big problem and just perpetuate the gender gap found between male and female. Kilbourne also goes on to …show more content…
The woman in the advertisement is also a stereotypical female character with common characteristics, including long brunette hair, skinny, and white skinned complexion which the media have enforced as the norm for attractiveness. She is also wearing a skimpy dress which offends the dignity of woman because her feminine figure is shown in a degrading manner. Devor also states that “Many activities and modes of expression are recognized by most members of society as feminine. Any of these can be, and often are displayed by a person of either gender.” Which means that femininity is being portrayed as everything that masculinity isn’t, but this prevents males from acting in a different way outside their norm or they are risking of being kicked out. In turn, this causes feminism to become the exact opposite of masculinity or else females become rejected by society. This problem is only causing a bigger gap to occur between males and females furthering feminism and masculinity further. Kilbourne counter argues that “These days some ads do feature clothed and often aggressive women with nude women. And sometimes blatantly objectify women” but this kind of feminism is rare and not viewed as true femininity because the commonly held stereotypes are not being perpetuated against women which causes the definition to stay the same and keep projecting these stereotypes in