Sex sells! Duh-we all know that! Just flip through any North American fashion magazine, and you will see Calvin Klein, Diesel Jeans, Guess, and the like selling their products with raunch sauce and sex.
Recently, an article in the Montreal Gazette, Sex Becoming ‘Cultural Wallpaper‘ (written Misty Harris) discussed this age-old and over-scrutinized topic, but raised attention to the brand American Apparel- a brand I believe to be the most notorious for its highly sexualized advertisements. The company, as Harris mentions in her article, “founded by Montreal native, Dov Charney, has gone farther and featured professional adult entertainers as models in its advertising.”
Knee High Socks + Porn Star= Classic American Apparel Ad.
Carmine Sarracino, co-author of The Porning of America and professor of English at Elizabeth College in Pennsylvania stated, “Porn is becoming our cultural wallpaper … It’s so commonplace that we’re just figuring out how to manage it, rather than being really shocked by it.”
Jezebel.com; however, featured an interesting article on AA’s advertising tactics, and reported a billboard which featured a “woman wearing only tights, bent over, legs spread- was defaced… when someone spray painted “Gee, I wonder why women get raped.”
Gee...
Hmm… apparently some can “manage” sex in ads- but others not so much
American Apparel is one of my personal favourite clothing shops- I do not have a problem with their choice of adverts; however, I can understand why some members of society might. The ads themselves may “send out mixed messages to people who are aggressive because there’s a lot of violence in society, especially against women,” one viewer of the above billboard stated. This is a great point.
Perhaps the company should keep the more risqué ads limited to its website or in alternative magazines, because although many of us can “manage” when we see sex in ads- we must keep in mind, that some cannot.
But then again, sex sells- why change something that brings the money in?
Go buy some underwear...
Excellent!
You know it! Kind of sad that companies don’t know how to sell in a more classy way.
I think it’s disgusting for that vandalizer to insinuate that it is somehow women’s fault for getting raped. Of course the consequences of dressing like a hoe means you may be treated like one, but to blame a woman for a man’s sexual crime is just wrong.
And to roiledclarity: if anything is sad, it’s that consumers are so tantalized by sexual advertising. Selling is a company’s job, but it’s our responsibility to be either “pro” or “con” of the sexualization of women in advertising. obviously we are PRO and so the ass-shots continue.