Women being oppressed as sex objects/tools in advertising

In the advertising world, there are many issues surrounding gender stereotypes in advertising. Since there are many of them, I will narrow it down to one topic/theme for this blog, which is that women in advertising are oppressed as sex objects or tools. I will post an image and explain how that woman is portrayed as either a sex object or tool.

Images taken from:

http://newsfeed.time.com/2014/01/10/off-with-her-head-the-headless-womans-place-in-art-and-ads/

In this image, the woman’s body is just being used for the man’s pleasure, but instead of looking at the girl’s face, there’s a magazine showing a BMW. The woman’s body is just being used for sex/pleasure, but what the man really wants, or is really in love with, is the car. It says “The ultimate attraction” centered on the page, which should be the woman, but instead it’s the car that’s attractive.

Image taken from:

http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/most-influential/10-of-the-most-sexist-modern-print-ads/

This next image shows an advertising campaign for a chip company. However, what is noticeable is the woman’s cleavage instead of the chips on the bottom right of the ad. Although she is holding a ball with the logo on it, she’s still exposing her cleavage. Her body is being used to attract others to the ad, to see if they’re viewing it for the wonderful and delicious… chips, or if they only cared about the woman’s body. This oppresses women that all they’re good at is looking good, or if they play sports that they need a certain sized bust or breast. Yes, physically active women do have different bodies in certain areas, but this ad is clearly emphasizing her body as a bridge to get people’s attention rather than have the chips advertise itself.

Image taken from:

http://msmagazine.com/nocommentarchive.asp

This last image shows an advertisement for a hair care product line for women. It’s saying that the hair care products will make your hair good looking, that others won’t notice anything that’s wrong with you. In this case, it’s showing that the bottom of the women’s dress is not fully down, showing a portion of her underwear. This, again, oppresses women in a comedic manner. Instead of having to show her underwear, they could’ve shown a rip on her shirt/blouse/dress or a coffee stain.

In retrospect, all of these advertisements use women and their bodies to get viewers to look at the ad. It’s not the only way it can be looked at, but it is a perspective. It is ultimately portraying that women are just for looks and attention. Their bodies are no more than a tool to get people to look at them through advertisements. This frames society to look at females as nothing more than looks. Whether if people find it funny or not, these types of advertisements do not help advance women into an equal level with men.