The first image I want to start with is the Burger King advertisement. Clearly one of the most obvious attractions is directed to the woman with her mouth open about to eat a sub. This automatically makes the consumer think of oral sex. The surprised look on her face, is one of how "large the sub is." Everything about it is related to oral sex. From the print of it saying " IT'LL WILL BLOW YOUR MIND," to the clarification at the bottom of the "Bk Super Seven Incher." The target audience is clearly not a woman. Most woman I would believe would find this offensive, thus because oral sex is usually a very private and personal thing between two individuals. Also, age comes into play. Children who see this advertisement can look at this as a way to perceive a woman with objects that resemble their own phallic symbol. Promoting that it's either okay, or it's better if it is a certain size. It's not so much that I find this ad completely demeaning to woman, but more so the blanket message it can send to children about oral sex. Furthermore, I realize any ad can have a "negative message" to children but this just seems to scream oral sex to an audience who sell kids meals, and toys. That is the problem that I have with advertisement.
The second advertisement promotes " Ice cream" in all the wrong ways. The photo of the pregnant nun is a popular ad in Britain from a company called Antonio Federici Italian Ice creams. You will be surprised to know that these ads were surfacing around Europe for quite sometime before it became banned in September of 2010. If you notice not only is the nun pregnant but the catch phrases like " Immaculate conceived" is right above her breasts and next to the carton of ice cream. The Advertising Standards authority received numerous complaints from readers stating that it was offensive to Christians and that imagery with the saying "immaculate conception"was seen as mocking the beliefs of Roman Catholics. There are plenty of other images I stumbled upon of the pregnant nun about to make out with a very handsome man with the terms " give into temptation" next to where they were about to kiss. There are so many things wrong with this image. Ranging from offensiveness to religions, also a crude way to display a pregnant woman sinning while she is in the process of conceiving a child.
The problem with degrading advertisement is not just within the United States but also around the world. As much as the world differs in politics, and the stating of what is moral, you can clearly see a pattern where the offensive advertisement is something that is commonly shared. I thought the nun was the most interesting because a lot of times we can get caught up in the gender bias in ad's but it's one thing when a whole religion is being thrown into the mix. After all religion has a lot of times been a huge factor and building block for riots, fights, country separation, protests, and war. It's scary to see someone almost poke at something so fragile as religion.
The last image that I thought was interesting was the Trojan ad. I think this ad is done brilliantly and think it promotes and advocates some very positive things towards our society. At first glance you notice a bunch of pigs in the photo. The environment is a bar, with what it looks like, a lot of drinks, and groping. You can tell by the woman's faces that they are clearly not interested in them trying to convince, hit on them, or persuade them to do anything. In this ad the pigs are ultimately and metaphor for men who are not acting like gentlemen, hence the woman's faces as they are trying to get their attention. Centered in the middle of all this chaos is a very respectable looking couple who looks extremely happy. I think everything about this is promoting not only to have sex with someone who makes you happy, but also to have safe sex. Moreover, Trojan is well known condom company which gives them ethos in this ad. Not only that but also pathos because the pigs are indicating that they do not practice safe sex, and or have condoms on them. Whereas the young gentlemen looks smart and is prepared for whatever the night happens, with the safest intentions. I'm a big fan of the positive message Trojan is trying to get across.
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