Two Way A Woman Can Get Hurt Jean Kilbourne Analysis

561 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Women's portrayal in the media essay

Jean Kilbourne’s “Two Way a Woman Can Get Hurt: Advertising and Violence” is a section of a book titled: “Deadly Persuasion: Why Women and Girls Must Fight the Addictive Power of Advertising” that was originally published in 1999. It is about the images of women that advertisements illustrate. The central claim or thesis of the document is that: “advertising helps to create a climate in which certain attitudes and values flourish and it plays a role in shaping people’s ideas” (paraphrase). The author wants people by all genders and young children to acknowledge a right attitude towards what is shown in the advertisements so that the standards of behavior will not be influenced. As a result, it enables the negative contribution from the advertisements to be limited or eliminated. …show more content…

Accordingly, “pornography can be considered mainstream” (page 460, paragraph 1, line 5), said the author. However, there were problems brought up since the pornography glorify the violence and crimes, and it had no difficulties in being shown in mass media. Jean Kilbourne, though, did not place all the blame on advertising when she pointed out: “Ads don’t directly cause violence, of course. But the violent images contribute to the state of terror” (page 466, paragraph 2, line 1). Such erroneous attitudes are known to be existed as: “women are valuable only as objects of men’s desire, that real men are always aggressive, that violence is erotic, and that women who are the victims of sexual assault “ask for it”” (page 478, paragraph 5, line 2). The impact it made on women well-being is dreadful when it comes with them along their journey through life starting from being misbelieved as young to ending up with self

Show More
Related

  • Jean Killbourne Two Ways A Woman Can Get Hurt Summary

    875 Words  | 2 Pages

    In a consumer-driven society, advertisements invade the minds of every person who owns any piece of technology that can connect to the internet. Killbourne observes that “sex in advertising is pornographic because it dehumanizes and objectifies people, especially women,” (271). Advertising takes the societal ideology of women and stereotypes most kids grow up learning and play on the nerves of everyone trying to evoke a reaction out of potential customers, one that results in them buying products. Another point made

    Read More

  • Plato's Allegory Of Cave: The World Of Beauty

    1373 Words  | 3 Pages

    Thus, we can assume that the audience itself, the members who believe in the content of ads and its sincerity, as well as, people who agree with the portrait of the women that is being created are the only prisoners in this particular situation. “To them, I said, the truth would be literally nothing but the shadows of the images” (Plato 868). On the other hand, according to the Jean Kilbourne, author of “Two Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt” what is not mention to the public is the fact, that many women from the very young age during the process of finding out the truth and being blinded by the “light” are fighting with depression, low self-esteem, eating disorders and sexual harassment. “I contend that all girls growing up in this culture are sexually abused – abused by the pornographic images of female sexuality that surround them from birth, abused by all the violence against woman and girls, and abused by the constant harassment and threat of violence” (Kilbourne

    Read More

  • Socialization And The Power Of Advertising Jean Kilbourne Summary

    542 Words  | 2 Pages

    Jean Kilbourne is passionate about an array of topics when it comes to advertising, but her message is clear: we cannot escape advertisements and they are influencing our minds. Socialization and the Power of Advertising illustrates this using children and consumerism. Killing Us Softly 4’s main example is women. Either way, advertisements are negatively impacting us and, as Kilbourne points out, it’s getting worse. Whatever the solution is, we have to put an end to the experience of being immersed in an advertising

    Read More

  • Women In Advertising By Jeanne Kiilbourne

    1267 Words  | 3 Pages

    According to Jeanne Kilbourne essay, Kilbourne talks about women being abused by men in visual advertisements and the consequences of those representations. I for one, argue with Kilbourne that women are being too exposed and hurt when they are in advertisements. So using Kilbourne 's analytical perspective and my own perspective we can give our insights on why we feel women are being treated badly and unequally from men with the following pictures. From the past till today women in advertisement pictures have been mostly victimized by men, and Kilbourne and I feel this sort of action needs to come to an end.

    Read More

  • Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

    1140 Words  | 3 Pages

    Kilbourne, Jean. “‘Two Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt’: Advertising and Violence.” From Inquiry to Academic Writing: A Text and Reader. 2nd ed. Eds. Stuart Green and April Lidinsky. Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2012. 459-480. Print.

    Read More

  • Analysis of the Documentary: Killing Us Softly 4 and the Role of Women in Advertising

    533 Words  | 2 Pages

    The documentary Killing Us Softly 4 discusses and examines the role of women in advertisements and the effects of the ads throughout history. The film begins by inspecting a variety of old ads. The speaker, Jean Kilbourne, then discusses and dissects each ad describing the messages of the advertisements and the subliminal meanings they evoke. The commercials from the past and now differ in some respects but they still suggest the same messages. These messages include but are not limited to the following: women are sexual objects, physical appearance is everything, and women are naturally inferior then men. Kilbourne discusses that because individuals are surrounded by media and advertisements everywhere they go, that these messages become real attitudes and mindsets in men and women. Women believe they must achieve a level of beauty similar to models they see in magazines and television commercials. On the other hand, men expect real women to have the same characteristics and look as beautiful as the women pictured in ads. However, even though women may diet and exercise, the reality...

    Read More

  • Two Ways A Woman Can Get Hurt By Jean Kiilbourne

    791 Words  | 2 Pages

    The world is becoming more aware of the gender hierarchy occurring in our society. Men are consistently leaders and placed in positions of power while women are seen as inferior. Jean Kilbourne, author of “Two ways a Woman Can Get Hurt”, investigates this ideology as she looks throughout media and advertisements and highlights their sexually explicit commercials that degrade woman. In comparison, Allan G. Johnson, writer of Why Do We Make So Much of Gender?, discusses how the world’s view of gender has changed over time and how it has affected the world. Kilbourne and Johnson outline the presence of a gender hierarchy but do not accurately interpret why it happens. The underlying presence driving patriarchy is hidden deep in men’s resistance

    Read More

  • Dangers of Advertisments in Jean Kilbourne' Killing Us Softly

    529 Words  | 2 Pages

    In a brilliant update of the Killing Us Softly series, Jean Kilbourne explains the dangers of advertisements and how they objectify women. Advertisements intelligently portray women in a sexual and distorted way in order to attract the consumers’ attention. Media sets a standard on how young women view themselves and puts them at risk for developing an eating disorder. Kilbourne’s research has led her to educate those who have fallen victim to achieving the “ideal beauty” that has evolved in today’s society.

    Read More

  • Dreamworlds 3: The Role Of Women And The Media

    788 Words  | 2 Pages

    Instead, women are being discriminated and treated as inferior due to the stereotypes that are portrayed in the media. The media creates and reproduces ways of seeing that at a minimum reflect and shape our culture. We can look at the media to understand more about a culture’s values and norms, if we realize the limitations of looking at the media. For example, one may ask, does the news based in the United Sates represent what the American culture is like, or only what stands out from everyday American culture? The answer to that is no. Instead, the media represents what it thinks it will be able to sell and is supported by advertisements. This includes violent acts, the sensationally and inappropriate. Jhally reminds us that “it is this male, heterosexual, pornographic imagination based on the degradation and control of women that has colonized commercial culture in general, although it is more clearly articulated in music videos” (Jhally 2007). Therefore, “media content is a symbolic rather than a literal representation of society and that to be represented in the media is in itself a form of power—social groups that are powerless can be relatively easily ignored, allowing the media to focus on the social groups that ‘really matter’” (Gerbner,

    Read More

  • The Effect of Advertising on Women's Body Image

    1387 Words  | 3 Pages

    To sum up, it is often said that advertising is shaping women gender identity, and some have been argued that the statement is true, because of the higher amount of sexual references of women that advertisement show and the damages that occur on women’s personality and the public negative opinions of those women. As well, the negative effects that those kinds of advertisements cause to young generations and make them feel like they should simulate such things and are proud of what they are doing because famous actors are posting their pictures that way. Others deem this case as a personal freedom and absolutely unrelated to shaping women gender identity. On the contrast, they believe that, those sorts of advertisements are seriously teaching women how to stay healthy and be attractive, so they might have self-satisfaction after all.

    Read More

  • The Changing Role of Women in Automobile Advertisements

    1430 Words  | 3 Pages

    Side-by-side are two advertisements, each showing a picture of a car and two family members. The ads demonstrate the amount of power allotted to women in the times they were made. The differences in these ads far outweigh the similarities. The ad –from a 1954 Good Housekeeping –shows a woman being reprimanded by her husband for wrecking their car. The other–from a 2003 Redbook–shows a wife and mother holding her daughter with one hand and an umbrella with the other. One woman is ignorant, irresponsible, incapable, and not in control; the other is competent, responsible, and in control. The evolution of advertising reflects the changes that have taken place in the way American society views women. The ads use body image, body language, and text to encapsulate the stereotypical women of each era; in the 50's, women needed to be controlled, but now women can be in control.

    Read More

  • Culture Jamming Research Paper

    1428 Words  | 3 Pages

    In “Killing Us Softly” , a documentary based on the lectures of Jean Kilbourne, advertisers are discussed as “America’s real pornographers” as they constantly use images that sexualize women to sell things. This constant use of sexualization can be harmful to a woman's self esteem and in turn creates a desire to always want to be someone else. The constant sexualization is also, to a point, comical, which creates a space for culture jammers to manipulate images, attack, and make fun of it. An example of this would be the Guerrilla Girls, they employed the use of culture jamming to create conversation in the constant sexualization of women in the art world and media. A bold poster they put up stated that “less than 5% of artists in the modern art sections are women, but 85% of the nudes are female”, this has un-arguably become one of their most famous pieces and goes along with attempting to subvert views that the media presents.

    Read More

  • The Portrayal of Women in Advertising

    2734 Words  | 6 Pages

    4) Kilbourne, Jean. Killing Us Softly 3: Advertising’s Image of Women. Dir. Sut Jhally. DVD. Media Education Foundation, 2000.

    Read More

  • Argumentative Essay On Women And Violence

    1463 Words  | 3 Pages

    With so much exposure to this type of media, it is easy to become desensitised to it. With America becoming numb to the violence in these advertising tactics, domestic violence is an increasing problem as brutality against women has become trivialized. Jean Kilbourne 's “‘Two Ways a Woman can get Hurt”: Advertising and Violence’ argues that violence in advertising profoundly affects people in a skewed physiological manner, leading to violence against women. Kilbourne insists that “...violent images contributes to the state of terror...” felt by women who feel victimized by men who “...objectify and are disconnected...” from the women they mistreat (431). She furthers her argument by dictating that “....turning a human being into…an object, is almost always the first step towards justifying violence against that person” (431). So much of the media that America consumes is centered on dehumanizing women into an object of male enjoyment. It is difficult to have empathy toward a material object. Because of this objectification, men feel less guilty when enacting brutality upon women. Violence becomes downplayed because it is seen everywhere - in advertising and media - and this has contributed significantly to the cases of domestic violence in America. America has become numb to violence against women in advertising, leading to an alarming increasing domestic violence in this

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Garnier Fructis Advertise

    939 Words  | 2 Pages

    Curry and Clarke’s article believe in a strategy called “visual literacy” which develops women and men’s roles in advertisements (1983: 365). Advertisements are considered a part of mass media and communications, which influence an audience and impact society as a whole. Audiences quickly begin to rely on messages sent through advertisements and can create ideologies of women and men. These messages not only are extremely persuasive, but they additionally are effective in product consumption in the media (Curry and Clarke 1983:

    Read More

More about Two Way A Woman Can Get Hurt Jean Kilbourne Analysis

Open Document