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I Am a Victim of Advertising
You could call me a shop-a-holic, as most of my friends do, but I call myself a lover of fashion. Sitting in my room, I look in my closet at all my belongings and wonder what else I want to buy. Abercrombie, Guess, J Crew, Armani Exchange, Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger, and Banana Republic are just a few of the name-brand items that clutter my room. And I want more. I've never stopped to question whether I'm getting what I'm paying for, though I've always been a "smart" shopper, a sale shopper. But, as I learn more about my future field, marketing, I realize that I am a victim of advertising. All the things I want and buy are influenced by what magazines, television, and other advertisers tell me I need to want and buy.
Everyone wears clothes. They can be a statement, a style, or a definition of who you are. They can also be a simple necessity. For me, clothing has meant different things. As a child, I wore what my mother gave me or the hand-me-downs from my sister. I never questioned how I looked, but I liked to dress up. In middle school, I became more concerned with my appearance, like most girls. I tried to keep up with the fashion, but what defined the fashion? Magazines and television were the big ones for me. I wanted to look beautiful; thus, I wore what the beautiful people showed me I should wear in hopes that I could be just as beautiful, or at least as fashionable. I had a huge desire to be fashionable, because in being fashionable, I believed I could be popular.
As I look back upon those middle school days, I am amazed at how concerned young people can be about their image. Children become so concerned at such a young age with being popular and looking beautifu...
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...t someone of the opposite sex. Smoking, drinking, socializing, and looking great in expensive clothing are the images of an attractive person.
Advertisers use our weaknesses to tell us what is new, what we should be like, what is cool, and what is hot. Because human nature makes us want to be popular and glamorous we follow the lead ads give us. Is it the victim's fault for believing, or the fault of society for allowing advertisers to do so? These are the questions I often ask myself as I enter the field of marketing. It is very easy to use human insecurities as a means of targeting consumption, but is it right? How will we ever know unless we step back and stop reading magazines and watching television? How will we know unless society and advertising break their bond? Until then, I will remain a victim of advertising. And so will almost everyone else.
“What We are to Advertisers” by James B. Twitchell is a short article that emphasize how advertisement attracts audience magically. From the quote, “ Mass production means mass marketing, and mass marketing means the creation of mass stereotypes” James points out of how the world appear to be. The advertisers seems to be psychologically abuse to the public for them to be successful in their industry. Base on the way the society act, dress and thinks, we fantasize something ridiculous and only our imagination can only make it close to a reality. With that in mind, the industry of advertisements will immediately think of a way to try and sell their product to us.
This thought has been held on for far too long. 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.
People are often deceived by some famous brands, which they will buy as useless commodities to feel they are distinctive. People require brands to experience the feeling of being special. People spend their money to have something from famous brands, like a bag from Coach or Louis Vuitton which they think they need, yet all that is just people’s wants. Steve McKevitt claims that people give more thought on features or brands when they need to buy a product, “It might even be the case that you do need a phone to carry out your work and a car to get around in, but what brand it is and, to a large extent, what features it has are really just want” (McKevitt, 145), which that means people care about brands more than their needs. Having shoes from Louis Vuitton or shoes that cost $30 it is designed for the same use.
Have you ever seen an advertisement for a product and could immediately relate to the subject or the product in that advertisement? Companies that sell products are always trying to find new and interesting ways to get buyers and get people’s attention. It has become a part of our society today to always have products being shown to them. As claimed in Elizabeth Thoman’s essay Rise of the Image Culture: Re-Imagining the American Dream, “…advertising offered instructions on how to dress, how to behave, how to appear to others in order to gain approval and avoid rejection”. This statement is true because most of the time buyers are persuaded by ads for certain products.
Medicare was designed as a universal healthcare program for individuals 65 years old and older. This program is funded by Medicare taxes and general federal funding withholding taxes. Medicare is a partnership between federal and state with the goal to provide medical insurance to the elderly that is poor and disabled. Generally all people who are 65 years or older and qualify for social security will automatically qualify for Medicare.
In society today, the clothing that someone wears is basically a billboard for his or her personal, or family's financial situation. For children in public schools, fitting in with the popular, or most fashionable people is probably the most important thing to them. When children are preoccupied wi...
This means that young children and adults are being exposed to media and advertisements several hours every day. Due to the fact that the brain does not fully develop until the age of 24; children and young adults are the most vulnerable class citizens to the proliferation of medias messages. Today younger girls starting as early as age’s six to eight are becoming more concerned about their physical appearance, because it is more emphasized and reinforced. Media is portraying to children and young adults that their value and worth lies in their youth, beauty, and sexuality. When children are watching TV they are constantly exposed to the unattainable and unrealistic standards of beauty, criteria that only a small percentage of women meet. Media’s unrealistic models send an implicit message that in order to be considered beautiful; you must be “unhealthy.” Many children and young adults are also exposed to reality television. In reality TV the media portrays that every women is catty, bitchy, manipulative, vindictive, and not to be trusted, they are on display to be judged and objectified by men (documentary). Researchers are unclear of how exposure to images in the media affects their physical appearance; although there are many different perspectives on how they may be affected by it. Some of these perspectives include social comparison,
“By blood, I am Albanian. By citizenship, an Indian. By faith, I am a Catholic nun. As to my calling, I belong to the world. As to my heart, I belong entirely to the Heart of Jesus.” These words fully sum up the essence of Mother Teresa. Having left the world 17 years ago in 1997, her life continues to inspire many. So many lives touched by her. The story of her life inspires an awe of how someone could live such a life starting from her childhood, through adulthood, and ending with her later years and legacy.
We encounter art everyday. Art is paintings and sculptures, music and dance, film and photography. It is also fashion designing and architecture, novels and magazines. These seemingly different things have one thing in common – they are all ways in which humans convey themselves. For thousands of years, humans have used symbols to tell a story or describe a struggle. Art is the use of these symbols, symbols that represent us in some distinct way.
...r young, impressionable mind will have been exposed to more than 77,000 advertisements, according to an international study. Last week, it confirmed the link between the images of female perfection that dominate the media and increasing cases of low self-esteem among young women..” (Shields,2007). The propaganda techniques such as liking, sex appeal, and celebrity endorsements are used in advertisements constantly. Commercials on television, billboards, magazines, and various other advertisement types are everywhere you look in America, and sadly it has become very important for women of all ages to try to be perfect. We come into contact with these messages every day, and the beauty industry is getting bigger and bigger. Propaganda has molded our worldly perception of beauty and will only continue to hurt us and gain from our lack of self-esteem if we allow it to.
In the past years the main court ruling in family court decisions has laid in the favor for mothers to have sole custody. However recent years have proved some changing ideals on custody. With rising father’s rights activism groups, more fathers are starting to get treated more fairly in these court cases. Courts are redefining the guidelines that they are using to determine custody cases. As these guidelines change they look past the general idea of a mother being necessary for a child’s well-being and give the father a fair chance.
To begin with, I will look at each of the two subjects. Fashion is an extremely large subject with many sub-categories and can mean many different things, however in this essay I will take fashion to mean the popular clothing style. I will put emphasis on looking at high fashion as these are the leaders of their field. Fashion itself though, is not to be confused with clothing. Clothing is a part of fashion, but it is predominantly purely functional, for protection from different aspects of the environment. Fashion however, is primarily for image. It is a way to present individuality and personality. A physical mouldable form of expression. Designers wish to create works of art that can be worn, and this is wear clothing becomes an art form.
In today’s world, advertising reaches and influences teens in both negative and positive ways. Teens are bombarded with ads through television, teen magazines, radio, and the internet. Advertisers know teen’s buying power and their willingness to spend their money. Many companies even hire teens to be “consultants” and trendspotters. They want to know what teens are thinking and their likes and dislikes. Some feel this is a good thing and that teens are letting companies know what they want. On the other hand, many believe all this advertising to teens has a negative impact on them. Ads show models with “perfect” bodies. “Every year, the average adolescent sees over 5,000 advertisements mentioning attractiveness” (Haugen). Some feel this leads to teens having low self-esteem, while others argue that it does not have an effect. These people believe teens have the power and control in the advertising world.
In conclusion, fashion will speak out a person’s social signal, people dress on designs that blend with their social class. Just as population, social activities and fashion are changing with time. Fashion has made clothing to be convinient, everything needs to be done with the least effort and spend the least time.
Fashion is a controversial issue in society nowadays. We live in a consumerism advanced era in which whether following fashion trends or not has become a debatable point. Many people believe that it is important to follow fashion trends. For example, Lord Chesterfield once said, “If you are not in fashion, you are nobody.” The question is why fashion should be an essential matter of concern to all of us. As far as I am concerned, each person should be able to decide if one wants to follow a trend or not.