Weight Loss Propaganda
For this project, I decided to focus on the harmful weight loss propaganda that lives in the world of advertising. There are many products that promise the public tranformation. Products are marketed to be the solution for weight loss. This is manipulative and harmful to those who have insecurities related to their weight and how they look. Products are said to change ones life, or ones body type and in the end these products have little results. Businesses market there products in this way so the target audience thinks they need these products. By poking at the deepest insecurities of a target audience, advertisers can determine how to get the audiences attention. Advertisers then use these insecurities to create a need for the product they are selling.
This type of propaganda is harmful because it further creates insecurities in society. When these products do not have the results they promised, individuals can feel bad about themseleves leading them to have more insecurities, and in the end poor mental health. This propaganda is also harmful because it convinces the public the spend there money on a product they do not need. Businesses know many people are insecure about there weight. They use this topic to emotionally and financially manipulate there target market. By talking about an insecurity, the company is creating an emotional need for the product. Once someone is emotionally connected to a topic, they are more likely to believe a topic. The use of emotions help companies sell a product that is not needed. Weight loss propaganda helps benefit the company while the public is left feeling worse than they did before.
Weight loss propaganda is also harmful because it further promotes beauty standards in society. Weight loss products give the impression that everyone in society needs to look the same way. This is an unhealthy and unrealistic expectation. Everyone has different body types and promoting one standard will make many in society unhappy, depressed and anxious.
I selected this example because there was once a point in my life where these advertisments provoked at my deepest insecrutities. At a point where I was struggling with my weight, these advertisments made me feel as though I needed to look a certain way. I would feel motivated to buy products I didn’t need.
Even today, I workout often and still find myself drawn to advertisments about certain products that will change how I look and how I work out. I do not buy these products because I know understand how they are marketed. However, I find this propaganda to be extremely manipulative and think it is harmful to many in society.
The insecurities of society are manipulated by businesses in order to create a financial gain. If businesses know a certain insecurity can draw in a large group of people, they will make sure to create and market a product around this insecurity. The public is being manipulated to buy a product they do not need in order for a business to gain money.
I struggled with the time on my video assignment, I kept going over the time limit. I had to rerecord a couple of times because I was talking deeply about topics. I had some trouble with the screen recording application that we used. At times, it slowed my computer down and this was difficult for me. I also am fighting a sickeness and struggled pronouncing some words. My apologies if my voice sounds congested and I tried to communicate as clearly as I could!!
Script:
Propaganda can be harmful to many in society. Advertisements, and forms of media are manipulated and targeted towards insecure individuals in order for companies to increase business. Many weight loss pills and products are promoted unethically in order to gain popularity and recognition. When these weight loss advertisements have no result they leave individuals hopeless, anxious and insecure about how they look.
*INTRODUCE THESIS*
Weight loss propaganda can be harmful to society because they give individuals false expectations that could potentially lead to poor body image and mental health.
This advertisement unethically pairs a model and this product in order to give off the impression that this pill will give you the end result of a model. This gives the target audience, false expectations. The target audience buys this product because they believe that the pill can cause this type of transformation. Although, this is not true and this is not how this model came to look this way.
Propaganda like this is created within advertisements in order to give the audience a false reality. The target audience is willing to do many things to lose weight and those creating the advertisement know this. By correlating products with weight loss, advertisers know they will have a target audience who will want to buy the product.
These types of advertisements are harmful to society because they give users false expectations. These expectations manipulate users into spending money on a product they think will help them lose weight. When the product does not give this result, it is more likely that these insecurities will heighten. This advertisement manipulates users into spending money on a product they don’t need. Weight loss propaganda is dangerous because they give false body expectations to those in society. These ads create a standard for how one should look when all body types should be accepted. There are many bodies in our society and everyone does not need to look the same. Weight loss propaganda gives off the stereotype that all bodies need to be fit and look the same. Fitting into this standard in society can become stressful for those with insecurities. When they can achieve these unethical goals with the product, they feel less about themselves and this in the end creates poor mental health for individuals. Weight loss propaganda emotionally manipulates users into buying a product they think will solve their problem.
In the end, advertisers create content based on insecurities because there is a target audience present. Advertisers look at insecurities as a way of marketing a product. Insecurities are the way to knowing what people truly value and will want to purchase within society. Weight loss Propaganda is harmful because it’s manipulate users into buying a product that will have no end result.
The only outside source I used for this project was the image of propaganda
Work Cited
1.)“Misleading Weight Loss Pill.” Mind Over Media, propaganda.mediaeducationlab.com/rate/misleading-weight-loss-pill. Accessed 1 Nov. 2023.
