Fake Sex Sells
The advertising industry’s depiction of the perfect lifestyle is not obtainable and nor should it be.
Recently I was having a conversation with a customer in my workplace about his career in advertising. Having been brought up by a staunch left-wing, anti-capitalist, anti-consumerist mother I naturally had to question the morality of his career choice. Fortunately for me, this turned into an enriching discussion, rather than a heated debate, as conflict is something that I tend to try and avoid at any cost.
This guy actually told me that since his retirement he has often questioned whether he and his colleagues in the industry are to blame for the modern day state of affairs for families, lovers and the general happiness of the human population alike. The expectations that we now have for ourselves and others are often unobtainable due to the fact that they are simply unrealistic, something that advertising is largely to blame for. And for this, this guy said he carries a lot of guilt.
For me, the exploitation of human desire to sell a product then creates an issue of ethics.
He told me that when he first started working in the industry, advertising was about selling a product based on its functions and merits. This vacuum cleaner is lightweight, has great suction and a triple filter system? Excellent. However, quickly the advertising paradigm escalated to selling a lifestyle. Buying a car is no longer about the horsepower, fuel consumption or any of the other practicalities, but rather about making your kids think that you’re cool, as seen in the recent Volkswagen Tiguan advert, in which the Tiguan is described as ‘Cool. Calm. Connected.’ Not some of the more traditional adjectives that come to mind when thinking about cars, at least not for me anyway.
However, this exploitation of the ideal lifestyle creates problems for the human outlook. At least in my experience of life so far, your choice of car is not something that is going to make your kids love you. My mum confesses that her car is pretty damn ugly, but that doesn’t make me think any less of her. Not working overtime every night so you can afford to buy your Volkswagen Tiguan, and instead spending quality time with your children will probably be more effective in making them love you… Advertising is then exploiting the needs of humans through a fake representation of their desires to the detriment of our lives and relationships.
Even more common, however, than advertising tycoons abusing parents’ desire to be loved and adored by their children is them abusing the human desire for sex. In the Digital Age, sex is everywhere. It is more accessible than ever and it is more acceptable than ever.
Have you ever been sat watching a cheeky episode of Come Dine With Me (guilty), or Jeremy Kyle (also guilty), at five in the afternoon to all of a sudden be ambushed by an overtly sexual perfume advert and be horrified that young children are being exposed to that too? There are meant to be laws in place to limit the sexual content of films and other film mediums alike, one of the key reasons I believe the film adaptation of Fifty Shades of Grey was so crap, but sometimes I feel as though perfume adverts manage to defy that.
I will confess that I certainly feel a little sexier and more desirable when I spritz a bit of perfume over me, which is perhaps influenced by the relentless thematic use of sex to sell perfume. However, I definitely don’t feel like Keira Knightley straddling a motorbike in a skin-tight cat-suit riding to my conventionally very attractive lover who is waiting to lust over me on a balcony in France. My boyfriend might kiss me and tell me that I smell nice which is lovely, but I can assure you that the Keira Knightley situation is never going to happen to me, and it most probably is never going to happen to you. And as fanciful as it may seem, I’m sure that it is not all that it looks cracked up to be.
For me, the exploitation of human desire to sell a product then creates an issue of ethics. Not only is this selling an unobtainable lifestyle to adults, but it is also creating unrealistic expectations for children. Expectations that are going to affect them in later life. There are already numerous studies stating the harmful effect that porn is having on our young children: leading them to have an unnatural understanding of and unhealthy expectations for sex. Further to this are studies stating that teenagers and young adults are no longer able to have real life sexual relations because their understanding of real sex is warped. If you’re addicted to watching Hentai porn which features an animated girl with anatomically impossible proportions getting fucked by a tentacle thing, then let’s face it the missionary position, or perhaps even the slightly sexier doggy, probably isn’t going to do it for you.
In the Digital Age, sex is everywhere. It is more accessible than ever and it is more acceptable than ever.
Even though there is no doubt that porn is more extreme than the representation of sex that we see in advertising, these representations are still harmful. Each and every one of them depicts a glamorous lifestyle filled with beauty, lust and extravagance. People need to be assured that not all women look like Keira Knightley and Natalie Portman and that not all men look like Jared Leto or Alberto Ammann, and nor should they. They also need to be assured that their life is no lesser or their sexual experiences no worse just because they didn’t begin on a gondola in India somewhere and end in a three way on silk lined bed.
When advertising is ready to start showing a not perfectly sculpted woman attempting to attach a suspender to a stocking (which is unnecessarily difficult FYI), or an average built guy accidentally poking the girl he is caressing in the eye as he goes to stroke her hair, let me know, but until then let’s stop feeding people fake representations of sex as a means to make money. Exploitation in all guises is dangerous and the exploitation of human desire as a capitalist money making tool is no different.
With thanks to Daniel Otway
