Todays advertisement game plan is to use toddlers and babies to sell adult products. These advertisers take advantage and use to there advantage the innocence of the very young. They take them form one extreme to the other; from a little girl to an object of sex. Little girls arrive to these shoots as just that, little ones. Then that go through make-up as any adult model would, hair and wardrobe. "...characteristics make the young model appear to be much older than she really is." (Constructed Bodies, 65) Shouldn't she be at a park, playing or enjoying a snack? Some don't even go through "wardrobe" because there isn't any. The advertisers as I perviously stated take advantage of there innocence and make them appear topless, and at the same time pose them as adults. Not smiling, but gazing out to there spectators.
In a Just For Men commercial a baby boys face is placed on a toddlers body. Through out the whole commercial he is expressing a sense of masculinity and hierarchy over the woman in the commercial. Might I add they are adult woman in sexy dresses and in a club atmosphere. Not only is he in a suit, having woman throw there selves at him and driving a fancy car, but he is also has a mustache. None of the previous has anything to do with being a baby boy, yet its already being made clear to the audience that a he will need Just For Men one day if he wants the woman, cars and attention.
Just For Men Baby Commercial
As an alternative I would use children as children in my ads. I would not let them appear to be anything but as an innocent child. Not at any point should a child be used to advertise sex or be looked at as an object of sex. If I was in charge of a lipstick ad, I would use a child mimicking her mom scenario. THe mom in her vanity applying her lipstick and the little girl on the floor with her little mirror and crayon and copying her mom. The innocence of the child is preserved because she, being a child uses a crayon in stead of actually applying make up and at the same time the presence of an adult is still there.
It is my understanding from our class readings that advertisement wants the perfect pure beauty and they go to great lengths to find that flawless tall, white, frail model, that perfect provocateur. The perfect provocateur's role is to arouse a feeling or reaction to be desired and attractive. (Constructed Bodies, 54) The line is crossed when they reach as low as a toddler to exude that type of presence in there advertisement. There are ways to incorporate children in these ads. My advice is before you take that first snap of the camera, remember there just a child. Even in Versace a child can come across the camera as a child.
Dear V: Your topic really goes to the heart of our class discussion on Saturday, March 10. How marketers are using "baby" pics to bring parents into the fold, conditioning them to accept these images as "pleasurable" although some appear to be "sex-ing up children" for the future market. The message conveyed to parents is to employ them to use the same message with their children and some how, some way, have them also see these ads and "accept them." These kids ending up become both the consumed and consumer, ready for their roles in the next few years, to replicate and copy what we have been copying for a life time. This cyclical system we call marketing feeds itself and its young. Good article.
ReplyDeleteLou
Ms V,
ReplyDeleteChildren should be more apart of children advertising as being what age they are. No child should become an adult before there age. media using children to advertise is wrong. Yes sometime they are funny, but in reality do you really want a child to be your reason to buy condoms(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjIbjvYA1Qc)? Though children ads can really sell a product, but little girls dressing up, wearing makeup, and posing in the gaze only promote not only that ads are getting younger but kids are more adult like.