Modern Media

Three thousand advertisements are seen by the average consumer every day. Media changes the way we perceive everything around us including our own interests. Overall Media’s impact on consumers is negative because they lead people to strive for a body type that is nearly impossible to achieve, flood our lives with advertisements, and influences violent tendencies in culture.

Media takes advantage of multiple methods of persuasion to convince the consumer that that need to buy their products to be beautiful and have the “perfect body”. Men and women alike are harmed by media’s image of the perfect body, both in their own ways but just as detrimental. As seen in Jean Kilbourne’s film, “Killing Us Softly 4”, men are portrayed as an angry, macho gender armed with guns, fast cars, and an attractive female by their side. On the other side of the coin, woman are depicted as fragile, innocent but overly sexualized. Not only do women get judged on their identities and the way the show themselves to the world, but on how their bodies look and should look according to media companies. There has been a 457% increase in women who get cosmetic procedures since the late 90’s (Kilbourne). Men see the same problems with image and body issues but with the what Jackson Katz calls the “Tough Guise”, such as, the aggressive Rambo type. From young age Men are convinced by movies and popular music that they should be masculine and suppress their emotions to be cool, respected by other men and to catch the attention of women according to Katz in his video “tough Guise”. The big media’s manipulation of our younger generations have caused society’s unreal expectations of how male and females should act like and what their bodies should look like.

The media companies use advertisements to target everyday people so that they buy things that they don’t need. On every type of platform, everywhere you go ads will be there waiting. The average person sees nearly three thousand advertisements a day, making the media a oversaturated pool of useless information. When Liv”e Science conducted a study they used two kinds of advertisements, logical persuasion and nonrational influence. Remy Melina and the Live Science website state that the logical persuasion tactic actually help the consumer, “These brain regions have been shown to help inhibit a person’s response to certain stimuli, such as preventing an impulse purchase.” When consumers watch the non rational influence advertisements, the brain has less simulation than when watching the logical persuasion advertisements causing them to be prone to impulsive buying and spending money on items they do not need. Advertisers also use specific people in the advertisements to drawn people and connect their products with something that will stay in the consumers mind. Many advertisers use attractive people to connect their consumer, “For men, sexy and attractive women in ads will grab your attention. Instantly, and without a need to explain anything. And that is what advertisers want, instantly having our attention, as their message by itself is to most of us not really that interesting,” (Unenticed). By using these people they connect the consumer to the person in the ad not the product itself. This makes consumers more willing a product they do not actually want.

Increased violence, especially in men, is a direct effect of media portrayal of violence. In the media, violence is always present even if not direct, it is signified by the aggression depicted by male characters. Additionally to this acting, men in media often show little to no emotion, and that is admired by the people around them. Through the impression given on the television it seems almost inevitable that violence is connected to masculinity through the media. Tough Guise said that many instances pay tribute to men being violent such as child abuse, the area you grow up in, and the people you surround yourself with. In the Tough Guise video, young men were filmed while answering, “What does being a man mean to you?” Most of the boys answered by describing how men need to be tough, physically strong, and show little to no emotion. The media has made a “standard” for men to follow which displays aggressive and physically strong characteristics. According to Jackson Katz in Tough Guise, more than 95% of school shootings are perpetrated by boys. He explains that men are more prone to violence because movies, music, and even children’s toys are made to show men as courageous, uncaring warriors who have muscles that are almost impossible to duplicate.

Advertisements have the ability to manipulate their consumers into buying products they may find unnecessary. They force preconceived notions of the human body and how it should look. Advertisements negatively affect the consumer’s mind in order to make their products sell better.

Work Cited

1. “The Influence of Advertising.” The Influence of Advertising | Unenticed.com, www.unenticed.com/english.php?title=influence%2Bof%2Badvertising.
2. Katz, Jackson. Tough Guise.
3. Kilbourne, Jean. “Killing Us Softly 4.” Media Education Foundation Online Store, 10 Feb. 2016, shop.mediaed.org/killing-us-softly-4-p47.aspx.
4. Melina, Remy. “How Advertisements Seduce Your Brain.” LiveScience, Purch, 23 Sept. 2011, www.livescience.com/16169-advertisements-seduce-brain.html.