I imagine that lesson one at advertising school is that if you make something seem sexy enough, it will sell. From fashion to dental hygiene and everything in-between products are brought to the mass market in a form that has been seen to border on the pornographic. Once upon a time, this failsafe technique enabled rich men in shiny offices to sell us absolute garbage that we definitely didn’t want but, for reasons beyond our better judgement, seeing a semi-naked lady made us believe we need, however, the sexy times are changing. Never has there been a time of such great social conscience where we are able to recognise (and call out) a sleaze bag when we see one. We no longer tolerate sexist objectification, we no longer want to buy into this cliché marketing tactic and the whole concept of 'sexy' itself is revolutionising…or is it? Where do we draw the line between artistic merit and selling sex? What's celebrating body confidence and what's straight up objectification? Where are we, as responsible consumers, supposed to stand on this crazy confusing matter of sex and advertising?
There's been backlash and debate on an enormous scale in the last decade over the matter of what does and doesn’t constitute over-sexualisation in advertising and the message this sends to a global audience. The Advertising Standards Agency has ay-okayed some pretty borderline adverts over the years. Most recently the ‘Beach Body Ready’ campaign saw (rightly) angry feminists take to the internet and streets alike to draw attention to the objectification and unrealistic ideals for women being portrayed to a mass market, however, the suits decided that no real offence was being caused *eye roll*. This is by no means a stand-alone event with business giants such as Tom Ford, Victoria’s Secret and Coca Cola, amongst a multitude of others, all being accused by the public of over-sexualisation in their campaigns with no severe action being taken. At the other end of the ASA spectrum we have the banned adverts. What, you may ask, must
these companies have done to go beyond the likes of Tom Ford’s For Men fragrance featuring an oiled up, fully nude, legs akimbo, female model to get themselves banned? How about a 22 year old woman sat fully clothed in a room by herself – raunchy!!! I am, of course, referring to Miu Miu’s A/W 15 campaign featuring Mia Goth which was branded “irresponsible and likely to cause serious offence” due to the actress’s “youthful appearance”. This is not a first for Miu Miu after their 2011 campaign featuring Hailee Steinfeld met the same fate as well as brands such as American Apparel, Calvin Klein, Marc Jacobs and Chanel coming under fire for similar reasons. All of the brands I just listed for being banned were done so because they depicted vulnerable (by which I mean young) people in sexually suggestive positions or scenarios. As we rightfully protect young people from society's leering gaze why are we not doing the same for them once they grow up. With the immense influence of the media and the growing discontent with the way we objectify both men and women, is it healthy that we still use sex to sell and, with that in mind, are people still willing to buy into it?
The morality of these types of campaigns has started to present some other super confusing issues and the one that has baffled me the most is where we draw the line between liberation and objectification. Using sexuality in advertising is a minefield of ethical issues that seems to have no neutral ground. Groups have been campaigning to have more ‘realistic’ body types in advertising to reshape society’s idea of ‘sexiness’ but that poses so many follow up questions; do advertising agencies have a social responsibility? Should we really be looking to advertising to define ‘sexy’? Are there any real benefits to changing the models in adverts or are we just casting the net wider for people it’s ok to objectify? The problem people have with the skinny, shiny, legs for days models is that they represent