KILLING US SOFTLY 3

The following is taken from the Media Education Foundation’s Study Guide for this video that may be found at: http://www.mediaed.org/index_html

CONTENTS

• Synopsis and Key Points

1. Introduction
2. Objectification
3. Dismemberment
4. The Obsession with Thinness
5. Food and Advertising
6. Woman vs. Woman
7. Silencing
8. The Trivialization of Power
9. The Sexualization of Teenagers
10. Ageism in Advertising
11. Violence Against Women
12. Is it Intentional?

SYNOPSIS & OVERVIEW

In Killing Us Softly III, the newest version of her groundbreaking video Killing Us Softly (CDF-1979), Jean Kilbourne surveys the contemporary advertising landscape to critically examine how, why and to what effect corporations and their advertisers use images of girls and women to sell their products. Deconstructing advertisements with the same kind of care and thought that went into constructing them, Kilbourne pushes the discussion of media and advertising beyond the realm of pure market values on the one hand and pure aesthetic values on the other. She sets mass media images of femininity against social reality, advertising fantasy against the actual experience of girls and women, and encourages us to consider the relationship between the stories advertising tells about girls and women and the actual lives girls and women lead.

One of Kilbourne’s underlying arguments is that advertising, as perhaps the primary storyteller in American culture, has the capacity to both produce and affirm the very fictions about women’s desires and identity that advertisers themselves often claim to be innocently tapping into and reflecting back at the public. In keeping with the industry’s own self-stated mission to create the markets they pitch to, she argues that there is little that is natural, inevitable or innocent about the stories advertising tells us about women, that cultural standards of "femininity" are less given than made, and that in terms of sheer money, power and cultural presence, the maker that matters most is advertising itself.

By showing how and why advertising takes agency away from women, Kilbourne therefore puts the focus on the agency of advertisers. She uncovers a distinctive and pervasive pattern to the deliberate choices the industry makes, tactical decisions designed to sell their particular brands by selling particular brands of femininity. Her baseline point is that these choices produce casualties in the world beyond advertising – that advertising simultaneously reflects, exacerbates and exploits deep-seated personal and social anxieties about femininity, masculinity and this country’s continued ambivalence about shifting gender roles – undermining the way girls and women see themselves, while normalizing the violence done to them by men.

Kilbourne’s analysis of advertising fiction and fantasy unfolds against the backdrop of this disturbing reality:

• Boys and men rape girls and women somewhere in the United States every 2 minutes.
• More women are injured from being battered by men than by all rapes, muggings and automobile crashes combined.
• Thirty percent of women murdered in the U.S. are murdered by their husbands, ex-husbands or boyfriends.
• 4 out of 5 women are dissatisfied with their appearance.
• Almost half of American women are on a diet on any given day.
• 5-10 million women are struggling with serious eating disorders.

With an eye on these facts, Kilbourne looks behind the speed, sensation and cool veneer of contemporary advertising and uncovers the following:

• A mass-media fantasy world populated by carefully crafted and highly restrictive models of femininity.
• A world in which images of girls and women often project the illusion of female power and agency while at the same time subtly subverting them.
• A widening cultural space in which aesthetic codes and ideals of femininity turn men’s violence against women into art, and women against their own bodies.
• An arena of impossible ideals that derives its power from cyclically feeding and feeding off of reactionary attitudes toward women.
• A repetitious image system that normalizes sexism and men’s violence against women even as, and perhaps because, American women continue to struggle and make progress despite these daily social realities.
• A place where pervasive images of men’s violence against women, along with passive, vulnerable and dehumanized images of women themselves, conspire to reinforce the culture’s casual attitudes toward domestic violence and rape.
• A showcase of so-called "cutting-edge" advertising techniques that continue to thrive on old ideas, including the objectification and dismemberment of women’s bodies, the cult of thinness, the co-optation of feminism and women’s equality, the infantilization of women, the sexualization of children and teenagers, and the stereotyping of women of color.
• A world in which advertising image and copy conspire to silence girls and women.

KEY POINTS

• Because of the prevalence of advertising in our culture, the sheer amount of cultural space it occupies, it is crucial to examine and understand the stories advertising tells us about femininity and what it means to be a woman.
• In addition to products, advertising attempts to sell women the myth that they can, and should, achieve physical perfection to have value in our culture.
• As advertising pushes its objects, it turns women’s bodies into objects, often dismembering them with excessive focus on just one part of the body to sell a product.
• Advertisers themselves acknowledge that they sell more than products, that the images in advertising are designed to affect the way we see our lives.
• Men and women inhabit very different worlds. Men’s bodies are not routinely scrutinized, criticized and judged in the way that women’s bodies are.
• There is a tremendous amount of contempt for women who don’t measure up to the advertisers’ ideal of beauty. This is particularly true for older women and women who are considered overweight.
• Media images of female beauty influence everyone. They influence how women feel about themselves, and they influence how men feel about the real women in their lives.
• Little girls and teenagers are increasingly sexualized in advertisements. A growing number of ads are reminiscent of child pornography.
• The negative and distorted image of women in advertising affects not only how men feel about women but also how men feel about anything labeled "feminine" in themselves.
• In general, human qualities are divided up, polarized, and labeled "masculine" and "feminine," with the "feminine" consistently devalued.
• Advertising is not solely to blame for rigid gender roles. However, there is no aspect of our culture that is as pervasive and persuasive as advertising.
• Changes in advertising will depend on an aware, active, educated public that thinks of itself primarily as citizens rather than as consumers.

I. INTRODUCTION

Key Points:

• In 1979, companies spent $20 billion on advertising. In 1999, companies spent $180 billion on advertising.
• The average American views 3000 advertisements in a day.
• The average American will spend 3 years of his or her life watching television commercials.
• Advertising is the foundation of the mass media. The primary purpose of the mass media is to sell products.
• Advertising sells not only products, but also values, images, concepts of love and sexuality, romance, success and normalcy.
• In recent years, computer retouching has become a primary technique used by advertisers. Before photographs are published, they are digitally retouched to make the models appear perfect. Complexion is cleaned up, eye lines are softened, chins, thighs and stomachs are trimmed, and neck lines are removed. Computers can even create faces and bodies of women who don’t exist.

II. OBJECTIFICATION

"Women are constantly turned into things, into objects. And of course this has very serious consequences. For one thing it creates a climate in which there is widespread violence against women. Now I’m not at all saying that an ad. . . directly causes violence. It’s not that simple, but it is part of a cultural climate in which women are seen as things, as objects, and certainly turning a human being into a thing is almost always the first step toward justifying violence against that person." – Jean Kilbourne

Key Points:

• The objectification of women in advertisements is part of a cultural climate in which women are seen as things, as objects.
• Turning a human being into a thing is almost always the first step toward justifying violence against that person.
• Most women who have had breast implants lose sensation in their breasts, so their breasts become an object of someone else’s pleasure rather than pleasurable in themselves. The woman literally moves from being a subject to being an object.

III. DISMEMBERMENT

"Women’s bodies continue to be dismembered in advertising. Over and over again just one part of the body is used to sell products, which is, of course, the most dehumanizing thing you can do to someone. Not only is she a thing, but just one part of that thing is focused on.".   Jean Kilbourne

IV. THE OBSESSION WITH THINNESS

"...the omnipresent media consistently portrays desirable women as thin....even as real women grow heavier, models and beautiful women are portrayed as thinner. In the last two decades we have developed a national cult of thinness. What is considered beautiful has become slimmer and slimmer. For example, in 1950 the White Rock mineral water girl was 5 feet 4 inches tall and weighed 140 pounds. Today she is 5 feet 10 inches and weighs 110 pounds. Girls compare their own bodies to our cultural ideals and find them wanting. Dieting and dissatisfaction with bodies have become normal reactions to puberty. Girls developed eating disorders when our culture developed a standard of beauty that they couldn’t obtain by being healthy. When unnatural thinness became attractive, girls did unnatural things to be thin."   Mary Pipher, Reviving Ophelia

Key Points:

• As girls reach adolescence, they get the message that they should not be too powerful, should not take up too much space. They are told constantly that they should be less than what they are.
• At least 1 in 5 young women in America today has an eating disorder.
• One recent study of fourth grade girls found that 80% of them were on diets.
• Twenty years ago, the average model weighed 8% less than the average woman. Today, the average model weighs 23% less than the average woman.
• Only 5% of women have the body type (tall, genetically thin, broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped, long-legged and usually small-breasted) seen in almost all advertising. (When the models have large breasts, they’ve almost always had breast implants.)
• The obsession with thinness is used to sell cigarettes.
• 4 out of 5 women are dissatisfied with their appearance.
• Almost half of American women are on a diet on any given day.
• 5-10 million women are struggling with serious eating disorders.

V. FOOD AND ADVERTISING

"[In American culture] emotional nourishment is linked with physical nourishment. Many of our words for those we love are food words, such as sweetie, sugar and honey." The association between food and intimacy can be dangerous for women who struggle with binge eating disorders and bulimia, since bingeing often represents an attempt to satisfy an emotional hunger rather than a physical one. Advertisements that support emotional eating and imply that "you can never have too much" encourage, or at least normalize, the attitudes that lead to bingeing. There are many other ways that advertising supports eating-disordered attitudes. Women are sent the message that they shouldn’t eat too much, that it is appropriate to eat only a cereal bar for breakfast, and that they gain power and respect by controlling their bodies. When advertising for food is examined in conjunction with the prevalence of extremely thin models, we discover a recipe for disordered attitudes toward eating.

Key Points:

• The American food industry spends $36 billion on advertising each year.
• Women’s magazines are full of ads for rich foods and recipes.

• Eating has become a moral issue. Words such as "guilt" and "sin" are often used to sell food.
• Americans spend more than $36 billion dollars on dieting and diet-related products each year.
• 95% of all dieters regain the weight they lost, and more, within five years.
• Articles about the dangers of diet products are often contradicted by advertisements for diet products within the same magazine.
• Sex is frequently used to sell food. Many ads eroticize food and normalize bingeing. These ideas support dangerous eating-disordered behaviors.

VI. WOMAN VS. WOMAN

Girls and women are often depicted in the mass media as being in competition with each other for men. This phenomenon can have consequences. If these media depictions are absorbed, they can create suspicion between women, make it difficult for them to form solid friendships and bonds, and undermine trust. It can also isolate girls and women from one another and keep them from finding the strength (emotional and political) found in numbers to question and challenge the status quo.

VII. SILENCING: DOES HER VOICE MATTER?

"I have lots of opinions about the ideas we talk about in class, but I don’t want to say them out loud because I don’t want the boys to think I’m a bitch."- 17-year-old girl (to her teacher)

Key Points:

• There are many images in advertising that silence women – images that show women with their hands over their mouths and other visuals, as well as copy, that strip women of their voices.
• The body language of young women and girls in advertising is usually passive and vulnerable. Conversely, the body language of men and boys is usually powerful, active and aggressive.

VIII. THE TRIVIALIZATION OF POWER

Key Points:

• When girls are shown with power in advertising, it is almost always a very masculine definition of power.
• Often the power that women are offered in advertising is silly and trivial.
• Women are often infantilized in advertisements, producing and reinforcing the sense that they should not grow up, resist becoming a mature sexual being, and remain little girls.

9. THE SEXUALIZATION OF TEENAGERS

In recent years, mainstream media have increasingly traded in the sexualization of young girls and teenagers. More and more, we see teen models and icons captured in seductive poses that draw attention to their bodies. When teenagers emulate the celebrities and models they see repeatedly in media – whether in dress, style, attitude or behavior – they are in effect emulating a carefully crafted fiction that is expressly designed by marketers to be consumed as an object.

X. AGEISM IN ADVERTISING:

"Keep young and beautiful if you want to be loved."

Advertisements rarely feature women over the age of 35, and there are many advertisements for beauty products that claim to help women continue to look young, even when they no longer are.

XI. VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN

• Boys and men rape women and girls somewhere in America every 2 minutes. (U.S. Dept. of Justice, March 1998)
• 1 in 4 women will be raped in her lifetime. (U.S. Dept. of Justice, March 1998)
• 66-80% of victims know their offender. (FBI, 1990)
• More than 50% of all women will experience violence from intimate partners. (National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, 1992)
• Wife beating results in more injuries requiring medical treatment than rape, auto accidents, and muggings combined. (Stark, E. and Fliterart, A. "Medical Therapy as Repression: The Case of Battered Women," Health and Medicine. Summer/Fall (1982) 29-32)
• 30% of women murdered in the U.S. are murdered by their husbands, ex-husbands or boyfriends. (Bureau of Justice Statistics National Crime Victimization Survey, August 1995)

Despite the alarming rates of men’s violence against women in the United States, women and girls are frequently depicted in the media as victims of violence. Often, the violence is sexualized. Scenes of violent assaults against women are used continually in horror films for entertainment purposes, and some companies use violent images in their advertising campaigns for shock and aesthetic value to help sell their products. Because we see these images regularly and without serious commentary, they become normal.

Key Points:

• Increasingly, advertisements show women as victims of sexual harassment and violence.
• Violence against women is normalized by advertisements.
• Women live in a world defined by the threat of sexual violence and intimidation. The portrayal of women in advertising supports, rather than objects to, these threats.
• Masculinity in advertising is often linked with violence, brutality and ruthlessness. Men are constantly portrayed as the perpetrators of violence.
• Violence, hostility and dominance are often presented as erotic, attractive and appealing in advertising.

XII. IS IT INTENTIONAL?