Local News
Sex still sells - even if it would break her in half
‘Dove’s “campaign for Real Beauty”-which proudly features “real” women of different shapes and sizes-has attracted international attention and scores several major advertising rewards to boot. But it turns out it may not sell that much product. A new study has concluded that traditional ads featuring rail-thin models had it right all along: yes, they make women feel worse about themselves, but such ads are still more likely to convince women to buy.’
Lunau, Kate. "Study finds real women don't sell." (2008 August). 24 hours, p. 34.
If I properly voiced by initial response to this article, it would sound like every-one’s favorite British detective was constipated. But is that not expected?
Even the most mentally defunct thins in the media are, well, intelligently placed. An example would be those annoying phishing e-mails. As retarded and pointless and retarded as we all see them, they get enough of a response to merit their reproduction. As is the case, it seems, for the talentless boy/girl/transgendered bubble-gum-pop bands - they do make money.
So, as much as mothers disagree, and fathers and sons pretend to disagree about the scantly clad, rail-thin models, they are still working. Back in the day when this amount of sexuality was seen as whoreific, they sold with these pseudo-plus size models. But, over years, the skin:clothing ratio steadily grew further apart, marketing anyone’s saw the monetary gain over this. The irony is that the less clothing a woman is wearing, the more you wish to buy.
That being said, I very much am a fan of Dove’s campaign, especially considering the risks. The gist of Capitalism is making more money, no? So besides the fact that I (attempt) to follow this Conservativeve mindset, I also give them mad props for going against what may be the most profitable.
So have Dove’s curvy models hurt its bottom line? The company doesn’t think so.
“We’ve achieved a healthy growth since the campaign launched in 2005,” says Dove Canada’s Alison Leung. She adds that Dove has the No. 1 body wash and bar in the county, and won’t be abandoning its “real woman” position any time soon.
I am not sure where they would stand if their profits were otherwise, but I also find it unfair to judge a company on something of that nature. As even a man, with a pervy nether-region, I applaud Dove for this campaign.
But milk men never whip it out in public…
A woman’s right to breastfeed in public was bolstered yesterday when more than 100 mothers and their babes held a feed-in at a downtown clothing store.
(2008, August 22). 24 hours, p. 3.
My daily newspaper published, the other day, a story about a woman and secreting nipples. This woman, it would seem, was asked by a clerk of a certain H&M store to respectfully feed her child in a change room, or something of the like. Being the year that it is, a certain 2008, and being her a woman, she seemed convinced that she was allowed to do whatever she wanted. It was sexist, of course, to limit public nipple secretion and consumption.
As was quoted above, there gathered ~100 pairs of bare breast, both young and old, being suckled in public. This gather was, in fashion of anything these days, organized by Facebook. I find it ironic that the breasts women, shown off so adamantly in the summer and in their low-cut shirts, are begging for public sucking on one side, but then yell at men for looking.
Their excuse was written to be for the sake of ‘parenting’. This was the argument I received the blunt end in LAX when I approached some mother for changing her child’s diaper in the middle of a hallway. I sat down the hallway buried inside a book when I noticed the stank, and even still, my request was labeled as ’sexist’.
“Women have the right not to be sequestered away when they’re parenting,” said Sonia Strobel.
This is not so much an argument that mothers have not a right to expose wrinkly and stretch-marked boobs in public, it’s that a shopper has the right to not have to watch them do it.
Needless to say, the women won and H&M apologized. Why, do you ask? With such an excellent retort as written by me? Because men control everything, and because old boobs make men uncomfortable. But mostly, because everything counts as sexist.
I find it ironic that PETA treats everyone but HUMANS humane…
“Right now, this exact scenario is reality for many. They are sensitive, they value their lives, they see what is happening, they cannot run-away, and they often suffer greatly yet are being killed for nothing more than a fleeting taste of their flesh.”
“If this ad leaves a bd taste in your mouth, please give a thought to what sensitive animals think and feel when they come to the end of their frightening journey and see, hear, and smell the slaughterhouse. Try switching to a healthy vegetarian diet and save lives every day, including your own.”