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The Dismemberment of Female Body Parts in Advertising
Women have been looked upon as merely sex objects and housewives. They have fought for the right to be treated as equals to men for many years, and the fact that women are portrayed in such a degrading way shows there is a problem. This web site addresses the problem of dismemberment by analyzing previous research and articles by Jean Kilbourne, Rebecca Zarchikoff, Michael F. Jacobsen and Paul T. Harper. We also observed advertisements taken from various magazines and commercials. An extensive Internet search on this topic yielded truly amazing results. Through our research, we discovered that men and women are portrayed differently in advertisements. The truth is advertisers use their air brushed models to sell products. "Most people today see over 2000 ads a day," says Kilbourne, "they sell values, images, concepts of success and worth, love and sexuality, popularity and normalcy."


Women are feeling self-conscious about their bodies and are becoming unhappy with who they are on the outside. Women feel overweight after watching the "skinny little brats" that have invaded their TVs; therefore, women and teenagers are experiencing many cases of bulimia and anorexia. Advertisers dismember women's bodies in order to appeal to consumers through the theory: SEX SELLS. Rebecca Zarchokoff believes advertisers suggest "that men are important for their intellect and personality, and women are important for their general attractiveness and figures." The dismemberment of women's bodies is divided into two areas, facism and bodyism. Zarchikoff has found that 65% of a man's picture is typically devoted to his face, compared to 45% of a woman's. According to Kilbourne, dismembering women's bodies allows them to be treated as if "a woman's body is not connected to her mind and emotions." Kilbourne also notes that body parts of women are being "dismembered in commercials, their bodies separated into parts in need of change or improvement." This relates to the fact that most believe there is an "ideal image." But, this perfect being actually does not exist. Through this image of perfection, though, the ad makers can sell millions of products because so many want to attain this ideal image. As Michael Jacobson has said, "the use of women's bodies in ads is essentially a cheap trick that marketers use instead of making more thoughtful arguments on behalf of their products."



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Heather & Samantha