The Use Of Gay-Vague Advertisements

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Advertisers have been using sexuality in their ads for years, but in the 1990's a new trend appeared: what Michael Wilke referred to as "gay-vague" advertisements.  These ads, which we see most notably for brands such as Calvin Klein or Abercrombie and Fitch, include images that may appeal to both gay and straight consumers.  By encoding ads with visual cues so that gay individuals interpret the ad as gay, while keeping the cues subtle enough that straight individuals do not pick up on them, an advertisement can target two audiences at the same time.  This advertising strategy is based off of the idea that people see what they want to see, and even when presented with an image that appears gay, a straight individual will create a story in their head that aligns with their own beliefs and values.  The use of "gay-vague" advertisements has become a legitimate strategy since the 90's when the phrase was first coined, and used for all sorts of products, though most often for clothing brands.  While at first it seems a little far-fetched, that advertisers are hiding "codes" for the gay community to interpret while the rest of the population goes about their lives unaware, in reality this is an extremely effective strategy.  Just like politicians campaigning for election try to appeal to both parties without alienating anyone, clothing companies are able to market themselves to both parties while offending neither party.

Media Portrayal of the Disabled

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The biggest problem with stereotypes being used to describe people with disabilities in the media is that most people do not even realize when stereotypes are being used, and are wrong. Throughout literature, disabilities have historically been used to symbolize evil or malicious intent.  This leads to people, even subconsciously, associating negative emotions with disabled people.  This stereotype has been common throughout history, and shows up in much classic literature, such as Captain Hook in Peter Pan.  Because we are exposed to this idea throughout our lives in movies and books, it is only natural that it seeps into our media.  The difference between stereotyping a particular race or gender and stereotyping people with disabilities is that many times people stereotype disabled people without even realizing it.  Most people are able to recognize gender and race stereotypes when they come across them in the media, and hopefully realize these are wrong and one must not rely on stereotypes of groups of people.  There is less attention paid, however, to the dangers that accompany putting people with disabilities into stereotypes.  There are even films based off of common stereotypes, such as the disabled person courageously overcoming their disability or the disabled person portrayed as a victim or burden.  A movie maker would be very unlikely to make a film with a storyline based off of a stereotype of women or minorities, yet it is socially acceptable, even common, for movies to use stereotypes of disabilities.  Until people learn to recognize these stereotypes and try to avoid using them, our culture will continue to be one that, perhaps unknowingly, portrays people with disabilities in the media by relying on a handful of stereotypes.

Women in Politics: Media Coverage

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The 2008 election brought the issue of women in politics to a whole new level, with  both Hilary Clinton running for president and Sarah Palin running with Joe Biden as his vice president.  More than ever before, the media focused on the personal characteristics of the candidates, namely gender, and with all of this attention came an abundance of stereotypes used when discussing both Clinton and Palin.  While it is true that women in politics is still a relatively new phenomenon, the glaring disparity in the way men and women are discussed in the media is still surprising.  If one was to compare the coverage men receive to the coverage women receive during a political campaign, it would be obvious that men receive more issue coverage, while women receive more attention for their appearance and personality instead of their political stance. 

www.dailymail.co.uk

     The difference in how Palin and Clinton were discussed is also interesting, because while they share the fact that they are both women, that is where the similarities end.  Palin’s physical attractiveness was the focus of the media’s coverage of her, with constant references to her past as a beauty queen.  On the other side of the coin, Clinton was often painted as the “anti-seductress.”  In both cases, the coverage of both women would occasionally cross the line from typical political attacks to rude personal attacks. Together, these two women almost perfectly illustrated the “double bind” that many women face.  A women who is considered attractive, or too feminine, will be thought of as incompetent and inferior to men.  Women who are less feminine, however, are not received any better, and are often judged by different standards than men of equal qualifications.  This problem is not limited to politics; women in all careers are forced to deal with this double bind.

Stereotypes in 1965 Newspaper Articles

  When reading the front page of a southern newspaper from July 23, 1965, one would certainly expect to find certain stereotypes more abundant than nowadays.  In the case of the Southern Courier, a newspaper based out of Montgomery, Alabama and written by journalism students from Massachusetts, there were definitely stereotypes present, most notably when describing race.  Civil rights issues were central to pretty much every story in the newspaper, so obviously the way race was addressed is important to look at.  While this newspaper was based in the South, the authors were from the North, so there was less racism present in the writing than in other papers that were published in the area around the same time.  The being said, there were still quite a few stereotypes used when describing people, most often when depicting African-Americans.  All of the articles referred to African-American men and women as “Negros,” and one headline included this term.  While the writing contained language that we would probably not see published today, the stories themselves were presented in a somewhat equal way.  The most prominent story is a somewhat unbiased piece about a man who was shot simply because he was African-American.  The authors interviewed people of both races to comment on the story; however the Caucasian interviewees were all introduced by name and in some case, title while the African-Americans interviewed for the article were in most case not identified by name, and only described, such as the “elderly Negro woman” who commented on the case.  In addition, the white sources that were quoted tended to be men of status, such as a policeman or a reverend.    The African-Americans quoted in the story were often regular men, women, and even children.  This inequality in presenting black and white community members illustrates how pervasive racism was at this time, even among writers who were attempting to give an unbiased report of what happened.  This pattern, present in most articles in the newspaper, assisted in perpetuating the idea that whites held higher positions in society than minorities.

http://www.southerncourier.org/archives.html

The Use of Sex in Selling Magazines

     It does not really come as a surprise to anyone who has ever passed through the magazine aisle at their local grocery or convenience store that magazines, whether targeted at men or women, usually use a thin, beautiful, often sexualized woman on their cover.  The study performed by Lambiase and Reichert, Sex and the Marketing of Contemporary Consumer Magazines: How Men’s Magazines Sexualized Their Covers to Compete with Maxim, confirms what we see everyday.  This study, which analyzed the covers of men’s general interest magazines from the years 1995 to 2000, links the increase in sexualized women as cover women to Maxim’s American debut.  While scantily clad women gracing the covers of magazines has become an accepted reality during my lifetime, the statistics are still staggering.  According to the study, “images of women on covers increased from 25% to 56% from 1995 to 2000," and of the men who were featured on covers, 84% of them were dressed in everyday clothes as opposed to provocatively, while only 7% of women were dressed demurely.  This dramatic change over such a short period of time illustrates how society has fully embraced the usage of women, and specifically their bodies, as a marketing device.  While this study focused mainly on Maxim’s affect on other men’s general interest magazine, it was also pointed out that many “lad mags” copied their formula not of Maxim, but of women’s magazines such as Cosmopolitan.  The fact that magazines targeted at women as well as magazines targeted at men promote unrealistic standards for women’s bodies is worrisome.  In addition to leading to body image issues, especially in young girls, this also gives young boys an unrealistic expectations for women.  This marketing trend, while proven to be successful, is definitely not healthy for our society as a whole.  Unfortunately, it has been proven to be very successful, because as the well-known saying goes, “Sex sells,” and for that reason, I believe it is unlikely that we will see a marked change in this phenomenon any time soon.

Stereotypes in Media Portrayal of Murder

The story of Heather Mack and her boyfriend, Peter Schaefer, murdering Mack’s mother, Sheila von Weise Mack, and hiding her body in a suitcase in Bali certainly lends itself to some eye-catching headlines, and the media lost no time in broadcasting the story in all of its dramatic glory.  Sounding like the plot line to a movie, the riveting story of a potentially psychologically unstable teenage girl and her delinquent boyfriend brutally murdering her innocent mother was played up by the media.

The initial stories, which detailed the 86 police visits to the Mack home between 2004 and 2013 and the cryptic Instagram and Facebook posts foreshadowing foul play from Heather and her boyfriend, painted Heather Mack as a crazy teenaged killer that drew the public’s interest.  A friend of the victim was quoted saying “[Heather] could be as charming and self-effacingly sweet one minute, and then a vicious little monster the next.”  These potentially exaggerated facts all played a part in portraying Heather Mack as a typical teenager who got in with the wrong crowd, which eventually led to her committing a grisly crime more suited to a Hollywood film than privileged Chicago suburb.

In later coverage of the story, the reports were less focused on the shock value of the story and provided more details into the lives of both the victim and the suspect.  Heather Mack’s father was a prominent Chicago composer who had died in 2006.  Police reports suggest that Mack suffered from depression after his death, which led to some of the altercations with her mother.  As the shock value of the story wore off, the media started giving more accurate representations of everyone involved.

To read articles covering the murder of Sheila von Weise Mack, visit the following links:

Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Guardian
New York Post
Daily Mail