Welcome back to my blog!
I wanted to pick up on where I left off last week. Last week I spoke of vegetarian ecofeminism. This week I wanted to look at the objectification of women and animals and how this can lead to oppression. To do this I am going to analyze three images of my choice from a slideshow presented by Carol Adams. I chose this first image seen below for many reasons. Not only does it speak of the objectification and sexualization of women, but also the objectification of animals. Clearly an advertisement for ham, but has it been taken too far? If you look closely, you’ll notice the pig has eyelashes and rather plump lips. These are both features typically drawn out to represent women. Though, from a first glance, one would likely only notice the huge butt depicted on the pig. This is a feature that gives off the goal of satisfying two types of hunger. The first being male hunger. I mean come on; you’ve seen a male checking out a woman’s butt before. The second hunger the image is trying to satisfy is actual hunger. The advertiser is trying to say that their company sells “thick” hams, with an extra emphasis on thick. Another detail of this image I am now able to see due to the Adams reading is the color of the skin of the pig. It’s very fair. In the interview with Adams, she specifically speaks on advertisements of pigs depicted as “white trash” females and she mentions that “black women are often depicted as wild animals and have to be captured” (Adams 16). This shows that on top of the sexualization of women and animals these advertisements can also be racist. The main audience for this advertisement would be males. Males would be the ones to fall into this trap of the sexualization of women.
The second image I have chosen is an advertisement for Avalia which looks like it is supposed to promote healthy skin, however, they are really reaching with this advertisement. The chicken appears to be a woman “raising her skirt” or in the case of the chicken its feathers acting as the skirt. You might notice next how clear the leg of the chicken is. Beneath the cartoon image says “Healthy skin, less scratches and cellulitis.” This image objectifies women by projecting this image of clear skin and lack of cellulite. Cellulite is completely natural however and this advertisement looks to hide that. Men and women both will see the clear skin and men will think that this skin is natural and beautiful and could come to expect it from women. Women would end up being the consumer in the case of this advertisement. They could seek this treatment or medicine in order to erase those natural marks that come with being a woman or being a human in general. I want to speak more about the use of a chicken for the advertisement. Typically, when eating chicken, everyone seems to want the drumstick and thinks it’s the best part of the chicken. This could follow over to the sexualization of women and their thighs and legs being some of the best parts to men.
The last image I have taken from the slideshow of Carol Adams is this image showing a man delivering a burger from a woman. As weird as that sounds its exactly what you see. However, does this image have multiple meanings? If you asked me, I would say that the delivery standpoint could mean two things. It could represent delivery in the sense of delivering a baby. Or because it is a burger, which is meat, it could stand for a man “delivering his meat.” Notice how the delivery doctor is also a man. I am pretty sure you get what I’m saying with this. With the last meaning I have brought up I also want to mention the use of the word urge in the title of the advertisement. Urge is something I hear a lot in terms of sexual urge. The burger delivery or meat delivery could satisfy hunger urges or sexual urges depending on how you look at the advertisement. This picture could represent women making food for men as well. Because women are supposed to provide for men and cook for them in a woman “delivering the burger” to a man one might see this. All and all I feel like this image speaks a lot about the sexualization of women and women satisfying the needs of men. An argument can be made for who is the consumer and who is consumed. Women could be the consumers, looking to please men or be pleased by men in both providing food or pleasure.
I have been tasked with finding my own image similar to the ones posted by Carol Adams. I found this advertisement for Burger King. This advertisement came out in Singapore and raised controversy for using the model’s image without consent as well as being sexually suggestive. This image is a prime example of how women and animals are being sexualized and objectified for the purpose of profit. In the image, a woman looks like she will be performing an oral sex act on a “seven incher.” We typically hear terms of size like this when hearing men talk of their parts. The meat on the sandwich was once an animal that has now been objectified to represent a penis. In the article, The Pornography of Meat Lisa Kemmerer writes on Carol Adams and how she agrees with Adams on why advertisements are set up in the ways they are set up. One of the first quotes mentioned in this article is “She goes on to state that some readers “may feel aroused” while others “will feel distaste” (Adams). This is a perfect example of the feelings one might gather from examining this image. I for one feel it’s distasteful and disrespectful to women and animals. However, some men might look at this image and its sexual connotation and feel aroused and might be more likely to buy the product.
Article Links:
Burger King Ad: https://www.foxnews.com/food-drink/model-calls-for-a-burger-king-boycott-after-she-was-featured-in-a-sexually-suggestive-ad
Adams Interview: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/54792ff7e4b0674c74cb719d/t/55dc8dace4b0ad76d7277cb7/1440517548517/ANTENNAE+ISSUE+14.pdf
Kemmerer Article: https://philosophynow.org/issues/56/The_Pornography_of_Meat_by_Carol_Adams
Hi Ashton! I really enjoyed reading about the images you chose for this week’s blog post. I would like to talk about the last one that is an advertisement from Burger King. This advertisement was the first one that came to my mind when we were asked to chose our own image but I chose a different one after seeing you had chosen this one. I actually remember when it was first released and talking about it in high school and how innappropriate it was. This particular image really hurt their brand name that year and I remember my parents telling me i wasn’t allowed to eat at Burger King anymore. The sheer sexual nature of the ad was way too out of control at the time, and still would be today. I definitely agree with your explanation of the image and the sexual meaning behind it, and I also agree with you about feeling like it is distasteful and disrespectful towards women and animals. I feel like society has changed at least a little since this time, and more people are becoming respectful of women, or becoming feminists. I have definitely seen a decrease in the amount of ads being produced with scandalous looking women in it or overly dramatized cartoon images. The place I see the most ads now is on YouTube and they do not allow certain things in their videos anymore, so I am glad to see women being treated more like humans and less like objects on social media. Im sure it still happens often on other platforms but like I said, I don’t see it often.
Hi Ashton, I really like the way you explained your point and connect it with Adams. In your blog you wrote about the picture you chose of burger delivery that one of the possible explanation could be that the delivery is of the actual baby. I would add on to this of what I think it could be is that the baby being delivered by the woman, basically belongs to that man as if it’s his and because of him that baby exists. Which is true, many men thinks that the baby is because of them, but they do forget the fact that no matter it was your sperm but we women are carrying that baby, and it’s us who give them birth. Well back to the main discussion, the last picture that you have chosen is amazing, not that the picture it self is amazing but the idea behind it is. But I have a slightly different opinion about it. Whenever I have come across this idea of wanting bigger sized penis, it’s always women who wants that, and for some part men wants bigger size so that they can satisfy a girl. And I might be wrong, but I am saying this because of what I have heard and know. I don’t see any pressure here or expectations of some sort from women to have the want for bigger penis. But again I could be wrong.
Apart from this I do agree that women and animals are objectified and sexualized. I always heard my parents, relative and people in my society saying that girls should maintain their figure or else they wouldn’t get good guys for marriage. Kasey Lynn, James L. et. al. in their article mentioned about the physical expectations of our male dominant societies from women, “Women are overtly sexualized with their bodies displayed for the use and pleasure of others…. even when sexual aspects of women are not relevant or focused on, women, and girls, encounter a profound focus on their physical appearance” (Morris, Kasey, et Jamie). Moreover she also mentioned about the advertisements in which women’s body is being exposed, such as in Victoria Secret’s advertisements and in their shows, every model has a lean body, or you can a perfect body. You wouldn’t find any healthy women but all slim. Why? because that’s how our society works, especially men, they expect women to be slimmer and sexier and want to see them in such garments and that too because of their pleasure, because women in lingerie do arouse men.
Morris, Kasey Lynn, et Jamie L. Goldenberg. « Women, objects, and animals: Differentiating between sex- and beauty-based objectification », Revue internationale de psychologie sociale, vol. tome 28, no. 1, 2015, pp. 15-38.
What a great photo you have chosen! It is crazy to think that some businesses really get away with advertisements like that. I don’t ever understand that sexual arousal that one would get from a plate of food; meat. But our society has over-sexualized everything. It is unfortunate that a woman has to be depicted as preforming oral sex for some burgers to be sold. Gross- but I wonder if our society has pushed the topic of beastality. I don’t know the true history if that was acceptable in the past. But I wonder if the cases you hear of now are due to humans having over sexualized everything. This could in turn make people feel more of a need for sexual activity and make an animal seem more pleasing. If we are constantly being shown images of sexualized animals over and over and over, it’d be interesting to know if that plays a part on the psyche of people. Constant exposure could possibly change someone’s point of view and maybe lead them to do some really messed up and gross stuff.
* I do not think sexual realations with any animal is okay or acceptable. Just an interesting way to look at our faults as humans.