Does the world of PRODUCT advertising need a Lord Leveson inquiry? Do you find that your training courses or management feedback and action around behaviour issues and "managing prejudice" in the workplace still hit the cold buffers of the REAL WORLD?
Does sexism extend to modern consumer adverts? -ADMAN and Eve? Or should we accept Vance Packard’s notion (1957-The Waste Makers) that Sex Sells?
Some of the witnesses who gave evidence to Lord Leveson’s recent inquiry on UK press standards and ethics produced research from an evaluation of British newspapers portrayal of women over a two week period in September 2011. One of their recurring themes was the persistent portrayal of women as sex objects. This was underpinned with women being portrayed and judged solely on the basis of how they looked. Our own research at QED which we have called ADMan and Eve in the period 1950 to present day shows an interesting paradox, namely that as women’s rights have moved up the legislative agenda the depiction of women in adverts has become more violently aggressive in terms of how women and girls are depicted. Words and images in our mini portfolio echo and sometimes go beyond the themes found in the Leveson evidence on newspapers. So we have had an inquiry in editorial standards -do we now need something on ADVERTORIAL standards. Or should we just accept that sex sells! How do you explain the paradox we have found that as "rights increase" a backlash comes in from another side? That backlash of course is something that can also be found in the prevailing tensions between "religion v sexual orientation", "family rights v non-family rights" etc etc
If you want a copy of the research report just get in touch at trainingqed@aol.com
