In the film, Killing us Softly, Jean Kilbourne says that,
“The impossible, ideal image presented by advertisers wouldn’t matter so much if it didn’t connect with the core belief of American and Canadian culture that such transformation is possible; that we can look like this if we just try hard enough, buy the right products. If we’re not beautiful, or thin, or rich, or successful, it’s because we’re just not trying hard enough.”
I think there is a connection through human rights. Human rights are an increasingly prevalent issue these days and there are so many people pushing very hard for rights in all different kinds of fields. I think that now, being able to decide how you look and change yourself has almost become a “right”. You have the right to do it, and if you don’t your just not trying hard enough. Of course this is not the case but sometimes this is what it seems like. The fact is that it is very hard to change very much of how you look. Making it look so easy in the media, and with the immense pressure to try from society its amazing most of us have any self-confidence left at all. People are constantly bombarded with subliminal messages when exposed to the media (look like this, feel like this etc.). When you see these images and ideas you assume these things are normal. Being normal is a common aspiration so people try to fit into these stereotypes. Everyone is different. Stereotypes make people the same. These are two opposite ideas and they are trying to mesh and there is just no way it can work. Society needs to figure out a way to advertise without such brutal stereotypes. I can see how this would be a problem for advertisers. Their job is to appeal to as many people as possible. Using stereotypes accomplishes this; they are generally stereotypes in the first place for a reason. They just need to find a healthy medium; at the moment it is at such an extreme in some cases that it is almost dangerous. For example, young girls are almost literally killing themselves trying desperately to be thin because that is what the media and society are telling them is how they should look; and that that is how they should want to look. For any of these ideas about change and stereotypes to change will take a huge change in society. It is not something you can simply put into law and over night things will start to get better, it’s part of our mentality. Overtime it is definitely possible for things to change. More and more now films like, Killing us Softly and opening peoples eyes and provide a great start.
