Sex Sells, Products Don't

I'm pretty sure most underwear is flexible.

I'm having a hard time keeping my mouth shut these days when I see American Apparel ads. In no way am I a die hard feminist, but I can't help but to take offense at the blatant exploitation of young women that American Apparel is so fond of using in their ads. I understand that commercialism now uses sex appeal to sell their products (instead of actually inducting a selling strategy advertising the product more so then the model), but when they make the models overly expose themselves in unflattering ways to market a product that you can barely notice because it's either not actually in the ad or it's so inconsequential compared to the sexual or otherwise rise that one gets from viewing the ad, you have to question the motives of the PR department; are they selling the clothing/product or making a statement that it's ok to fantasize about barely out of their tweens-looking models. It's like an open call to pedophiles.

These ads highly offend me. I'm all for creative ingenuity, but where does the line get draw between creativity and pornography? Yes, Los Angeleans and New Yorkers have a higher tolerance for racy ads then the gentler folk of the middle states, but that doesn't mean the PR morons need to exploit our apathy to the limit, stretching to see how far they can go before they're paying out too many law suits to have the ads remain profitable. When did society stop trying to depict products in their natural state, showing viewers what the product are capable of? Why did they make the switch to marketing obscene and obscure ads to make a company notable, but leaving the product a barely grasped memory. I guess if you remember a commercial or an ad, the PR department has done their job, but do you remember what the ad pertains to, or only what it was about - some random guy on a horse or a 15 year-old spreading her legs? What was the product being marketed? How does this help sales? There are numerous ads where I can only remember the product and not the company or the company and not the product. How is this helpful? Shouldn't an ad be memorable for both the product and the company.

Sex or Socks?

I guess in this sense, America Apparel ads do achieve their goals of being instantly recognized and remembered, but does a girl looking like a piece of sex candy make you want to buy socks? Who is this ad targeting; men or women? For the guys out there, if you saw this ad, would you buy the socks and give them to your girlfriend in hopes that she'll somehow turn out to look as stunning as the girl in the picture or that you'll get lucky because you bought your girlfriend/wife/friend American Apparel socks? For the Women, if you bought these socks, do you think you will look sexier, or does this ad make you feel less sexy because you can't be 15 again and have the perfect body? Why have a marketing campaign that makes people question their looks, weight, self-worth?

It's like a subliminal mind fuck to the general audiences and instead of the ads helping to sell the products they're advertising, they turn the already impressional young people into walking sex fantasies via wearing their products or having disturbed individuals imagine them in said outfits. Either way, it's appalling. I know this rant has gone on long enough, but I just want to state the fact that American Apparel uses a lot of their store employees as their models, promising young women illusions of modeling success when they agree to be employees, but never actually fully explaining the mental consequences of becoming a store model. It's exploiting innocence for capital gain. It should be a crime.

Why would I want to buy stockings that can easily rip?

Yummy Heart Cloggers

There was a news article the other day on the five newest 1200-1500+ calorie meals served at restaurants. The sad thing is that most of the items look like delicious, heart clogging plates of awesomeness. This could be an effect of the vibrant photography depicting said food, but no matter, my mouth was watering and I almost ventured across the street to eat at Denny's. I was taken in by Denny's new grilled cheese with fried cheese sticks stuffed between layers of gooey, stringy yumminess. My taste buds yearned to devour this monstrosity of the beloved grilled cheese. And for all the meat eaters out there - there's also a cheeseburger served in the South that has grilled cheese sandwiches as it's buns.


Denny's Fried Cheese Melt Sandwich


Friendly's Grilled Cheese Burger Melt

What is the world coming to when cheese upon cheese looks and sounds appealing to our appetites? No wonder our society is growing bigger and wider; we're dismissing healthy foods for visually appealing delectables and brushing off the consequences of munching to our figurative heart's desire, instead of taking care of our physical hearts. Maybe we should all sit down in front of Wall-E and try to imagine what it would be like to drink all our meals and float around in a hover chair because our bones have liquified and we're nothing more than blobs of semi-intelligent masses - similar to amoebas.

Now if Denny's had put fried chicken strips in the middle of their new grilled cheese sandwich instead of more cheese, it would probably contain the same amount of calories, but at least the consumer would get their daily amount of protein. Plus, when I originally saw the photo of the sandwich, I thought it was chicken. Sounds so good to me, but bad Em, bad.

Poll: Would you eat one of these sandwiches?