Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site randvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!randvax!edhall From: edhall@randvax.UUCP (Ed Hall) Newsgroups: net.singles Subject: Re: Dates not eating and m/f body image Message-ID: <2386@randvax.UUCP> Date: Sat, 6-Apr-85 20:32:53 EST Article-I.D.: randvax.2386 Posted: Sat Apr 6 20:32:53 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 9-Apr-85 02:08:36 EST References: <475@spp2.UUCP> <> <255@lasspvax.UUCP> <174@tektools.UUCP> <2342@mit-hermes.ARPA> <324@unc.UUCP> Organization: Rand Corp., Santa Monica Lines: 59 > In article edhall@randvax.UUCP (Ed Hall) writes: > > > I think the women that are picking at their food on dates > > > are in a double bind. On the one hand, they're trying > > > to meet *your* expectations and on the other hand, > > > they're trying to meet society's (read *men's*) > > > expectations of women to be slender. > > > Barbara Zanzig > > > I have to disagree about this being a conspiracy of men. > > The advertising industry is pretty well sexually integrated > > (especially compared to most other areas of American business), > > and it is there that you should place the blame. > > Nonsense. Stop trying to pass the buck. We men are responsible. > The advertising media doesn't tell us which women to desire. > I've never seen an advertisement which said, > > "Hey you! This is what a beautiful woman looks like!" > > The advertisers FIRST find out which female image the public adores > and THEN use it to sell the product. They would have no reason > to try to sell the image of beauty as well. No profit in that. > Say what? What are advertisers selling, other than image? And at enormous profit! The image of beauty sold by advertisers represents literally hundreds of *billions* of dollars in sales--a sizeable fraction of disposable consumer income. Food, cosmetics, clothes, fitness, drugs-- all are sold to people based on an *image of what is desirable*. Face it, the advertisers FIRST find out what female image REQUIRES MORE OF THEIR PRODUCT, and SELL THAT. Or they CREATE an image, SELL that image, and CREATE NEW PRODUCTS for that image. That's the first law of fashion: lead, don't follow. Anyone can do a market survey and turn out tons of what the public already is buying; the only way to obtain a competative edge is to create a market where none was before. Tens of billions of those dollars in sales are currently going to the diet and fitness industry. Even more goes to the clothing industry (where, admittedly, the styles, in both clothes and bodies, are set by a small group mostly of men). Mass-marketing efforts tend to mimic the more palatable efforts of the designers, with the result that the ideal ``image of beauty'' is something between a fashion model and a female movie star. (Some designers have discovered the lucrative mass-market (e.g. Ralph Lauren), and thus have more direct influence.) Frank, I'm afraid you have a lot more faith than I in the public's ability to form asthetic opinions free from outside influence. When so much of our time is spent with our noses pointed at one instrument or another of the mass media, it would be amazing if we weren't affected, and strongly so, by the images presented there. (I'm not being snobby here--I admit to being strongly influenced by the cultural images presented in mass media, and doubt very much that I've been able to reject more than some of them.) > > Frank Silbermann -Ed Hall decvax!randvax!edhall