Galvan 1!

Arlenn Galvan
Professor Beadle
English 115
7 December 2016
Dolce & Gabbana Ad
What's your reaction to a shirtless male or sexy female on an ad? Do you ever catch yourself
left without words while watching an ad? An ads job is to grab the audience attention through
appealing to peoples preferences. The articles by Judith Lorber and Ruth Hubbard discuss
social construction of gender. Women are portrayed as a materialistic figure in society through
their physical appearance with clothing, body features and etc., so men can bemore attracted to
the ad. However, women often receive public shaming through the half naked appearance
and as well as their appearance in music videos, where theyre often seen as objects. In the
Dolce & Gabbana ad you can see that there are 4 shirtless guys all around the picture with one
male aggressively holding onto a female who is in intimate clothing. Gender stereotypes begin
to evolve as you can see the male dominance over the female as it usually is portrayed in
society today.
To begin with as society plays a major role in influencing the audience on how women are
portrayed in the real world through ads or any source of social media. Through the traditional
beliefs of how women should act or become like, this continues to take place even today
where negative treatment of women continues to grow even if it happened some time ago.
Women are easily used to become a sexual object for the male population when trying to sell a
product. For example, women are to model for advertisements including selling tires, cars

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or anything male individuals are willing to buy. When women themselves see these ads all
over their city, they begin to say that the models are sluts, shes asking for it or etc., due to
their physical appearance with most of their of their body uncovered wearing just intimate
clothing. Typically, women were to wear clothing that didnt show much of their body and
they were to show that theyre viewed as a respectful women. In this ad, you can see that
there are shirtless men in the background, but one man is aggressively holding onto the
sexy female. In the society we live in today, men are not looked or judged upon what they
are doing to the female in such an aggressive matter. When a situation occurs where women
make upon a sudden mistake, theyre suddenly publically shamed by society. A example of
this occurring is when Kim Kardashians sex tape was leaked onto social media back in 2007
with former singer boyfriend Ray J. Throughout social media Kim expresses herself when she
says, I will not live my life dictated by the issues you have with my sexuality. You be you and
let me be me (Kardashian 1). Kims pasts till to this day continues to haunt her despite what she
has achieved in life financially and personally. She has proven that despite what happened in
the past, she is a very successful business women, in addition to being such a loving and
caring mother to her 2 kids and happily married with a respectful man. Regardless of
having this in someones life, there will always be someone who is to bring up the past and
try to ruin your career.
With social media and the music industry evolving throughout the years, music lyrics
are seen as women hooking up with many different guys, showing most of their of their
bodies to the world to see and basically seen as a sexual decoration to the videos. In old school
music artist were viewed badly if they were to mention anything that related to women simply as

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just saying they woke up from bed to go to the kitchen was seen by the audience as a big issue.
As you fast forward to the late 90s male artist began to mention women in every single one of
their song releases; through lyrics and music videos where women were categorize as sexual
objects. In the article, Equal Opportunity Objectification? The Sexualization of Men and Women on
the Cover of Rolling Stone talk about how women are made to be seen differently than men, Yet

our most striking finding is the change how womenbut not men are sexualized. Women are
increasingly likely to be hypersexualized, while men are not ( Hatton 257). Women would
dress in sexy appeal, having a seductive tone and sexually dancing, where this demonstrates
that women are the ones who are making the situation a sexual way, just based on how they
look and are dressed. Music industry has an important role when it comes to the Dolce &
Gabbana Ad because this image would possibly seen in a music video of some kind. In
Hubbards article Rethinking Womens Biology she gives the example of the common idea
about women, offered that characterize women as weak, or overemotional...(Hubbard 46). This
quote shows that woman are seen as weak links in society, compared to the way men are viewed
by the traditional values and all this is reflected and shown upon these ads and music videos that
have women appealing to their body just to make a hit new single.
To conclude, one would say that both the female and males in this ads are viewed in a
way, the same. Both the female and males are shown as sexual objects in this ad, but this is
also seen in many other ads. The company is appealing to both genders, targeting both women
and men to go buy their clothes through this advertisement. Many would argue that there is no
difference between the ways both genders are seen in society. In this ad, men are simply going
to look at the very attractive female and not the males in the ad, while women will be

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looking at the shirtless, hot guys and pay no attention to the female in the ad and vice
versa. Men can simply take their shirt off and its categorized as, sexy and breathe taking. Men
are seen as tough, masculine and are considered superior than women, due to the old traditional
roles between women and men in our society. In the article, Imaging the Male Body: Ads,
Aesthetics and Representations of Imagined Masculinities Williams talks about how both
genders are seen as object of gazing, Conversely, both males and females can be depicted as
those who do the looking and the consuming. Both females and males can be depicted at one and
the same time as both object of the gaze, and the gazing subject. Men look at women, and men
also look at other men. Women look at other women, and women certainly look at
men (Williams 35). Williamss looks about the meaning of gazing were both genders follow this
same process in everyday life, where no matter if youre male or female, you tend to appeal
towards the opposite gender in the same ways. Okay as a counterarguement but how can you
refute this?
In conclusion, both women and men are portrayed as a sexual objects and object of gaze in
society through their physical appearance in a advertisement. Men and women have similar
likings for the opposite sex through these ads; and this will continue to be an ongoing cycle
for many years to come. If nothing is to change for the younger generations, they will grow
up watching these music videos and think what is being shown is an okay thing to learn and to
accept. Children will no longer have a traditional childhood, like the generations in the past
have had, where they can have more respect towards what a woman or man wears in
advertisement.

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Work Cited

Williams, Amber. "Imaging the Male Body: Ads, Aesthetics and Representations of Imagined
Masculinities." Student Thesis, edited by Department of Sociology, University of Alberta, 2000,
pg. 10-40. http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk1/tape2/PQDD_0008/MQ60067.pdf
Hatton, Erin. Equal Opportunity Objectification? The Sexualization of Men and Women on the
Cover of Rolling Stone Sexuality & Culture, Volume 4 Volume 20, Springer US, pp 256 http://
link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12119-011-9093-2
Hubbard, Ruth, Rethinking Womens Biology Composing Gende, edited by John E. Sullivan
III, A Bedford Spotlight Reader, pg 46-52