Do males ever feel insulted by TV ads --- ???

I sure do --- I'm female ---


I don't watch TV -- and certainly don't watch TV ads ---

However, every once in a while I see something ---

the other night -- an ad for DIRECT TV --- featuring a female singer ---
who finally ends up with a gold plated sign in her mouth saying ---
"DOWNGRADE" ---


Tonight I happened to see an ad where young males were beating drums --
seemingly in anticipation of "Mom's" preparing and serving some Duncan Hines Brownies ---

The dad is invariably a blithering idiot

I didn't notice it before he mentioned it, but you and he are right.

They are all nitwits.

Men are pushed by TV into sterotypes of what we're supposed to be just as much as women...Like all the viagra ads "get back in the game" or the Just for Men ads, where a man is shown being unable to date until he dies the grey out...Of course he has to date a women 30 years his junior to be "in the game". Its really manipulative, it tells us what we are supposed to be, and also to want. If you happen to like older women for instance, you're obviously not "in the game". Nor if you have grey hair or want to cultivate something deeper with women than merely being a "player".

I'm thinking, "give it a rest." Do men really find it so important to be able to have an erection in their senior years? The ads sure make it seem so. Of course many, many ads use sexual desirability as the ultimate goal of life. It gets very tiresome. There is no acknowledgment that there really are stages in life, and it is perfectly normal and should be acceptable to focus less on sex and more on other things when you get older. It's really OK even to not give a damn about it after a while.

From my female perspective, when I see the young woman/older man thing, I'm thinking---"yeah, in your dreams." They make it seem like it's common for a young woman to be attractive to a much older man. It's mostly a male fantasy I think.

Viagra is fine if an older mans wants to have a certain kind of sex when he is older of his own volition, but that's not what the commercials offer...Its about getting "back in the game". The thing about "the game" is that in games there are winners and losers, and if you are "on the bench" you are clearly a loser, your personal sexual desires have nothing to do with it. Its not about what men want, its about what men are supposed to want.

I think its the same thing with women men are supposed to date, be it youth or slenderness or whatever. I personally am attracted to women who are not obiese but a little fatter for instance than what I am supposed to want...So in choosing to be with larger women, who I prefer, the media can decrease my social standing, as I'm clearly not "winning the game". Young slender women are like sports cars...Very few people actually care about racing in itself, they just want the fast cars because other people want the fast cars. But of course there are some exceptions.

For starters, the whole notion of Big Pharma marketing prescription drugs to consumers via TV ads is revolting.

But when it comes to boner pills, as a middle-aged male, I'm mostly just saddened. I'm perfectly fine with my ever-so-slowly decreased drive to mate every other minute or so. Assuming things proceed in a somewhat linear fashion, when I'm in my 50s, I think it'll be perfectly manageable without any artificial, potentially life-threatening enhancements, and with open communication with my wife about our physical needs.

Sure, if I were to find myself utterly incapable of sexual function, and in a position to improve matters with some help, I'd look into it. But I really don't think that's what's being marketed. I think Viagra and Cialis are being sold as a kind of Way-Back Machine and that's just sad.

It's unnecessary, it's unhealthy, and the commercials are beyond annoying with their "ooh, we're so naughty!" music and absurdly cleansed depictions of human relations.

Right---I think that is what bothers me. As I said in my other post, it seems like a refusal to accept that there are natural changes in our desire for sex---in most people, I think that's so. I certainly know a lot of women who don't give a damn by the time they have reached their 50s.

That's a pleasant surprise. But it kind of makes sense. They want to market the stuff, and an older man has to think it useful - if they used much younger women it might not seem necessary to the average old man. He knows his real chances of ending up with a much younger woman. And they are catering to the married bunch, whose wives are their ages.

The "bumbling dad" is about as solid a meme as you can get in our culture; I don't particularly blame ads for it. I do blame ads for being so appallingly badly written. And also for being so ineffective -- I can't tell you how many national-buy ads I've seen where I don't even notice the product's name. Strangely enough I've started noticing many local ads are quite good: the product name, three reasons it's better than its competitors, and where you can buy it (the best ad I've ever seen was a local Virginia piece for Koala Mulch -- textbook ad script).

But I digress -- the point is that I don't feel offended by the "dumb dad" stock character in ads. I feel offended that the ad implies that buying a particular detergent or hot dog bun is actually an important decision.

There's a formula. I second dmesg's sentiment. As a sentient being I am insulted.

it's not limited to commercials

Dad is always putting Mom "in her place" on that show. He is sometimes befuddled, but never wrong.

Strictly "doing something" like males forming a drum circle for brownies isn't patently offensive to me. Not like, say, a female in a string bikini ogling a guy drinking beer must be for women.

In fact, that second one might be fun, if the guy ignores the woman for the beer, and the woman does a Jackie Chan kick to his stomach, and SHE walks off with the beer, smiling.

It's the same philosophy as humor. There is absolutely no topic that a good comedian can't use for a laugh. It's all in how it's used.

Now, Spike TV has a trailer-living family in mullets who are apparently making fun of the Spike channel's percieved audience; inbred RE-tards. But in practice, it works out and it is funny.

It's supposed make you feel superior to the product, so you can buy it without feeling duped into it. At least that's what the book on subliminal advertising I read said.

Bumbling Dad, Moronic teenager, Aftershave adds

Then you get adds like this, which subvert everything
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQfXkK1FD3s

(BTW for the US audience "Trollies" is dialect for all male nether garments)

Commercial tell-a-vision is nothing short of brain and spirit pollution. If we're watching something with commercials {although most prime time material is in itself a form of cultural advertising} we always mute them or use the video/monitor switch to black out the picture.

That aside, why do you suppose TVs of all sorts, high def now, flat screens, behemoth screens, are so popular within the consumer culture? It's the delivery system for the DRUG.

talks about Freud and his nephew Edward Bernays who invented the field of P.R. and advertising to cater to unconscious fears and desires of the lizard brain, as discovered by Freud.

Also watch "Manufacturing Consent" by Noam Chomsky.

Both are on YouTube.


WATCH WHAT YOU FEED YOUR HEAD!!!!

Of course they want you to feel uncomfortable or turned on...it means they got your attention. The fact you remembered the advertiser means it worked twice as well. Not that you're gonna buy...just they got your attention and that's the purpose of a commercial..."to heighten awareness".

As a copywriter in a previous lifetime, I learned that advertising is meant to get your attention...that's all. You have 30 or 60 seconds to make your "message" stand out from others and many of these companies will do whatever they can to get that "impression". Magazine ads are notorious for this (subliminal images) as that also is a short "impression" time...and while you may not want or like or need the product, the name has been imprinted.

I'm not condoning this...but that's how the advertising game works. Personally, I appreciate my DVR and remote control...I'm notorious for zapping the second a commercial comes on to sample what other paprika is on the boob toob.

Cheers...

... and some adults make it a career. That's all it amounts to - "made ya look!"

Advertising is an industry that produces nothing and exists entirely on the belief in its own necessity. It makes very greedy people into armchair psychologists and pays them money to do so.

Just had to vent a little about this.

In the case of misandrist media memes, I'm sure some marketer in the 60s did a study that showed that inflating female narcissism under the pretense of feminism and female empowerment, combined with writing off men as hormone-driven wastes of space (but you got to love 'em anyway - himbos are so cute), translates into a perpetual cash crop for your product. Unfortunately it feeds the insecurities of a lot of people and it works.

This is one of the reasons I never watch shows like CSI on the network - I always wait for the DVD set. Advertizers will find a way to wheedle their paycheck out of management whether I'm watching or not.

Control the public mind outside of the workplace.

I wonder why so many resources go into TV advertising when that might be the case with many people.

Yes, this is definitely subliminal...I get the same response on most ads as you do. There are tons of studies on how messages work and what it takes to get noticed (or make an impression). Wilson Key is the master on this type of research...and you see images and sounds manipulated as to get a virtual primordial response. Almost like you can't help BUT to look at it.

While the first time you may not remember, if you run across it numerous times, you will look up again and soon the name does burn in. The power of suggestion can be quite powerful. This regime knows is...look how they've gotten 25% of this country under a hypnotic trance.

Cheers...

it doesn't appear the messages are getting to me. I wonder if there has been any study to prove that people will buy the products whose ads they watch over and over again.

Not only are the programs, for the most part, mindless, insulting rivers of pabulum, but the commercials are worse. Frankly, if the writer's strike would bring the entire industry to a halt and all we were left with were blank screens, I think that would be a good thing.

Ya can't tell me you haven't seen this one with "Big Dick Bob"...



Enzyte... makes your stiffy really spiffy!! :rofl:

It's actually kind of funny, but it is also soooo insulting and patronizing.

"Oh look, Bob fucked Jane's brains out again, literally. Better buy me some Enzyte."

She's dressed in a very matronly way, and I swear, I thought she
was supposed to be his mom. That certainly added a new dimension
to the ads.

let alone an advertisment. I think we have all be so conditioned to be "offended" at the slightest perceived insult.

"Mom, Dad's holding his breath again." :mad:

so you'll spend money on shit you don't need.

because some bimbo is on the commercial.:eyes:

Two classic offenders.

A man playing doubles tennis badly with his wife. He's slow as his wife zips all around him, because he didn't eat his Kellogg's Whatever Bran. The ball hits himn on the head, bouncing it over the net, and wifey says "Great shot Honey!" :puke:

Dr. Mom walks around the house with some purple goo in a spoon, taking care of the kids. At the end of this root canal, she enters her room and there's feeble little helpless Daddy, in bed sick, and she gives him the same purple goo.:eyes:

propaganda by another name.

...nontheless very bizarre...

The first one that popped in my head is the most recent Pizza Hut commercial where the mother worries about her husband because he said he'd cook, and they get home and he has pizza hut laid out. So many commericals imply that men are utterly incapable of cooking, or cleaning, or helping, or generally being anything other than uncouth unbathed monkeys who open jars with their huge medically induced erections.

It's insulting.

I thought it was so insulting and patronizing to men. Not to mention completely stereotyping everyone in the worst way possible. I actually started yelling at the TV the first time I saw that. That's one of the worst offenders in recent years that I can think of.

...when I posted below, but obviously I was too pissed off with the underlying message to bother remembering the product.

There was a Boston Market ad a few years back that started off with this beautiful Viking-style stove/range/oven as the centerpiece of the scene. Then the business-woman drops off the several bags of Boston Market stuff on the top of that stove and walks off again. If I had a range like that (and could afford the gas to fuel it, not to mention the carbon footprint) I would never bother with Boston Market :P

First of all, the only thing in the woman's freezer is brownies.

Second, would you give your little darlings pots and pans to play with, along with spoons/drumsticks?

In answer to the original question, yes, this male feels insulted by tv ads. Anything to do with "erectile dysfunction" or hair loss.

(which, by the way---do you remember the brand? I don't. My point in a post upthread)---is the 2 boys grabbing the brownies and shoving them in their mouths. I keep thinking how their both heading for a sugar stupor.

and I remember it because I have seen that commercial a LOT.

And, yes, the two boys shoving the brownie's their mouths bothers me, also. My partner and I look at each other and say "My mother would have KILLED me if I did that".

when I watch that part.

seem to be aimed at ten year olds. Rather puzzling because ten years olds can't buy cars or beer.

Go figure. :shrug:

Not a fan of the "Life Takes Visa" ads, for a number of reasons. Mostly because the one guy in line who wastes all of 3 seconds paying in cash is looked at as an ass, even by the cashier, who's job will be obsolete.

More depressed than insulted. Random human contact takes a back seat to quickly getting wherever it is that you probably don't have to be all that fast.

Like chewing tin foil.

to reach the lizard part of our brain, regardless of gender. I believe while this may sell products, it primarily reinforces our thinking toward the inane, superficial, shallow, petty and look at the pretty paintings while the Titanic sinks mentality, it's a constant bombardment against our sensibilities 24/7.

Somebody wiser than myself once said "you are what you think", this coupled with so much corporate media programming and commercials solely geared toward the goal of manipulating the American People's consciousness for the media's own greedy self-serving agenda, cause me to have great trepidation for the future of our nation.

I find most (about 99%) commercials offensive.

men are always portrayed as incompetent idiots in commercials and sitcoms because it's deemed socially acceptable. If the gender roles were reversed there would be a total outrage against said show and the usual fallout would occur, endless debate discussions, calls for boycott, public apologies etc...

Where dad or hubby did everything right as in "Father Knows Best" or all those damn westerns with the manly men. Women then were subservient and never smarter than a man. But these days the shows are on this other stereotype that has run its course.

Rule #2: Never date women with dragon tattoos.

Rule #3: Always get chili on your Nachos Bellgrande.

I see you've met my ex-boyfriend. I wouldn't lend him any more money if I were you.

I'm very insulted by the beer commercials that get thrown at us, especially the bud lite commercials. They're the very definition of alcoholic behavior, anyone doing what the people in those commercials do would very quickly find themselves divorced, unemployed and homeless desperately seeking another drunk.

Just once I wish they'd show what real hardcore beer drinkers are like, show the party after half the keg is gone, the fights, infidelities, the deafness of the drunk, people puking up the swill, and the carnage that happens after you consume too much and attempt to drive, just once say at halftime during the superbowl.

Just once.

edit: wrong word.

It's all yippy-skippy in the ads. No beer breath, hungover and abusive, no nothing of real life drinking. And fights, as you say. Or getting robbed because you're too tanked to be paying attention.

...are those dealing with men and food.

Give a guy some charcoal, a backyard grill and a slab of meat and suddenly they're Emeril.

Unblindfold them in the middle of your average kitchen and suddenly it's as if you've dropped them off in a foreign land without their GPS device.

I mean, one ad went so far as for the woman to print out photos of the items to be bought at the grocery store for the guy to buy.

I know how to cook. I know how to bake. I know pastry, grocery shopping, cleaning, ironing and how to sew. And yet, I don't own a grill or care to.

What's really interesting is how these ads are often conceived and produced in New York City, a place also famous for its male chefs. Why the complete disconnect with their home culture?

when they are bouncing around ideas. Sometimes I imagine it in my head while watching a particularly bad commercial. Everybody is saying "yeah, great idea" and why it is, when it really is a rotten one; but they live in some weird world that I don't live in, so they don't know it's a rotten idea.

Nah...I just ignore them. I only watch about a football games worth of TV a month.

Not just ads either, but the sitcoms.

He thinks a lot of media nowadays portrays men as stupid, immature, and incapable of basic life skills without the assistance of a woman (who of course is blond, skinny, and about 14,000 times more attractive than her boorish husband...but that's MY beef about sitcoms...).

He also hates the diamond commercials this time of year, because they all suggest that if he can't or won't buy me expensive jewelry for Christmas he's a failure. Never mind that I don't actually WANT any diamonds for Christmas...

The really good-looking woman with the "lousy"-looking husband. That means you can be a big slob, but a woman doesn't care about your looks; it's what inside that counts. Whereas for the man, it's just the opposite. Both are wrongly based.

Except with these stupid programs, the guys never have anything "inside" to recommend them either. They act like little incompetent babies who are basically extra children that the long-suffering woman has to take care of and clean up after.

Yeah. That's what I find attractive in a man. Immaturity, incompetence, and slobby-ness. :eyes: What planet do these moron sitcom writers live on anyway???? I would NEVER have given my husband even a second date if it was obvious that he didn't have basic life skills like cooking and doing laundry.

I guess i could feel insulted about how men are portrayed on adverts.
Stupid men, stupid women.

I am always reminded of something from <i>Videodrome</i>
The television screen is the retina of the mind's eye. Therefore, the television screen is part of the physical structure of the brain. Therefore, whatever appears on the television screen emerges as raw experience for those who watch it. Therefore, television is reality, and reality is less than television.

I think therefore TV is more real than reality....

Unfortunately, I think, so the advertisers aren't looking for me.

Tell you what, we can all be pissed off about Adverts, MythTV everything, and force the marketers to put the products into the show. Eventually we will get the ability to blur those as well, until something even more bizarre and inexplicable is created.

And who said there was no creativity in TV?

..."Blipverts" from Max Headroom? ;)

Unfortunately, as I recall, they killed people, too. Kind of the antithesis of marketing...