Advertising code of ethics, meaning, cultural/situational context & representation

Source: http://idryclean.net/images/ad.png

Man should not stay at home, man should work and supports the family. Woman should stay at home and raise their children, woman are weaker therefore man should do all the hard work. Man should act like a man and marry a woman, man who marries the same sex are weak. All this are sexist, it shows no respect to man, woman and even homosexual people. Smith (2010) states that sexism is a form of bias judgement based on gender. Many people uses the term to describe discrimination against women, it also effect men, transsexual, inter-sexuals, along with individuals who abstain from traditional roles and identity (Smith, 2010). Advertisements this day shows a lot bias-ness. We can see female model in computer virus advertisement, it gives an idea of woman are not intelligent enough to take care of a computer.

Sexism is not just about showing bias on gender, it also includes stereotyping the gender itself. Sexism includes attitudes which support that discrimination, such as stereotyping sex roles and generalizing an entire gender (Smith, 2010). Male with well-build body in fragrance advertisement creates a stereotype where man should look physically like the male model in order to be perfect. Female with well-curve body in bikinis advertisement creates the stereotype where woman should look like them in order to attract man. They push the traditional way of viewing the opposite sex where beauty comes form the inside. 


Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) plays a role in filtering all the advertisements before going out to the public. The ASA is the UK's independent watchdog committed to maintaining high standards in advertising for the benefits of consumers, advertisers and society at large (ASA, 2009).


In one of Kathryn Peter's article - Time to kick sexism out of advertising, she talks about sexism and uses one of WKD's 'funny' footballs advertisement. The advertisement shows a very heavy sexist issues when the husband of the family orders the woman to do house chores (Peter, 2010). She then explain about ASA's responsibility. ASA acts as the independent regulator of advertising industry in UK, they enforced rules written by the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) and Broadcast Committee of Advertising Practice (BCAP) (Peter, 2010). Peter then states that all this sexist advertisements are released because the ASA are not doing their job well. Complaints are made to the ASA but they rebutted all this released advertisement are "unlikely to cause extensive and significant offense", the ASA also states that "it was intended to be a humorous representation" (Peter, 2010).


Peter states that in order to stop this sexism issue, we, as the people, holding the rights for a citizen should press complaints to the advertising company (Peter, 2010). Therefore, in my own opinion, when we're not satisfy of an advertisement, especially when it's hurtful and offensive, we should complaint. We have the power to define perceptions of what amounts to "the prevailing standards" of our society (Peter, 2010).




References:

• Smith, S 2010, What is Sexism?, online, retrieved by 6th November 2010, from <http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-sexism.htm>
• Russell, V 2010, Racism and Sexism, online, retrieved by 6th November 2010, from <http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/wlm/racesex/>
• Advertising Standards Authority 2009, About ASA, online, retrieved by 6th November 2010, from <http://www.asa.org.uk/About-ASA.aspx>
• Perera, K 2010, Time to kick Sexism out of advertising, online, retrieved by 6th November 2010, from <http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jun/29/kick-sexism-out-of-advertising>