08th Feb 2010
EDEC 262- Blog 6
Blog 6- Arabs in the Media: One is All
By presenting a unified and homogeneous representation of Arabs on television and screen, media creates the illusion of a reified group, a group that supposedly thinks and acts together as one. Consequently, when one member of that reified group acts in a way counter to the prevailing culture, viewers of that media are able to reject, castigate or dehumanize large swathes of people in a wholesale fashion. One Arab becomes all Arabs.
We’ve all seen the ridiculous representations of Arab people in media and been saturated in the continual imagery of terrorism, guns, sexuality, apparent irrationality, and violence that narrows our understanding of who an Arab person is. This is only further reinforced by the discourse surrounding Arabs, notably in the 6 o’clock news; when we hear the dreaded “They”, we give pause to wonder who precisely falls within those boundaries. Despite the fluidity of identity and race (Who is an Arab? Who decides who qualifies as an Arab? Do you have to self-identify to be an Arab? What is the difference between Islamic and Islamist? Why is there a ubiquitous conflation between Arab and Muslim?), borders are formed and deemed static.
This type of reductionism isn’t just to be found in representations of Arabs. Television is seemingly masterful at painting broad sweeps to gather in large groups of people without consideration for nuance or identity. These clusters of ethnicity, religion, race, culture, and geography are both products of a tendency towards reductionism in the fast-paced media but also tools for subjugation and the further homogenizing of society.
What other groups receive similar homogenous groupings and what are the implications for those clusterings? What examples exist of a single individual (lauded or vilified) who is made to stand as a representative of his entire race (much in line with that “credit to his race”-talk still occurs)? How are these clusterings read by viewers of media?
Robert
PS—Dr. Steinberg requests that you blog at some point about a Super Bowl commercial. Thus, if you didn’t do so last week, do so here. If you did so last week, you’re welcome to comment here about this week’s topic or about a topic of your own choosing.
*DIFFERENT TOPIC* – HOW DOES THE MEDIA SUPPORT VALENTINE’S DAY?
As Valentine’s Day approaches, men and women are shopping around for little (or big) gifts to give their loved ones, but why is it so important? Is it because of religious beliefs for Saint Valentine? I think not. I think the media has created this propaganda that everyone needs to buy…and buy…and consume…on the 14th day of the month of February. Is it odd that the Holidays are over and thus the consumption of goods has perhaps decreased, yet all of a sudden flower shops and stores such as Hallmark are flourishing for this one day? And we can’t forget the chocolate…
I think this message of consumption is reinforced in the media – just look at the movie coming out with the most insane cast of popular culture actors in one single movie entitled “Valentine’s Day”. Isn’t it crazy that all these famous people (Patrick Dempsey, Eric Dane, Jennifer Garner, Jessica Alba, Queen Latifah, Ashton Kutcher, Taylor Lautner, Taylor Swift, Topher Grace, Julia Roberts, Jamie Foxx, to name a few…) are reunited in a movie that focuses and celebrates this commercial holiday? I mean, the cast is almost ridiculous! I can assume that the theaters will be PACKED this weekend, and this, to support Valentine’s Day, because this movie – a popular form of media – emphasizes its crucial importance.
P.S. Am I so terrible to want to go see it with my boyfriend? I might wait a week or two…you know, to show that I am being critical about the media and do not have to follow the trends…*slightly embarrassed…*
Here is the trailer for Valentine’s Day..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0t8-l8SMxA
*Off Topic*
Response to HOW DOES THE MEDIA SUPPORT VALENTINE’S DAY?
Every year, on February 14th individuals around the world celebrate Valentine’s Day. Even though I am in a long-term relationship, I do not support this “holiday”. I think this holiday is a stupid excuse for corporations to make money. As I have repeated it so many times, why do we need to set aside one day to celebrate our loved ones? Why can’t it be everyday? Why does consumerism need to remind people to tell their loved ones that they love them?
I remember through out elementary, peers would pass out Valentine’s Day cards. There was always that one person that felt left out because they only received one card; as compared to the popular kids who were overwhelmed with Valentine’s cards. Whereas, in high school, the girls in relationships were “surprised” with flowers and chocolates during school hours. What a dramatic scene it used to be.
From my perspective, the media has placed pressed on guys – to purchase the perfect flower, chocolate and jewellery in order to impress their wives or girlfriends. Some even considered it to be romantic to purpose to their loved ones on Valentine’s Day – yuck; how tacky can you be?
Maybe, I am being a valentine’s day Grinch, but do we really need to buy into consumerism and marketing in order to celebrate the ones we hold close to our hearts? I think the only good thing about Valentine’s Day, is the great sales on chocolate the next day.
The spam thing is still happening. I cannot post, any suggestions?
DIFFERENT TOPIC: Super Bowl 2010 Commercial
The one thing that I don’t like about watching the Super Bowl in Canada is that we don’t get the American commercials. Yes, we had some pretty cool Olympic commercials, but I’m always jealous that the Americans get to watch all the “made for Super Bowl” commercials. Luckily I found the commercials online. Most of these commercials were really amusing. I found that they were geared towards men, generally those who were more likely to be rowdy, or who enjoyed sports (obviously!). There were some exceptions to this rule however, including the pro-life commercial that Focus On The Family aired. The commercial that stuck out to me after watching all commercials was one by Google. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=889LgVOPdaw) This commercial was probably one of the least expensive to film, as the only shot in the entire commercial is of a search box and search results page on Google. The commercial tells a story of a student going to France to study abroad, only to meet a girl, whom he continues dating, moves to Paris for, marries, and has a child with. This entire story is told through the search box of Google, with only text and background music, no words. It is surprising to me that the least expensive commercial was the one that stuck with me, and the one that I liked the most. This simple commercial, although expensive to air, gained publicity for Google, as many people are still talking about it, some people have even made parodies of the commercial already.
SUPER BOWL & SUPER ADS (My response to the Super Bowl)
As many of my peers have stated in the previous commentary, Super Bowl and Super Ads (Blog 5), the Man Crunch advertisement presented a supposed to be funny story of two macho, masculine men act in homosexual ways. Now, when watching this advertisement, I immediately wondered how the American population would have reacted to such a commercial airing during the Super Bowl this year. As we have seen in previous Super Bowl’s, the commercials that air are usually aimed at a certain demographic and present hegemonic ideals. This commercial does not fall into either category.
Therefore, can it be said that this particular advertisement was created for the sole purpose of being talked about. Due to the man on man action, something that is taboo in media, it doesn’t surprise me that the broadcaster restricted airing such a commercial. It clearly demonstrates that the broadcasting companies want to continue to enable these hegemonic values and present them to the world at large. I personally think that this advertisement should have aired because it would have perhaps introduced the world to seeing that we need to stop living under these hegemonic values that were disposed to. In all honesty, even though this advertisement for Man Crunch did not air during the Super Bowl, it has still gotten people taking, and whether the talk is positive or negative, it is getting publicity. As the saying goes, controversy creates cash.
DIFFERENT TOPIC: American Idol phenomenon
American Idol made its premiere in 2002 and has blazed its way to top. I have not missed a single season and this makes me ponder why? The most sadistic thing is that my favorite part of this show is the auditions. Why do I get personal satisfaction in seeing people humiliate themselves in front of millions? I have to say, I’m flummoxed by the fact that these awful singers actually believe they have talent and when they get brutally rejected by the judges, they look devastated. This begs the question, is it purely an act from these individuals in order to get their moment of fame or am I actually witnessing genuine emotions?
When it comes time for Hollywood week, I begin to scout out my favorites. I simply cannot imagine how stressful this week must be for them. I believe the reason people still tune in for the this part of the show is because they want to be there from the start to witness a star being born.
Is this show credible? Yes, I believe so. A handful of the contestants have made it to the top of the charts. Will this show keep on getting bigger and bigger or will the hype die down?
*DIFFERENT TOPIC*
I love the comments on Valentine’s Day! I am laughing because all my friends and I had this conversation last week, “what should we get for our boyfriends for Valentine’s Day?” It is actually quite funny because we are all anti-valentine’s day, and yet all of our boyfriends want to do something special. It is almost like men have been brainwashed into thinking that women love the holiday, and as a result, they insist on doing something in order to celebrate it.
I agree that it is just another excuse for consumerism. And honestly, who buys into it all? Men, because the majority of women in society expect it!
As far as the movie “Valentine’s day”, I have never heard of it. This weekend my boyfriend and I are going to see Dear John instead. I know it came out last weekend, but hey, he wasn’t in Montreal then. I am actually so excited for it and I wonder if it may do better in the box office, only because so many people know Nicholas Sparks and love his work. It will be interesting to see.
Good call on the cast though, it’s crazy! Pretty much every character in the film is a well known celebrity! (Definitely will help its ratings!)
g*y men. I think this ties in well with Valentine’s Day too. All of the advertisements that I have seen are targeted towards heteros*xual couples. This is strange considering there are a large number of homos*xual couples in North America.
I feel like g*y men are stereotyped into a cluster. When many people hear of a g*y man, they automatically think of that flamboyantly gay character “Jack”, portrayed in the TV show, Will and Grace. Many people do not associate macho, working men as capable of being gay.
I mean Montreal is definitely better for this than the small town I am from, however it still happens. It’s like whenever my friends meet a g*y guy who works out and loves sports, they’re like “I can’t believe he’s gay”. I mean come on, does he have to wear a tutu and prance around? Let’s be realistic!
And even after people meet someone who does not follow the cluster, they consider it coincidental so their opinion doesn’t change. I believe this is the case for races too. When will people finally be exposed to enough people outside of their specific mindsets that they change their opinion? Will they ever?
**SUPERBOWL COMMERCIALS**
Watching the Superbowl isn’t one of my annual traditions and therefore, I wasn’t aware that there was such a big hype surrounding the commercials. But I guess because the Superbowl is the biggest night in television, it makes sense that it would be a good time to showcase the best of the best in the advertisement business. So when it finally came time to watch these infamous commercials, I was pretty excited to sit down and be entertained by something I usually press mute for! However, I think my expectations were set too high because I thought the commercials lacked the creativity and ingeniousness everyone was talking about.
It seems a recurring theme was actually female dominance over males. For instance, the commercial about the mini handheld tv portrayed a guy who was forced to go shopping with his extremely high maintenance girlfriend. The voice over even says “This is Jason and as you can see, his girlfriend has removed his spine and prevented him from watching the game.” The message is clear: women are simply nagging control freaks who take away your freedom and cause you to suffer each and every day.
And who is the target audience?! Why macho testosterone-ated men watching the GAME, of course. Who needs women when you have beer and football? The ad is an outcry to males reminding them not to let women take control of their lives.
SUPERBOWL AD
I went to http://www.superbowl-ads.com and they were listing the top ads from the last 12 years as well as the ones from 2010. Going through them, I was quite suprised that they included trailers during the ad spots. I had thought that the American media would have simply wanted to spend the time promoting consumer products not movies. The Alice and Wonderland trailer, staring Johnny Depp was seen amonst these trailers. To me, this shows how much backing this movie has. If they can afford to put a slot up during superbowl time obviously shows that they are trying to get a large audience and that they have a great amount of money, most likely because of the stars seen in this movie.
The one that I want to talk about is the Kia Motors ad that contained characters from Treehouse TV, a preschool television station. Why would they want to have the main characters from the most popular shows (geared to ages 1-6) driving their car? To me, this states that the company is trying to emphasize that their car is a family car, safe, reliable and suited for kids and adults alike. It is filled with the characters participating in fun activities, such as riding a jet ski and bowling, all family activities. Again, this can show that the new Kia van is a perfect family car.
NEW TOPIC—DISNEY and racism
After watching the clip of Aladdin in class yesterday, I went home and went through my Disney collection to watch it again as I love this movie. When doing this, I noticed something that I hadn’t really before. All of the movies of Disney are really staying true to the sterotypes of not just Arabs but other races as well. Mulan, even though she goes to fight the Huns, does return to be the perfect wife and daughter to the men in her life. Disney’s princesses uphold the views of the typical, sweet, niave and rather feminine views of women. The white men are often portrayed as manly, for instance, Gaston from Beauty and the Beast. But it was the realization of the African American’s that really hit me. Only in Atlantis is there a main character who is African American. Despite almost 80 years of movies has Disney finally made an African American WOMAN as the main character, let alone having African Americans in the whole movie–The Princess and the Frog.
My question is, is it because of the Walt Disney’s racist views while he was alive, the sterotypes of past and present, or the fear of racism that caused this to happen? Why only in 2009, after 80 years of movie making, did Disney decide to create a Black protagonist?
*** Valentine’s Day and other Consumer Holidays
Cindy raised a valid point about Valentine’s Day becoming all about buying things. The media seems to try to latch onto any holiday and market all sorts of things to our consumer society. It seems today that when you walk into a store there is always some holiday theme with its merchandise. In the summertime you see Halloween stuff beginning to take over store shelves. Almost immediately following October 31st Christmas decorations are everywhere! Then when Christmas is over you begin to see Valentine’s Day and so on….. In stores it always seems that holiday stuff is displayed earlier and earlier every year! So many of these holidays have to do with family or a religious event but unfortunately now turned into but now they just seem another excuse for people to reach into their wallets and hand over endless amounts of money for cheap items with a theme!
There are aisles and aisles dedicated to holiday items in so many stores. Of course a popular one for many is the dollar store. It seems there is an endless selection of holiday themed pencils, stickers and even socks! As a future teacher I often find myself guilty of browsing looking for cute little trinkets to give my students. Yet I think it is also important not to have too much commercial holiday stuff in the classroom. Children’s handmade decorations are more unique and a lot nicer than the cookie cutter stuff found in stores. The focus in the classroom should be more on the meaning than on the “cool stuff” you can buy. I’m sure it would be hard for most of us to go cold turkey and not buy anything for any particular holiday. But for example, on Valentine’s Day your affection should be shown more in actions than by the amount of stuff you buy or how big the bouquet of flowers you purchase is. There is always another reason to spend money so why not spare some change and find a better way to show someone you love them.
Response to Cindy’s Blog on Valentine’s Day and Commercialism
Cindy is absolutely right how Valentine’s Day is commercialized. Does anyone even know how it originated? How it was a religious belief?? I don’t think so. As soon as February hits, or even earlier, we get bombarded with television ads about jewelry, chocolate… It sort of forces people to buy things, and if you don’t it seems as if there’s something wrong with you. In the “metro”, the newspaper which anyone can get in the metros, there was a Valentine’s Day countdown!! On the front page! Under the number, it says how you can go to Hallmark for last-minute gifts. It makes you wonder how much money Hallmark, and other stores get just by Valentine’s Day alone! Flower shops must make the most money from Valentine’s Day!
Christmas too is commercialized! Although many people still celebrate it for its religious purposes, many just celebrate it because we are all exposed to “gift-giving, tree-decorating…” Many non-Christians even celebrate it for the sole purpose that they want to buy presents, receive presents, decorate their house, put up lights,… which in the end, requires money!
SUPER BOWL & SUPER ADS – RESPONSE TO DAVID’S REPSONSE TO THE MAN CRUNCH AD
I found it really interesting to read David’s blog, especially when he commented that the Man Crunch ad really did not belong as portraying the hegemonic ideals nor as those of the homosexual ones. I agree with this. If careful observation is made of this ad, I notice that the url for this dating site is not even mentioned. Rather, a caption stating “Where many many many Men Come Out and Play” comes on screen for 3 seconds – long enough for the heads on the logo to kiss. I also noticed that the posters behind the “gay lovers” included a sign that indicated “no entry,” there was a stop sign with an arrow pointing to the chip bowl – “the scene of the crime,” and yet another poster that read “this equipment starts and stops automatically”. Perhaps I am reading way too much into this all these signs seem to point to anti-gay behaviour. The “no entry” sign points to no sexual entry permitted (forgive the crassness), the stop sign with the arrow meant “stop the action that will occur at the chip bowl” (the stepping stone toole scene), and the “this equipment starts and stops automatically” relates to the uncontrollable gay act. I am not homosexual but I do not feel as if this is a pro-gay ad.
PART II
Watching this makes me feel as if the creators if this ad believe that homosexuals are devious sexual beings and need a place where “many many many Man Come Out and Play”. In my experience, heterosexual dating sites are geared towards finding life-mates. Sites that promote “hacing fun” are clandestine and protrayed as dirty. Do heterosexuals even have clean promiscuous websites? Would that even work? Maybe denial is at hand with me but perhaps that is one reason why this ad did not make it to the ultimate big screen.
***NEW TOPIC: RESPONSE TO SAMANTHA BOYD’S response to Super bowl ads.
I think Samantha made a good point when she wondered why marketers used Treehouse characters in their car advertisement. I saw the commercial as well and was struck by several of the marketer’s choices.
First, I think the marketer’s use of children’s characters not only indicates that the car would be a “good” choice for a family but it also specifically targets the dominant culture of the Super bowl audience. It recognizes that many of the Superbowl’s audiences members are doubtless of family rearing age.
Many parents would probably recognize these characters and laugh at the idea of them doing reckless and “grown up things” like going to a club, hanging out in a hot-tub and going water-skiing . The advertisement seemed to suggest by these images that even the most innocent of characters (such as responsible parents) can have a hidden wild side.
This freedom can thus be achieved… through driving a fantastic Kia automobile.
The advertisers recognized that their audience may also include children. If they were to catch sight of these familiar characters having a good time, kids would probably jump for joy at the sight of them and completely miss the subtle innuendo’s that their parents were privy to (Such is the calculated shrewdness of advertisers). By creating multi-level commercial, they reach more than one facet of their target audience.
After the montage of images depicting the Treehouse characters in a variety of city, country, quintessential American locales has had its dramatic effect, the commercial reverts back to an image of a child getting into the car and the mother pulling away from their “dreamy” mini-mansion. Here this lasting image recognizes suburbia as the ultimate hegemonic ideal of the “American dream”.
You have made it when you drive a Kia and live in the suburbs with a family.
*SUPERBOWL ADS*
When looking through several Superbowl ads, I couldn’t help but to be really appalled of the new IPad commercial. For starts, do we really need a new Mac product? It is incredibly exhausting for those who want to constantly keep up with the trends, but then again, this desire to keep up with trends is exactly why they make so much money. Secondly, this is probably one of the most blunt ads I’ve ever seen. It begins by giving us a small list of things you could do with an Ipad (ex: control the galaxy?..ridiculous!). The ad continues to inform you that if all else fails, you could always use it as a tray and it finishes with a message that all ads attempt to send to their viewers only in a highly less obvious way: “Just buy it already”. Am I the only one who finds this offensive as a viewer? This ad is treating its viewers as if everybody would be this easily influenced and feeble minded. The effort that went into this commercial is also very minimal and it makes me feel as if we are working backwards in the world of media. This is the type of message I would expect to see so bluntly stated in the 1950’s when the television had not long ago been available to the public.
Here is a link to the commercial for those who are interested:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIF1pcE9r-4
*DIFFERENT TOPIC – SUPERBOWL ADS*
My brother had told me that the Doritos ads for the super bowl were really good, so I decided to check them out. They were actually quite funny, but I realized that all the characters were male! The few Budweiser commercials that I saw also were focused around male characters. Females eat chips and drink beer too! We definitely see the stereotype here that only males watch the super bowl, therefore most of the commercials are made to grab the attention of male audiences.
When looking at the Doritos commercials I noticed that the themes they used were especially focused around masculinity. In one, there were two friends at a GYM, the other was with man’s best friend (a DOG), and another involved DATING and VIDEO GAMES.
The specific one I want to talk about is where a black man comes to his date’s house to pick her up. He walks in and gives her flowers and then she walks away and says she’ll be right back. She (also being African-American) walks away and struts her stuff, and of course, doesn’t the camera focus on her butt and then back to the man who takes a GOOD look at her booty! We see him tilt his head and make kind of a “dayyyuuumnnnnn!” face; he is quite impressed. I wasn’t at least bit surprised when I saw this because of course, the stereotypical black male looks at all women’s booty’s as they walk away, right!? It was quite funny to see, but also reinforces what we’ve been talking about; how the media loves to show stereotypes, therefore making it even harder for us to erase these stereotypes from society.
I just focused on half of the commercial, you can check the full clip here:
http://www.superbowl-commercials.org/604.html
So for me, football has always been part of my growing up. My brother used to play in a league, my family has been watching it for the past forty-four years, and I dated a quarterback who is now playing for a college in the United States. Obviously, every year, around the beginning of February, we take the chicken wings, the nachos, and the beer out. But is this sport holiday really only about the football game itself?
Every year it’s the same thing. We ask each other what the commercials will be like. But isn’t this about two teams combating for the Vincent Lombardi Trophy? I have to say, I am part of those who does get excited to see what new commercials Bud Light will come up with. Now to think about, they aren’t just funny commercials you sit down and laugh to but a lot of stereotypes arise.
Like Camille mentioned, when I was watching the Super Bowl on Sunday, I saw the commercial when the African American brings flowers to his date. I was so shocked when the camera literally pointed at her butt! As a woman, I felt disrespected. I felt as if they used her behind as a pure object, which then directly relates to sex.
Another commercial that got me think was the Bud Light commercial parody of the television series, Lost. So obviously, by looking at it, especially if you are a fan of the show Lost, you’ll think it’s funny! But think again. I woman comes running to the lost people who, their plane has crashed, telling them she’s found a radio to get rescuers. We then hear a man in the background say he’s found Bud Light and every one runs to him. By watching that, one we see that Bud Light is more important than being saved, and two, they use a mans power over a woman’s… Why couldn’t it be the other way around? Why couldn’t it be the woman who found the beer? I think it’s very disrespectful for us, woman, especially that after all these years we’ve fought for a place, and to this day, in the year 2010, we still see the man having power!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pt3GsTPgSGo
**DIFFERENT TOPIC**
I agree with everyone who said that the commercials during the Super Bowl are aimed at men and how it’s sexist (blah, blah, blah). But the fact of the matter is that the majority of people who watch the Super Bowl are in fact men! Companies aim their commercials at the demographic that will be exposed to them so I really don’t see what the fuss is about. Imagine that a female oriented company like Tampax advertised during the game, what would the reaction be? There are certainly more men than women that watch the game so I think that the overwhelming majority would be squirming in their seats rather than be amused by the commercial.
I also watched the Dorito’s commercials and thought that they were hilarious. While they did play into stereotypes a little bit, particularly in the one that showed a black man going on a first date with a woman. Camille Charbonneau spoke about this one, he checks out her booty for a second while she walks away but I believe that a white man could have easily replaced this black character and it would have been equally funny. The emphasis was not on the man checking out his date’s booty but him grabbing one of her young son’s Doritos. The son slaps the man and says, “Keep your hands off my momma and keep your hands off my Doritos.” I think that regardless of the minimal controversy regarding the booty stare, the commercial was still funny because of the little kid.
*Different topic: How media’s representations of Arabs has affected my life
This topic relates closely to this week’s blog. After having discussed and read about media’s influence on the thoughts of North Americans concerning Arabs, I immediately thought of something that happened to my brother-in-law.
I decided to go to New York City this year (for the New Year) with my sister, my brother-in-law and my cousin. This is not the first time that we take a road trip together to New York City or to another State. As soon as we reached the border, the American lady that was serving us immediately asked for our passports and she also asked us how we knew one another. After answering her two questions, she began looking through our passports and one-by-one (starting with me first and ending with my brother-in-law), she asked us little questions about our identity. When she reached my brother-in-law’s passport, she put on a different face (a defensive one) and she began asking him questions about whether he had a citizenship in Saudi Arabia? An “important” point that I forgot to make is that my brother-in-law is Lebanese; his last name is Abou-Atme and he was born as well as he lived in Saudi-Arabia for ten years. When this woman read his last name and saw that he was born in Saudi-Arabia, she literally “freaked out!” She began asking many questions to my brother-in-law only concerning Saudi-Arabia and whether he was sure that he was not a citizen there. Then she asked my brother-in-law to stop the car, to give her the car keys, and to step out of the car while she looked through our personal belongings in the trunk. After having clearly realized that there was nothing to worry about, she asked everyone one last question about our occupation and then she let us leave.
This situation also took place soon after the terrorist incident that had happened on the 25th of December. The Americans were clearly not taking any chances and as was discussed in lecture last week, they assumed that if you are from any form of Arabic background that you are a terrorist; that one bad Arab is all Arabs. They think that they are protecting their country by acting in such a way although all they are doing is wasting time and reinforcing stereotypes. The American government and the media’s influence on Americans and more importantly, on North Americans are extremely heavy; they clearly, through this example, have great power in controlling the thoughts of the North American population.
Response to “HOW DOES THE MEDIA SUPPORT VALENTINE’S DAY?”
I am responding to this blog from a single’s point of view. I am single and I find that Valentine’s Day is so pushed in the media that I find, if I don’t receive something for V day, that I am a failure. I have to say, as far as I know, I am not a failure just because I don’t have someone to celebrate Valentine’s Day with.
What is being done on Valentine’s Day is something that couples can do on their anniversary. There is so much pressure to remember birthdays and specials dates such as anniversaries and on top of that, you have to buy gifts each year? I don’t think that adding Valentine’s Day to that list help very much.
The media really does push it because as I mentioned, I feel like my life isn’t complete with the Hallmark card that sings to me or that box of “Russell Stover” assorted chocolates in a heart shaped box. Do I really need all that? I don’t think so, but the media does.
SUPER BOWL & SUPER ADS – RESPONDING TO DAVID’S and NATASHA’S REPSONSE TO THE MAN CRUNCH AD
As I had mentioned in my previous blog, advertisements serve as a powerful force. I’ve decided for this blog to build on that idea while at the same time replying to what my peers had to say about the “Man Crunch” advertisement that was supposed to be presented at the Super Bowl this year. The commercial shows us two manly men watching football. As they reach for some chips, their hands touch and they start to make out all of a sudden. I can’t believe that this was supposed to advertise a gay networking website. I agree with David who said that this commercial is considered to be taboo. This explains why it wasn’t aired during the Super Bowl because it truly goes against hegemonic values. However, I must disagree with David when he said that it should be aired to go against hegemonic values. I think that this commercial is a mockery of the gay community. Like Natasha had pointed out with the posters in the background stating such things as “No Entry”, a stop sign and an arrow pointing down at the chips, and “Caution: This Equipment Starts and Stops Automatically”. This advertisement sends out the message that being gay is a joke. The music even contributes to this mockery. I’m glad that the commercial was not aired; it saves the targeted audience from the humiliation.
RESPONSE TO: “HOW DOES THE MEDIA SUPPORT VALENTINE’S DAY?”
Valentine’s day is often associated with red roses, chocolate, teddy bears with hearts and jewelry. BORING. In my opinion, the media supports Valentine’s Day in all the wrong ways….
Magazines articles, websites, movies and ads are just a few branches of the media that are involved in making Valentine’s Day the commercialized “holiday” it has become today. Valentine’s Day is just around the corner and we can definitely sense its presence as we watch the many businesses prepare for this awaited “holiday”.
I have to agree with the fact that the media does an excellent job in being able to change the meaning of many celebrated holidays. In my opinion, Valentine’s Day has always been one of the most commercialized “holidays”. The media portrays Valentine’s Day as being a day about love and affection between couples (dinner for two, romantic weekend, etc) and women (as well as men) around the world seem to expect a special kind of “treatment” on that one day a year.
In reality, love is not about one particular day. Valentine’ s Day is not only a day intended for those in a relationship, as the media tends to portray. Love is not just for couples; it is for everyone.
I think the best way to express love and affection towards your loved ones is through the small gestures in life that are done every day of the year.
SUPER BOWL AD
I did watch a bit of the Super Bowl this Sunday, but unfortunately, I was only able to see it on CTV so I didn’t get to see all the commercials that are aired in the states. So I looked online for the commercials and I ended up finding a few that caught my eye. They include the FLO TV “my generation” ad and the ad for E trade. However, the one that really stood out for me is the Google ad, which Jennifer Allore mentioned as well. Apparently, this commercial had been on youtube for quite some time and it became so popular that they decided to air it during the Super Bowl. When I was looking through the different super bowl ads, I saw that quite a few of them stuck with sex, humour and the use of celebrities to help endorse their products. The Google ad was a refreshing change from that. It was a simple commercial, and yet, it was able to get its message across, which is that Google can help you with anything in your life, whether it is to help find places to go in Paris or instructions for how to build a crib. It probably is the one that cost the least to make, and yet for me, was one of the best.
This definitely is an ad that I don’t think is necessarily geared towards men. Both men and women use the internet, so the ad does target both groups in that respect, but I think that the love story that is told through the commercial definitely is geared towards women. It is a story of a man who goes to Paris to study, and ends up meeting and marrying a girl, and they are about to start a family. It certainly stood out for me, and from the number of views that it has on youtube, which is in the millions, it definitely has caught the attention of many others as well.
In contrast to pretty much everyone else this week, I decided to respond to this week’s topic. As mentioned in class, Arabs are extremely negatively portrayed in the media. I gave a lesson while I was on stage about stereotypes (especially concerning Muslims) and one that the students thought was very funny was that Muslims were the three Bs: billionaires, bombers or belly dancers. It may sound funny to children, but sadly, it is common belief that mostly all Muslims fit into one of these categories.
hmm they won’t let me post the rest of my comment… its “too spammy” apparently!
As an Asian, I think Asians receive similar homogenous groupings. Everyone knows that Asians are shown as nerds or those who are good in math in media. Since I was young, in any movies or in any Disney movies, if there was a guy with big glasses, holding a book, and passing by the main characters, they were Asians. People think Asians are shy and smart. Yes, I am shy but I’m not that smart. I always felt burden when people asked me what I got on my test, or when people asked me questions on our math assignments. However, because people thought I was smart and good in math, I thought I had to be that way. I finished my assignments before anyone else so that I would be able to answer questions if someone asks me. When I didn’t want to do my assignments then if I had the feeling that someone would ask me any question, I would quietly move away from that place. My sister also said that people think she is in sciences and they get surprised when she says that she is in politics. Although now, I don’t care whether I meet other people’s expectations or not, I still feel that small burden.
RESPONSE TO VALENTINES DAY
Due to the large discussion on Valentines day I decided to do a little homework. So here are a few things you may not know:
• It was named after a Christian martyr Valentine and was established in 496 AD.
• First associated with romantic love in the middle ages (Geoffrey Chaucer)
• It is actually on the Saints days calendar for Feb 14th.
• Cupid is the son of Venus, the goddess of love
This came mostly from Wikipedia, which is not a reliable source, but for today I think it will do. Now here are a few facts about consumers Valentine ’s Day from http://www.stvalentinesday.org/valentines-day-fun-fact.html:
• Roughly 1 billion valentines are exchanged yearly (in the US)
• 85% of valentines are bought by women
• 50 million roses are given yearly worldwide on Feb 14th
• About 3% of pet owners buy valentines for their animals.
I find the consumer facts even more fascinating then the history of the day. Can you imagine what we could do with the money spent on valentines? Or how much less time we would spend worrying if the day never existed?
Now don’t get me wrong, I am the typical girl who loves a good chic flick but I think that the media really twists and pulls at our heart strings. The media portrays this as the only day to show love and affection, and that presents must be given. The day is represented by hearts and flowers and if in the month of February I saw those things I would immediately think of the “holiday”. I think it is sd that this is one of the recognized symbols of today.
*******NEW TOPIC!!!!!*******
While browsing the internet this past week i came across many articles criticizing the hit MTV reality show, “Jersey Shore.” These articles state that the highly entertaining TV show is portraying Italians in a negative light. For those of you who have not heard about or seen the Jersey Shore (which is impossible to miss) I will give you a little summery about it. For nine episodes MTV followed followed eight Italian American 20-somethings who partied hard, tanned all the time and described themselves as “Guidos” and “Guidettes.”
In my opinion, i really do not believe this show is portraying Italians in a negative light. Clearly not all italians act the same way as these 9 people, just like not all Jews are rich and not all black people are ghetto. I understand that the show is not intended for every audience and it depicts just one aspect of youth culture, however i don’t think the intention was to stereotype or discriminate.
I agree with Cindy’s post about Valentine’s Day and the media’s role in generating a corporate America holiday. I decided to call it that because last week I had a discussion with some friends about it and one of my friends said that he did not like Valentine’s Day because it was a ‘corporate America’ holiday that was created simply for companies to generate profits by brainwashing consumers into buying heart shaped objects, stuffed animals, chocolates and really anything that was red or affiliated with love. I feel that we have become so consumed with this one day dedicated to showing those we love how much we love them. However, I do not believe that we need one day to tell the person we love that we love them, I think that should be evident every day. I do not want to sound cynical or anything, because I find Valentine’s day a cute idea and I have contributed to this ‘corporate America’ holiday buy buying heart shaped candies and things. However, I do find that the media has played it out to be something many should not live without, it seems as though that for some people being alone on Valentine’s day is the end of the world, when honestly it’s a day like any other. Why is it the end of the world for some? Well that’s because television shows as well as movies have made it seem like there’s something wrong with not having a valentine.
As for the movie Valentine’s Day, I am more than excited to see it. I have seen the trailer many times and I truly hope that the movie will be as good as the trailer was for me. Although, this movie may contribute to the media’s brainwashing of people about Valentine’s day, I think it will show a more realistic approach about how different people feel on Valentine’s day.
** RESPONSE TO: “HOW DOES THE MEDIA SUPPORT VALENTINE’S DAY?”** …sorry i forgot to mention what i was responding to.
**New Topic: Celebrities on Twitter and Facebook**
So, I had never really heard of Twitter before we discussed it in class one day so I decided to ask around to see if my friends knew anything about it. A friend showed me her account “page” and told me that she writes to celebrities all the time, and was “tweeted” or replied to once by Lindsay Lohan. I didn’t understand the whole concept – celebrities write little phrases about what they did that day, or post pictures that their “followers” (sounds a bit creepy to me!!) can look at whenever they like. Okaaaaay, why can’t you just read US Weekly if you are interested in celebrities going to the mall or watching a basketball game. My friend peer pressured me into making an account because several of our other friends had one too, and I started to see why this was so interesting. I could “follow” my favourite actor from the TV show “Glee” and see intimate details of his private life…somewhat weird, I agree, but nonetheless…I was curious!
Slowly, I began to see just how crazy the concept of celebrities on Twitter (and Facebook for that matter). It just might be the most ingenious idea ever. Fans are constantly updated on everything that this celebrity is promoting, what they eat, what shows they watch and what they do in their spare time. It’s a marketing machine! If I’m a huge fan of, for example, Taylor Swift, I can see what kind of breakfast cereal she eats, and then go and buy some if that’s what would make me feel good. Celebs can promote their movies, and gain tons of fans by “tweeting” back their followers regularly. People seem to LOVE this – I even saw one girl that was literally euphoric because “Justin Beiber” had said hi to her! I believe her words were “I can die happy now!”. Some celebs get themselves in trouble by tweeting too much information – for example, John Mayer. If you don’t believe me check THIS out: http://www.starpulse.com/news/index.php/2010/02/10/did_twitter_ruin_john_mayer_s_relationsh
All to say, I am still baffled by Twitter and can’t say I will be using it regularly, but I find it fascinating how the internet can increase one’s feeling of proximity to a famous person by just a few phrases. It is definitely something that will take some getting used to.
Response to Adina’s thread on Jersey Shore
The hype over this MTV show has been unbelievable. I had heard about it through my roommates and friends who watched it weekly online at MTV. I at first had no idea who they were talking about; “the situation” “snooky”…what are these names? After, what I admit to be not that much persuasion, I actually sat down and watched the show online. Yes it kind of portrayed Italians in a negative light (at least the ones who live in that particular area), however, is it really any different than the stereotypes that we see on any other show? The new housewives shows, for example, showcase rich, bimbo, and full of plastic surgery women who live in places like Orange County, New York, and New Jersey. The negative stereotyping behind certain people from those areas is no different.
On a completely other note, I am a big fan of the Ellen show and was watching it the other day some of the cast of Jersey Shore was on it. They played one of Ellen’s famous games and the whole point of it was really only to showcase the casts stupidity for things like current events and historical facts. I felt as though the entire point f the show was really just to poke fun at the ridiculousness of these characters and the overall concept of the show.
I’ve watched a quite a few Superbowl commercials in the past week. I actually found a YouTube channel that contains all the Superbowl ads (http://www.youtube.com/user/adblitz?feature=ticker). Of all the Superbowl commercials, I must say, I liked the commercial for Kia Sorento the most. The commercial features a sock monkey, a robot, a one-eyed red thing, and a teddy bear driving the Kia Sorento around and having a good time bowling, doing water sports, partying, etc. I think this commercial was very fun to watch and more gender-neutral than other commercial spots. It actually appealed to adults and children alike. Adults were reminded of their childhood with the characters and the fun they can have with the Kia Sorento, while children are reeled in with the cute human-sized puppets.
As I was watching the commercials, another commercial spiked my interest in commercial censorship. I clicked on a commercial called ‘Light House’ and it asked for my age before I could proceed to watch it. However, when I entered my real birthday thinking 18 was the legal age everywhere, they refused to let me see the commercial. Then I remembered that I was operating with laws enforced in the United States so the legal age would be 21. However, I they YouTube channel registered my IP or something because they wouldn’t let me attempt to view it again. So I had to YouTube is generally. And what did I find? A commercial with a house made entirely of Bud Light beer cans. Then I started to wonder, if they censored this commercial on the Internet, why would they show it on television during the Superbowl? Kids are bound to stay up and at least watch parts of the Superbowl with their parents. So why censor it online when it was readily viewable on public television? To me, there were more sexualized commercials that were more worthy of the censorship such as the GoDaddy commercials that highly sexualize women such as this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBaKZ8KYbOo. What I don’t understand is why the company is so consistent with their sexually suggestive commercials. They’re a freaking web hosting company for crying out loud! Maybe by marketing the company as sexually suggestive makes it a more ‘fun’ and less traditional company.
I chose to discuss an advertisement CTV has produced to promote the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. The ad is an example of one person chosen to represent her entire race, culture, country. The ad depicts a young woman, assumed to be in her late teens with dark, long, curly hair, brown eyes, fair skinned. She is used to represent all of Canada.
CTV’s Olympic ad campaign is based on the word “I believe”. The target audience is the people of Canada and the people of the world. Canada is being showcased, and it is very interesting to see how the media will portray Canada to the rest of the world. Canada is a multi-cultural country, and not everyone is ‘fair-skinned”, we have people of Asian descent, we have our Native populations, we have people of Indian descent, we have people of Irish and Scottish descent, we have people of Middle-Eastern descent, we have people of European descent… We are a country comprised of immigrants and native people. I don’t see how one young woman can be used as a representative of all of Canada.
This lets the target audience, who is the people of Canada and the whole world in this case, to assume that the people of Canada are young, beautiful and fair skinned. Most of the “I Believe” campaign promotes Canadian athletes and in most cases, the people in the ads are fair skinned. This is an unrealistic portrayal of our country and emphasizes what the media wants the rest of the world to see as a “dominant culture”. Instead of promoting the white, English-speaking, athlete with white people in the background, a multi-cultural portrayal of Canada would be more effective in uniting our own country. As a critical viewer now, I am disengaged by the ad-campaign and almost insulted by the media’s attempt to promote the people of Canada as a single-colored race, and a homogenous culture. It is not fair to assume that people immigrating to Canada leave their pasts behind and conform to the “Canadian culture”… What is “Canadian culture”? Isn’t it an acceptance of the cultures of the world? I have included the CTV “I believe” ad campaign below:
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090105/believe_ads_090105/20090105/
Different topic!!
While reading through this week’s comments I came across Deborah Graziani’s blog about American idol. When I read that she has never missed a season, I instantly thought of the TV show BIG BROTHER Israel came to my mind instantly. While I was away the last few weeks I came to understand just how big of a phenomenon this show really is. People in Israel are completely obsessed with this show and many of them even schedule their life around being home to watch it. If this was not bad enough, they also have the option to pay an extra fee each moth and have a channel that shows only the cameras in the big brother house. The more money you pay, the more cameras you can watch! CRAZY!!! This obsession has gone to far!
The whole idea of reality TV made me think of our first class when Dr. Steinberg ask how much of reality TV which most of us love, is actually reality?
Its crazy because as most people know but will not allow themselves to admit, Almost non of these shows are actually reality. Sometimes this can be attributed to the makers of the show but other times it can be due to human nature. This was clear while I was watching one episode of Big Brother Israel and the “show” created a fake power outage. When the participants thought the cameras were not working they acted completely different and did things that they would have never EVER done on TV! For me this was a complete reality check!
REPLY TO:
**New Topic: Celebrities on Twitter and Facebook* BY SHANNON SUMMERS
With the advancement of technology, social networking on the web, the availability of entertainment news, our society has become more obsessed with celebrities. Soap Operas were yesterday’s medium for gossip, drama, betrayal.
Now, with Twitter and Facebook, we’ve become slaves to “status updates”, either our own, our friends’, or celebrities!
I had a love/hate relationship with Facebook, however because I use it frequently and it keeps me in-touch with friends who live far away, I actually enjoy it and appreciate the easiness and accessibility to it.
My concerns are people’s obsessions with celebrities will grow and become more intense, where the line between reality and fantasy will be blurred. We live in virtual society now with much less human contact. We can be connected to the world through our computers rather than going out and actually seeing and experiencing our community and school programs. With texting, status updates, “twittering”, our grammar skills decrease, our writing skills decrease, will our own children know how to write a letter to a friend and drop it in the mailbox?
Instant messaging will only increase, where will we be in 10, 5, 2 years from now?
*****SUPERBOWL AD*****
Just as Jennifer said before, Canada doesn’t get any of the good superbowl commercials. So I went online and watched a bunch of them to see what all the hype was about this year. The one that stood out for me was the Motorola commercial that featured Megan Fox in a bathtub. The commercial is technically for a new phone the company is promoting but the one thing they mainly focused on was Megan taking a picture of herself and wondering what would happen if she sent it out. Even though I did find it funny, I didn’t understand how that was supposed to help sell their phone seeing as how every phone made today has a camera on it. The commercial was obviously geared towards men and even though it was entertaining it did not fit well with its product and simply made to entertain the male viewers of the superbowl.
Here is the ad if you would like to watch it yourself. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-Oskte2uQ. Or search Megan Fox superbowl ad.
It seems that homogeneous grouping occurs all the time in the media. I think homosexuals are extremely targeted by this clustering effect. I believe homosexual individuals are definitely portrayed as a group where everyone thinks alike and does the same thing. It seems that when we see a homosexual (male or female) on TV, they rarely fit outside the standard stereotypes. I agree with Sarah Giroux when she says that guy men are all portrayed as flamboyant characters similar to Jack from Will & Grace. Homosexual women on TV, even though they are very few, tend to all look like Ellen Degeneres. I think these clusters simply help perpetrate the existing stereotypes and feed the preconceived opinions. I feel that the clustering effect presented by media makes it very tempting to pick up the existing stereotypes instead of creating your own perceptions of difference. I think one of the dangers of this clustering phenomenon relates to the definition of identity. In some cases, defining and assuming your own identity can be a very challenging issue. It can be even worst when you feel judged based on stereotypes that exist regarding your differences.
SUPER BOWL BLOG
The Super Bowl is a hugely popular event for everyone now, not just football fans. I was surprised to hear my dad say that he was having his usual “sports-watching” buddies over, with their wives! They were making it into an occasion for everyone to get together!
The commercial I am commenting on is the Reggie-Bush liftoff. http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-super-bowl-commercials/09000d5d8164e586/Reggie-Bush-liftoff-commercial
The commercial is in slow-motion and really depicts an amazing football move. The ad promotes the excitement of the game through the incredible leap the player performs to miss being potentially tackled. The audience is in suspense and watches in anticipation.
The camera spans over the crowd and their awed faces are flashed as they watch the “lift off”. The “count down” is compared to the one of a rocket lifting off. The commercial ends with the crowd cheering, teams colors grouped together, everyone is elated.
Analyzing the commercial, we see the “dominant culture” once again represented in the crowd. Most faces are fair skinned and mostly men, however we see more and more male children and women now.
In this day and age, the media seems to still be afraid of showing a variety of people of different races other than the fair skinned “All-American”.
Another point is that young girls are not supposed to watch football, and only a few women are included in the crowd. Maybe if girls were encouraged to play and attend sporting events more, they would be more willing to be involved in watching an event like the Super Bowl.
**Response to Adina and Amy’s thread on Jersey Shore
I must admit that I began watching Jersey Shore right from the beginning of the season. At first, I really did not believe the show was going to last more than 3 episodes because of the immediate backlash it received from Italian-American organizations who thought the show portrayed Italians in a very negative way. But it actually lasted through the entire season and became a hit show. What I have to say in response to the whole argument that the show reinforces negative stereotypes about Italians, especially those who live in New Jersey, is that I really have trouble understanding how it does.. Firstly, it is made clear on the show that all cast members except for one are not even from New Jersey in the first place, so they cannot possibly be “representing” anybody who lives there. It is about people coming from different places down to the Jersey Shore during the summer to party. Secondly, I just think it is such a far-fetched idea for anybody to possibly believe that just because these cast members are wild and engage in outrageous activities that ALL Italian-Americans must be like this as well. Like Adina said, it is like assuming that ALL black people are ghetto or ALL Jews are rich. If anything, I think they are just representing people who self-identify as “guidos” and “guidettes”, who all do truly act in similar ways as the Jersey Shore cast. Otherwise, they would not identify themselves as these stereotypes in the first place. MTV is just showcasing one kind of youth culture that has nothing to do with Italian-Americans as an entire group, but rather just a very small subset of young adults who live in the Tri-State area.
OFF TOPIC: VALENTINES DAY
I really thought that Cindy’s topic of Valentine’s Day portrayal in the media was in interesting topic and very relevant during this time. I agree that Valentine’s Day is simply a commercial “holiday”; a ploy developed by companies to make money. The ads on television make it seem like you must buy your loved one something expensive in order to prove your love. They also make it seem like Valentine’s Day is the only day that one can show their love and appreciation. I believe that love and appreciation should be done daily, and if this is so, you don’t need Valentine’s Day. While it is true that it gives you an opportunity to be romantic, the romance that is expressed if often cheesy and cliché. In other words, it is store bought romance. I personally believe that it is better to not be romantic at all then to be a fake romantic. The commercials on television romanticize this holiday way beyond reality, giving many the feeling of failure when they don’t receive the same response as the people on TV. The ads also send a message that the more money you spend, the more you love. But in the words of the Beatles, “money can’t buy [you] love”, unless you are looking for the false kind that is.
DIFFERENT TOPIC: THE OVERSATURATION OF VAMPIRES AND WEREWOLVES ON TV AND MOVIES
I must admit that I have watched the Twilight movies, True Blood and Vampire Diaries and enjoyed them. However, I cannot believe how many TV shows and movies that have appeared about vampires and/or werewolves. Although the different perspectives can be interesting, the amount of media about vampires/werewolves is overwhelming. As I have mentioned, I am a fan of some of the media forms about vampires/werewolves but I also enjoy watching TV shows and movies about different topics. There are so many interesting topics that can be shown but there has been a focus on assimilation. I am speaking as someone who actually enjoys the vampire/werewolf topic so I can only imagine how annoying this may be for people who have absolutely no interest in the topic. I feel that there are so many interesting ideas out there and the media should give them a chance. There are more than enough successful vampire/werewolf shows and movies and I think that it would be nice to have other types of shows and movies highlighted in the media.
SUPERBOWL POST
As we have seen in class, the Superbowl is a very profitable event for advertisers. Advertising companies and their clients spend millions of dollars to advertise a few second of a commercial. Some companies have numerous advertisements such as Doritos and Budweiser. The reason for which this event is so profitable is that it is viewed by so many people. Thus, viewers absently internalize certain messages which are embedded in the commercials they watch. While watching the Suberbowl ads, I got stuck on one particular commercial.
The commercial is an advertisement for Doritos. It is an African-American family; mother and son. The mother is single, and her date rings the door to take her out. The “boyfriend” is then showed “checking out” the mom in an obvious matter, as the mom is walking out of the room. He then sits on the couch accompanied by the four year old son. As he reaches for a Doritos, the son aggressively pushes him and says something along the lines of “You don’t touch my “momma”, and you don’t touch my Doritos.”
One can easily think this commercial is “cute”, however I saw many problems with it. First off, I believe they picked African American actors to depict them as being sexual predators (the date checking out the mom in front of the son, being completely careless.) as well as aggressive, as the four year old son slaps the date across the face and tells him off. I also understood that the advertisers were comparing women to Doritos. You don’t touch my mom, as you don’t touch my Doritos. So apparently, the mother belongs to her son and not the other way around, as the Doritos belong to him as well.
This commercial got me to realize how important media literacy really is. I doubt many people understood these embedded messages while watching it.
**Different Topic-Olympics Opening ceremony & Canadian Heritage**
I was just watching the Opening of the Olympics and noticed some few things that I thought would be interesting to share. Aren’t we proud to be Canadian? Don’t get me wrong, I love this country, and feel blessed to be part of it….in this era…. Canada is a great country, but to a certain extent. During colonization, all Canadians believed in assimilation; they wanted to assimilate all the first nations. In the early 20th century, with new immigration policies, so many were blatantly racist; so many ethnic groups had a hard time entering Canada and being accepted within the country.
Tonight, during the opening ceremonies, which were nonetheless beautiful; everyone got a sense of patriotism. What hit me the most was when I heard the following, and I quote, “The aboriginals welcome the Olympics”. The aboriginals welcome the Olympics?! What in the world is that suppose to mean; I would love to hear an aboriginal’s thought on this. What intrigues me the most is what the writer of this script was implying? I took it in the sense that Canada is “demonstrating” for lack of a better word, a fantastic friendship between all Canadians regardless of ethnicity, and that we have a history to be proud of.
Furthermore, a man was making a speech about how Canada is the country to be in, because of how multicultural we are… They failed to explain how racist we have been throughout history as well as now. I give Canada an E for “Effort” on that speech!
*Different Topic*
Indigenous people and the 2010 Olympics
As I watched the opening ceremony of the Olympics last night, I couldn’t help but notice all the mention, decoration and performances from the “aboriginal” people. As each country’s athletes marched in, there were hundreds of aboriginals surrounding the main ring dancing, and the announcers were constantly making references to how important the aboriginals are to our country’s history and culture. It’s interesting to me that as soon as the Olympics come around, suddenly the aboriginals are essential to our culture to represent Canada as this peaceful and accepting country. However, we all know how horribly the aboriginals have been treated and how they are literally segregated from our society on their reserves. Moreover, it’s ironic that the 2010 Olympics are taking place on Indigenous land while the majority of the indigenous people are against the Olympics. The following article describes some of their concerns. http://www.anarkismo.net/article/7304
I am just flabbergasted at how they can put on this big show about how much we love and appreciate our aboriginals and indigenous communities when we are still today oppressing them and taking over their land. It’s crazy how history can repeat itself. Any thoughts?
2010 SUPER BOWL COMMERCIALS POST
I was only able to watch a small portion of the super bowl but from the commercials I did see, none of them really struck me as memorable. So I decided to search some online and landed on two really interesting ones called Betty White-Snickers and Google-Parisian Love.
What seemed interesting to me was how very different both were. The Betty White commercial illustrated a scene of touch football where one of the guys was playing poorly due to hunger and made fun of as being slow like Betty White. The Snickers bit came in to promote the product yet in a funny and smart sort of way appealing to an audience who, for example, love sports, playing with their buddies and having fun. It involved a bit of rough play and humor targeting a specific audience of men during the super bowl season rather than the second commercial by Google who took on a more subtle and softer approach.
This commercial consisted only of the Google online page where a story was told through the text box. As one of the earlier students mentioned, there were no words, only text and soft music. This ad was a lot simpler in its creativity and delivery illustrating that commercials can be really great and well received even if the punch line isn’t big and the budget not as expensive. Rather than appealing to a loud and rowdy crowd like the ones during a super bowl game, this commercial offered a more softer and subdued tone, perhaps for those quieter men who prefer a relaxed game of football…I think it was a nice change to the adrenaline pumping ads we usually see during a super bowl game.
** SUPERBOWL COMMERCIALS **
I confess, I didn’t watch the superbowl and their lovely commercials since I was busy prepping for exams. However, we can thank the power of Youtube for posting them. So, I was browsing on the site and came across this Snicker bar commercial ad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1Sv_z9jm8A
I’ll give you a synopsis of the ad. So a couple of guys are playing football, and we see who other than Betty White as one of the players. One of the teammates tried to pass her the ball, misses completely and then gets tackled by the rival team. LOL. So they regroup, and then his friend goes “Mike, you’re playing like Betty White” and she turns on him by saying “That’s not what your girlfriend said”. Then Mike’s girlfriend calls her to eating the Snickers bar and he turned back into himself. Later on, one of the players becomes an old man only to be tackled yet again and “That hurt”, because the elderly are usually fragile. The commercial ends with their slogan “You’re not you when you’re hungry”. So, on the whole pretty funny commercial.
Now, I’ll say what I need to say on the commercial. Don’t get me wrong, I live chocolate bars, snickers is one of my favourite ones, except the bars with peanut butter in them. Chocolate bars are a source of energy, so we can say the same thing for Aero, Caramilk, Mars, 3Musketeers, Hershey, etc…If you’re chemically inclined like I am, it’s obvious that chocolate bars, while boosts a huge increase in energy, it falls really quickly. It’s even hard to pay attention in class after you ate one for a while, I know from experience. So to play a game a football, you need to be eating a lot of Snickers to get good amount of useable energy. That’s what Gatorade’s for. So unfortunately, while a hilarious commercial, this is just a marketing ploy in order to buy the chocolate bar.
SUPERBOWL ADS AND COMMERCIALS
While scrolling on YouTube, looking at the various super bowl commercials, I cam across one that said Top 10 Commercials of 2010. When I started watching it, I saw many of the commercials my classmates where talking about. Then I saw a banned abortion ad. I decided to look into it, so I looked up the entire video. I though that the commercial was horrible. There is a main man who is discussing about abortion and then there are two beautiful women who are fighting with each other, in order to make a statement that women should have control over their own bodies. However, the fight is totally sexualized, the women ripping off their clothes and then at one point is fighting in the mud, as to totally arouse the male population. I think that it is completely sad, that millions were probably put into this serious content commercial, and most of it is focused on the girl on girl sexy fight. I think that it is pathetic that people have to make their ideas sexual in order to get good ratings. Well in this case, clearly it did not work as the commercial was banned. I believe that depicting women this way, especially on such a serious topic is just plain sad and should definitely be reconsidered in the future.
**Different Topic**
As I watched the opening ceremony for the 2010 Vancouver winter Olympics, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of pride. I thought Canada did a great job with the ceremony. The audience in attendance was enthusiastic, and I was impressed with the layout of how everything looked. It was the first time that the Olympic ceremony was held indoors, which I thought was an interesting concept.
I felt terrible for the Georgian team walking the procession wearing their black arm and neck bands in honour of Nodar Kumaritashvili. His accident was just so tragic and unfortunate.
In response to Pamela’s post about the aboriginal people: I understand where she is coming from. We have been oppressing the natives for many years. Now that the whole world is watching and the spotlight is on Canada, we make ourselves seem less oppressive towards them and attempt to show how we all co-exist peacefully in our country. On the other hand, I did enjoy the segment regarding the welcome by the First Nations. I thought it was appropriate because the games are being held on their land and British Columbia is known for their amounts of aboriginal people. Perhaps this was the Canadian way of making a sort of peace offering and I think including them is better than excluding them altogether. The Olympics are about all the nations coming together peacefully and in competition to see who the best amongst them is. Therefore, it’s appropriate for all the Canadian peoples to come together as a host nation as well.
Overall I enjoyed the ceremony, and definitely felt a sense of patriotism when it was all over. Let the games begin!
RESPONSE TO: “HOW DOES THE MEDIA SUPPORT VALENTINE’S DAY?”
I really enjoyed reading the blogs in response to Valentine’s Day and I would have to agree with Cindy’s post about how the media has portrayed this holiday. It is true that there is a lot of pressure to find that perfect gift on Valentine’s Day from the various commercials we see that remind us the day is approaching soon. I was even watching the six o’clock news on CTV and during the 5-day weather forecast they placed a big red heart on Sunday February 14. The weather forecaster mentioned they placed this heart so that nobody would forget this holiday was on Sunday and ultimately no one would get put in the proverbial dog house for a night.
Even though Valentine’s Day is such a commercialized holiday I am guilty of enjoying buying presents and receiving presents. I was really excited to go watch the Valentine’s Day movie because the trailer really caught my attention especially since there were so many actors and actresses. I actually saw the movie last night and yes I dragged my boyfriend to go see this sappy love story. But in response to Mara’s blog there is nothing to be excited about. I find the movie concentrates on too many love stories that end up changing throughout the movie. It does have a comedic twist on how people feel during this holiday but also has some very random scenes that should have been cut out from the movie. Anyways for all of you who are waiting to see it on Sunday February 14 I suggest waiting till it comes out on DVD and maybe drag your boyfriends to see another movie like Dear John.
**DIFFERENT TOPIC: VALENTINE’S DAY
A few of my classmates decided to write their blogs this week about Valentine’s Day. Although I do agree that this day’s purpose is to get people to spend their money on items like flowers and candy, I can’t completely bash this day. I think people are entitled to decide whether or not they will celebrate these types of so called “holidays”. Nobody is forcing these people to go out and spend one hundred dollars on a dozen roses. People have such anger towards this holiday but for what reason? Nobody seems to care about the way we celebrate Halloween. Halloween can also be seen as a consumerist holiday where people go out and buy outrageous costumes that they’re only going to wear once. And what’s the difference between giving free candy to kids and buying candy for a loved one. In both scenarios that candy is still being bought, so why aren’t people against Halloween? Sometimes, I think it’s nice to get in the spirit of things and do things that would make other people feel happy. I think it would be sad if nobody celebrated holidays like Halloween or Valentine’s Day. These holidays bring people together, because despite popular belief, even people who aren’t involved in a relationship can celebrate Valentine’s Day. I have to admit that when I was younger I would get excited to get cute cards and chocolates from my classmates. Even though this day could be based on increasing consumerism, it is like any other day where people can choose or choose not to celebrate it. So who cares, celebrate Valentine’s Day or don’t, but what’s wrong with having the option?
RESPONSE to “DISNEY and RACISM”
In response to Samantha’s blog, I believe firmly that Walt Disney wasn’t himself racist, whereas more appealing to the vast majority. I feel that hegemony plays a key role in understanding why so many of the ethnic minorities viewed in Disney movies are either trivialized, or as Samantha mentioned, often fit into that cookie-cutter stereotypical view that we have of women, men, Caucasians and ethnic minorities.
While working on my PowerPoint presentation on Chapter 26, I decided to watch Aladdin also. I was shocked just by the opening theme song which has the following lyrics:
“Oh I come from a land, from a faraway place
Where the caravan camels roam
Where they cut off your ear
If they don’t like your face
It’s barbaric, but hey, it’s home”
-Arabian Nights from Aladdin
I do not remember those lyrics quite honestly. What I personally find makes the most impact in that chorus is the word barbaric and how many of us view Arabs and barbaric interchangeable.
It is to be noted that Disney has been working on the idea Princess Tiana (the Princess and the frog) for quite some time now. I believe most likely the move to push this movie forward came from the election of President Obama. Why was President Obama the first black President can be tied into Samantha’s question of why has Disney waited this long to make a black protagonist.
I have loved anything Disney all my life, but this course has definitely made me step back, as Samantha did, and look at all my childhood movies a lot more critically.
Different Topic Japanese Game Show Rip Offs
I have for a long time been a fan of shows in which people do things that will probably get them injured for example Jackass. I know that these shows are dumb but it is for that reason I enjoy them. My friends and I discovered Japanese game shows and immediately became addicted to watching them on youtube. For example door runner, human tetris, treadmill madness (note these are not the real names because they are Japanese so I don’t know what they are really called. A couple of years ago they began to bring out Americanized versions as these shows. For example Hole in the Wall and Wipe-out. For the most part I enjoy watching these shows but they have already been done. They are successful at showing me people hurting themselves which is always funny.
What I do not like however is the choice of people that they put on these shows. They give the impression that everyone has an equal chance to win. This however is not the case for example on Wipe-out they will have overweight people go through the obstacles and it is clear that a physically they are not able to compete with the other more athletic competitors. Winning is not their role though they are simply there so that people can laugh at them. I think it is a cheap shot on the part of the people making the show and I don’t really find this funny. I assume that these game shows do this for the same reasons as American Idol devotes tons of time to the most terrible singers.
DIFFERENT TOPIC: 2010 Super Bowl Commercial
One of the things that bug me about watching the Super Bowl in Canada is that we don’t get to see the American commercials that are always supposed to be so good. It’s always a disappointment, but at least we can search and watch them online. While I was searching the 2010 Super Bowl commercials I found this, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrpvlmTTJ7o . It’s a short clip put together of all of the violence showed in the different super bowl commercials that were aired. After watching it I was really shocked at just how much violence there was, and it seemed like a slap or hit across the head was most popular. Violence has seemed to become accepted and popularized in the media, which I don’t think is ok. Sure, this violence in the commercials are supposed to make people laugh and are supposed to be a joke, but it promotes violence and shows that it’s alright to hurt people. These commercials show adults hitting people, the elderly being abused, and even shows children hitting people. These violence acts are encouraging the wrong behaviour, and they are especially going to encourage the children who see these commercials to do the same thing that’s portrayed on them because that’s what a lot of children do; they imitate what they see.
DIFFERENT TOPIC: 2010 MANCRUNCH SUPERBOWL AD
The unfortunate truth about SuperBowl ads is that they play to the dominant culture which does not include homosexuals. Heterosexual males are the target audience, and are the biggest audience that watches the SuperBowl, so while I find it sad, I am not surprised that they did not include the Man Crunch commercial. I believe that this demonstrates that the desire for profit and mass appeal trumps the inclusion of all sorts of people in the ads. What seems to be forgotten is that women, children, homosexuals, and people of all sorts of different races watch the SuperBowl too, so why not appeal to them as well, even with one ad out of many? The broadcaster who rejected the ManCrunch commercial has sent out his discrimination loud and clear: gay men are not welcome as part of the SuperBowl. I believe that it is easy to forget that being ‘uncomfortable’ and pretending that certain people do not exist (or at least not allowing them to fair and equal treatment) has NOT made what is viewed as a ‘problem’ disappear. Gay men are in the world, and they have rights too, I wonder what kind of comments would have been posted if this ad had been about a certain race being rejected? We have not seen many Latinos represented. Many would be furious. So why is it different for gay rights?
The image of arabs but also muslims in the media is without a doubt an issue that has been frequently addressed over the past 9 years, but yet itg is a subject that has not been exhausted. Indeed, since the unfortunate events that occured in 2001, the image of arabs has been affected worldwide. Nowadays, as seen by all of the mass media, Arabs are a seen as a MENACE to society, degenerates from uncivilized culture, It is a continuous bombardment of negative images that has lead to numerous misconceptions and consequently; the creation of stereotypes towards arabs. When you think about it though, a stereotype is often formed based on a biased opinion or view, it is usually an individual that takes the behavior of one person or a group of persons ( a minority) and states that all people belonging to that particular group, behave in the same manner. The establishment of stereotypes encourages people to react and behave in a manner that is both jugdmental and biases. At present, we are face to such an issue, stereotypes are omnipresent in pour society. A great illustration of stereotypes of arabs in the media, is the fact that the mere world “Arab” is used to describe an individual from the middle East, despite the fact that these individuals are form different countries, with diverse cultures, beliefs and a variety of religions, they are characterized by one term, “Arabs”. The world Arabs in itself in my opinion, reduces individuals and countries to a distinct target, open to stereotypes and bias opinions. Thus, the Western media has often projected individual of Arab descent in a negative manner. Currently, Arabs are seen as terrorists and murderer due to how the media presents them. Newspapers use key words such as extremists, terrorists and fanatics to describe Arabs. Overall, I find it extremely sad that in the so-called liberal media is acutally a very controlled communication medium. I also find it unfortunate that some people buy all that is presented to them in the media as if provided with so many different sources of information why are we so quick to jump to conclusions, why don`t we seek for knowledge before passing judgements? I think we should all, look at what is depicted to us through the media with a grain of salt and a whole lot of critical thinking.
**OFF TOPIC** Olympian Nodar Kumaritashvili
Since the passing of Olympian Nodar Kumaritashvili yesterday, I feel there’s been a huge cloud hovering over the much anticipated 2010 Winter Olympics held in Vancouver that everyone has been so looking forward to, especially us Canadians.
A sports accident of a 21 year old athlete who was at the peak of his Olympic dream is a tragedy in itself, this goes without saying. However, I was absolutely appalled at the fact that his death, not only caught on video, kept on being televised throughout the day. I was at work the entire day yesterday, therefore, only heard about the tragedy later at night. I was told that the footage was so gruesome and real that you heard the impact of the body hit the pole through the video. I did not have the nerve or the courage to even look up this footage. It is not something I wish to see or hear.
In my opinion, this is an example of media coverage crossing a very fine line. To think about this olympic athlete’s family, friends, and teammates; this coverage is not taking their feelings and devastation into consideration. In such a case, I find this kind of media coverage absolutely inhumane.
Again, I did not see the footage for myself, and for all I know, it has already been blocked online. Has anyone seen it?
Any thoughts? Should this kind of tragedy be repeatedly televised, as if it was some kind of form of entertainment? What about the integrity of Olympian Nodar Kumaritashvili and the impact on his family, friends and teammates?
RESPONSE TO: “HOW DOES THE MEDIA SUPPORT VALENTINE’S DAY?”
A lot has been said about Valentine’s day! I have to say that I am more person to agree with all that has been said about V-Day being way too commercialized. As I was doing my errands this week and entering various stores all I could see were various pink and red articles of anything and everything to BUY. The worst part is that so many people had their baskets full of chocolates, candies, teddies that they were going to purchase for their loved ones. Although I sound very negative about this holiday, I have to say that I am not someone who hates Valentine’s Day.
Although this may sound cheesy, I do enjoy taking the time with my loved one on this day to spend time together without necessarily spending tonnes of money; a simple supper at home with a movie will suffice. Unfortunately, with the advertisements and media it is very difficult not to get caught up in purchasing every useless item. Like I always say; everything in moderation is much better; therefore, a small, inexpensive thought is plenty if there is a desire to offer something. I do believe that this day encourages couples to spend important time together that we do not always take the time to do with the crazy weeks that the average individual has. Don’t get me wrong- the media has commercialized this holiday wayyy too much and it is no longer seen as being a simple holiday.
I actually went to see the movie Valentine’s Day… (Yes, I know what you’re thinking- the ads got me hooked since there are so many popular actors)., but it got me thinking a lot about the meaning of Valentine’s Day. The five different couples’ lives that we see in the movie are very realistic. I don’t want to ruin the end for anyone; however, the simple things in life are often the most appreciated- the movie actually made me cry…
Thanks for sharing that eye-opening experience, Noemie Battista. Your assessment that the border guard was “wasting time and reinforcing stereotypes” is certainly an apt one and I would add that if your friend was indeed a potential “terrorist”, wouldn’t that implicate you all, sitting together in that car, regardless of your ethnicity and origin of birth? The favouritism expressed by the guard showed a lack of professionalism and the disgust she expressed towards your Arab friend was, I believe, always bubbling below the surface, 911 just made it acceptable to express. All that nationalistic and fear-based fervour, “You’re either with us or against us!”, has certainly justified such openly expressed racism. This makes me think of how the rise of anti-communism in the 1950s became an acceptable excuse for racism against immigrants, which, as we saw from the film “Class Dismissed”, was reinforced on American TV by replacing immigrant themed shows with the White middle/upper class variety. In spite of all the advancements in humanism and civil rights, a significant portion of Western society remains entrenched in an elitist and racist mindset and it only takes a bout of bad leadership to unleash it.
Recently, it has really hit me how crucial leadership is in setting a good example or, at the very least, containing negative influences and, at the same time, there is nothing intrinsic about leadership that attracts good leaders. We are really at the mercy of circumstance.
NEW TOPIC – I stumbled across a comedy sketch about class. Since this will surely not entice anyone, the clincher is that it involves a young John Cleese. In it, three men of different classes relativize their position in relation to the other, which is pretty straightforward, except for the point about money since the upper class “twit” admits to not having any. This tips the balance of power in favour of the middle class guy. And, perhaps too, an exception could be made about the working class guy’s exceptional character, which elevates him above the others in a spiritual sense. This sketch made me think about the issue of social capital in relation to class – a person may not have connections or money but, in a democracy anyway, that same person may speak several languages or know how to attract people to a cause. Does this equalize the playing field at all? When I consider the dismal state of leadership generally, I am inclined to believe that we are far away from a meritocracy. Perhaps others have a more optimistic view of things?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mYY1QGK0jQ
*Different Topic* HOW MEDIA DOESN’T SUPPORT BRO’S BEFORE HOE’S
Bro’s before hoe’s in simple terms is the GOLDEN rule for guys to choose their guy friends over girls. A synonym would be DICKS BEFORE CHICKS! If media has taught me anything it would be that by choosing a girl over a guy would mean you’re whipped! The process begins, when friends make fun of you, they’ll say things like “hey, Romano what’s the matter, you lost your balls!” The guy’s friends end up hating the girlfriend, and the girlfriend ends up hating her boyfriends friends. The boyfriend is always in the middle and doesn’t want to choose sides. We usually see all the guys friends gang up on their friend and be like “what happened to you.” Remember when you said “ I would never choose a girl over my boys”, and now your “balls are on a chain!” A perfect example of how media doesn’t support BBH is in the reality show Jersey Shore. In the beginning of the reality series this guy Ron says “I would never fall in love at the Jersey Shore.” He would always talk to the other members of the cast and act all macho and say things like “I would never choose a girl over you guys, it’s all about the boys.” A couple episodes later he falls for a girl and the guys rarely spoke to him again, because he would always ditch his friends for this girl. His friend’s would often criticize him behind his back saying things like he doesn’t hang with the boys anymore. The boys obviously were upset with the whole situation which made things awkward between Ron and his guy friends. Obviously, the girlfriend was happy because she had her boyfriend wrapped around her finger.
A perfect video clip made by College Humor: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDg6YoDPBKE
Happy Valentines everyone!
Valentine’s Day has become the second biggest holiday, falling right behind Christmas. Valentine’s Day has become a one day holiday that is a major reason to buy expensive gifts, and spend a great deal of money on going out to expensive restaurants. For example, last night my friends and I went to a restaurant called “Weinstein and Gavinos”. The first thing I noticed when we entered was the hundreds of pink balloons and hearts. As we sat and took a look at the menu, there was a special card with a set Valentine’s Day menu. The prices on that menu were outrageous, for a couple to dine at Weinstein and Gavino on Valentines Day; you are looking to spend way over a hundred dollars. It’s mass consumerism at work. I am not saying-Bah Humbug to Valentine’s Day; however, I do think that people really need to think of what the holiday really means to them, instead of getting caught up in purchasing all the latest Valentine’s Day gadgets. For me, I have been in a relationship for over five years, and although when I was new to my relationship, it was nice to go all out on Valentine’s day, now I do not feel the need to wake up early and go decorate my apartment with hearts and red decorations for my boyfriend, and I do not expect that from him either. I would be more than happy to spend the day at home watching movies and hanging out, just enjoying each other’s company. A card from him would be nice, or even a single rose, however all the fancy chocolates, and jewelry is not needed. I know I am loved and appreciated; I do not need a $300 necklace, or a dozen red roses for $100 to signify his love for me.
Valentine’s Day has become a holiday where everyone from your loved one to the dog expects a gift. It’s becoming crazy when people are buying Valentine’s gifts for their cats, Professors, and the doorman to their apartment building. Not to mention that there are Valentine’s cards for just about everyone, and they have everything to say. In these Valentine’s cards-they are funny, sexy, kids giving to kids, and romantic. This year online I even saw a Jersey shore Valentine’s Day card. Instead of putting all your energy on finding Valentine’s Day gifts, people need to remember that it is a day to celebrate your love with your loved ones.
Topic: Superbowl ads
I am the kind of person who watches the superbowl especially for the ads. I think advertisement has becomed our new way of life as it tries to reproduce it in a way that makes us feel good about ourselves. If you want to see a perfect picture of how people were thinking in the past just watch ads from that period it will remind you of lost memories but it is also a nice travel in time experience. I watched many superbowl ads in the last 10 years or so and this year was an absolute dissapointement. There wasn`t any enormous FedEx ads and even pepsi or Coca-cola seemed shy this year. Still, some of them were interesting. The snicker ad with Betty White was interesting and was also awarded best ad of this year`s superbowl. The one I laughed the most certainly was bud light (of course) with the asteroid falling on earth. I also was happy to see Dr Pepper with Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley (members of the band Kiss for those who weren`t on this planet for the past 35 years). But my favorite ad was Gatorade. It was a very long ad and they do not talk about Gatorade they only talk about what it takes to win a superbowl game: courage, ambition, will power, etc. These kind of ads who do not sell a product but an idea are the perfect demonstration of our society of consumption. The ad doesn`t want you to buy Gatorade because it`s the best product but because of who you are. You are a fit person who`s not afraid of pain; you deserve to drink Gatorade. They won`t say it because you know it already. Advertisement has become very subtle and very effective since we don`t even notice that we are influenced by it.
I’d like to respond to Sabrina Cerro’s piece on the luge Olympian Nodar Kumaritashvili. I think it’s interesting to look at this event and how the media covered it. I’ve spent some time thinking about it, and I have mixed opinions about the news coverage of his death.
On one hand, I think it’s horrible that they showed the video on the news. I was watching ESPN and they actually showed it! I heard they were allowed to broadcast it because it’s not a clip of him dying (he died a bit later at the hospital I believe). As a human being, I don’t understand how some head-honcho made the decision to air the video. Don’t any of these people have moral standings? …because to air a video like that, I’d have to make a lot of moral compromises. And while one can argue freedom of speech or expression (meaning they can play the video if they like, and you don’t have to watch it if you don’t want to), isn’t there an argument to be made of sharing somehing worth sharing?
While I don’t agree with the decisions made in this event, I think it says more about us as media-consumers than it does about the media-heads making these videos available to us. They don’t just show whatever they please on TV and we watch- there’s a question of supply and demand. People have a weird fascination with tragedy, and the media-heads only play into it. If no one wanted to see this stuff and no one watched it, then it wouldn’t be on major TV networks. It’s the same reason why movies about 9/11, la Polytechnique or Columbine are so successful- people can’t help watching, and the media-heads know it.
Maybe we need to stop pointing the finger at TV networks, and media corporations in general, and assume our responsibility as viewers and consumers. Like I said, if no one wanted to see this stuff, and no one watched it or paid attention to it, it wouldn’t be around-and we wouldn’t have this problem to begin with.
My own Topic
Holidays… all about money!! WHY?
In my opinion, Valentine’s day is overrated. Last night I went to watch the movie Valentine’s Day (I’m a sucker for chick flicks) and I found it so interesting how this type of media (film) brought together so many types of couples. The old married couple, the homosexuals, the high school students, the elementary students, the best friends and the mother and child. Even though someone got dumped or cheated on, they still ended up Happy at the end of the day… all but those who commited the crime (the cheater).
In the movie I found out that 100 million roses are sold on that day. I’m sure there are just about as many chocolates sold. Valentine’s day represents a day to show your loved one just how much you love them; shouldn’t every day be that way? What about Christmas, this whole idea about Santa Claus took this religious event and tore it apart, where the true meaning about Christmas became to buy and receive presents!
My Question is:
How did these holidays become all about money? and why do we, as consumers feed into these holidays?
Well it seems that a lot of individuals are commenting on Valentine’s Day this week. I have decided to put my two cents into this topic, since I just posted about the Super Bowl commercials like 30 minutes ago! Personally, I am not much of a Valentine’s Day fan, I cannot say that I do not like getting spoiled but I think it is way too over commercialized. I mean you walk into any store right now and there are shelves and shelves dedicated to Valentine’s Day products. However, if you really think about it, it is like that for every commercialized holiday. Right when Valentine’s Day is over all the Easter stuff will come out. Or when it is Halloween time, once that holiday is over, all the Christmas stuff comes out, even if there is 2 months until Christmas. This is true but I believe that Easter, Christmas, and even Halloween have a more legitimate meaning than Valentine’s Day. People go out and buy expensive gifts for their loved ones, go to expensive restaurants, and go see romantic movies. This “holiday” has become the second biggest one that we celebrate. I just find people are spending too much time buying stuff for each other, when really Valentine’s Day is about celebrating the love you have in your life, money is not needed to do so!
Different Topic
Olympic Hype
The Olympics have been the talk of the town for months now and finally they have arrived. Canadian, and now more recently, American TV stations are bombarded with commercials sponsoring, promoting or praising the Olympics. Of course, the Olympics have reasons to be cheered on. It’s a huge part of not only our history, but the world’s history as well. Having people from almost every country, or countries that can afford it anyway, represent their home by bringing home medals is honorable. Yes, the Olympics deserve all the hype, but the problem is that people are starting to forget about the actual sports. It’s more about the opening and closing ceremonies, the advertisements and scandals. Many of my friends watched the opening ceremonies simply because everyone else did…and do not plan on tuning in on Canada’s progression throughout the next few weeks. These athletes train all year round and finally get a chance to make it to the finish line. I find it a bit sad that people are more interested in controversy then the actual game. Then again, it’s like that for any large event, like the Oscars. Who’s wearing which designer is more important then who will win best picture.
**Different Topic***
Power of network broadcasters and media conglomerates
Did anyone who watched the superbowl notice how the half-time show included a performance by The Who? CBS had the broadcast rights to this year’s superbowl and I don’t think it was a coincidence that the band that was chosen to play the half-time show has 3 songs that are very closely associated with 3 of CBS’s biggest prime time shows (all from the network’s flagship CSI franchise). It has gotten so bad that now whenever I hear the opening chords of “Baba O’Reilly” or” Who are you” I can’t think of anything but CSI New York or CSI Las Vegas. Throughout the whole performance it really felt like I was watching an extended commercial for all 3 CSI shows and that CBS was aggressively attempting to market its own programming.
Question: Can any of you think of any other examples of cross-promotional “advertising” that the big TV networks or other media conglomerates have engaged in?
***New Topic***
WHERE IS MY T.G.I.F???
A topic that my co workers and I have been spending much of our time on is the noticeable emptiness we feel at the loss of T.G.I.F. For those who do not know, T.G.I.F stands for Thank God It’s Friday, and it was also the name given to the bunch of sitcoms that aired in the 80’s until the early 2000’s on, you guessed it, Friday’s!!! It also stood for Thank Goodness It’s Funny when referring to the line up of ABC’s comedy.
Recently, I have started to re -watch Boy Meets World which finds myself (and many others I am sure) wondering where the good old days of T.G.I.F and family comedy have gone?! T.V just seems so sad without it and while there are a bunch of really good shows out their (not including Jersey Shore) where are the shows that families can watch together that are enjoyable and innocent to all? Friday night T.V has really turned to crap and most networks just repeat what they already showed earlier in the week. Many people would say this is due to people being partying instead of watching TV on a Friday night which may be the case for some, but not the 10 or 11 year olds (or at least I should hope not). That is the age I was when I had a friend over to watch Sabrina the Teenage Witch which was an enjoyable and clean TV show that I could enjoy. I just don’t really understand what kids have now to watch that they can enjoy with friends of family, understand, and not feel babied by. T.G.I.F holds some good memories for me as a kid and I just hate to think that younger generations are missing out and having to turn to other ways to keep them occupied on a friday night.
OFF TOPIC VALENTINES DAY
Yes, I completely agree with Lisa Morello and Cindy Brault with the fact that Valentine’s Day has become an obsession because of the advertising industry. But what is so bad about the holiday? It is true how the history and the meaning of Valentine’s Day is still rumored. I just searched over fifteen sites and got completely different answers. Check out this website to read up on the different origins of this now international holiday. http://www.stvalentines.net/stvalentinesdayhistory.htm
Nonetheless, this Holiday has become a special day for couple’s and loved ones to show their affection toward one another; a day to honor love. Yes, people should be encouraged to express their love and affection throughout the year, but why not make an extra special day for it? It gives more people jobs, makes everyone happy, actually, it could make some sad, but in the end it is still a special day even though it has been created by media. I know plenty of couples that refuse to celebrate the holiday on February 14th. They told me – why celebrate this fake holiday when we could just be one another flowers and chocolate on a different day of the year . . . so in fact, the celebrate a love day at some point through out the year –just not on the Hallmarked holiday.
About the Valentine movie, personally, I do not think it is embarrassing for these actors to be involved in this movie. First of all, even if it weren’t about Valentine’s Day it would still get just as many viewers to see the movie because all of the actors are famous and gorgeous. The movie didn’t get the best reviews anyway. Just to respind to Cindy – it is not shameful to go see that movie – it’s fun! Enjoy!
SUPER BOWL COMMERCIAL BLOG
Megan Fox-Motorola Motoblur commercial 2010
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=rosebudlifestylemag&annotation_id=annotation_568798&feature=iv#p/u/27/_HMDpgI36zc
As I was watching this commercial, it didn’t surprise me that they had used a celebrity to advertise for Motorola. This is the time where people want to attract as much attention as possible during the advertisements, and what better way to do so by combining Megan Fox and a having her sit in a bubble bath with some strategically placed suds protecting her modesty. I definitely think this commercial also deals with hegemonic ideologies, because any other person probably couldn’t make such an impact on what the message was trying to convey.
The brief commercial illustrates Megan Fox in her bathtub talking about how the new Motorola has Motoblur, which allows her to keep in touch with everyone. She takes a photo of herself and wonders what would happen if she leaked her photo out to the public. You see people fall off ladders because the person isn’t paying attention, electrical explosions, people getting angry at their spouses…it’s all too typical. Interestingly enough, I was reading in an article about the Super Bowl add, and they had got another actress to be her thumb double…YES that’s right, they got someone else to shoot her thumbs for the video because apparently Megan Fox suffers from a genetic condition called brachydactyly, which means she has clubbed thumbs. I was shocked!
I mean, television has come to this ideology that perfection is something that needs to be shown on television and corrected if needed. I guess this can relate to the banned commercial, in terms of the advertisement for Mancrunch, that just because these ideas are avoided or disregarded as a whole, I think just makes us subject to hegemonic ideologies. Because this isn’t the norm or the preferred issues of ideas conveyed or portrayed in an advertisement video, I guess people feel that perfection and the “norm” is something that can be looked at with ease and comfort I guess? I don’t really know why, I am assuming that I guess because the Super Bowl is such a manly sport, they don’t want to portray homophobia or imperfections in women, I guess because “sex sells” and Megan Fox has got to be perfect, I mean look at her she is gorgeous right? I just think that these ideas are biased because we don’t often see commercials advocating for inner beauty, like dove for instance. It’s always the same things, it’s advertisements about the popular brands of chips, chocolate bars, beer, electronics, and so much more…but is this all necessary to the audience? It ALL seems to sell! Why would be my question?
I think that one group that has been reified is women. Women are seen in the media as always super nurturing, loves to shop, looking for men with lots of money, loves holidays, cares about how they look all the time, etc. I guess a case could be made that all groups are combined into hegemonic groups. Maybe we do this because it is easier for our minds to grasp people as one identity then as the myriad of ever-changing combinations that they actually are.
SUPER BOWL & SUPER ADS
I would like to respond the Jennifer Allore’s comment on the 2010 Super Bowl ad that Google created. As she mentions, it is probably one of the simplest and inexpensive advertisements that could have been created, but it is so creatively produced that it draws the viewer in. To watch it, go to http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/06/googles-superbowl-ad-will-make-you-cry-a-little-bit/
I came across this ad because an acquaintance suggested that I watch it. She thought that it was so good that she “didn’t want to ruin it” by telling me what it was about. I have to say that I was sceptical when I began watching the commercial, but I was eventually impressed by how Google presents itself. (For an explanation of the commercial, please see Jennifer’s comment).
I agree with Jennifer that this advertisement is geared toward women. It pulls on the heart strings telling the story of a man seeking out and marrying a woman; all through text. Nevertheless, Google also sends out something stronger than its sentimental message. By explaining the story of an improbable relationship that succeeded because of the information/advice that the man retrieved from the internet, Google tells its audience that anything is possible through knowledge, and that knowledge is powerful. Google is therefore portraying itself as the incredible tool that allows access to this knowledge and power to anyone who uses it. The take-away message: Using Google can make your dreams, as improbable as they seem, come true.
Response to: Olympian Nodar Kumaritashvili
Thank you Sabrina for sharing the story about the passing of the 21 year old olympian, Nodar Kumaritashyvili. As I do not have cable at home and have not been watching any Olympics recently, I am extremely surprised to hear about this. I completely agree with you and find it very disrespectful to be showing such footage of the Olympian. I am very surprised that the news stations would broadcast such a gruesome video clip if it is truly that detailed.
As I am from Vancouver, I will be going back home for the Olympics next week and am really looking forward to the Olympic spirit and energy at home. I will definitely be looking into Nodar’s incident and am curious to see if Vancouver has done anything special to commemorate the athlete. Has anything like this happened before in the Olympics?
*Also, what could the host city of the olympics do to prevent such accidents from happening again?
DIFFERENT TOPIC: Valentine’s Day
In light of it being Valentine’s Day, I think many of us had the same idea to take the opportunity to talk about this commercialised “holiday”. I won’t lie in that I do get a little excited when I start to see the stores being taken over by pink and red hearts in early February. I like Valentine’s Day, not necessarily because of its intended meaning of being a day for lovers, but more because of the decorations that overtake stores and florists (maybe I’m just a girl who likes roses and the colour pink). However, with such a mentality, I can’t help but wonder how it was generated. I came to a conclusion that for me, it partially manifested itself early in school. In elementary school, as soon as February rolled around, my teachers would take advantage of the holiday and create themed vocabulary lists, art projects with red and pink hearts, and on the big day I remember we would give everyone in the class a “valentine”. I have to wonder, in doing such are teachers just propagating this commercialised holiday. Is this partially why we feel pressured on Valentine’s Day if we are in a couple? Or likewise, why we feel like failures if we are not in a couple of Valentine’s Day? As future teachers, should we be sensitive to how this holiday is commercially based, and how should we approach it in the classroom? Furthermore, can we transcend this argument to other holidays such as Easter and Saint-Patrick’s Day?
I’ve always remembered Russians as being the bad guys in the media, since the 9/11 attacks, there has been a shift towards Arabs. Examples of Russian Bad guys in media: Bourne Supremacy, Rocky 4, From Russia with Love, XXX, and a few of the James Bond movies to name a few. Russians have always been portrayed as vodka loving communists, gymnasts, wrestlers, soviet mobsters, boxers, nuclear war, spies etc. I don’t think Russians have had it as bad as Arabs in terms of the racism they’ve experienced in North America. I did not think it was as bad here in Canada as it has been in the states, but when I asked one of my Iranian friends whether he had been discriminated against since the attacks, he told me it had gotten worse. I don’t recall people treating Russians like how Arabs are being treated.
I wonder if the reasons for more discrimination towards Arabs is due to the continuous and up to the second media coverage of the 9/11 attacks? Considering the attack was on American soil, might this have caused it to hit a little closer to home? If you compare the 9/11 attacks to the atomic bomb the Americans dropped in Hiroshima in 1945 that killed 80,000 innocent civilians, the Japanese certainly never portrayed Americans as ultimate evil in their media (I’m not an expert in this area, the only Japanese media I’ve been exposed to is the Japanese anime that seemed very popular about a decade ago). Doesn’t seem fair.
Just a side note, if anyone is interested in Iranian culture, I really enjoyed the book “Honeymoon in Purdah” by Alison Wearing. It made me want to visit Iran and appreciate the people and the culture more.
Off topic: The Quebec winter carnival parade shown on television last night
Living in Quebec for over 22 years I have never went to see the Quebec winter carnival parade in person and this year after watching it on television, it really has motivated me to go see it next year. I decided to go learn more about it on its internet site: http://www.carnaval.qc.ca/en and found there was even a teacher’s corner section on it. What I also found very interesting was the amount of money involved with this carnival: Visitors spend more than $42.5 million dollars per winter in Québec City, while the Carnival itself generates direct economic spin-offs of $48 millions a year. WOW! Throughout the broadcast done on channel 10 last night, the two newscasters kept mentioning how much fun they were having and what great variety f activities were happening on site for the whole family. There was also a lot of sponsoring of Loto Quebec, SAQ, M. Christie, Metro, Telus and the list goes on. During the parade and at different places where the newscasters went to visit we could see what these sponsors did to get recognized. For example Telus promoted their telecommunications company by having fire places set up everywhere with their logos on them. I believe that during big festivities like that, a lot of media coverage gets done and we get to see what kind of advertisements attract their tourists.
******Different Topic*****Superbowl Ads****
I did not get a chance to watch the game this year, I was preparing an assignment, but as I was searching the internet for videos to compliment my other assignment, I noticed that although the game had not yet started, there were already posts and examples of advertisements that were to be shown. As everyone knows Superbowl Ads are one of the main reasons, besides the game and the half-time show extravaganza, that people tune in.
Curiousity got the best of me, and I went on to look at the ManCrunch Advertisment. I do not find it offensiive at all. In fact, I found it to be quite humorous. What I do find offensive, however, is that in a society where Democracy, and free speech is promoted, it seems rather unreasonable to have such censorship. As discussed in class citizens are not treated with equality. If the ruling “middle-class” norm may find a topic or concept especially offensive, it is amazing how quickly the topic is canned or how much effort is placed on brushing such ideas or concepts under the rug. I have always assumed that these ads are to make money. The association makes money and in turn so do they advertised companies. However, I guess this is not the case. Even though the Man***** company offered to pay in cash, their offer was declined. This is obviously due to the fact that Homosexuality is still a taboo subject that should not be brought to the “main stage,” for everyone to view. Especially not via the means of something as sacred as the SB ads! The association has no problem advertising the latest gadget, the newest car, best kind of beer, or classic brands of chips. But, watch out if a subject was to offend the “ruling class” communities. One thing I did take note of when watching the commercial, is that the two gay men are the ones who start making out, and it is an African-American man who just sits there stunned. This implies that most gay men will be white, and that an African-American men will be shocked if they see two men in a sexual relationship. This could spark a whole other kind of debate. I really did not find anything that shocking In my opinion, the only reason to ban such a thing is to ensure that the typical mocho, football watching, Christian, All-American type of guy would not take offense to it. The point of media should be, at least in part, to stimulate the mind, and produce points of interest and discussion. To promote different points of view and push the status quo. Of course, to a certain extent, it is simply for entertainments purposes. But, I am beginning to reflect on whether or not something can ever truly just be for entertainment purposes. Since a commerical will always put forth some sort of agenda, would it not be better to promote topics that help out society, instead of simply allowing individuals to be exposed to topics that are clean-cut and promote the regular stereotypical presuppositions of wider Western society? Since advertisers are paying millions of dollars, for just a small Ad, and Mancrunch was able to pay the pricetage-this means that there is obviously a market for this kind of website. If the market is there…people are interested? Then why not show it? This is very problematic.
I started to research an Ad for this assignment, but instead of simply looking at other ads that were banned as well. I started to think about what we have discussed in class over the past few weeks. I reflected on the ideas of what the advertisers are really trying to get across? What are the blatant messages, and what are the subliminal ones? What are the advertisers trying to impose on their viewers, and what do they presuppose about their viewers in the first place? I decided to look at some of the other banned commercials, to see if there was any consitent theme. The first thing I thought of was that even if the ads are banned the companies will still get coverage, which in turn becomes attention which will then potentially be profitable. Think about it…the mere fact that something is “banned” makes it of interest. Most likely there will be some sort of media coverage that comes into play, and then people. just like me will go onto websites, such as You**** search out such ads. So, I mean even though the mainstream media bans such an ad and tries to keep it from the viewers of the Superbowl during the inital airing time, such as will nonetheless be viewed. But viewed away from biases and scrutany. This means that it is ok for society to view something as long as it is sort of, “not under our watch.”
There were two other comercials that I came across that we completely off. The first one was by Doritos. It was of a man reversing his car in a parking lot. He drives over a woman and she begins to convulse on the ground. He strugs his shoulders and then drives over again. He stops, not to help the woman, but rather to pick up her half-eaten bad of chips. I thought this ad was not very tasteful. But, then I also realized that Doritos also has an ad that was aired. So, they pay millions of dollars to have an ad that they know will play, and then millions of dollars to produce an ad, that they will know will produce controversy. So, basically they have covered both ends of the spectrum. Very intelligent marketing scheme to say the least.
The second one I viewed was for the website called GoDaddy.com. The first thing I noticed was that this ad is racist, and sexist. It is racist because it depicts an African-American man that doesn’t say anything the whole ad, except for some hmmmming and some other weird noises that one cannot really make out. The he is surrounded with beautiful, skantily dressed White women. It is sexist because the women are running around in their lingerie just sun-bathing and enjoying the sun. I also noticed that the producers have produced the scene in such a way that would imporess of the viewer that he is supposed to be homsexual. Blowing kisses at the camera and dressed all in pink. I mean, maybe this is just my own perception, but it truly made me feel as though they were trying to impress this kind of thought. This was an ad for GoDaddy.com. I was wondering wha thte big deal was. I mean there are other over-sexualized and silly ads that are aired. The only thing I could really see that was so “wrong” about the ad was the homo***** nature.
I couldn’t resist but go onto the website. This is what I found: it is basically a website to build your own website. The ad is about a man that has created his own fasion company and uses BigDaddy as a way to create a website. There are two things that I could see that would be offensive to the same sort of person that would have been offended by the ManCrunch ad. Thhe male is supposed to be a former football player turned fashion designer, that I suppose could be viewed as a a-masculine type of job, A big tough football player turned sensitive, creative designer. The other thing is that, like mentioned above, it is sort of implied that he is gay. I mean I don’t see anything particulary out-of-sorts with this ad, except for what I just mentioned. I find it terribly troublemsome that such prejudice still exists. I mean on one hand I guess the sponsors were taking into
Super Bowl commercials
I watched Doritos Super Bowl adds on YouTube. There is a clip that shows most of them.
I was stunned by the way the commercials were all presenting a violent act. A kid slapping an adult, an older man using a tazer to get someone else’s Doritos, a dog putting hid anti-barking necklace on a human to gets its bag of Doritos, … These are all minor acts of violence in a certain way; ones that we can see every once in a while and very often on TV and in movies. It made me think of how violence is trivialized. Most people think violence is shooting at people in an action movie. I think people should be critical when they see such commercials and acts on TV. They should remember that it is not banal and that it should not be reproduced in real life. I think a great deal of the growing violence in our eastern society is due to the perception of certain violent acts as normal.
here’s the link : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h25JmSCwx8o&feature=related
SUPER BOWL
Allthough, I did no watch the Super Bowl I did catch some of the commercials. The one thing that I have noticed over the years with th Super Bowl commercials are that they pretty much have Carte Blanche to do anything they want. Some of the commercials are somewhat inapropriate in the way they present the commericals and the content that is used.
One of the commerials had a baby trading on ebay and at one point he burbs as an adult would. To me I found it a little a linapropriate because babies should be represented as babies not as adults living in a babies body. This is something you would never see being advertises on everyday public TV. Then there are some that are just plain silly. For example the Doritoes commercial where the Doritoes are throwing Doritoes around. I will admit a commercial like this will encourage people to go out and purchase Doritoes,. I know for myself I became rather hungry watching the commercial.
During the Super Bowl the sales of merchandise and services being advertised to go up, why wouldn’t they. The Super Bowl is a time for celebration for those avid Football fans. A time to get together eat, drink and party. It has in many ways become a national event and for some a national holiday. I know a few of my friends who would normal y work during the Super Bowl take it off.
I guess you have to love Football to really appreciate the commercials that are being advertised. I do believe that most of the commericals are geared towards men and in many ways show how we live in a male predominant society.
SUPERBOWL COMMERCIAL
I found this years super bowl commercials rather entertaining. I was actually surprised as to how appropriate they were. I found the commercials funny and there wasn’t as much nudity or sexual references as I thought there might be.
Super Bowl is on of the most watched events on television and it is an event that many women also take part in. I think in general men care more about the game, whereas women will see it more as a get together.
In tems of the commercials some of them, like the Google commercial was even cute. They weren’t as stereotypically ‘macho’ as I thought. The Snickers commercial was to be expected as there is usually one like it.
SUPER BOWL
One of the commercials that caught my attention during the Super Bowl this year was the E-Trade baby girlfriend commercial. This type of commercial isn’t new to E-Trade, they have quite a few commercials featuring babies talking as if they are adults yet still incorporating some baby aspects. These commercials seem to be quite popular as I have seen various versions of the talking baby commercials posted on facebook-implying people think they are funny and would like to share them with their friends. The E-Trade commercial that played during the Super Bowl featured 2 babies talking over video chat. The girl questions why the boy didn’t call her the night before, the boy claims he was fixing up his portfolio on E-Trade, the girl then asks: “that milkaholic Lindsey wasn’t over?” ,another girl baby then comes on the screen, from the boys room saying “milk-a whaaaat?”. I find this includes current aspects of our society, such as the use of video chatting in relationships. This commercial depicted a stereotypical relationship, where the girl is jealous and insults another girl. The boy lies to his girlfriend to cover his cheating and gets caught. This commercial involved very little information about the product- after seeing many of these baby commercials I still don’t really know what E-Trade is, but it is entertaining. As a viewer I am now somewhat compelled to go find out what E-Trade is and in this sense it is somewhat effective but mainly just another funny commercial.
Link to the commercial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbLTl7egwlU
Different Topic: Muslim driver halts bus to kneel in aisle and pray
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/02/uk-muslim-bus-drivers-locks-passengers-aboard-as-he-stops-to-pray.html
Just last week there was an incident in London concerning a Muslim bus driver who stopped the bus without warning during his route to stop and pray. “Passengers said they looked on in stunned silence, fearing the driver may be preparing for a terrorist attack on the bus. No one was able to get on or off the vehicle during the five-minute prayer session.”
I think that this is a perfect example of how “one becomes all”. However, as much as we can criticize people for thinking that a Muslim praying is a sign of a terrorist attack, we can also argue that perhaps there is a time and a place for prayer. I don’t think that there is anything wrong with praying in public, especially if it is a religious requirement. However, is it right for a city bus driver to stop his route in order to pray? Probably not. The Islamic religion permits delayed prayer sessions so the bus driver could have waited until the end of his route or until his break (where there are no passengers on the bus).
Too often, people generalize the behaviors of single individuals to represent the customs of entire races. This is just one example of how one Muslim can add to the negative views of Arabs in general. There are so many stereotypes and false representations of Arabs in the media that we tend to simply believe what we hear and see with critically analyzing. Did this bus driver do this deliberately to scare people and make headlines? No, he is simply following the rules of the religion he believes in but most people don’t view the situation in this light. What this man did is not a crime… However, there is a time and a place for certain things, and he should have perhaps postponed his prayer session.
I just want to add that Arabs are definitely NOT the only groups with false representations in the media. All groups have their own stereotypes…
Response to “How Does the Media Support Valentine’s Day?
Valentine’s day is a truly unique holiday. The religious significance has been ignored for decades (likely more) and it exists entirely for people to shower each other with fairly meaningless and inconsequential gifts. Many supporters of Valentine’s day will argue that other holidays such as Easter and Christmas, which over the past few decades have become increasingly more consumer oriented, are equally as corporate and media supported as Valentine’s day. However, the difference between the holidays is that many people still regularly attend church on Christmas and Easter and depending on the person or family and their beliefs, those holidays can in fact be celebrated in a more traditional manner with minimal consumer implications.
A previous blog entry by Lisa Morello, asked the question, “why does consumerism need to remind people to tell their loved ones that they love them?” The answer, from my point of view at least is simple, because they can. Big corporations stem to lose nothing from over hyping Valentine’s Day and making it the one day of the year to buy your significant other gifts such as overpriced flowers, candy or jewellery. So they put out a few ads on TV or the internet (and even this year a movie dedicated has been to the holiday) to maintain the holidays relevance in popular culture and to assure themselves that people will go out and spend money on unnecessary items. The worst part is that the holiday has become so entrenched in our culture as an important day for couples that there is an enormous amount of pressure for people, mostly men, to buy the right gift and do the right thing. A failure to do so, will, to some women, based on how the media portrays the holiday, be a disappointment and as a result Valentine’s will remain culturally important for many more years to come.
NEW TOPIC: MEDIA LITERACY AND FAFEBOOK
I would like to write about the most hilarious and also scariest thing I have seen in a while.
My boyfriend frequents a bunch of sites about internet and technology, and he showed this to me. One of those sites is ReadWriteWeb, “one of the most popular technology blogs in the world. ReadWriteWeb provides analysis of Web products and trends to an intelligent audience of engaged technology decision makers, Web enthusiasts and innovators” (http://www.readwriteweb.com/about_readwriteweb.php). The site put up an article about Facebook login and how you can now use this login to get on other sites and AOL. So that’s the boring background. Now comes the hilarious part.
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebook_wants_to_be_your_one_true_login.phphttp://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebook_wants_to_be_your_one_true_login.php
I recommend going to this site if you need a good laugh. Personally, I was crying it is so funny. But it also opened my eyes to issues of media literacy. Never mind critical media literacy, I’m talking about media literacy period.
There are hundreds of comments after this article—I read almost all of them. Some are angry, many are in caps, many contain curse words. People were posting on the comment section of the blog thinking that it was the new Facebook login. Many were angry and frustrated that they couldn’t get into facebook—from this blog. Ranging from “can I please log in now?” to “I WILL DELETE MY FACEBOOK ACCOUNT IF YOU EVERLET ME IN AGAIN!!!”, the comments looked like people had read the article and still not understood that it wasn’t facebook. My personal favourite was someone typing in caps, obviously to show their rage about logging in o FAFEBOOK. Haha, it’s funny when angry people make typos. I can’t really explain just how funny it is that over 250 people made the same mistake.
Apparently the owners of the site looked into the traffic on the site and found out they were getting all of these people on the site from google, having searched facebook login in google. It was the second result. So basically these people don’t know what a URL is, they don’t think to check and see if they are on facebook, and they are upset because they don’t understand how to internet. In fact, after learning what happened, the site added a message in the article:
“Dear visitors from Google. This site is not Facebook. This is a website called ReadWriteWeb that reports on news about Facebook and other Internet services. You can however click here and become a Fan of ReadWriteWeb on Facebook, to receive our updates and learn more about the Internet. To access Facebook right now, click here. For future reference, type “facebook.com” into your browser address bar or enter “facebook” into Google and click on the first result. We recommend that you then save Facebook as a bookmark in your browser.”
And people were STILL posting confused messages about how they couldn’t get in to facebook.
As hilarious as all of this is, it brings up important issues of media literacy. We take a lot for granted and need to realize that not everyone understands the internet and technology as well as we do. As future teachers, we should realize that not all children will have had as much access to technology as we are used to, and may struggle to understand things we assume are common knowledge. We should also consider the parents of our students, and not assume they will be fluent in the language of technology. We need to make sure all of our students are media literate as well as teaching them to be critical about it.
(Sorry–I typed my blog in word and forgot to put the paragraphs back in when I pasted it, I hope it isn’t too hard to read)
Also…LET ME ON FAFEBOOK!!!
I speak on behalf of myself as well as others when I say that there are people out there who choose not to classify a group because of misconceptions. But with the help of media it’s difficult not to always have some of those judgements innately imprinted in to your memory even if they are not acted upon. I feel that it takes sometimes one person of a particular race who meets the criteria or judgements that we have placed upon his/her race and then you kind of unknowingly check off the stereotype as being true. Because of that one person you typecast everyone in that group as fitting into the stereotype. I feel that as a society we have to be more generally aware of how these stereotypes segregate groups and to put it in the most cliché way possible “put yourself in their shoes”.
This may be a silly relation but I’ve decided to relate society to elementary/high school- there are always the bullies and the victims. From a young age you see it right away students alienate those that they fear, don’t understand, are different and now the same is being done and has been done for years just on a much larger scale. Of course I’m not justifying that as a society we are bullies but I’m saying that it’s almost in a sense human nature. It can be understood, not justified but understood that after 9/11 the fear evoked needed reasoning and with the help of media people were given a victim, a group of people they can typecast as terrorists and society felt warranted in blaming them for the loss of thousands of American lives.
Everyone feels different or unwelcome at least once in their lives. I’m not implying that it’s ever on the scale that Arabs are being treated but it seems like it’s something that can’t be avoided. You give people the right to think for themselves and the right to free speech you have to accept the worst along with the rest.
Also on a very different topic I’d like to comment on Mallory Forget’s post. I remember the days of watching boy meets world as well; I remember waiting all week for Friday. As someone who attended Portuguese school on Saturdays and catechism some years on Sundays, the weekend was not a relaxing time for me. Finally I had a reason to hope for the weekend because it meant I can watch my favourite shows.
When I was watching the videos from last class which depicted Arabs in such a way, it got me really upset. In my psychology class, my prof was talking about how everyone stereotypes. It is undeniable and it’s a natural habit that everyone does. To have the media represent groups in a certain way is not helping with how cultures or people of different ethnicity see each other. The one thing I have learnt from this class thus far is the advertisement is a type of pedagogy. People learn through what is being taught to them in the media more so then through any other form of pedagogy i.e. Schools. When young kids, or even people in general who do not think critically about media, see images, movies and/or ads which are portraying Arabs or any other people in a certain way, consciously or unconsciously, people will absorb it. In my opinion, media portraying people in a certain way is what is helping strengthen these “groups” and is helping to keep racism and stereotypical ideas alive. But what can we do to change this?
*DIFFERENT TOPIC*
Alright, today is Valentine’s Day, so I thought it would be a good moment to talk about it.
Let’s do a little recap here and let us remember what exactly why we are “celebreting” this day. I was told the following story in primary school, so if it’s not acurate don’t blame it on me, blame it on our educationnal system. Valentine was a catholic priest in the Roman Empire. During that time, the Roman Emperor thought that married man did not make good soldiers. Many young men were looking for ways to skip their military service and Valentine was the only priest that accepted to mary them. Valentine helped a lot a people that way and ultimately saved their lives. The Emperor heard of that story and arrested the priest. In a way Valentine is a martyr that helped facilitate catholic marriage.
So, In response to many of you who asked the question: yes Valentine’s day is a religious holyday like Christmas. But, is it really?Bottom line, I think that, like Christmas, it’s just an other reason to buy stuff for someone else. By the way, I don’t need a special day to do something nice to the one I love.
** New Topic**
In light of the discussion about Arabs, I wanted to talk about different point of views from different media sources other than television and movies. I just finished reading a book for Literature class called The Breadwinner which is about Afghanistan in times of war. It is told from a 3rd person perspective looking in on a family who has to cope with these difficult times. I found it interesting how these Afghan people are scared of other Afghan’s who are part of the Taliban. This story showed that we are not the only ones who believe what the media says about Afghan people. This little girl and her family are living in fear of the Taliban because of what they know has been done by them although at one point during the story, the little girl sees a Taliban crying and she realizes that they are humans just like her who have lost family members and friends. I thought this was an interesting story that shows how we are always afraid of what we do not know. It teaches us the lessons that you cannot judge a whole society based on only a few individuals.
I will be talking abuot the superbowl as well because i don’t feel like responding to the valentine’s day articles! The first time i watched the superbowl adds were about five years ago. I did not know that the Americans had different publicities than the Canadians. I was wondering if it was because we think differently or because our humour is different or simply because we are two different countries.
The commercial that caught my attention is the 2010 Hyaundai “Luxury”. Many people want a car and many people are attracted to luxury and would love to be rich. What a better way to get these people interested than telling them they will get luxury at a affordable price.However, I find it only adresses the middle class and upper class since everything they show in the video is very expensive. I think publicity should adress all the classes, but I understand that for Hyaundai or other company that want to sell the product; that the lower class is not their target class.
Over all, i find the commercials funny, but ridiculous and it is why we remember them that much.
*OFF TOPIC*
Like Luc and Nikki, I figured Valentines Day would be a good topic to poke at. This, not only because of the celebration’s direct link with media and advertising, but because this day is also my birthday. =)
I had the discussion with my mother earlier today, at my birthday brunch, about the day I was born. I learnt that my mother actually planned to give birth to me on this day rather than waiting the anticipated Feb 21st the Doctor had set. Like many others, V-Day meant something different and she figured having your birthday on this loving day would turn out as interesting. I must admit, it does have its benefits. Its as if my family and closest friends put aside the title of the day for me and express the built up vibes of care and appreciation towards me. It is very gratifying. Not to mention the extra attention I could catch from the girls who are in a loving mood.
On the other hand, it does have its cons. For example, last night, I wanted to have a little get together with friends for my big day and was turned down by absolutely everyone who were in couples. I was a little disappointed. Turns out they had all planned a Surprise Party for me and everyone was present and ready to rock out!!! I had a lovely evening!
While I’m somewhat taking advantage of the embellishments brought upon this date on our calendar, I must agree with above comments that the commercialized priority of Valentines Day disgusts me. The expectation that they plant in people’s minds about the offerings couples should be making to each other to make it a good day is nearly foolish. Why do we need such a day? I should be showing love to my closest people regularly, should I not? Must I really be reminded? Must I really go purchase the chocolate and roses which are emblems of the celebration? Anything to spin the wheels of our economy! I’m actually curious to witness the emergence of another one of these days. Can anyone think of one? Sleep day maybe? Hehe, this must be on my mind because of the lack of rest I got this weekend. Thanks for reading me!
I agree with the fact that post 9/11 there has been a lot of negative stereotyping towards Arabs. The media had an effect on me that I didn’t even realize until I stepped into an airport. I never consider myself a racist person or one who stereotypes however I remember being fearful and suspicious in the security section of the Toronto airport of an Arab man who was to be on my flight. People don’t even realize the affect the media has on creating these stereotypes and fears towards a group of people. I think that as a Jewish girl, we are also stereotyped. I have seen several non-Jews refer to conservative Jews in stores as cheap or assume someone’s Jewish because they have dark curly hair or a big nose. Asians are another group that I find are constantly stereotyped. I find they are stereotyped for driving slowly and always being good in math. I like how the teacher pointed out how everyone is stereotyped against and how the media increases many of these stereotypes.
**Blog 5- Super Bowl and Super Ads**
Since this blog discusses banned Super Bowl commercials, I was tempted to discover what other commercials have been rejected, and why. The commercial that I fell upon and that caught my attention is a Snickers commercial that shows two males working on a car. One man pulls a Snickers candy bar from his pocket and starts eating it while the second man begins chewing the other end. As a result, the two men touch lips and then back off from each other extremely quickly, terrified by the sinful act they have just committed. Assuming that if they do “something manly”, they will be dismissed from the misdeed in which they have done, and consequently rip hair off from their chests.
When I saw this commercial for the first time, I was not exactly sure how to take it in. I read on CNN.com that the Human Right Campaign and the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) condemned the ad. Clearly the commercial is controversial, but I believe that it gives two messages. Firstly, are they trying to say that males have to pronounce their masculinity by being heterosexual and nothing else? Or do males have to pronounce their masculinity by being homophobic?
The “accidental” kiss, in my opinion, is not what should trigger the audience’s uproar. Personally I was more shocked with the fact that the two men believed they committed something that was completely immoral. The commentary on the website where I retrieved the video was also pretty shocking. One of the comments that struck me the most was, “What do children think when they see this commercial? Are they learning anything?”. I believe this is where the notion of hegemony comes to play. The manner in which the hegemonic ideology is perpetuated is by showing that if the two men were to have intentionally kissed, they would not be “manly”. In other words, homosexuals should not be considered “manly”.
The ironic part to this commercial is the fact that it was “banned” due to its controversy. However, it seems to be causing more controversy since it is considered “banned”.
http://www.spike.com/video/kiss/2819686
**Blog 6: The Misrepresentation of Women in “The Little Mermaid”**
I believe that a clear example of reductionism lies in the portrayal of women in the Disney film titled “The Little Mermaid”. In this blog, I will discuss how the movie is a gender biased film that offers a unified and homogeneous misrepresentation of women.
When Ariel sings the song “Part of Their World”, the audience gets a clear idea of what her goal is at this point of the film. She wishes she was something she is not: a human. Near the end of the film, Ariel’s goal changes as she is now determined to find the prince and get him. This demonstrates that love is submissive and that the fate of the little mermaid goes to the dominant group: man.
In comparison to men, the film portrays women in a demeaning manner. The average woman in the film is powerless, unless she is demon-like, smothering or monstrous. Ursula, for example, is demonstrative of the fact that in order for a woman’s power to surpass a man’s power, she must be ugly.
Love is represented in relation to sacrifices. In Ariel’s case, she starts by letting go of her family in order to get her man. She then loses her voice with the intention of gaining the ability to commit herself to the prince. Ironically, the first thing that the prince was attracted to was her voice. However, Ursula reassures Ariel by telling her that her looks, face and body language will remain- simultaneously sending the message to girls that appearance will always be of greatest importance.
Ariel is the one who is made to stand representative of the entire race in this film. Since she is the main character, young viewers of the media have faith in her actions. The Little Mermaid should be used as an example that Ariel is not necessarily representative of what it means to be a woman, and that a kiss is usually not all it takes to fall in love.
** DIfferent Topic **
I wanted to comment on some of the things that I found particularly enjoyable about the Olympics so far.. I really like the idea to have a province or territory “present” themselves each night at the medal ceremonies in BC place. The idea to have live performances, essentially just an open concert, is great and many of the artists are international successes. Nelly Furtado, who had the theme song for the world cup a few years ago, is a great example.
I also love the profiles on the athletes. They always seem to have terrific stories that indicate just how difficult it is to get to the Olympics and perform at such an elite level.
The support from Canadian companies has been great too. Obviously there is an advertising benefit to sponsoring athletes, but it is companies like Excel Gum and RBC that are not only Olympic sponsors but also sponsors for the individual athletes and teams.
I hope everyone has the opportunity to watch the games and cheer on the athletes!
http://www.ctvolympics.ca/video/collections/collectionid=40427/index.html
Superbowl Commercials – A Masculinity through Materialism Narrative
Many others have noted that a hegemonic (heterosexual, white or black, middle-aged, beer-drinking, middle-class) male emerges as the vision of the pinnacle of masculinity.
However, Sonia noted above that women became the sideline targets–as nagging and castrating helpmates but somehow integral to Superbowlish masculinity. So if you’re a respectable family man (i.e., father, maritally faithful, corporately successful, disciplined) your masculinity is diminished — how to compensate?
The answer is provided by the commercials: buy mannish stuff. Two commercials made this very clear: Dove for Men and the Dodge Charger.
The Dove commercial runs through the hegemonic male identity: white, married, father, protector, handy man, financially successful – then makes the point that after you’ve sacrificed so much of your pride and energy, indulge in your masculinity by using – soap? …for men. It’s soap for manly men. Made by a company that’s invested a lot of money in an anti-hegemonic ad campaign trying to make women feel comfortable with their bodies (not a particularly interesting or welcome subject to the hegemonic male). I didn’t feel convinced.
The Dodge Charger commercial even more overt and runs through the same narrative, only in first person. The white male is talking to his castrating female counterpart: “I go to a 9 to 5 job, I go shopping with you,” etc., suggesting all these things are self-sacrificing, counterintuitive actions. And he ends claiming that one thing counterbalances all of this humiliation – that he indulges his masculinity by driving a certain kind of car. The commercial itself is well-done and I think if I were a man it would weigh on me.
To a less obvious extent, it’s the same with the Snickers ad, the Bridgestone Tires (Bachelor party) ad, the Bud Light survivor ad, the Flo Tv “Spineless” ad,
Can you buy the adrenaline-pumping, wild-oat-sowing, freedom-loving aspect of masculinity that seems to get sacrificed to responsibility? According to the Superbowl, you can.
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Muslims and TV
My parents are retired and watch lots of television, particularly the crime shows and lawyer shows (these shows are very prevalent – go to any major network’s website and click on “shows”–they make up more than half of primetime showing). A mutation of this is the army/navy lawyer show, like NCIS or JAG.
These shows invariably take on Islam and Muslims. The attempts to portray Muslims fall largely along the Sean Hannity/Bill O’Reilly dichotomy – there are “moderate Muslims” – portrayed as law-abiding, tax-paying, shutting up and minding their own business Muslims, and the “fundamentalist”/”radical”/”Islamist” Muslims that are busy at work trying to blow Americans or Israelis up.
Weirdly enough, these shows are trying hard to change their superficial image. There are more and more good guy Muslims being shown, but they are always portrayed juxtaposed, as either victims or suspects of horrible violence, spousal abuse, religious fanaticism or terrorism. For example, I think it was NCIS, where there was an episode where a white pastor’s son soldier converted to Islam and was murdered in the episode. Another episode showed a suspect of planting car bombs, a former American Muslim Iraq-war veteran, as disfigured and reticent; most of his character is relayed through his white Christian wife.
There are no shows (outside of Little Mosque on the Prairie in Canada) on network TV that have Muslims as main characters. There is a Muslim comedian/actor, Aziz Ansari, who stars on “Parks and Recreation,” a documentary “The Office” type show. Ansari plays “Tom,” a pervy self-agrandizer from North Carolina who is neither a practicing Muslim nor has any connection to Arab/Pakistani/Indian culture, though is sometimes mistaken for a terrorist.
A good website that keeps tabs on Muslims and media is elanmag.com.
Blog 5 February 9st 2010
Response to Deborah Graziani
This was a great marketing move on the dating company’s part just like Deborah said. The commercial gets the attention of all those who watch it. Mancrunch surely knew that they would not be able to get a spot as part of the Super Bowl commercials, because they knew from the beginning, that it would be truly too controversial to air. If you ask me this is genius marketing! After knowing that it would be too controversial they made it anyways and tried to sell it, all the while they pretended to be naïve. Just like all the other banned commercials they have gotten their publicity in the media for the simple fact of being banned and without spending a penny. For example this Doritos commercial that was banned:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T_DiTPoy-A&feature=player_embedded
Yes, it was banned, but just because it has the word banned in the title and it’s now on YouTube, just like all the other banned Super Bowl commercials, just as many people will click to watch it. Thus creating publicity for Doritos without having to pay.
So whether marketing companies pay 3 million per 30 second slots or 0$ it is up to them. We see now that both have been done! Which is more successful?
Today while at work I caught a few minutes of Tiger Woods’ apology on television. Frankly, I am unimpressed by the whole situation. Maybe it’s because I don’t watch a lot of television, but I can’t seem to get involved into celebrity gossip. I can’t relate to it and it in no way impacts my life. Any guy friends of mine have a multi-partner sex addiction affair? Anyone I know helping a married person ruin their marriage and personal reputation? I think not.
I think it says a lot about us as media-consumers that this is the type of thing that warrants a whole press conference, the type of thing that makes it on to the news on various networks. Aren’t there more important things that we should be concerned with? Where’s the integrity? This type of reporting is far and few between. Perhaps this explains why I don’t watch much television in the first place…