Commentary
too much sex in advertising, say young people
- by Erik Sass , Staff Writer @eriksass1, October 26, 2011
People have been saying that advertising is over-sexualized for a long time, but sex may actually no longer sell. The college panel seems to agree that sexual imagery (with its idealized images of the human form ) in advertising is unrealistic and unrepresentative of themselves and "real" people in general. And this has ramifications: one panelist says overtly sexualized imagery "immediately makes me not like the ad and the brand." In my humble opinion, in view of human psychology it was only a matter of time before the pendulum started to swing back. Overuse of sexual imagery in advertising had to eventually result in desensitization and aversion, especially considering the easy availability of online pornography.
Erik Sass is editor of Publishers Daily. You can reach Erik at eriksass@gmail.com.
Used at the appropriate time, sex can still sell. But far too often a younger audience are the target of mid-life (or even recently parenting 30 year old) fantasies based on what the no-longer young think younger audience like.
Most often it's quite revealing of the suppressed frustrations of creative teams.
I'm encouraged by a younger generation that is not feeling represented by what most of society feels like is garbage. This is good news!