project 4

Carl Jr.'s Tex Mex Bacon ThickBurger Advertisement.

In 2015, Carl's Jr. posted an advertisement for Tex/Mex cheeseburgers. This Ad shows barely dressed women in bikinis fighting over which cheeseburger is better. Then, which leads them to play volleyball to see which is better. In addition to that, this ad was made on September 28 of 2015 and this Ad doesn’t say who specifically directed the ad, it only says it was made by Carl's Jr. Also, I will be talking to you about some points from Kilbourne’s articles that talk about how women are sexualized in these ads and degrading it can be for these women. Throughout my essay, I will be using quotes from Kilbourne’s article to make my points and talk about the Carl's Jr.Tex-Mex ad, and how they sexualize and demote women in this ad.

Through the video, the women are playing volleyball, and they keep doing close-up shots on their butts or keeping showing their breasts. In the beginning, they show a girl eating a burger in slow-motion while lustily staring into the camera in a kind of sexual way. The rest of the ad is filled with the women playing volleyball and zooming in on their butts and then two guys watching the women play volleyball. I think this ad takes the product of cheeseburgers and spins it to sexualize women and that the cheeseburger may be so good that you may get to watch women in their bikinis playing volleyball as the guys in the Ad.

Sexualizing women:

Throughout this ad, they objectify women and how their bodies look every second. For example like in the first couple of seconds of the ad, they have this scene where they use and this girl is going to drink water then, the girl pours water all over herself (example 2) Then, this part of the ad is kind of trying to be sexual by putting water down her chest as Kilbourne said “Sex in advertising is pornographic because it dehumanizes and objectifies people, especially women, and because it fetishizes its product.” Page 489. In Addition to that, this is dehumanization and how they use the cameras and how they do close-up shots on certain parts of the ad. Then, a part of it is that people don’t make an account of others feelings when they are filming these kinds of ads.

Example2

There are these guys just sitting and watching these girls play volleyball in their bikinis in another scene. Is this idea supposed to show how good the burger tastes, or is it more like them trying to sexualize women in the ad? As Kilbourne said “Male Violence is subtly encouraged by ads that encourage men to be forceful and dominant” page 489. In the other part of the scene, the men are sitting in the chair then go to the other guy to say “ should we tell them to stop” and the other guy replies and says “eventually.” I think that’s what Kilbourne said the ads are teaching men to predominate like for example when these men are watching these girls play in their bikinis (example3). To add more to that, what if the roles were reversed? Or what if they were put into these women’s shoes? Then, to take it to another level of these men being dominant is that they are sitting on these chairs and looking down on the girls playing volleyball.

Example 3

Even more than that, in the rest of the video, you kind of only see small girls in bikinis playing volleyball. As Kilbourne said “All women are vulnerable in a culture in which there is such widespread objectification of women’s bodies” page 505. However, these girls are going to look at that and see these women with slim figures and see that has to be the expectation for what they’re supposed to look like. Then, imagine seeing that as a younger female what is running through your head. Another part of the scene from the ad is that they are playing and suddenly they score a point and then zoom in on her teammate slapping her butt while they zoom in ( example .4) I think that’s a perfect example of them using women’s bodies as objects in this Ad.

Example 4

Conclusion:

In the entire advertisement, only the sexually suggestive scenes remain. Also, in general, this ad doesn’t help women and as I said in the paragraph before this, it doesn't help that these women will look at this advertisement and try to compare their bodies, or it sets the standard. The duration of this advertisement is about 52 seconds, which may be about 5 to 6 seconds without making women pornographic or showing their breasts or buttocks. Then, the other parts may take about 10 to 15 seconds to show the burger or even the advertisement CarlJr. Again, it is not their fault, because the advertisements before them set the standard.

References:

Kilbourne, Jean "Three Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt"Rereading America. Eds. Colombo, Cullen, Lisle. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's P. 2013.

Tex Mex Carls Jr. commercial 2015- youtube unknown 25 April 2021

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