Sexuality: An Advertising Medium to Mass Consumption

We all know the concept that “Sex Sells” is not a new form of advertising that we are not exposed to everyday. We are constantly being shown images of pretty, slender, and scantily clad women and men in the ads from our favorite brands like Budweiser, Victoria Secret, Calvin Klein, and Abercrombie and Fitch being used as a means to sell us products and services on the most primal of all levels. A prime example of sexual advertising can be easily drawn from some of the recent Superbowl 47 commercials. Take the GoDaddy.com commercial for say. What was a beautiful woman making out with a nerdy and less attractive adolescent really selling us? Website domain rites like what the company is built on or was it something else? I think we all know that sex and appeals to sexual intimacy amongst genders is constantly being used to manipulate and to guide our consumer habits even if we are not quick to admit it. Jeannette Mulvey, editor of the Business News Daily, an online journal for trends in business and consumption, further explains the impact of sexual advertisements and expands upon the notion of sex being used as a medium to encourage mass consumption as she says, “"Advertisers use sex because it can be very effective," said researcher Tom Reichert, professor and head of the department of advertising and public relations in the UGA Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.” Sex sells because it attracts attention. People are hard-wired to notice sexually relevant information, so ads with sexual content get noticed."’ (Mulvey).  According to the The American Association of Behavioral and Social Sciences (AABSS), there is actual science behind why sexual advertisements are not just effective in the selling of products, but also why both genders are so responsive to sexual advertisements. Carol M. Shepherd, from the National University in La Jolla, California, explains these scientific specific gender reactions and the power of sexual advertisements on the typical consumer in the AABSS as she says, “Whereas men are stimulated by the immediate physical sexuality in the ads, women

seem to be more stimulated by the sexuality for the romantic aspect of it. Men want to get the

women. Women want the sexuality for the promise of the future. Research has shown that

both sexes are almost equally aroused by the nudity exhibited in these advertisements” (Shepherd, 3).

 The funny thing is that appealing to the taboo of sex and the implication of sexual intercourse is not a new or modern means to advertise and sell products. Instead sexual advertising had its true modern start on the posters and advertisements for dance halls, movie theaters, and amusements parks of the late Victorian Era and the Early Twentieth Century, which used the new notion of heterosocial behavior and interactions between the sexes as a means to not only lure in the working female and working male consumer, but to also implant this new notion of the acceptability of challenging social norms and respectability and thus making gender relations an encouraged form of leisure instead of the taboo and unrespectable form perceived by the middle and upper classes of this period . A perfect example of using sex, cultural taboo at this time, as a means to appeal to the mass consumerist culture of the working class comes from some of the advertisements for the more racy and risqué West Brighton amusements of Coney Island. Kathy Peiss in her novel, Cheap Amusements, explains how West Brighton entrepreneurs would use the notion of sexual intimacy to advertise their rides as she said, “Many sideshows promoted familiarity between the sexes, romance, and titillation to attract crowds of young women and men” (Peiss, 133). One of my favorite advertisements that Peiss quoted from was from an ad trying to draw the young working class to the Cannon Coaster at West Brighton Park which used the come on, “Will she throw her arms around your neck and yell? Well, I guess, yes” (Peiss, 133). Other prime examples of these raw forms of advertising using the suggestiveness of sex and inter-gender mingling came from the rides The Canals of Venice and the Tunnel of Love in which the entrepreneurs attributed their success to the sexual intimacies their rides promoted as they said, “The men like it because it gives them a chance to hug the girls, the girls like it because it gives them a chance to get hugged” (Peiss, 134). Due to the success of sexual suggestive rides and attractions that gave patrons the opportunity to touch other sexes in a socially acceptable local, sex as a form of advertisement not only expanded in the mass consumption world of the Amusement park, but it became the primary subject used to lure patrons in at George Tilyou’s Steeplechase Park. Upon describing, Steeplechase Park, Peiss is quick to depict how Tilyou used heterosocial relations as a means of distinguishing his park from the more respectable amusement parks of the middle class like Luna and Dreamland at Coney Island. Peiss portrays how Tilyou took advantage of this new era of sexual exploration in the working class as she explains how Tilyou would explicitly appeal to sex as a means of getting the working class patrons on his rides as she explains Tilyou’s Barrel of Love ride and his accompanied advertisement for it: “Similarly, the Barrel of Love was a slowly revolving drum that forced those in it to tumble into each other. Tilyou’s intentions were made clear in this advertisement, “Talk about love in a cottage! This has it beat in a mile” (Peiss, 134-135).

By depicting the prevalence of sex being used as the most popular advertising medium for the working class and the mass culture, Peiss is not only introducing the exploitation of sexual suggestiveness as a means of promoting mass consumption in the Victorian and Early Twentieth century eras in the dance hall, movie, and amusement park industries, but she is also linking this pattern of sexual exploitation to the basics of American and World Advertisements of today. 

The Tunnel of Love at Tilyou's Steeplechase Park

Cannon Coaster at Tilyou's steeplechase Park

The Heterosocial Atmosphere at Tilyou's Steeplechase Park

             My question to the consumers of the world is if this appeal to sex and gender relations will be ever-present in our advertisements and will continually draw us in as consumers by the rawest forms of our emotions? Or will there come a time when the advertising market has become so overcrowded with sexual images, that the naked female and naked male body will no longer be an effective means to the consumer pocketbook. I know I would like an advertising revolution to occur in which the focus goes back to advertising quality goods and services and that advertisers would cease in putting subliminal messages in every ad we encounter, but I think I might just be wishful thinking. Sadly, I believe the appeal to sex and to sexual intercourse will be an ever-present means of advertisement until it either loses its appeal and success in the consumer market or until a new generation of consumers makes a conscious decision to put an end to the hold the sexual advertisement has on people and their disposable income.

Works Cited

Mulvey, Jeanette. "Why Sex Sells...More Than Ever." BusinessNewsDaily.com. N.p., 7 June

2012. Web. 09 Feb. 2013.

Peiss, Kathy Lee. Cheap Amusements: Working Women and Leisure in Turn-of-the-century

New York. Philadelphia: Temple UP, 1986.

Shepherd, Carol M. "The Influence of Sex in Advertising." The American Association of

Behavioral and Social Sciences 14 (2011): n. pag. Web. 9 Feb. 2013. <http://aabss.org/Perspectives2011/CarolShepherdTheInfluenceofSexinAdvertising.pdf>.

Link to Commercial

Link to GoDaddy.com Commercial http://videos.godaddy.com/

-Michelle Tobeson