Advertising is everywhere. Social media, magazines, tv screens, newspapers, and even when we speak to people.
We never take into consideration on how advertising is actually bad for us.
- Ads can influence to buy things we do not need.
- Ads can promote unhealthy thinking on how we view ourselves.
- Ads can promote negative values and beliefs.
Advertising wants you to believe a certain idea in order to buy a product that you probably do not need.
There are countless times I have flipped through the pages of magazines or scrolled through social media and have found myself comparing my looks and lifestyle to the people on the screen or page.
Not only has it made me self-conscious of my own body but has also made me want things in order to resemble the people in ads or live life “perfect” as advertising wants me to think.
We all think we should have the new phone being advertised on tv during commercial breaks. We all think we should try our hardest to look like the models on Victoria Secret ads. We all think we should buy the new spring collection from the trendy store that claims if we do we will “look pretty” and be “on trend.”
We all think we deserve something. However, we are never grateful for what we already own and we take granted the things we already have.
Why is this?
For me, I think one reason is behind the advertising industry. The industry likes to manipulate, encourage, and influence us to believe we need something or believe in a negative idea in order to be happy, successful and perfect.
Advertising paints us a pretty picture for us to buy in order to live a life that according to them will give us our goals and dreams. However, the picture they paint right in front of our faces is all fake.
We should not submit to the ideas and messages that advertising sends us. We can be smart and prevent ourselves from comparing our lives, bodies and views with ads.
That is not to say that all ads are horrible. Some ads send useful and accurate messages to people. Ads like Moms Demand Action, WWF, and feedus.co are a few good examples.
In the book, On Earth as It Is in Advertising it says,
"Advertising has a very influential yet deceptive voice. Because media come in so many forms, the voice is everywhere suggesting lifestyles, promising belongings, and disorientating its listeners.”
Next time you come across an ad on your phone, computer, tv or as you walk throughout a store, be aware of what the ad is trying to tell you. A good example to look at is a few ads that take in Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.
Abraham H. Maslow, Hierarchy of Needs, A Theory of Human Motivation:
“Self-actualized people...live more in the real world of nature than in the man-made mass of concepts, abstractions, expectations, beliefs and stereotypes that most people confuse with the world.”
