you are only allowed to love yourself with capitalisms consent

You are only allowed to love yourself with capitalism’s consent.

Did you know you’re in a toxic relationship? No, I’m not talking about your significant other. I’m talking about the signs on the walls of the subway. I’m talking about the Instagram posts that have invaded our feeds. I’m talking about the whispers in your ear that tell you to buy! Buy! Buy!

We’re all being gaslit by capitalism. We’re being told any positive perceptions of ourselves don’t exist and our realities are altered and negated before our eyes. Happy with how you look? No, you aren’t.  Happy with how your family and friends perceive you? …are you really?

Both as active consumers and as passive partakers in society, we are constantly being barraged with media images telling us we’re not enough. Capitalism fights for control. It creates a need for products or lifestyles where previously there was contentment or maybe just ambivalence. It isn’t outright (although sometimes it is), it’s usually disgustingly and sneakily subtle as it is coming at us through the media we consume.  Advertisers are the foot soldiers of capitalism. They look to target very specific demographics and these groups aren’t chosen arbitrarily. The target group must have four critical qualities: identifiable, accessible, measurable, profitable (Clark).

Advertising images are then created to appeal to these demographics in a way that batters at their self-esteem. Most advertising seeks to prey on people’s insecurities, but the demographic that advertising preys upon insistently is women. Berger notes that these images “…steal her love for herself as she is, and offer it back to her for the price of the product.” (Berger). What advertising sells is “values, images and concepts of success and worth, love and sexuality, popularity and normalcy” (Kilbourne). Women and non-cis people are constantly targeted because they are perceived as vulnerable. And advertising works to solidify and convince them that they are weak and in need of material assistant. Advertising doesn’t sell products – it sells a lifestyle. It is a faulty education, conditioning women to think they are ‘less than’ and leading them to purchase and contribute to the capitalist economy.

An example of photo retouching done to ads to create unrealistic expectations. From The Lash Strend, ADWEEK

Over consumption is then normalized as we buy things that are unnecessary to our health or perception of ourselves. If you want control, you use advertising (Steinem). Advertising also works to create stereotypes when targeting very specific groups – as someone raised and socialized as a woman, the second I turned 13 I turned to the make-up aisle in Rite-Aid in search of womanhood, adulthood, and maturity. Young boys are not turned toward the make-up aisle. We see this in popular culture, we see this among our friends and family. We see influencers on Instagram getting paid to post about clothing or drinks. We see product placement in our favorite films and television shows. Advertising is truly everywhere.

I, myself, see advertising everyday in my favorite forms of media. I am a consumer of the podcast Hannahlyze This , a self-help podcast produced by Youtube star and author Hannah Hart and her good friend Hannah Gelb. To fund their podcast - record it and get paid for the labor that goes into creating it - the Hannahs advertise for different products by giving their own personal recommendation and then offering their public a discount when they purchase an online order. The content of their podcast is not altered from their endorsements of products but the inclusion of these advertisements does make for a different experience when listening. The funding is necessary but the jovial and congruous way in which they seamlessly include ads has a somewhat disrupting affect, ironically. While listening to a self help podcast featuring people I admire, I don't expect to be sold something.

Another form of media with an advertising in my daily consumption is Instagram. Instagram is a social media platform that did not used to have much advertising. Now it is both in their regular posts and in their stories. When I want to watch my friend’s Instagram stories and see what is going on in their day to day lives, there are not advertisements that are targeted towards me and my interests. Through the data collecting of Facebook, who owns Instagram, I am constantly seeing ads for things that I recently searched for or talked about with friends. I also see ads when watching Snapchat stories now. Snapchat did not used to have advertisements. Advertising among Instagram stories and Snapchat stories are frustrating. They are easy to skip but still annoying.

News outlets also have forms of advertising. The online magazine outlet Bustle also uses advertisements interspersed throughout their articles. Since Bustle is a women’s issues-oriented magazine, mostly the advertisements have to do with situations and products in that realm. Some articles are even directly sponsored by events or products. Buzzfeed also had an interesting advertising model in that they create articles in tandem with advertising for products. These articles are usually quizzes, that end up telling the reader what product to buy – instantly matching a user with a product that will fit them and “change their life.” 

Advertising and degradation of self esteem – telling people that they need to buy something to improve their life or be like their role models, go hand in hand. This model in and of itself is dangerous to everyone.

Citations:

Clark, Danae "Commodity Lesbian" Camera Obscura, Vol. 25 (1991)

Kilbourne, Jean "Beauty and the Beast of Advertising" Media&Values (Winter 1989)

Steinem, Gloria "Sex, Lies & Advertising" MS Magazine, July/August 1990