"I live by my own rules", "No one
tells me what to do", "I make my own choices", "I am
free". Many of us think that we are our own person and that the decisions
we make are our own. Many of the things we do are influenced by what we see.
Whether it is on television, in newspapers, or advertisements through commercials
or magazines. That is not to say that everything we do is entirely up to
someone else. The power of advertisements is real and it does more than just
getting people to buy products.
In the Video “Killing Us Softly” (http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=Killing+Us+Softly+4+Film&view=detail&mid=064835CC3B97514F914A064835CC3B97514F914A&first=0&FORM=NVPFVR), Jean Kilbourne
talks about the messages that advertisements are actually conveying. For nearly
35 minutes she displays these ads and goes on to depict them. She shows
countless ads from health products, to alcohol. From applying cosmetics, to
getting surgery. From women being “beautiful” models, to men showing their
“dominance” over these women. These advertisements can be quite controversial. Kilbourne also mentions that some of these ads expose men, but that the message behind it is nowhere near as diminishing of them as they are of women. In fact, they do not diminish them at all. She in essence says that these ads encourage women to embrace their roles as just that... woman. She mentions that the ads continuously reinforce society’s view on men and women and how they should be treated.
In the video by Tony Porter “A Call to Man” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td1PbsV6B80), he talks about what society expects from men and the effects or consequences of straying from this norm, being a man. He speaks about this “agenda” that men have to adhere to. This agenda is the Man Box or Man List. Some of the things on the list were “Do not show weakness or fear”, Aggression- dominance” and “Power control, especially over women”. The one that stood out the most was “Do not be like a woman”. In this video, he talks about society’s expectations for boys and men.
He also tells his audience how this affected him. He and his other friends all looked up to this older kid in the neighborhood. One day, the older kid called out to him (Anthony) and said “come upstairs”. Once there, the older kid asked Anthony if he wanted some. He goes on to say “I automatically knew what he meant. When asked if you wanted some, it could either mean drugs or sex”. Anthony was only twelve years old at the time. This just goes to show how early people, both male and female, fall victim to society’s views.
Both Porter and Kilbourne talk about the roles that are given to men and women by society through socialization. In the text Experiencing Sociology, socialization is defined as the process through which people learn their culture’s basic norms, values, beliefs, and appropriate behaviors (137). We learn these things since birth through different social institutions such as the home, a religious organization, the work place and even through the government. Anything that teaches us about our culture is an agent of socialization. In the case of Kilbourne, it’s the countless advertisements. With Porter, it’s not so much the advertisements or the media, but his family and peer groups.
There are many other accounts of this. In the article The Retro Wife by Lisa Miller, she talks about how women only get paid 77 cents on the male dollar. This already starts off showing women that they are “inferior”. In the article, she goes from being a hard working mother to depending on her husband’s income to be a full-time mother.
In another article called Parents’ Socialization of Children by D. Terri Heath, we see that different cultures have different ways of bringing up their children. It talks about the different approaches that countries use. For example, China focuses on individuality while Japan focuses on obedience. Different countries have different cultures and different methods of socialization, though they are similar.
