标题: The Effects of Misleading Advertising 误导性广告 [打印本页] 作者: David 时间: 2019-10-18 23:01 标题: The Effects of Misleading Advertising 误导性广告 回帖下载完整音频及双语全文：
I'm speaking to denounce a disease with our modern society, that is, tile sex role of misleading advertisements and commercials.
我在此发表演讲，谴责现代社会的一大弊病，那就是误导性广告的性别效应。
Advertising affects all of us throughout our lives. Adolescents, especially female adolescents, are particularly vulnerable, however, because they are new and inexperienced consumers and are the prime targets of many advertisements.
Advertisers are fully aware of their role and do not hesitate to take advantage of the insecurities and anxieties of young people, in the guise of offering solutions. A cigarette provides a symbol of independence. A pair of designer jeans or sneakers conveys status. The right perfume or beer resolves doubts about femininity or masculinity.
No politician or educator is more pervasive or persuasive than advertising. It teaches us to be consumers, to value material things above all else, to feel that happiness can be bought, that there are instant solutions to life's complex problems, and that products can fulfill us and meet our deepest human needs. The value of a person, especially the value of a young woman, depends upon the products used.
For a woman, conventional beauty is her only attribute. She is supposed to have no lines or wrinkles, no scars or blemishes. She is thin, generally tall and long legged, and above all young. All "beautiful" women in television commercials conform to this norm. The image is artificial and can only be achieved artificially. Desperate to conform to an ideal and impossible standard, many women go to great lengths to manipulate and change their faces and bodies. More than a million dollars is spent every hour on cosmetics in this country. A woman is conditioned to view her face as a mask and her body as an object, as things separate from and more important than her real self. She is constantly in need of alteration, improvement, and disguise. She is made to feel dissatisfied with and ashamed of herself, whether she tries to achieve "the look" or not.
Ironically, the heavily advertised products, such as cosmetics and weight-reduction drinks, are even detrimental to physical attracttiveness. There is very little emphasis in the media on nutrition and exercise and other important aspects of health and vitality.
Adolescent females are also discouraged from growing up and becoming adults. Growing older is the great taboo. Although boys are allowed and encouraged to become mature adults, girls are encouraged to remain little girls, to be passive and dependent, never to mature. Somehow placed in a double bind, they are supposed to be sexy and virginal, experienced and naive, seductive and pure.
Misleading advertisements and commercials depict a world in which love and passion are reserved solely for products, in which sexuality becomes a commodity, and in which young women are the worst victims.