Victoria's Secret is to look pretty and be quiet.....

I chose an ad from Victoria's Secret. This ad features many problematic images which Jane Kilburne discusses in her lecture. The commercial promises to sell "one thousand fantasies" with one gift. Then the commercial goes through various scenes which feature models with the body type that most women do not have, ie tall, thin, with broad shoulders, small hips and big breasts. All of the models in this ad are white women. The first message is that a fantasy woman would look like this. This poses the problem of creating an ideal standard of beauty which excludes most women, and certainly women of color. The unspoken message is that these women are beautiful, fantasy women, and anyone else is not.

Next, the commercial skips to scenes of the women. One scene features two women in the bedroom. This is framed not in an empowering way to women, but as a man's fantasy. The message is that a woman's sexuality is for man's pleasure only. Another scene features a woman against a wall while knives are being thrown at her. This scene is a fraction of a second long, but as the commercial repeats the words "one thousand fantasies" the violent image is associated with this word. This is an example of the romanticization of violence against women who are merely "things" and not people. This image is problematic because it perpetuates the notion that violence against women is not only ok, but a way to dominate women, which this commercial implies is one of man's "one thousand" fantasies.

Finally, the women each have the coy, pouty faces that portray them in a childlike way. The final image contains a woman covering her mouth, which is a presented as one of the "thousand fantasies" being the silence of women.