Media understand that one of humanities greatest desires in todays society is that of being accepted. People usually follow this notion that happiness and success in life corresponds with whether not you are attractive or significant other, even if the relationship is not based off actual affection, but commonly that of infatuation.
Through reading some blogs by peers, I have noticed many similar ideas proposed by bloggers suggesting that our demographic of young adults is typically allured to a longing for acceptance to the point where the media can manipulate our viewpoints and self-worth in the most degrading of manners. We seem to only focus on the product’s outcome rather than the insulting implication to our self-worth. Amy Lowe argues that, “Proactiv targeted teenage women whom are at an age in which their looks and relationship status are focus points in their self-worth… Proactive suggests that a girl’s acne is why she doesn’t have a boyfriend, and subsequently suggests that by using Proactive both her problems will be fixed.” http://lifeoflowe.wordpress.com/ Amy highlights the fact that, not only is our demographic manly focusing on the acceptance that only a relationship may seem to satisfy, but also that companies manipulate us through interpellation as they target our insecurities in our self-worth and tell us that their product can improve us.
In ads, our demographic is viewed as a sexualized generation, which to a certain extent is true, I mean, look at what passes as PG nowadays. Ads target this and sell us what they think is what we want most. Patt Shaw suggests that our demographic is given products mainly focused towards our sexuality: “Now I believe what this shows our demographic is that in order to feel successful or “good” about yourself, you must do two things. First, you must wear this cologne and secondly, you must have the opposite sex all over you.” http://pattshaw12.wordpress.com/ These ads are demeaning to us as they portray our demographic as unintellectual beings only focusing on sexuality and needing to be loved and accepted by others rather than ourselves.
Brenda Bouk mentions, “gender is central to identity, and gender solicitation is one of the earliest processes of interpellation” http://whatthehailblog3.blogspot.ca/-brend Since our demographic seems to self-identify with gender and sexuality, I guess it is fair to say that these ads to portray an accurate view of our demographic. Think about it, we are buying these products, are we not? I feel that our society is focused too much on what other people think about us that we are willing to sacrifice our self-worth to be accepted. If we stop caring so much about how we are viewed and focused on how we feel about ourselves rather than how others may feel about us, we may be able to see a shift in interpellation and the self-identifying ways of our demographic.
xmatthewfame 
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