Young Girls and Media Exposure

I have noticed while scrolling through Instagram and Twitter, that a common post is a comparison of girls when they were 12-14 vs. 12-14-year-olds now, highlighting the differences in maturity and appearance of themselves to other girls. Here are just a few of the many posts like this that have been published:

Cleary, this trend is huge among women: comparing themselves to other girls and how different their appearances are when they were the same age. This points to two clear implications for me. The first is that, with more media being exposed to young girls than ever before, through iPhones, social apps, and television, girls are met with more pressure than ever to look like beautiful celebrities and models that set unrealistic standards for them. In the past, the media has not had such a huge influence because apps such as Instagram and Snapchat did not exist, nor did the phones that use them with. However, in my generation, everyone has a smartphone and is therefore exposed to the media that pressures them to look a certain way, by wearing makeup and more mature clothes, explaining the huge differences between older generations and preteens now. The second implication of these types of tweets is that women are constantly in competition for who can look the prettiest. This topic was covered in the documentary, MissRepresentation. Because the media portrays beauty in an unachievable way, women constantly compete to try to meet this standard, thereby competing with each other and often putting each other down.

Cultural Appropriation and the Media

At McClatchy High School, no student is oblivious to a trend that emerged last year and is now (hopefully) trickling to an end. White people doing cornrows. Rather it is while in the halls or while scrolling through Instagram, I have witnessed Caucasians "rocking" cornrows, a hairstyle that is traditional to African cultures. For that reason, white people with the hairstyle easily fits the description of cultural appropriation, which is when a dominant culture adopts elements of a minority culture without consent, often times without an understanding or respect of the culture.
To be perfectly honest, when I first saw people wearing cornrows who were not African American, I didn't see a problem with it. I mean, its just braids, right? But after listening to my friends and reading some opinion articles online and in the Prospector, I understood why they can be offensive. I realized that the hairstyle does not represent just braids in the same way that a white girl wearing a Native American headdress on Halloween is not just a costume.
I think that part of the reason that I did not fully understand cultural appropriation the first time I remember witnessing it is because of the media's influence on my perception of what is offensive and what is trendy. Dozens of celebrities and supermodels have appropriated certain cultures, mainly African and Native American cultures. In turn, pictures of it-girls, such as Kylie Jenner, Kim Kardashian, Paris Hilton, Gwen Stefani, and Heidi Klum, have surfaced on Instagram, Twitter, and in magazines, as they are hailed as fashion icons and trendsetters. This type of media exposure writes-off cornrows as a simple hairstyle for everyone, when in fact, it is historically linked to African cultures and can be seen as offensive.
Do you think that white people doing cornrows is culturally insensitive? Or that the media has influenced you to view cornrows a certain way?

I HATE 13 REASONS WHY

I hate “13 Reasons Why,” a Netflix original show that has gained immense popularity, especially at the recent release of it’s second season. 

I have only seen the first season and do not intend on watching the second because I think the implied messages behind the show are toxic, especially to girls of my age and position. The show is about a high school girl named Hannah Baker, who kills herself after sending out a number of tapes to those whom she recognizes as the reasons that she committed suicide, hence the title, “13 Reasons Why.” Putting the terrible acting, boring cliches, and corny script writing aside, the show is so problematic. As it follows Hannah and her relatable problems in high school, it romanticizes depression and suicide, making it seem beautiful and poetic. After killing herself, most of Hannah’s proclaimed “reasons” for killing herself feel responsible and awful for their actions. Hannah becomes the center of attention at her school, neighborhood, and beyond as everyone collectively feels saddened and regretful of her death. Everyone misses her, which the show portrays in a romantic and desirable way. The show revolves around suicide and teenage depression without bringing helpful awareness to the problem. Instead, it makes it seem tragically beautiful and even trendy. It doesn’t discuss these modern problems so that it have a positive effect on depressed teenagers who can relate to Hannah Baker’s problems, but basically encourages teens to commit suicide, implying that they too will gain the recognition and attention they lack in day to day life if they do kill themselves. 

While I personally believe that this show has caused a lot of harm among adolescents, at the same time, some have said that it has helped them through their depression or served as an outlet for them. However, there are more people who have suffered from its implications after binge watching “13 Reasons Why.” 

With a second wave of popularity upon the release of the second season, I am once again appalled at the way that the show portrays mental health issues. It makes suicide seem poetic and beautiful, like the ending of a Shakespeare tragedy. I am only hoping that this very popular show, at the arrival of its second season, does not contribute to any teenage depression or suicide. 

This is American Media

Childish Gambino's "This is America"

I have now watched Childish Gambino's most recent music video, "This is America," 6 or 7 times. It has become clear to me since my first viewing that it is about the dual roles of gun violence and racism in America's history and culture. I have noticed many references to specific mass shootings and just gun violence in general. For example, in the seconds 2:44-3:01 in the video, it is silent, leading me to think it is 17 seconds of silence in honor of the 17 victims of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting. In addition, Donald Glover shoots at a church choir in a more graphic part of his video, which alludes to the Charleston church shooting in 2015. In the midst of all the violence and bullets flying around them, Glover and several back-up dances maintain a smile and an energetic routine. Other actors are on their phones, seemingly unaware of their surroundings filled with chaos. This reminds me of how people don't really care about mass shootings or they are ignorant to them. Being that all the back-up dances were African-America, it could also mean that black communities, faced with far more gun violence than whites, are simply forced to move on quickly. At one part of the video, a man on a white horse rides through, which made me think of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, a biblical reference.

This video is stacked with references and intertextuality, far too much for me alone to notice and understand. Luckily, the media has done an abundance of analysis of the music video and lyrics of "This is America." Twitter, the youtube comment section, and even news outlets like the Washington Post have thoroughly looked into every scene and aspect on the video. One twitter user compared Glover's movements and dancing to the Jim Cow persona from the 1950s. Many others noticed that the end of Glover's video, featuring him run through the dark, was a reference to "Get Out."

Listening to the song and watching the video has made me realize that Americans in general often use media to ignore the racism and gun violence that plagues our county. Glover sings, "We just wanna party/ Party just for you/ We just want the money/ Money just for you." The money and partying are forms of entertainment in America that distract or even blind us to the suffering around us. In the video, while Glover sings these lines, he is featured dancing with a group of African-American teenagers. They have their backs turned to riots, fire, and people running behind them, using entertainment to remain clueless to chaos and gun violence. This makes me wonder if I use media as a way to distract myself or to become more aware of problems in America.

Does my phone listen to me?

Call me crazy, but I think my phone is eavesdropping on me.

Earlier this week, I was talking to my mom in the car about getting some more workout clothes. This was an entirely verbal interaction, so I didn't write anything about it down on my phone or search for workout clothes on Safari.

The next day, I was using my phone to look something up online, and an ad for Nike running appeared. I thought that this was strange because I had not typed in any athletic brands into my browser. I know that many websites use cookies, or files that keep track of everything you have searched to try to show you ads that were created for your target market profile.

I've experienced cookies before. If I am on my computer and looking at the websites of clothing brands I like, I often will see advertisements for similar clothing brands the next day. I even find myself clicking on the ad and being delivered to its page, where I spend 10-20 minutes scrolling and wasting time.

However, in the case that I most recently experienced, it was different from the use of cookies. I did not type in anything about athletic clothes or brands into my browser, and my phone still showed me several ads for the, as if it heard me talking to my mom in the car. I've experienced a similar situation with other topics. After talking about makeup, I saw Sephora ads. After talking about wanting to go traveling, I saw ads for airlines.

I talked to my friends about this, and they too have had moments where they were spoke about something and then saw an ad for it the next day. If so many people are experiencing this phenomenon, where it feels like our phones and computers and listening to us, could there be any shred of truth to it? Perhaps my target market profile is so exact and accurate that companies just know what ads will appeal to me the most. Have you ever had a similar experience and gotten a little freaked out by your device's ability to show you ads for topics you were just talking about?

The Irony of Guerrilla Ads

Kaiser Guerrilla Ad Image
Guerrilla advertisements was a concept that was covered in the movie that we watched in class, "The Persuaders." For anyone who is forgetful, guerrilla ads are ads that pop up in random and unexpected places. Places where one would not expect to see an ad, as they would on TV or in the newspaper. This description is vague, so some examples of guerrilla advertisements are ads that you see on a closing elevator door, ads that are plastered on a bench, and even ads that cover the inside of a bathroom stall.

This weekend, I noticed guerrilla advertising, and for the first time in my life, I was able to put a name on it. I saw an ad for Kaiser Permanente on the side of a bus station. On top of being a guerrilla advertisement, it was also high concept. It depicted a women stretching, looking relaxed and put together. The clever caption to accompany it read, "Don't just stand there." Kaiser is a health care company and they are not literally selling the feeling of being calm and confident. However, the picture that they displayed communicated exactly this, attempting to make viewers feel this way about Kaiser health care.

While the content of the high-concept ad made sense, the method marketing, the guerrilla technique, confuses me. The purpose of guerrilla ads is to catch you off guard. They are supposed to be unexpected and refreshing, leaving an imprint on viewers. No one will remember the ads that they saw on TV last night because they muted out the noise or changed the channel. However, the ads that they saw on the side of the bus were supposed to surprise them and therefore be memorable. While this logic in theory should be affective on consumers, in my opinion, it is flawed.

The sole purpose of guerrilla ads is to break through the clutter and get you to remember them at the end of the day. Guerrilla ads, though, have become so abundant and constant that they just end up adding to the clutter of ads that I see everyday. In fact, not a day goes by when I don't see a guerrilla ad. On the bus stop, on the side of trash cans, inside my grocery cart. Hopefully these are ringing a bell to those who are reading this. Guerrilla ads have gotten so frequent that they have defeated their own purpose of being unusual and attention grabbing. I gotten so used to ignoring them that now they are just another layer of the clutter of ads that I see everyday, making it even harder for marketers to find a way to reach myself and other consumers that have gone numb to guerrilla ads.

you know you love me, xoxo,
Maeve

Why do people spend real money to flex on Fortnite?

Fortnite Skins Image

Earlier this year, we watched a video, "Digital Nation," which featured gamers that were so addicted to their choice games that they would spend real money on their fictional character's clothes and accessories. When I originally watched this, I was bewildered with how addicted and absorbed people were into their games that they spent real money that they would never get back to be cool on an online game. It really just does not make sense to me. Why would someone waste money on a non-material article of clothing that will only matter within the limits of that game, and only for the next 6 months that it is still popular?

I was not at all surprised when the internet's newest game sensation, Fortnite, started selling skins for real money. It is a manipulative technique to take money from teenagers who are already hooked on  the game to spend not just their time, but their money on it. It has been successful for many other games that sell virtual clout for real money, such as the Kim Kardashian game.

However, I was surprised when people in my grade that I interact with everyday actually buy them. I know that Fortnite has taken the world by storm (haha) and I know that they play regularly, which I don't really care about. It is just shocking to me that so many people I know are obsessed with Fortnite enough that, even though it is a video game and in a year, it won't be popular anymore, they still spend real money on it. It just shows how much Fortnite consumes their time and resources. 

Seeing how other people interact with media and so influenced by it, I myself am noticing how I spend so much time on Instagram and Snapchat recently. I want to practice what I preach, so I decided to stop using those apps for the next week (unless I have to communicate with someone for school) and see how it affects my day to day. maybe I am just as obsessed with media as my Fortnite playing peers, even if I don't spend real money to flex on virtual games. 

I know that this might be an unpopular opinion to the people that this blog applies to so please comment so we can have a constructive conversation!

xoxo, 

Maevey