Week 9: Absence to Advertising

While reading the chapter about advertising in our book I was shocked by the actual statistics about the lack of minorities in advertising. An example was that the Native American statistics weren't talked about because they were practically nonexistent. It seems to me that advertising does not reflect the actual world as most people are skinny, gorgeous and airbrushed white male and female models. Unless the actual company or product are gear towards minorities, they are not in any advertisements. People with disabilities, elderly and the poor are rarely shown in mainstream advertising and are almost absent completely. The only time that these people are portrayed are for products that target those type of customers. Usually these advertisements don't put them in a good light, but instead show them either as something "normal" people pity or ways to improve their lives with this product with disabilities and age.

I couldn't find the blog with the links for this blog, so I search for some of my own. According to http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~schacht/rhe309k/tricia/advertisements.html the main Native American advertisements are the Indian Princess for Land O Lake Butter, Hi Yu apples and Abaco Tobacco showing Native Americans associated as housewives, selling fruits and smoking. In the United States, 12.4% of the population is over age 65 according to http://www.outdoorbillboard.com/articles/bps_outdoor_advertising18.html . Also a lot of the advertisements don't appeal to the elderly because of bad colors, lack of simplicity and the size of graphics and text.

I think that advertisers need to re-evaluate their customers and appeal to the rest of the non-white population. Also, they need to show these customers in the advertisements, not just as a quota, but to represent all of their customers.