IMPACT COMMUNICATION
AND INNOVATION
AND INNOVATION
As a consequence of the relentless pursuit of a better quality of life and well-being, advertising has been increasingly flooded by a focus on human rights and political correctness. Examples of this are the recurring public apologies issued by major brands like Skol, Dove, H&M, and AMP, which, following a history of sexist and racist ads, made a point of rectifying their actions. Because of this, it is believed that a complete overhaul is necessary in how to communicate with this specific type of consumer: the millennial.
On the other hand, however, millennials have also been blamed for the most recent advertising disasters due to their age and cultural perspective on contemporary society. Because of them, the industry has had to adapt its media content and learn to speak the language of the younger generation, which does not accept any form of prejudice when consuming advertising.
Market research data confirms the validity of these demands for more diversity in the media. A good example of this is the call for a revision of the feminine beauty ideal, which had been defined in communication based on very specific traits to determine whether a woman was beautiful or ugly. There is no need to list them; everyone already knows them: it is what most of us women strive to achieve.
Such traits are historical and social constructs, changeable over time. Feminist movements in the 20th century embraced aesthetics as a political stance, in order to counter the standard that had always been pre-defined according to cultural and temporal contexts. Hence the burning of bras, the abandonment of skirts in everyday clothing, and the challenging of shaving as the status quo — all very symbolic actions for the time.
After the hippie movement and the second wave of feminism, identity-based agendas gained more strength and, suddenly, being a woman meant having power—even if that power was fictional. However, between 1960 and 1980, the first advertisements for the famous girl powerbegan to appear, from cigarettes (Virginia Slims) to Legos. The subversion of traditional values began to gain ground, and women started to experience a freedom never before known.
A possible and interesting analogy to make is that of the TV show Breaking Amish. The Amish have very strict policies regarding any use of technology, clothing, and behavior in their small American towns. It is unthinkable for an Amish person, for example, to have sex outside of marriage, as this is punishable by the community. Likewise, it is strictly forbidden for an Amish woman to have a voice in decision-making within a marriage.
Over time, however, young members of Amish communities have renounced their place in the religion and even their own families, moving to big cities. The impact of freedom was so great that behaviors considered deviant even for modern, capitalist society began to be adopted by this new generation. That is, these former members began to develop habits such as drug use, gambling addiction, nymphomania, and excessive consumerism.
Similarly, women, having been recently "liberated" by the activities of feminist militants, also began to understand something that had been denied to them for a long time: the right to feel good about themselves. Soon, advertising also accelerated toward girl power, a discourse that today returns in the form of body positivity.
Thus, the concept of body positivity has permeated famous clothing brands, such as C&A, which constantly launches campaigns advocating for women's well-being: you are beautiful just the way you are. But more than that, such messages seek to be a counter-movement to beauty standards while simultaneously making it a rule to feel good and happy.
These strategies end up creating an anti-parallel polarization between the before and the after, as if one necessarily had to have the intensity of the other. The movement is especially strong due to Black feminism, which specifically advocates against the white European aesthetic, and fat feminists, who seek an end to fatphobia.
It is interesting to observe that within the gender women, there are various intersections to be made, and each of these groups ends up redefining the aesthetic goals to be achieved. In the trans,Blackandfat communities that exist within the female gender, there are different aesthetic standards constructed to be followed in pursuit of bodily and mental fulfillment. All of this is part of the great tidal wave that is body positivity.
In this context, the notion of the pursuit of pleasure, or jouissance, is of extreme importance, since the theory that every human being is on Earth in search of physical, mental, and spiritual pleasure also encompasses women. We live in expectation of events that provide us with well-being, since we now understand it as a human right, and as long as it is not achieved, we remain on the same journey.
Thus, when, most of the time, well-being and happiness do not arrive, frustration becomes chronic, which increases the desire for them, and so the woman ends up entering a vicious cycle of searching and disappointment. In the fashionindustry, this cycle usually occurs through the search for the fashion item that will make your body something naturally beautiful, the cream that will accentuate your natural beauty, the makeup that will draw attention to your trendy features.
Despite this, however, the situation will never truly be good regarding female self-esteem. It doesn't matter if she has already been voted the sexiest woman of the year by some magazine: the pursuit of pleasure is far from over. This is how the cosmetic industry and fashion Western world profit from women everywhere.
And there is no threshold for the number of actions to be taken in the name of beauty. Before, you didn't put anything on your face before bed, didn't wear any makeup, and had only two pairs of pants and five t-shirts in your closet. Later, you are introduced to a night cream that helps with your dark circles (oops, there's something wrong with your dark circles), you start using eyeliner and mascara to get rid of that "just woke up" look (even though it's true), and you buy some special dresses for work to look more professional.
Suddenly, you have three creams to use during the day, a shoebox full of makeup, and a closet that won't close anymore. And guess what: you still believe you need to buy more of these products and that they will improve the quality of your life.
Beyond the profitability of the jouissance, there is also a sense of reward in shopping at stores that appear to include diversity in their catalogs, which makes the Catholic definition of guilt fit perfectly into our vigilant society. It was also in this sense that political correctness instilled the guilt of deviating from what is acceptable.
And, once again, feminist activism takes center stage by transforming advertising. However, now it is not enough to practice body positivity: the demand has grown into something bigger. The policing of discourse now advocates for conscious consumption and ethical capitalism—that is, buying only from ethical companies that are responsible regarding human rights.
Despite this, conscious consumption seems more attainable than ethics in capitalism, since the latter depends on an understanding of consumption, production chains, and the product's journey. Ethical capitalism, on the other hand, does not sound plausible, since the fashion industry, like any other, responds to only one stimulus: profit. For industrial monopolies to profit, some form of human and natural exploitation is necessary.
Although the end consumer is aware that cheap labor, exploitation of natural resources, and industrial waste dumping are required to produce the desired goods, the tendency is to forget the entire process when presented with some redemptive reason that convinces them of the company's goodness. Otherwise, the company can still adopt the discourse of inclusion and body representation/diversity as a behavior to be reinforced (like a lab rat receiving cocaine) and, if they reward the company enough, the behavior will become the rule.
Consumerism is like any addiction: a process of making decisions based on priorities—and the degree of importance society places on the final product is less than that placed on the manufacturing process. The idea is more visible than the material, as we have more access to advertising than to the product and the production itself. If we were to compare how many hours of our lives we spend consuming advertisements versus how many hours we spend actually consuming products, we would end up with a very high percentage of time in the first category and something close to zero in the second.
We conclude, then, that the idea of beauty standards in the West has not been extinguished: it has merely transmuted from conservative to liberal. Here we are also reminded of the impasse between women in the West and the Middle East, who cannot reach a consensus on hijabs, since some believe it is a symbol of oppression and others assume that every woman should be free to wear whatever she wants.
Although the very notion of freedom is extremely complicated and perhaps impossible to decipher, activism works excessively on the agenda without considering the philosophical foundations upon which it rests. As a result, we see a major movement by the culture industry that co-opts social movements (feminism, LGBT, anti-racism) for the sake of profit.
There is still much to discuss regarding ethics in capitalism, female aesthetics, and freedom, but some signs of relief are already beginning to appear in our daily lives. One example is the body neutrality (body neutrality), which essentially means being neutral toward your own body. This approach removes the pressure to feel good about yourself and doesn't advocate for punishing those who don't fit in. Most importantly, it takes the female body out of the market spotlight, thereby rendering the beauty industry unnecessary.
While the pursuit of the perfect body continues, with the specific nuances of each era, some women are already beginning to think of strategies to bypass it: one example is the encouragement of critical thinking and knowledge to actually—this time for real—improve the quality of life for women around the world.
After all, in a multicultural world with economic and social barriers between territories and specific internal policies, how could we possibly find a common aesthetic threshold that, coincidentally, would also be defined by the Western capitalist industry?
