hi prof lambiase...i tried to comment to your last blog but couldn't figure it out so I just did one on here! I've been up all night with my fiance who's been battling the flu for about a week, and as expected I feel horrible now as well. I'm going to stay in today and meet with you on Wednesday (God willing :) ) Just wanted to let you know. See you then

hi prof lambiase...i tried to comment to your last blog but couldn't figure it out so I just did one on here! I've been up all night with my fiance who's been battling the flu for about a week, and as expected I feel horrible now as well. I'm going to stay in today and meet with you on Wednesday (God willing :) ) Just wanted to let you know. See you then

Hello again...it's been a while. there is so much that i've noticed in the media and haven't had a computer around to jot. it's mostly been in movies. For instance, I saw the new Harry Potter flick. Not bad by the way, and i've hated the others. Anyway, there's this big competition thing and there's 3 guys and one girl competing. Guess who gives up first and comes last in every competition. She even has to be rescued from one of them. Then, I was watching House of Wax (horrible by the way) and there's this stripdance scene with Paris Hilton that has absolutely nothing to do with the movie. At all. Whatsoever!!!! Also I was watching the entire series of Sex in the City (off-and-on) and I think it would make an excellent study. It's one of the few products of media that I've seen both combat gender myths and perpetuate them. If I wasn't already into Disney princesses...I would go for it. But that would be kinda a hard transition.

Just something i wanted to quickly mention. I just read in our book that attractive models in advertisements don't actually influence a person to buy something. So I'm confused. I just got done writing a paper about how much advertisers use sex to sell because that's what people respond to and as soon as I push "print" I find out that's not really the case. Cool huh. Oh well, hope I get a good grade.

Oh my god! Over the weekend I ripped out every ad in my latest edition of Cosmopolitan. As I'm sitting down trying to pick which one I want to demolish, I'm thinking, "not a big deal, it's only a couple of pages." Wrong! Holy crap, I knew there were a bunch of ads in magazines (I don't even want to look through my InStyle) but I had no idea. Actually pulling the pages out made me realize how many of them there actually were. And I didn't even pull out every ad, just the ones with people in it!! When I picked them up to move them into my bag it was like the whole magazine. And when I went to put the magazine up, there was no point!! It was gone! Everyone in the world should try this just to see how much advertising there is in a magazine. I couldn't believe it. I mean I believe it, but seriously. Furthermore (which I know we're going to discuss this later but still...) there were absolutely no women of color in these advertisements, except Halle Berry for Revlon and Eva, the America's Next Top Model winner. No one who wasn't a major name in pop culture. Sad. Will I stop reading Cosmopolitan? No. Will I send a strongly worded letter? No. That's how they get away with it. And I'm willing to bet things would look a lot different in an African-American focused magazine. It's funny though because Cosmo does try to portray themselves as a even representation of women. My favorite is when the write articles about anorexia or how we should all feel comfortable in our own bodies, but the ad on the other side of the page is some under-weight woman using an orange peel as her only clothing.

I have been paying more attention to the media and advertising, and it's amazing what you'll see if you just look! What has struck me the most is how advertisers will use a woman's body in a way that has absolutely nothing to do with their product and shouldn't have anything to do with selling it. My favorite that i've seen lately is at Planet Tan. There's a picture of a woman's stomach and the words accross it say "In the bar, no one will notice your GPA". Isn't that crazy? There's a couple more funny ones there but you get the idea.
I thought the video "Killing Us Softly part 30 (or whatever it was)" was interesting, but it did cross my mind that maybe she was trying too hard to find something wrong with all the ads. Some of the arguments she was making I didn't really see in the ads. I could see where she was coming from, but she was working a little too hard to make her point. However it was still really interesting and after noticing things myself, I definately understand how much of a problem this is.

Ok here i am ! I hope I did this right...
I think the important fact for us to keep in my with regards to what we discussed in class is that it's neccessary to know all the facts of every case before we decide one case was given more publicity than another. This being said I don't know every factor in the girl's stories, so I can't tell which is more "important" than the other. Secondly, we have to remember that the news is about money also. News is something else that fills up the space between commercials. A station isn't going to air something that the public isn't interested in. Millions of dollars is spent every year to find out what we're interested in, and I guarantee you they know which stories will make them money and which will not. With this in mind, we have to consider why we tune in and why we tune out. Is it the media's fault for not showing more diversity in their coverage, or are the viewers' decision to turn the channel driving their news selection. There's a reason they're airing what they're airing. It's because they've found those reports are the one's who bring in the most viewers. It's not right or wrong...it's a fact.