Elements of Racial Discrimination in Media and Advertisement - Essay Example

Elements of Racial Discrimination in Media and Advertisement The evil of racial discrimination, even in the 21st century, pervades to a great extentthe lives of human beings across the globe. The concept of superiority or inferiority from racial perspective has become integrally weaved with the common mass psyche in such a manner that no matter how hard an individual tries to wave off the traits of racial discrimination from his mind, it does not becomes possible for him to act in an entirely unbiased manner. However, it seems more unfortunate when we see that media, more specifically advertisements sometimes play a major role in exciting the controversies associated with the aspect of racial discrimination. It has often been said in a complimentary manner about media that it is actually reflection of the society but as soon as allegations so severe as racial discrimination is associated with the media, it is quite confusing to determine that what actually is the role of media in developing the standard of social life. To which extent is the aspect of racial discrimination is weaved with our existence? Looking at the advertisements, even if International level corporate houses it becomes clear that people cannot stop themselves from seeing at lives as well as individuals in an unbiased manner. It is not that they always intentionally aim at focusing over those aspects that contain elements of racial discrimination but it is the ill effect of racism that has been integrally related to the essence of human existence, comes out all of a sudden and people even fail to understand that through their creativity they have actually derogated not an individual but a whole community, a total socio-cultural entity. Looking at the current situation and role of media, specifically advertisement in the current society it cannot be said with complete assertiveness that media has acted according to its assumed roles in the context of its ethical responsibility towards the society. Advertisement, as an effective tool of communication between people and industries, is into use since mid 19th century. The late 19th century, more specifically the year 1920 observed drastic change in the field of advertisement. In the recent years advertisement has become completely essential for promotion of a business or of the products created by a particular business house. Influence of advertisement has reached to such a dimension that advertisers and businesses houses are creating a particular brand image at the mass psychological level to increase demand of their products. However, series of debate has been raised regarding the influence of media content and ethical issues related to it. “It is not really in doubt that advertising has a general influence on media content, especially by shaping the structure of markets, the relations between media and their audiences and the balance of types of content offered.” (McQuail, 1995, p. 134) According to the theories of market analysis, there can be various types of market situations. Thus, a marketing strategy related to product content always does not satisfy such situations. While it comes to opening of opportunity of a new market, conditions like, “experiment, originality and independence of public policy” (McQuil, 1995, p. 134) play a leading role. Under these conditions, success of content and is followed by the advertisers. In the recent times, the major ethical issues that are directed against advertisement are, a) increase of deceptive, untruthful or manipulative elements, b) high level sexual connotation in advertisement, c) perpetuation of advertising stereotypes, d) creating unnecessary influence over consumerist behavioral aspect of the mass. Development in the field of modern advertisement has opened up opportunity for advertisers to influence people from the psychological level and in most of the cases they are ignoring ethical aspects. In addition to all these aspect elements containing strong connotation about racism is becoming explicit. As the companies are using media as the most important source for enhancement of their business as well as products, they most of the time focus over general trend that would help them to sell their products. Such urge to make profit often is extended to such extent that they ignore the aspect of humanity entirely. Media houses on the other hand, it seems, have placed the issue of social benevolence at the secondary place and they are more concerned about receiving monetary gains by promoting the ideas of business houses, even those ideas contain elements of racial discrimination. In this context it can be said that the media has shirked from the principle of social benevolence and encouraging the factor of social equality. In this context we can cite for a recently controversial issue that has put the focus over world leading beauty cosmetics giant L’Oréal. “L’Oréal, the French cosmetics giant, whose advertising campaigns proclaim “because you’re worth it”, was found guilty of racial discrimination for considering black, Arab and Asian women unworthy of selling its shampoo. France’s highest court was told that the group had sought an all-white team of sales staff to promote Fructis Style, a haircare product made by Garnier, L’Oréal’s beauty division.” (The Times, June 25, 2009) This instance is capable of exposing several aspects that are associated with racism, exposing the true nature of corporate sector, media and the attitude of white people towards people from the different other ethnic background. Despite repeated denial from the higher authority of the L’Oréal available evidences are clearly stating that, “Districom employees said that they were given oral instructions to favour white sales staff. But Thérèse Coulange, the deputy managing director of Districom, who sent the fax, said that she had merely wanted hostesses able to “express themselves correctly in French”. She said that the fax had been a personal initiative and not the implementation of company policy.” (The Times, June 25, 2009) This incidence clearly shows that a company will not compromise over its profit seeking mentality even though it has to sacrifice certain basic humane aspects. It is also quite astonishing to find that people have developed a kind of snobbish approach that they even cannot tolerate salespersons from Indian or Arabic ethnic background to come and sale products. Though this issue has received a great deal of media coverage but it does not change the fact that on several occasions media also act in a biased manner. Since inception of the photo and video journalism, there is no denial of the fact that appeal of media over the society has increased to a considerable extent. As a picture or a video is capable of expressing many other dimensions than words that is why the level of interpretation; rather scope of offering interpretations to people have also enhanced to a great extent. This aspect has opened up another opportunity before the companies that they can use elements inciting the factor of racial discrimination not in implicit manner. Due to such influence, use of visual advertisement is on a high and in this particular field we see excellent use of creative efforts. At the same time, from the social perspective, debates regarding ethical matters are also increasing. There are numerous such examples, where the use of a picture or a video is mainly aimed at exploiting mass psychology from the perspective of basic desire and sometimes those are overburdened with immoral connotations. “Eighty percent of the consumers interviewed spoke out against obscene or immoral advertisements. Such advertisements lead to generation in the society.” (Tyagi, Kumar, 2004, p. 384) Though business men and advertisers desperately ignore the negative aspect of photo and video journalism but from a common man’s perspective such sensitive aspects cannot be denied. We see that the young section of the society gets highly influenced due to such effect and in a sequential manner it casts wrong impact over the society from macrocosmic view point. No matter how much US citizens boost over the ideal of individual liberty but racial discrimination is becoming a growing sense of concern in the media sector, “An exhaustive new study of Americas advertising industry ... has found dramatic levels of racial discrimination throughout the industry. Bias against African-American professionals was found in pay, hiring, promotions, assignments, and other areas. The study was initiated by a coalition of legal, civil rights, and industry leaders who created the Madison Avenue Project. The Project was created in 2008 to address advertisings deep-rooted racial bias and today, Cyrus Mehri, Project leader and prominent civil rights lawyer, called the findings "absolutely astonishing in this day and age."” (Racial Discrimination in U.S. Advertising Industry, Big Firms Say No to Blacks, Thu, 08 Jan 2009) It is not that the governing or ruling system of a nation is completely ignorant about these issues and at the same time founders of law have came up with diverse range of legal prohibition that would put a stop over such ongoing trend of racial discrimination in the media and advertising sector. Legal provisions of United Kingdom has clearly suggested that “a) It is illegal (with a few exceptions) for an advertisement to discriminate on grounds of race; b) Advertisements must not include any material which might reasonably be construed by ethnic minorities to be hurtful or tasteless.” At the same time “The Race Relations Act 1976 (as amended) makes it unlawful to broadcast an advertisement which indicates or implies racial discrimination.” (Racial Discrimination, n.d.) Despite all these implementation it cannot be said with a confirmed tone that the element of racial discrimination has completely been eradicated from the psychical level of common people or the media sector has stopped using the elements of racial connotations. Simultaneously, it cannot be denied that government often expresses a kind of reluctant approach towards the handing of the aspects that can give birth to controversial issues rated to the presence of racial discrimination in advertisements. In this context if we refer to some of the visual ads of the recent times that will help us to understand that how critically the aspect of racism has penetrated through all the aspects of social life. While searching for certain evidences in this context I have come across one advertisement that clearly show to which extent people in the society are biased about their approaches towards racism. Someone named Bill Muse proudly commented over the advertisement of a university brochure, “When I get a college brochure, the first thing I look for is racial diversity. If I don’t see a few minority faces in the pictures, I toss it aside because who wants to go to some Podunk college that can’t even afford Photoshop?” (Zargaj-Reynolds, 21 May 2009) The moment one ready the caption he will surely notice the hilarious part of the whole thing but at the same time it is both unfortunate and surprising to see that in which way people generally think about other races even in the modern times. Though this quote has been used mainly for the purpose of inciting hilarious effect but at the same time it also points at the indifference of media towards such sensitive issues. It becomes evident from the quote that the individual is entirely biased about his position at the social hierarchal structure and there is a strong connotation of pity towards the “minority” class in his approach. It also becomes evident that the person is trying to be an unbiased person from racial perspective desperately; whereas, on the other hand he is conscious inside about his projection as an individual who is sensitive to deal with aspects related to racial discrimination. However, the meanness of mind or approach to look at the aspect of racism becomes clearer towards the end of the quote as he has attempted to imply that to attract more number of students and elevating the liberal image of a college or educational institution it must desperately include representatives of minority class. Why it has attracted media focus? Simple reason is that the advertisement actually aims at producing comical effect for the people and at the same time it also will serve the purpose of attaining more public attention. Isn’t such an advertisement clearly expresses biased approach of media towards people belonging to the minority section of the society? It has often been said that human entity is the greatest evidence of a person’s humanness. Unfortunately, it is becoming clear through this advertisement that people have been derogated to the level of racial subjects, ignoring the fact about their respective humanness. However, in this context Robert M. Entman, Andrew Rojecki have pondered deeper into the situation and come up with interpretation that, “The source of media’s racial images are complicated and systematic. If anything, the average White media worker probably feels less racial animus than the average White American. But even if most media personnel actively sought to advance a progressive racial project through the media, perhaps even to promote awareness of the structural hindrances African American face, they would be impeded by the operation of the strong forces ….” (Entman, Rojecki, 2001, p. 71) The second case is also an evidence of racism in advertisement but deals with the theme in a different manner. Title of the picture reads, Celebrating Black History Month the thoughtless way. The picture actually shows advertisement of a departmental store that is celebrating “Black History Month.” At the apparent level it may seem that the purpose is quite noble but the moment the word “Black” is pronounced it becomes clear that people are actually not identifying the African Americans as an integral part of their society but as some other person who only have the identity of “Black”. (Zargaj-Reynolds, 05 October 2007) Consequently, when other people, specifically visitors to the store, are reading the term they also, at their psychical level, they are also perceiving the African Americans as “Black” but not as a part of the same human entity and boosting the aspect of socio-racial discrimination. Thomas David Jones observes such acts that are performed by advertising actually point out general ideas of the society about “African Americans that are both untrue and defamatory; it is racial stereotyping. The act constitutes an act of racial discrimination … because African Americans are accorded wrongly unequal treatment by virtue of the fact that they are of a different race.” (Jones, 1998, p. 44) In the conclusion it can be said that no matter how much common people boost about the role of media to introduce equality in the society but in the modern context the situation actually differs considerably, compared to our general assumption. Due to different reasons, media often encourages application of elements containing materials of racial discrimination and on various occasions those reasons are not directed towards encouraging media ethics or social benevolence. The issues related to social discrimination were and still are an integral part of the human existence, eradication of which is only possible when we will be able to identify human beings on the basis of their human attributes; rather than as individuals belonging to a particular society, culture or race. References 1. Zargaj-Reynolds, P. n.d., Advertising Is Good For You, available at: http://pzrservices.typepad.com/advertisingisgoodforyou/racism_in_advertising/, retrieved on: 21st July, 2009 2. French cosmetics giant L’Oréal guilty of racial discrimination, Source : The Times, June 25, 2009, available at: http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/consumer_goods/article6572173.ece, retrieved on: 21st July, 2009 3. Racial Discrimination in U.S. Advertising Industry, Big Firms Say No to Blacks, Source: Medianewsline.com, 08 Jan 2009, available at: http://www.medianewsline.com/news/120/ARTICLE/3800/2009-01-08.html, retrieved on: 21st July, 2009 4. Racial Discrimination, n.d, London: Committee of Advertising Practice, available at: http://www.asa.org.uk/cap/codes/broadcast_codes/radio_code/Radio+Code+General+Rules+Racial+Discrimination.htm, retrieved on: 21st July, 2009, 5. Rojecki, A., Entman, R.M., 2001, The Black Image in the White Mind: Media and Race in America, Chicago: University of Chicago Press 6. Jones, T.D., 1998, Human rights: group defamation, freedom of expression, and the law of nations, Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers 7. McQuail, D., 1995, Media Performance: Mass Communication and the Public Interest, New Delhi: SAGE 8. Kumar, A., Tyagi, C.L., 2004, Advertising Management, New Delhi: Atlantic Publishers & Distributors Read More