Rhetorical Analysis Ads

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The average American will spend about sixty-one minutes a day watching commercials (Stelter). Based on the eighty-one year average life expectancy of Americans that is roughly three and a half years of their life that will be spent watching commercials. While advertisements may just seem like an annoyance, they do influence some of our decisions because of the amount of time we spend watching them. Many companies use advertisements whether it is a video commercial, or a print advertisement, in order to get people to buy their product. They do this by persuading the public through their use of rhetorical strategies such as, ethos, pathos, and logos, and incorporating Ideologies that are important to our society. Advertisements are easy to analyze…show more content…
The advertisement begins with Scherzinger walking toward the bathroom in a plane she then pulls out her Herbal Essence shampoo and begins washing her hair in the bathroom. This picture itself is problematic simply for the fact that somebody washing their hair in a bathroom on a plane is highly unlikely mainly because there are no showers on a plane and any girl who has attempted to wash her hair in a sink would know that it is nearly impossible. She then begins moaning because of how much pleasure her shampoo gives her. Once she hits the button, the rest of the plane can hear her screaming, “Yes,” and moaning and the passengers assume that she is having sex in the planes bathroom. There is no question as to whether or not sex sells. Many other companies sexualize their products because of the fact that sex sells, but why does it sell? Kilbourne states, “Sex in advertising is pornographic… because it fetishizes products, imbues them with an erotic charge—which dooms us to disappointment wince products never can fulfill our sexual desires,” (Kilbourne 169). The viewers see Scherzinger having a near orgasmic experience with this shampoo, and believe that they will get a similar experience by buying this product. However, shampoo giving a person as much pleasure as sex is highly unlikely. The people who buy this product will be disappointed because they will never have the same experience as Scherzinger did in the
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