Monday, May 31, 2010

Selling Sex, Denying Sexuality

They just keep putting words in odd locations around Justin Bieber to get all the pre-teen girls' eyes to gravitate to certain spots in the photos, and it's getting more obvious by the minute. You think this cover supposed to trigger the teen's buying reflex? Of course it is.

Every couple of years adults scramble to turn some young person into a sex symbol so they can exploit them. That's the business. We can pretend it doesn't happen, or we can acknowledge that not only are children sexual, but we're actually profiting from it. Right now, it seems no teen is as exploited as Justin Bieber, and obviously so much of his look is an example of marketing at it's most calculated.

Sometimes you have to really admire the gall of society to stick words at a boy's hind-level on the cover of a CD to entice girls to throw their allowances on it, and at the same time, categorically deny young people the legal ability to have a sexual interest in one another.

Unless of course we were supposed to take that calculated placing to be something different, like a fart taking shape in the words "One Less Lonely Girl" trailing behind him--as if he's become such a sensation even just a fart could cure a girl's loneliness. Seriously, they keep putting words where they want the teen girls' eyes to look, and it gets harder to take any picture of him seriously.

Update: an even more obvious example has been spotted!

No comments:

Post a Comment