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Food Advertising Feeding Gender Stereotypes

Marissa Madar Follow

Feb 28, 2015 · 5 min read

We may not always see it, but gendering of food and even many other things is

EVERYWHERE. On the television, on the radio, or even at the mall. No matter where we

look or where we are, it is always with us, following us around, telling us what to buy

and what to eat. Not cool advertisements! But what’s scarier is realizing that we are

giving into these advertisements, women are buying the yogurt and men are buying the

steak burritos…. I’ll just leave this here for you to witness the transparent gendered

advertisement…

If the name of the commercial (Manmercials) isn't enough to realize that something is

not right then maybe the listing of what real men do and don’t do will help you out. The

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list can go on and on of food chains gendering their food with the help of

advertisements. There are some that even go as far as naming their product with the

word ‘men’ in it, for example, the Hungry Man brand. Mostly made up of sloppy joes,

steaks, and other various meats, this is what “real men” eat. So what does this mean for

the women? Do we only eat yogurts, chocolate, and drink skinny margarita’s? How

satisfying are these foods for women? Maybe it’s just me, but those hungry man meals

sure seem more filling than my cup of strawberry yogurt.

Why…

Researching why food companies advertise their products in such ways was very

interesting to me. Companies do whatever it takes to make the most money they can,

these companies target genders to make it seem like they need that product, just because

other men and women are eating that product too. In the book “Food is Love: Food

Advertising and Gender Roles in Modern America” the author Katherine Parkin stated,

advertisers commonly believe that women and men spoke different languages and that

their minds worked differently. Women rely on intuition and men thought things

through to their logical conclusions. The language used in advertisements for women

should be common and sensible instead of technical or of the kind that is ordinarily used

to influence men (Parkin 16). Companies take the time to research why women and men

think the way they do and use that against us in their advertising. Women especially

became a priority to many companies, women are usually seen as the stay at home mom

who cooks the food and tries to focus on their body image. Products such as Lean

Cuisine, Betty Crocker and others jumped right on this advertising train. Now it is

obvious that women have come a far way from being the stay at home mom and just a

caretaker for the home. But advertisers are still feeding into this type of woman, the

mom who cooks for the family. This is why women are a main focus for advertisers.

These companies won’t advertise the independent women who cooks only for herself,

only for her husband and children. But its 2015, women are always cooking and taking

care of themselves now. It’s 2015! So why are we being advertised what to eat and where

to eat it?

How This is Affecting Gender Stereotypes

Advertising plays a big role in everyone’s lives. We are constantly watching television or

surfing the internet so basically advertisers have it made in the modern world.

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Technology has brought advertising to a level it has never seen before. But with this

advancement in food advertising comes advancement of gender roles. As seen above, the

Taco Bell Manmercial made it pretty clear on what they think real men do and eat. This

is brainwashing males into thinking they are only real men if they drive a truck and eat a

steak burrito. Men are men, no matter what they eat. But maybe eating steak will make

them feel better about their ego? I wouldn’t know, but this is what it seems like. Men are

advertised as powerful with a big appetite, bigger than a woman’s. This takes affect all

the time, for example at a restaurant, if a man and woman are on a date it is mostly

conditioned as the man ordering the steak and the woman ordering the salad. The man

will then pay for the dinner, because he is obviously making more money since he’s the

man and will drive her home and the cycle will continue.

With women, we are the chocolate eaters, who seem to fall in love with the chocolate

every time we take a bite and the Activia yogurt eaters (helps with digestion!).

http://marketingtowomenonline.typepad.com/blog/what_were_they_thinking/

Advertisements to women can be confusing, because we are supposed to enjoy our

chocolate but also watch our figures and stick to the salads. This can only make women

more insecure than they already were about what to eat. These advertisements make

women look weak, they should be the stay at home mom making chicken dinners for

their families after a long hard day at work. It is crazy to think that women have come so

far just to be advertised as the chef and caretaker for their family. These advertisements

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try to brainwash the women into thinking that they are supposed to cook and buy the

grocerices and drive the kids to soccer practice. I think it might be safe to say that these

gender stereotypes are permanent when it comes to advertisements. They will take these

stereotypes and use them to their advantage, to sell the most food and products they can

to each targeted gender no matter how stereotyped their advertisements may be.

“At the end of the day, everybody should probably be eating more fruit and veggies. So

men might need to eat more salads, and women might potentially need a bit more

protein” (Food: The Last Battle of the Sexes?) So next time you hear or see an

advertisement that is telling you what to eat or how to be a “real man”, keep in mind that

they just want your money. You don’t need to be the truck driving steak eater or the stay

at home mom who makes the sandwiches for your family. Either way the company will

make money, so eat what you want when you want it and be yourself. We can make this

happen by ignoring the blatant stereotypes of food advertisement.

Works Cited

Lefroy, Marj. “Food: The Last Battle of the Sexes?” The Sydney Morning Herald. N.p., 31

Oct. 2011. Web. 28 Feb. 2015.

Parkin, Katherine J. Food Is Love: Food Advertising and Gender Roles in Modern America.

Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania, 2006. Print.

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