Over the past several decades, monumental gains have been made in securing women’s right to abortion, with nearly 50 countries liberalizing their abortion laws. Some of this reform has been incremental, enabling women to access legal abortion only when there is a threat to her life or when pregnancy results from rape. But many of these changes have been truly transformative, overturning absolute bans on abortion in favor of women’s reproductive autonomy. The issue of abortion has been prominent for decades now, but it recently gained more discussion due to the case of Roe VS Wade being overturned in America.
Ireland is a predominantly catholic country, and has therefore gained lots of controversy over the years. This advert appeals specifically to Ireland rather than addressing the public. By referring to their audience as the country rather than individually, it creates a sense of comradery and necessity around the issue. The idea that for pregnant women specifically, the world is safer without them having the ability to make their own choices is pushes onto the audience and imperatives such as 'lets keep it that way' encourages the audience (in this case, people living in or from Ireland,) to do what's best for their home and mediates reality. The picture of the women holding her baby appeals to our need to nurture or protect those more vulnerable. The text hasn't necessarily relied on stereotypes, but it does reinforce patriarchal values as the advert suggests that pregnant women shouldn't have a say in the matter; the representation of women seems warped in a way, as the intentions of the advert seems to be to protect women, however the issue the advert is fighting for contradicts this. The agenda of the product is to convince their audience to vote against abortion- the advert seems to manipulate people into thinking that this is the best thing for women. The advert seems hegemonic as it reinforces dominant ideologies and asserts dominance over more vulnerable groups through control of the media.
This advert provides shock for us as an audience. The use of the knife being referred to as a pacifier mediates reality and gives us a false sense of how people who are pro-choice seem. The advert presents people who are pro choice in a dangerous way, implying that they are murderers. The tagline 'if you're pro-choice, the blood is on your hands' further enforces this idea that being pro choice is malicious and equates to murder. The image of the knife combined with it being labelled a pacifier, additionally with the text underneath reading 'to keep baby quiet' villainizes pro-choicers, women especially. The stereotype that women who don't procreate aren't fulfilling their potential or their role in society is reinforced through this advert. In terms of Richard Dyer's theory, 'a shortcut to meaning' stereotype is used, as people who support or believe this would be inclined to align with the ideologies being presented in the advert. The advert pushes a pro-life agenda, but instead of advertising pro-life as a positive thing, the way the previous advert does, this American advert instead demonizes pro-choicers. This advert is hegemonic because it pro-life is evidently the more dominant ideology in society, therefore the advert asserts control over their audience by reinforcing them.
This British advert is pro-choice, contrasting with the two previous adverts. The advert uses an interrogative to open their advert to call pro-lifers out and to draw attention to their views. The advert presents an empowering message through the use of full stops as an answer to the previous question. The last sentence 'no more names' encourages people to be respectful rather than judgmental. The advert doesn't rely on stereotypes and includes people of different ethnicities. The advert presents the ideology that women should be supported rather than criticized for their choices.The advert is pluralistic as it has includes a hashtag and the organisations twitter account, which suggests that the representation is influenced by people rather than controlled by the organisation specifically.
This advert doesn't comment on the controversy the abortion causes, but rather it focuses on giving women information instead of peer pressuring people into aligning with their views. As said from the news reporter, the advert caused lots of controversy in the UK but the organisation itself said that it was long overdue. I wouldn't say that the advert relies on stereotypes, it tries to create a more personal connection by giving the women in the advert names and showing their day to day lives to enforce the idea that this could happen to any woman. The advert gives women resources and supports them, I wouldn't say it's necessarily pushing ideologies, but the organisation itself is evidently pro-choice so this ideology would be pushed regardless of the advert. The advert is pluralistic as the one of the women apart of the organisation herself said in the interview that they get over 350,000 women asking for advice, which implies that this advert is shaped by the audience rather than the company themselves.
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