If you don't know, the ad I am referring to is the following:
The ad was banned in the UK by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for being too "misleading," and not giving a true representation of what the product could actually do. In addition to the ASA, women around the world bashed the ad for being overly perfected and unrealistic.
While I am the first to complain about our society's standards for female beauty -- correction: our society's completely unrealistic standards for female beauty -- I cannot say that I agree with those who were truly offended by this ad.
The main reason for this is because I honestly cannot see the difference between this ad and every other makeup ad. The way I see it is that EVERYONE is airbrushed in makeup advertisements. I'd like one of these outraged women to show me a makeup ad featuring a model who isn't airbrushed to within an inch of her life. I can tell you right now that they won't be able to find one, becuase they don't exist.
The point of every makeup ad, and even more broadly, every ad in general, is to make the product look like the best product on the market, to make the product look like exactly what it's target market is looking for. Why, then, would Lancome want to produce an ad featuring a model who didn't look the best she could possibly look?
I know that I may be offending some by saying that, but when it comes down to it, in this day and age, shouldn't we know by now that advertisements are not the best representations of reality?
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