Advertising
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Presentation Transcript
Advertising And media ethics
Advertising ethics • Advertising has always been part of American culture. • From colonial times, this country has promoted itself.
Advertising ethics • Americans generally support extensive advertising in their culture. • We believe rational people can be savvy enough to sort out advertising appeals.
Advertising ethics • We know advertising has powerful effects in society. • We don’t often know when, and how, however. • Advertising’s supporters say self-interest brings buyers and sellers together so everyone is happy. • Critics say ads exploit the public and appeals to people’s worst side.
Advertising ethics • Advertising relates to media ethics in a variety of areas: • Stereotypes. • What is appropriate to advertise? • How to make appropriate advertising pitches? • What kind of ads should appear, in what media? • How far should advertisers invade privacy?
Advertising ethics • Ethics philosophers say one standard doesn’t apply to advertising: truth. • By “truth,” in this case, we mean, fair, unbiased accounts. • Advertising does not generally provide that. • Most advertising can be called “opinion”: the tastiest beer, the sexiest perfume. • These claims can’t usually be verified as “true.”
Advertising ethics • The Federal Trade Commission regulates most advertising for outright lying or deception. • You can’t make false statements in an attempt to deceive. • But this often is a gray area.
Advertising ethics • Fair and balanced doesn’t apply to advertising. • Advertising plays up strong points, and plays down weaknesses. • We presume the public knows this, but some people really don’t quite remember that.
Advertising ethics • Rationally it would be good to demand that advertisers use clear, relevant and truthful evidence to support a claim. • But most advertisers don’t appeal to a rational side. Instead they try to create an appealing lifestyle around a product. • “Evidence” is irrelevant.
Advertising ethics • We can identify special cases regarding advertising that are worth closer examination in a discussion of media ethics.
Advertising ethics • First is political advertising. • Should political candidates, central to the democratic process, be advertised using evidence and rational appeal? • We know they are not. • Political advertisers may argue that the goal is persuasion, and if they stray from the truth, the “marketplace of ideas” will sort out misleading information.
Advertising ethics • So, once again, those in favor of advertising shift the burden of sorting out the good from the bad to society. • But should not advertisers share that burden?
Advertising ethics • Second case: advertising from groups professing an ideology. • Ecology, animal rights, abortion, gun rights, anti-smoking, etc. • Do these groups have some ethical responsibility to tell the truth? • Many groups argue their cause is critically important. But where do we draw the line?
Advertising ethics • Third, advertising for harmful produces. • What is the ethical standard for things that can hurt people? • Cigarette ads, of course, have been carefully controlled. Since 1971 they have been banned from television. • These clearly were the kind of ads that appealed to children, and today, it is hard to defend their ethical use.[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYvOgnabABU]
Advertising ethics • Okay, so cigarette advertising today is fairly tightly controlled. • But what about ads for alcohol, guns, pornography, strip joints, term paper companies…all legal, but not necessarily always healthy to society.
Advertising ethics • What about movies and television? • Humphrey Bogart smoked all the time. (He died of throat cancer.) Many young people were encouraged to smoke based on this suave, sexy movie star. • Smoking was widespread in the advertising world of the 1960s. But should it be depicted in a popular program today, such as “Mad Men?” Will people attracted to the retro chic pick up that habit?
Advertising ethics • A fourth area concerns separation of advertising and news. • Most newspapers label advertising as such, and clearly separate it from news. • In magazines, it’s not so certain. • Should media reveal when it does a story on an industry based on the amount of advertising it bought? • Should programs feature brand-named products whose placement was obviously paid for?
Advertising ethics • What about news celebrities? • Should people who present news shows also do advertisements? • If not, should sports or weather presenters also do advertising? Where to draw the line?
Advertising ethics • A fifth special area: dishonest, deceptive content. • Is it ethical to mislead people in advertising? • While the FTC requires truth, advertisers can nevertheless get buy with misleading to an extent, and extent some would call deception. • Is it ethical to advertise credit cards for people with little income or poor credit, while not divulging large fees and penalties?
Advertising ethics • Is it ethical to advertise “work at home” schemes (Make $20,000 a year!), despite that most of these are scams for gullible readers? • What about weight-loss products that promise to “melt fat away,” or give unreasonable results? • What about exercise products that are useless?
Advertising ethics • Does the medium itself have some responsibility to protect its readers or viewers from misleading advertising? • Some editors believe so, and more did in the past; many would not accept advertising for liquor, guns, abortion clinics or “gentlemen’s clubs.” • But does their refusal constitute a limit on free speech?
Advertising ethics • What about ads that don’t necessarily try to sell such services, but do enhance photos to make the product or service look better than it really is? • Is it ethical to use Photoshop to improve skin, make people thinner, make wrinkles vanish? • Is it unethical to make clothes or food look better?
Advertising ethics • Sixth: Using sex, fear, or violence to sell. • Sex sells, the others also appeal to primal emotions. That makes them effective sales tools. • You seldom see models ad ads who look like real people. Does this lead to unrealistic goals of thinness and beauty?
Advertising ethics • A seventh area: placement. • Have media which include material emphasizing social responsibility, healthy or good behavior some ethical consideration regarding placement? • What about an ad which seems to promote the opposite: a story about healthy eating next to a “supersize” fast food ad? • Some media try to avoid this conflict by going ad-free. Consumer Reports is an obvious example.
Advertising ethics • But many media have tried that, and have gone out of business. • Public television is supposedly ad-free, but what about considerations of sponsors? • Public broadcasting has become more and more obtrusive in its fundraising efforts and credits to corporate donors. Is this in effect advertising?
Advertising ethics • What would the great philosophers say? • It seems most advertisers would argue from the teleological perspective: the ends justify the means. • Pressure groups do this all the time. They will argue that can show color close-ups of aborted fetuses, cancerous throats, beaten animals or abused children because “the cause is just.”
Advertising ethics • Politicians use lies and half truths “to get that scurrilous opponent out of office.” • But is this kind of advertising destructive to a democratic society? • What would Kant say? “Just tell the truth.” • But what if the truth meant displeasing your employer, not promoting a product that could do good for others, or failing in your advertising?
Advertising ethics • The question, then, as one media ethicist said: truth or consequences? • Do we generally expect advertisers to tell the truth? • We say no, we say we are jaded, savvy consumers who can read through advertising claims.
Advertising ethics • But are we deceiving ourselves? • Many people love advertising, the entertainment, the industry. • We happily wear walking advertisements for soft drinks, beer or athletic shoes on our clothing—and in fact usually we happily pay for the privilege.
Advertising ethics • America accepts more advertising in more places than any country in the world. • In fact, in this more difficult economy, many Americans are willing to accept it in more places than ever before: on school buses, applied to school lockers, in parks and in other public places once closed from commercialism.
Advertising ethics • We don’t seem to be nearly as cynical regarding advertising as we like to profess. • While we say we are sophisticated Americans who can sort through it all, it’s at least worth asking ethical questions regarding what should be advertising, where, when, and how.
