Lynn drew our attention to the American Apparel webpages for men’s and women’s clothes. She notes a distinct difference:
On the Women’s clothing pages, the girls are modelling THEMSELVES in addition to the clothes. You see a butt purposefully sticking out here, a shirt pulled up to there, a head thrown back in a coquettish manner, a back arched this way and that.
On the Men’s pages, the men are essentially just “standing there”, letting the clothes speak for themselves.
I’ve included screen shots of all of the models in the slide show, so you can judge for yourself (sorry for the funky formatting; there were more images of women than men).
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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.
Comments 46
Dangger — October 2, 2009
It's official, the 80s are back.
Jennifer — October 2, 2009
Those clothes are UGLY.
Marc Taro Holmes — October 2, 2009
I've always been interested in why there isn't more marketing of clothing to men. We're socially programmed to have crappy choice in clothes. Women have more fun! Not that ANY of these clothes are interesting to me)...
Isn't the male supposed to have the brighter plumage? I suppose in our society its not clothes that make the man - it's phones, cars and stock portfolios....
Jenn — October 2, 2009
Am I the only one totally grossed out by the fact that it seems the advertisements with women are trying to create the youngest-looking "sexy" poses? I mean, the men used in the ads look young, but not teenage young. The women or girls look in their teens, and have their hair done in fashions that are popular for children.
It's just really creepy. This is the kind of stuff I'd imagine that pedophiles collect.
Jenna — October 2, 2009
Well, Dov Charney is well noted for his sexist beliefs and actions, and for how often he promotes a child-porn aesthetic for his ads (not to mention, his vaunted "fair treatment" of workers has been exposed to be not so fair at all).
Seriously, anyone who buys AA needs to remember who they're giving money to.
woo! tight shiny pants on young Women? I'm in. — October 2, 2009
Frankly I'm just happy that shiny tight pants are coming in to fashion for women. Lulu-lemon blessed the world with their (unfortunately black matte) booty pants and American Apparel is trying their hardest to give us all a view of some attractive girls deriers.
Nickey Robo — October 2, 2009
I feel as if I have a way better sense of what the clothes actually look like from the male models.
And, often, the women posing in American Apparel ads look so porny to me that I can't imagine any woman wanting to buy from them!
I looked through the website to see if I could find any pictures of men being displayed more than the clothes, and this was pretty much the only one:
http://store.americanapparel.net/1401.html?cid=175#i
Interestingly, if you click on the image to see more views of the product, all the photos are of poorly covered women.
ptp — October 2, 2009
At first I thought maybe this was AA trying to avoid the "male flirty/sexy = gay" image so as not to freak out the delicate sensibilities of the hetero male demographic but then I realized Abercrombie + Fitch has been riding that horse for years, so... I donno
[dave] — October 2, 2009
Heh, I was about to post the same shot as Nickey.
This guy is a little saucy: http://i.americanapparel.net/storefront/images/detail/serve.asp?media=4443_Brown_White.jpg
And this guy is somewhat loungy: http://store.americanapparel.net/rnt415.html?cid=175
And this guy is welcoming being gazed at: http://i.americanapparel.net/storefront/images/detail/serve.asp?media=rsacd401g_SeaGreen.jpg
I think it has to do with how men are socialized as sexy...similar to porn. If you look at old Playgirls, the men are always, say, doing yardwork. Naked. For no reason. Whereas woman are positioned passively or in a looked-at way.
I'm sure that if portaying men in a looked-at way would sell more clothes then they'd do it. Or if Dov Charney was gay. Either way, his misogyny is pretty pervasive.
And my understanding of his "fair work environments" was that while they weren't a whole lot greater than anywhere else he gave folks insurance and benefits. So, crap, but slightly less crap from some other big corporate policies.
Craig — October 2, 2009
I can't speak to what women look for in pictures of clothing, but this man is far less inclined to purchase something that is being worn by an ostentatious model. If it looks good on a young, beautiful man, strutting this and shaking that, it is almost certainly going to look ridiculous on _me_. Perhaps women are just more optimistic--perhaps they think the right dress really _can_ make them into a high-fashion model? I know there's no chance of that in my case; I just want to feel comfortable and avoid looking like an idiot if possible.
Elizabeth Kissling — October 2, 2009
These images immediately brought to mind Erving Goffman's Gender Advertisements, in which he argued that women in ads and catalogs were almost always shown in more submissive, passive positions, and that this was a way of displaying gender - specifically, femininity. Ex: The woman in the trench coat in this seris is displaying what Goffman called 'the bashful knee bend'. I challenge anyone to find a catalog or advert picture of a man doing that!
The really striking thing is how little has changed in 30 years....
Liza — October 2, 2009
Do you know nothing at all about American Apparel? Love the site, but this is another in a long, unfortunate, string of posts _and_ comments that could have benefited greatly from a bit of leg work before pressing "send." All together now, lets Google "Dov Charney" and "Women."
John Lewis Lookingglass — October 2, 2009
We have no idea how much direction there was in these shoots. I think these poses are close to what men and women tend to do (without direction) when modeling.
Maria — October 2, 2009
what... you are all saying you don't stand wait at the bus stop with on one leg with your hand behind your head and holding the heel of your way-too-pointy toed boots in the other? come on! that's COMPLETELY natural!
i think what's bothering me more is that, even though they are not posed in the same manner, the men's clothes are in my opinion ridiculously feminine. way too tight pants, lots of "unmanly" pink and pastels, perfectly swooped scarves (there is exact same one on both a man and a woman, in fact).
i'm in two states of mind about this: either they think it is provocative enough that the men are wearing womanly clothes that they don't need to bother with drawing even more attention to them than they are already getting, whereas women's trends tend to be the same across the board in chain stores, and they need to exploit them even more to get noticed. OR AA is just so obsessed with the female they feel the need to make the male look that way as well.
by the by- i'm not knocking any male who chooses to dress feminine. there's just something about this ad that makes it seems almost forced on these models, and it's slightly creeping me out in a Valley of the Dolls sort of way.
Yonah — October 2, 2009
Sheesh...those women are BENDY. I can't do that!
MeToo — October 3, 2009
Why do the male models appear to have rickets? And who on earth would be inspired to buy clothing which is intentionally portrayed as ugly and unflattering? I finally give up on popular culture.
oddrid — October 4, 2009
Regardless of how sexist this is, those womens' poses are look RIDICULOUS. I can't even stop laughing long enough to be properly offended.
Tim — December 30, 2009
It begs to be noted that these are hardly a "fair" set of photos from American Apparel-- almost all the male model examples are of the same guy (despite having at least 20 or so on the website), and all the girls here are the exact same one (despite having several dozen)! Of course one female model is going to always pose in a similar way if that's what she does. She is but one human doing one set of a certain type of poses.
nsh09 — June 6, 2010
I'm not sure this company is the best example of misogyny in the fashione world. American Apparel is notorious for sexism in the workplace, objectification of women in general, and specifically lots of instances of wildly inappropriate sexual misconduct in the corporate atmosphere. This company is already under a lot of scrutiny for this kind of stuff. I would have liked to see this point being made by using photographs from many stores, instead of just one. But I don't think the argument would have help up because the sites I've looked at (J. Crew, H&M, etc.)haven't been oversexualized according to gender or both genders have been hypersexualized (Rue La La).
Anonymous — February 28, 2012
They're both displaying themselves. But men are expected to be more reserved when they do that. Women are given more license to be fluid and whimsical in their movement without being ridiculed. Surely you realise this?
Jamie Martina — March 4, 2012
I'm with @JontKopeck:disqus here. The ads are selling personalities instead of clothing. The clothes give the individual liberty to perform in ways these models show as attractive (because they're attractive models and who doesn't follow the moves of attractive people? That was a snarky comment, by the way.). So while the women may be posing in unnatural, ridiculous ways, they're doing so because the personality they're being told to sell is one that is cute, flirty, and quirky; the men are being told to sell the persona of stoic, sensible, and collected. No gender is being undersold more than the other in these examples shown.
The Tyranny of the Gaze | Good Vibrations Blog — May 1, 2012
[...] feminine” ways works for me- I would be intrigued and turned on by a boy who struck the same poses women do in ads, poses that suggest vulnerability, submission, flirtation, and sexual availability. I’m [...]
disappointed sociologist — June 4, 2012
These sorts of arguments always just end up reinforcing the false binary--"man" vs. "woman"--which erases trans people, genderqueer people, etc. This reeks of unacknowledged cis privilege. Not everyone is interested in your boring, cisgender heteronormativity. Some of us are queer and proud. And some of us are trying to claim any sexuality beyond what exists in the fetishized niche markets of various forms of sex work. When was the last time you saw a trans person modeling for a clothing store? Sexy or otherwise? Talk about leftist balkanization. . . . Way to advance cis women's issues at the expense of trans people. Good job.
Signed,Disappointed and disillusioned trans woman sociology graduate
on why I can’t buy American Apparel anymore « {olivia-marie} — June 5, 2012
[...] they chose to quit hiring women based on what they look like and quit the current ad campaigns. the difference between men’s and women’s lines, not even in ads, is [...]