Scantily Clad women and gun advertisements. acceptable or not?

[zfk55]

The Sarge
" America has lost her way. "

It's ok Sarge. That chick over there in the negilgee holding the flashlight can help us find it.

 

[92GreenYJ]

Ya know, I get several Offroad magazines myself and constantly see people writing in to complain about the same thing in their mags. I don't get it. Seriously what is the big deal? Sex sells. Simple as that. When a product is aimed at men as the majority consumer it's only natural to use hot women in the marketing materials to draw the main consumers eyes to their product.

Get over yourself. I'm sure your son has already seen his fair share of T&A and you just don't know it yet.

 

[Sam1911]

When a product is aimed at men as the majority consumer it's only natural to use hot women in the marketing materials to draw the main consumers eyes to their product.

As has been brought up many times now, we are seeing more and more women in the shooting sports. While it may be perfectly reasonable (in your mind) to tell them they have to toughen up and accept the reality of playing in a man's world, that really doesn't do much to welcome them into the fold.

Now...put that "hot chick" in a real scene -- make her a successful competitor, competing strongly and with the support and admiration of her male counterparts -- and the female viewer can relate to the ad and identify with the subject.

Some advertisers do this well.

Others do the "eye candy" thing. If many of us men find that off-putting and childish, think how it must look to the female demographic (women customers ... and VOTERS) for whom the "little gun" isn't making 90% of the decisions!

 

[HOOfan_1]

Every law against anything is put into place because someone thinks it's not right.

Yeah, there are still plenty of laws in this county passed because people can't mind their own business.

If we want the Nancy Pelosi's of the world to keep their nose out of our right o keep guns, I think we need to keep others from trying to legislate morals as well. To me that is just as important as every gun owner out there trying to protect the right to own guns they don't even care to own. I see gun control and legislation of morals all in the same basket. The "government's" attempt to save us poor slobs from ourselves.

 

[Nushif]

My wife had an interesting thought on this one.

She points to very successful advertisement coming from for instance Serena Williams, and some of the female as well as professional athletes (which professional shooters are) that took the form of doing what they do while looking good.
Take a girl who is good with a Beretta, slap her in some nice shorts, a tank top and show her cruising through a live fire course and you have a winner, much like Serena started simply wearing nicer tennis clothes and a little bit of jewelry.
The same goes for males. A decently built shooter in some good pants, and a shirt that shows a little bit of bulk, shown tromping through a warehouse or somesuch is the exact same thing.

The problem I have with the ads is the puritans they tend to draw out and the fact that well ... They're bad. It's like SciFi. I love it, but there is so much bad SciFi. And ironically usually they are bad ... Because the company doesn't want to seem immoral! So they get the proverbial bosses wife or someone's daughter, dress her "properly" (read: not the way she usually does, so it is out of place) and give her a gun, she doesn't like even holding.

Instead of just doing it right.

 

[Sam1911]

Nushif, I think we're in agreement on this. Do the scene RIGHT, and it speaks to people. I've mentioned several very attractive lady shooters who look fan-freakin'-tastic doing what they do for real. That's enough to both catch the eye, and the brain.

Some ads get closer, but don't quite make it (like your "bad SciFi" analogy). Armordman's second CZ pic is a lot like that. Where is this lady's uniform blouse? Why is she in her skivvy shirt while defending that Dodge pickup? What military allows their female soldiers to let their long hair fly on operations? It's not bad ... but not good, either.

But this is the positive end of the spectrum.

And a lot of other companies are just dumb about it. Yeah...Dillon is near the top of that heap. Not offensive or WRONG, just silly and awkward.

Others...yikes.

...

Ironically, for all the flak they get from guys who don't like the women shown, I think Kahr is actually pretty good. Their most well-known ad seem to focus on a sophisticated, cosmopolitan looking woman in evening wear, who's armed with a discreet carry weapon. That makes sense. She's not a busty bikini babe, she looks like a someone you might see or meet at a dinner party or museum dinner or other semi-formal occasion. Her gun is appropriate to the scene (if a little oddly staged in that photo).

We had a good thread on that once, with some female members pointing out that the ad spoke to THEM more than to men. This is an "average" (in the best possible meaning) looking woman, dressed up for the night out. They could relate. They could envision secruing their Kahr pistol, grabbing the purse, and heading out on the town. "Thin is Sexy" spoke to THEM, not to the dude sweating by himself on the commode.

 

[Shadowdancer]

Lara Croft from Tomb Raider is going to get my attention for much longer than some sweaty bubba spitting chew-juice. I won't buy the product because of the girl in the ad, but I'll look at the ad and then decide if the product is of value to me.

 

[oneounceload]

Anyone who remembers the Snap-on tool calenders - same thing, great looking girls, but that was NOT why folks bought those expensive tools. Some of the gun ads look like they were photographed by a third grader with an I phone, others have a high-end Madison avenue quality.......in the end, it is about getting you to remember the brand name

 

[Freedom_fighter_in_IL]

Lara Croft from Tomb Raider is going to get my attention for much longer than some sweaty bubba spitting chew-juice. I won't buy the product because of the girl in the ad, but I'll look at the ad and then decide if the product is of value to me.

And THAT right there is the whole premise to using the "pretty girl" in the ad.

 

[MuleRyder]

My mother taught me that those ads are in poor taste. I still look at them.

My father told me not to look at them 'cause I'd go blind...I need glasses now

 

[henschman]

Scantily Clad women and gun advertisements. acceptable or not?

Hot nekkid chicks? I'm fer it!

It's kind of funny to me, because when I was in my teens and early 20s I was one of those uptight prudish folks from a very religious home. I was well on my way to becoming a libertarian even back then, so I didn't think pornography/sexual content should be banned or anything, but I didn't like looking at those pictures, and felt guilty when I did (because that is how that sort of upbringing teaches a person to be about what should be enjoyable human feelings). Now that I've grown up and accepted an ethical code that is based more on reality, I have come to see things a little differently.

As for the legal issue, I think it is an absolute disgrace that we still have government censorship in 21st-Century America. It's pretty simple, really... if you don't want your kids exposed to what's on TV, don't let them watch it... or get rid of your TV. If you don't want them exposed to our sinful and immoral society, then keep them locked up in your house. You have the inalienable right to give your kids as much of a sheltered upbringing as you want. But you have no right to use force/government to prevent the rest of us from printing, reading, broadcasting, and watching, saying, and listening to whatever we want. That sort of behavior does not threaten the rights of anyone else, so people have a natural and inalienable right to engage in it to their heart's content.

Someone made the comment that all laws are made because someone believed something to be wrong. While that may be true, the difference between legitimate and illegitimate laws is that legitimate laws only prohibit things that are actual violations of the equal liberty of others... in other words, they prohibit people dealing with one another through force, rather than through voluntary interaction. Any law that does any more than this is illegitimate, because by definition it violates the equal rights of individuals.

Just wanted to clear that up.

The good news is that the type of people who support these laws are dying off every day... so I fully expect that in my lifetime I will see a change in the censorship laws, and hopefully also in the ridiculous laws on things like drugs and alcohol.

 

[Formula94]

I like guns
I like women
I like attractive women holding guns

If another advertisement were showing some "spec ops" guy shooting the weapon wouldn't that be the same thing, just the other end of the spectrum? You go from racy women to tact-i-cool mall ninjas. If you stay in between, just showing your average Joe shooting the weapon, nobody will notice it, remember it, or buy it.

 

[JCinAK]

I personally thinks it's trashy and morally bent for a "respectable" firearms company to take advantage of women to advertise their product. It says only bad things about the company and the fact that they need to "go there" to try to generate sales. Show a revolver next to a horse and hat. Maybe even advertise a man in a suit aiming a CCW at the camera with his GF/Wife/Daughter behind him. But to put an offensive image next to a gun/accessory for the sole purpose of drawing someone's eyes to it is not The High Road, agreed?
.

Please don't take advantage of horses. Some might be offended.

 

[Shadowdancer]

And THAT right there is the whole premise to using the "pretty girl" in the ad.

Absolutely! and I do my best to give them positive reinforcement for their practices.

 

[youngda9]

The threads about such nonsense fluff always get the most posts on this GUN FORUM...Never ceases to amaze. Clip vs Mag, 45 vs 40 vs 9mm, now add sexy advertizing into the mix.

Off to the range.

 

[oneounceload]

I personally thinks it's trashy and morally bent for a "respectable" firearms company to take advantage of women to advertise their product

You mean to tell me those women were forced against their will to take part in the ad campaign? You REALLY believe that? If not, then there was no advantage taken except by them because they managed to get paid for posing for a picture -no different than ANY trade show where the "models" are standing there getting you to come closer to listen to the sales spiel by the nerdy engineer.

If they offend you, turn the page

 

[2WheelsGood]

It's kind of funny to me, because when I was in my teens and early 20s I was one of those uptight prudish folks from a very religious home.

I've seen the religious side of this mentioned several times. I'm about as Atheist as they come, and I'm still in complete agreement with Sam1911 for the same reasons he's already stated. This doesn't (or shouldn't) have anything to do with freedom, religion, or censorship.

In addition to the reasons Sam1911 has given, I also think it says something about how companies see the mentality of their potential customers. It's a bit like how predators try to use candy to lure children. I'd rather not support a company that thinks I'm so dumb that I'll buy their product just because they have nearly naked women in their ads.

 

[mgmorden]

I'd rather not support a company that thinks I'm so dumb that I'll buy their product just because they have nearly naked women in their ads.

As has been repeated several times in this thread, there's a subtle but important difference between putting women in the ads because you think it'll make people buy the item, and putting women in the ads because you think it'll make people LOOK AT THE ADS.

No advertiser thinks you're going to actually buy the gun because of the hot chick posing with the gun. What it does though is draw eyes towards it. A guy's eyes are almost INSTINCTIVELY drawn towards the female form. You look at the girl, and hopefully while you've stopped long enough to look you saw the gun too - and maybe got interested enough to look up some more information on it.

The bottom line is this is a trick advertisers resort to because IT WORKS. Plain and simple. If you're attacked on the street are you going to do what's prim and proper or are you going to resort to the methods that get results? I'm betting on results. Don't blame them for doing the same thing in a different arena.

 

[Madcap_Magician]

I can take it or leave it. A lot of the ads seem to have been developed by someone at a small company saying "Hey, your sister/wife/mom is pretty good-looking, think she'd pose in cutoff shorts for our ad?"

The major exception is The Blue Press.

My wife is always throwing it away before I can read it. Only a minor irritation, since I think the article writers are mostly idiots, and I don't have the money to buy reloading stuff now anyway.

 

[Shadowdancer]

As soon as advertisers find a way to make their ads smell like chocolate chip cookies or bacon, I'm done for. Better yet... how about a hot looking female, who is eating chocolate chip cookies, while holding a gun and smells like bacon?

 

[armoredman]

Armordman's second CZ pic is a lot like that. Where is this lady's uniform blouse? Why is she in her skivvy shirt while defending that Dodge pickup? What military allows their female soldiers to let their long hair fly on operations?

Raid, no time.

 

[jmstevens2]

I personally thinks it's trashy and morally bent for a "respectable" firearms company to take advantage of women to advertise their product. It says only bad things about the company and the fact that they need to "go there" to try to generate sales. Show a revolver next to a horse and hat. Maybe even advertise a man in a suit aiming a CCW at the camera with his GF/Wife/Daughter behind him. But to put an offensive image next to a gun/accessory for the sole purpose of drawing someone's eyes to it is not The High Road, agreed?

I am offended by all "trashy" advertising and media. Might not be what you'd expect from a 16 year old boy, but I am proud of my religious principles and feel that those sorts of things go against them.

I am offended when people try to force their puritan morals on me. If you don't like it, turn the page. Would you like it if Antis forced their morals on you?

By the way, pointing a gun at the camera violates one of the main gun safety rules. Shall we twist that too?

 

[JustinJ]

Apparently for many violence is perfectly okay to their 'morals' but to hint at sex is unacceptable.

 

[jmstevens2]

Raid, no time.

Yep. remember the photos of guys at Pearl Harbor on an M2 blasting planes in their underwear and helmets. I recall that at least one was awarded the Medal Of Honor for doing just that.

 

[JCinAK]

Better yet... how about a hot looking female, who is eating chocolate chip cookies, while holding a gun and smells like bacon?

Could be some real money in that!