Dove Viral Draws Heat From Critics

Dove has recently come out with ad campaigns that try to tell women to have high self esteems and be comfortable with who they are. Axe, whose ads are totally opposite, portray the deodorant as a magnet to women. When men where Axe body spray, women throw themselves at them. The public is starting to find out that Unilever is a company that owns Axe and Dove. This is making some of the public feel that Unilever is a hypocritical company because they are sending out two opposite messages to the public with their products.

I think Unilever is to blame. They are misleading the public. Young women look up to the Dove ads. When they find out the same company owns Axe, they may feel betrayed by the company. I believe Unilever should have one UNIversal message for all of its ads and campaigns. For example, if they want Dove to be about real women that are comfortable with their self image, Axe needs to have the same idea around it’s’ campaigns.

Race in the world of football

In my leadership class at UNT, we have speakers come to our class to speak to us every week. Senator Royce West talked to us this week and he released a document on Monday called, "A&M's quick choice raises questions about hiring process." A&M fired their last football coach and has already hired a new one. Mike Sherman is the new football coach at A&M. Senator West is concerned about A&M's hiring process and how quickly they hired a new coach. He questions, "Was an extensive search ever conducted?" Many of the players on A&M's football team are and have been African American. Senator West worries that African Americans might not have been strongly considered for the new coaching position. He wonders why this is when there are so many players that are African American."

According to the Black Coaches Association, of 119 major college football programs, when the 2007 season opened, only six had African American head coaches." Senator West wants there to be the same opportunities for minority coaches as non-minority coaches get. I agree with Senator West on this issue. There are so many African American players out on the football fields, probably more than Whites and non-minorities. African American coaches need to get the same treatment as everyone else in the hiring process of coaches. The Universities need to choose the coach that would be the best for the team. We can speculate that the full hiring process is or is not taking place; but hopefully, the issue of race will not determine who is chosen for the coaching jobs.

In Bruce Lee's Shadow: Asians Struggle to Create New Hollywood Images

Asians do struggle to create new Hollywood images. Most of the roles I have seen Asian men play in are martial arts roles. I do not think anything can be done about this until Hollywood decides it wants a change. The writers and producers are the ones that decide what kind of people play a certain role. One example of an Asian man who has been able to stay away from the martial arts role is B.D Wong. He plays the role of a forensic psychiatrist and an expert in criminal minds. NBC’s website states, “Wong gained notice as a cast regular on the critically acclaimed series "Oz", playing the resilient prison priest Father Ray for the show's five-season run.” Even though Wong has had a lot of diverse roles and he is more fortunate than many Asian men in Hollywood, he has one complaint. Wong has complained that he wishes he would get to play a romantic role for once. He says his roles never cast him opposite of another woman romantically.

Articles on race, music videos, and hip hop

I read both of the articles in the race, music videos, and hip hop blog. Everyone is going to have their opinions on whether or not hip hop and music videos affect society, etc. I, personally, think it can impact young girls that are confused, but I see the other side as well. I have watched BET many times before and it does not affect my decision making or anything like that. I know who I am and I know my own boundaries. However, I am in college, young girls in middle or high school might be confused on who they are, what is right or wrong, and might be struggling to fit in. These music videos can influence their minds on what is “cool” and what’s not. It might not even affect them either. It just depends on the person, parents, and how much they are watching music videos, etc.

Bom Chicka Wah Wahs

I never got a chance to blog on the Bom Chicka Wah Wahs so now I am going to give my opinions on the advertisement. The promotion is used to get people (mostly men) to buy Axe products. The promotion is obviously targeted towards men. When I first saw one of the advertisements in class, I laughed. I thought it was really funny and not sexy at all. I am interested to know who wanted to buy Axe products after seeing the advertisement.

It seems like all advertisements for men’s products are starting to have women dressed in barely anything in them. This sends out a poor message to men around the world because the women in these advertisements seem “easy” and all “fun.” All women are not like this and this is what the media world is making it seem like. Hopefully, this can be a phase and slowly we can come up with more catchy advertisements without having half-naked women in them.

Heineken 'DraftKeg': The Most Sexist Beer Commerical Ever Produced?

I watched the Heineken commercial several times. I can see why it could upset some, but I can also see the other side. I believe this commercial was sexist, but not the most sexist commercial I have ever seen. The reason I believe this is because the woman in the commercial was a robot. Beer ads seem so much worse when actual woman are in them. They are usually dressed – or I should say they are usually close to not being dressed; their clothes are revealing and targeted at making men desire them. The most sexist and degrading ads I have seen for alcohol are the “Absolut Vodka” ads. You can usually find these ads in Maxim , Cosmo, etc.

I looked up some “Absolut Vodka” ads on the internet to refresh my memory. In one of the ads, a woman was dressed in a barely-there bathing suit, and a man, wearing a tuxedo, was holding a bottle of vodka and standing above her. His legs were apart so if the woman looked up, her view would be in between his legs. I thought this was very degrading because the man’s posture suggests that he rules her and is above her. All of the "Absolut Vodka" ads I have seen are similar to this. They suggest men are superior to women.

Jacquielynn Floyd

It was nice to see that Jacquielynn Floyd did admit the media has wrong perceptions sometimes. The media likes to hype up stories so that the public gets drawn to them. This makes the media and television channels money because the more viewers they have, the more money their station makes. Sarah Walker was a well-known real estate agent that was stabbed to death on July 8, 2006. The media was all over this case and were pointing fingers at her loved ones. They believed the murderer had to be someone that was close to her. We now know that the murderer was just a stranger that robbed her and killed her, so she would not be available as a witness. The media was wrong all along, which Jacquielynn Floyd admits to. The media should focus on all crimes and not glorify and focus on one in particular. It bothers me that some cases get a lot of coverage, and more gruesome crimes get little coverage. The media chooses which case will get the most attention from its viewers and decides to cover that story, which gets really annoying. For example, OJ Simpson is on every news channel I turn on. I am so sick of hearing about him when there are so many other things the media should be talking about!

School gunman: Asa Coon

It is really tragic to read about another school shooting that was not prevented. It seems like the school did not do enough to stop this crime. Students claim that they wanted to talk to the principal about Asa Coon, the shooter, but there was never “enough time.” Students and teachers are wounded and hurt by this. Asa Coon shot at students and teachers, then killed himself. Race was brought into this article near the end of the story.

“Asa Coon, who is white, stood out in a school that is 85 percent black for wearing a black trench coat, black boots, a dog collar, chains and a glove. No one has suggested race played a role in the attack.” The reporter says no one has suggested race played a role in the attack, but he just stated two races in the sentence before that. I believe this article suggests that black people cause violence and trouble. Since the reporter said that Asa stood out, it makes it seem like the black people made fun of him or tormented him. Im glad this story was put out though because it shows that white people commit crimes, just like any other race.

Carol Gotbaum's tragic death

As I was beginning to blog on the topic of “latinos”, I came across a different story that I wanted to blog about. The article was called, Police release video of airport arrest. “See how cops handled woman.” Carol Gotbaum was not able to board her flight in the Phoenix airport, and therefore, started yelling, screaming, and causing a scene. Cops arrested her for disorderly conduct. I watched the video of the officers trying to arrest her, but she was resisting arrest. I think the media used gender to pull readers into this story. I inferred this from the title of the article. Even though the article sounds like it is going to be on the woman’s side, it wasn’t really. The officers left Carol in a holding cell alone for 6 to 8 minutes, which is allowed by the law. While she was in the holding cell, she somehow commited suicide. I do not believe it was the officer’s faults because they did not know she was going to be suicidal. Later, it was found out that Carol was on her way to an alcohol rehab program. Also, her husband stated that he was upset with how things happened and that he felt his wife could be suicidal. In my opinion, Carol's husband should have gone with her to drop her off at the rehab facility if he knew she had a past of alcohol and suicidal thoughts.

Civil rights reporting of past and present
Coverage of the Jena 6 may be found at Dallasnews.com, with video at:http://www.dallasnews.com/video/dallasnews/hp/index.html?nvid=176859An excellent history of reporting civil rights may be found here:http://www.reportingcivilrights.orgAgain, I invite you to blog about coverage that you've seen over the past week on this event.
Posted by jacqueline at 7:47 PM 2 comments



The Jena 6 incident seriously appalls me. There have been so many incidents where white people get lighter sentences than black people. The jury listened to the Jena 6 case was all white, with a white judge. I do not see this as being fair at all and it is very biased. On the news, it said that one of the guys in the Jena 6 incident could face up to 22 years in prison! Their possible sentences were attempted second degree murder and conspiracy. Thankfully, their sentences have been reduced to assault and conspiracy. I am happy to see that at least some justice has been done to reduce their sentences because attempted second degree murder for what they did was just a preposterous sentence. I will definitely be keeping up with this.

Guidelines for news reporting and disabilities
For coverage of disability issues:http://www.spj.org/dtb5.aspNational Center on Disability Journalismhttp://ncdj.org/links.htmlResources:http://pages.towson.edu/bhalle/disable.htmlVisit one of these sites and consider the stereotypes of disabilities that you are familiar with. Where did you get these stereotypes, from news coverage or mass media? Write about your perceptions on your blog.


In my opinion, people with mental or physical disabilities are stereotyped as being inferior to the rest of society. These stereotypes are developed not only from news coverage, but mass media as well. In news stories, people with physical and mental handicaps are praised and put on display for society to recognize for performing acts that are considered mundane when done by the rest of society. This alone makes us feel that those with disabilities are substandard to those who are not.

How do you get news? How often? What do you read and view both online and offline? About how many hours a day or a week do you intentionally seek out news coverage? And one last question: when you think about news media and their coverage of race or gender or sexualities or disabilities, what are your own assumptions?



I usually get news from the internet or the television. I like to keep up with the news once a day. Sadly, I have to admit that most of the news I look at is entertainment news. Lately, I have been checking MSNBC and Fox 4 news, and the news is usually crime related. I probably spend about two hours a week looking and listening to news. When I think about the media and its coverage on race, gender, and sexualities, etc, I often find myself subconsciously making my own inferences, most commonly with race. With all of the news coverage on the war in Iraq, it is almost an instinct to assume that when a Middle Eastern person is on or in the news that they are involved in some sort of act of terrorism I feel that news media has conditioned the general public to create certain generalizations about different groups because of the way they are portrayed in news.