If Sex Sells, What Is It Selling?

"Sex sells."

That statement has, over the years, become a trite, cliché ways to describe one key influencer of advertisements and thus what drives consumers.

Still, whereas advertisements for house fans, cleaning solvents and televisions seek to provide us with more practical utilities, advertisements for fashion seem to be primarily aimed at just that: Selling sex.

But at the same time, sex is a utility in its own way. It's what compels a huge amount of us to dress in a particular manner, bathe at least semi-frequently and pay at a moderate amount of attention to our physical appearance. It is a motivator because, despite the millions of thoughts and images that pass through our brains on a daily basis, sex is, in some form, always one of the most prominent aspects of our daily thought processing.

And in particular, overt sexuality has become increasingly manifested in today's advertisements. That trend, which can be largely attributed to the work of Calvin Klein, has resulted in advertisements, especially male advertisements, becoming increasingly about the physical body, as opposed to the advertised product. As Bordo writes, "Klein's genius was that of a cultural Geiger counter... Only gay culture unashamedly sexualized the lean, fit body that virtually everyone, gay and straight, now aspires to" (Bordo, 180).

Yet that advertising is also inherently selling a vision. Advertisements from Calvin Klein and also Dolce & Gabana clearly emphasize the physical presence of the body. Scantily clad, athletically built and (sometimes) profoundly passive, these advertisements seem to suggest, in their most basic interpretations, that an athletic body is sexy. But at the same time, they are also suggesting that acceptance into those often sex-laden cultures -- being incorporated into those idealistic worlds that are portrayed within ads -- requires perfection.

And in turn, that vision is creating increasingly self-conscious, self-indulgent and self-absorbed men and women that attempt to adhere to those constructed ideals. Unhealthily skinny models and men that are inordinately obsessed with working out in the gym are just two brands of people that would seem to be a direct product of that sort of advertising.

But underlying those constructions remains the desire to be sexy. Models, and therefore females, are encouraged to be skinny because that is what is considered sexy. Sexy is what drives men (and women), and therefore stands as the sort of image that those women are hoping to portray. The same concept holds true for men that are becoming increasingly pressured by advertising to maintain their bodies in a way that will exude sexiness.

And tragically, our collective self-images, as a society, seem to align with those evolving and often unrealistic expectations. Many, if not most of us, will never reach that ideal 'sexy' body.

So, I ask you all, on that endless road towards perfection, is sex in advertising ultimately selling unhappiness?