Jean Kilbourne Quotes & Sayings

The more you subtract, the more you add, — Jean Kilbourne

The fact is that much of advertising's power comes from this belief that advertising does not affect us. The most effective kind of propaganda is that which is not recognized as propaganda. Because we think advertising is silly and trivial, we are less on guard, less critical, than we might otherwise be. It's all in fun, it's ridiculous. While we're laughing, sometimes sneering, the commercial does its work. — Jean Kilbourne

Woman's bodies continue to be dismembered in advertising. Over and over again just one part of the body is used to sell products, which is one of the most dehumanizing thing you can do to someone. Not only is she a thing, but just one part of that thing is focused on. — Jean Kilbourne

Girls get the message from very early on that what's most important is how they look, that their value, their worth depends on that. And boys get the message that this is what's important about girls. We get it from advertising. We get it from films. We get it from television shows, video games, everywhere we look. So no matter what else a woman does, no matter what else her achievements, their value still depends on how they look. — Jean Kilbourne

The Ideal Consumer is someone who is constantly dissatisfies, constanly needs more and more products in order to feel better. — Jean Kilbourne

Our need for social and personal change and power is often co-opted and trivialized into an adolescent and self-centered kind of rebellion. — Jean Kilbourne

Turning a human being into a thing is almost always the first step towards justifying violence against that person. — Jean Kilbourne

But many people do not fully realize that there are terrible consequences when people becoming things. Self-image is deeply affected. The self-esteem of girls plummets as they reach adolescence partly because they cannot possibly escape the message that their bodies are objects, and imperfect objects at that. Boys learn that masculinity requires a kind of ruthlessness, even brutality. Violence becomes inevitable. — Jean Kilbourne

Addiction beggins whith the hope that something 'out there' can instantly fill up the emptiness inside. — Jean Kilbourne

Indeed the very worst kind of man for a women to be in an intimate relationship with, often a truly dangerous man, is the one considered most sexy and desirable in the popular culture. — Jean Kilbourne

Turning a human being into a thing, an object, is almost always the first step towards justifying violence against that person. It is very difficult, perhaps impossible, to be violent to someone we think of as an equal, someone we have empathy with, but it is very easy to abuse a thing — Jean Kilbourne

Advertising doesn't cause addictions. But it does create a climate of denial and it contributes mightily to a belief in the quick fix, instant gratification, the dreamworld, and escape from all pain and boredom. All of this is part of what addicts believe and what we hope for when we reach for our particular substance ... Addiction begins with the hope that something "out there" can instantly fill up the emptiness inside. Advertising is all about this false hope. — Jean Kilbourne

Ads sell more than products. They sell values, they sell images. They sell concepts of love and sexuality, of success, and perhaps most important, of normalcy. To a great extent they tell us who we are and who we should be. — Jean Kilbourne