Summary Of Men's Health Advertisement

Men’s Health magazine is marketed as a monthly publication which seeks to enhance the male reader’s health and lifestyle. Upon viewing the cover of Men’s Health on a magazine stand you will commonly notice a man with rippling muscles and captions highlighting themes of sex and strength. After examining my chosen advertisement and the magazine itself, I discovered Men’s Health promotes an idealized view of masculinity to its target audience, adolescent to adult males (18-50 years old). By associating Jockey with a consumer’s desire for sexual confidence and masculinity, the advertisers motivate a person to buy this product.
Men who have more sexual confidence often feel This Jockey ad features a US Marine veteran, Chris Van Etten. The ad contains

The ad focuses on perseverance by using the prosthetic legs of Chris Van Etten along with the symbolism of his military experience to make a point that bravery and courage are associated with the “Jockey” brand. Van Etten’s prosthetic legs are symbolic signs in this advertisement. The signifier is the actual prosthetic leg while the signified contains all the opinions, values, and ideas associated with disabilities. In this advertisement, the presentation of the signifier or the prosthetics is displayed in a prideful way. Thus, as opposed to treating disability like a disease, this company treats it as an honor in an attempt to show that men who wear “Jockey” underwear are valiant and heroic. Since the ad is targeted to an American audience, the American viewpoint will dictate the advertisement’s impact. In America, people value the dedication of oneself to their nation; therefore, veterans are treated with the highest honor. Veterans like Van Etten who suffered serious injuries are constantly praised for their valor. “Jockey” is capitalizing off this cultural belief to craftily connect the intrepidity of Chris Van Etten with the “Jockey”

Growing up in American culture, masculinity is constantly connected to a muscular body. In advertisements, television, and film men are presented as being masculine if they are strong and physically fit; well-defined muscles are deemed desirable by society’s reproduction of this value. The magazine itself presents masculinity through muscular fitness as the cover and ads/articles throughout any Men’s Health issue highlight working out and achieving a muscular body. Consequently, the muscles of Chris Van Etten are a sign for this idealized form of masculinity in American society; being strong and masculine is thereby attached to the “Jockey” brand with this advertisement. The bulge is another sign for the ideal male. In most societies, penile size is used as a way to assess one’s manhood. Large penile size is praised perhaps universally as advertisements featuring bulges and texts like “bigger is better” and “size matters” are plastered across all popular media formats. Sex is a topic so heavily covered by the mass media and a male’s worthiness for “getting laid” is commonly related to his penile size in popular depictions of sex such as pornography and sex-related commercials. Therefore, Chris’s enhanced bulge is yet another sign connecting our society’s idealized form of masculinity with