By featuring partly-to-fully naked homosexual men (or denoted as such,) American Apparel takes advantage of the fact that a gay man is NOT the norm of male beauty (the strongly sexual implications in the text make it clear that these men are, in no way, trying to make love to the coked-out American Apparel girls) to draw attention to the advertisement. In doing so, the clothing company makes a statement about both itself as a brand and about its customers: neither are afraid to embrace that which is potentially unacceptable, atypical. And while some may commend the brand for "standing up" for gay men and women, others may criticize that this is nothing more than a marketing scheme to establish the brand as different, innovative, unusual (and thus justified in selling a t-shirt for $25.)
Still, the men in this image are objectified: our attention is drawn almost immediately to one man's bare ass and the hand-covered front of the other man. Even those individuals wearing clothes are seen only for their physical significance, their sexual power; not only do we know what kind of sex they are going to have (gay sex,) we know what position they will be in during intercourse. Despite all these intimate details, we have no idea who these men are, where they're from, what their lifestyle is like, how often they've been a victim of homophobia, or what their parents said when they came out.
Later today, I will be shopping on Bleeker street (sue men, finals are over and I'm a child of the most materialistic generation thus far.) When I walk into American Apparel, I know that I'll be treated like a gay teen with image problems and a credit card who has seen such an advertisement and is ready to buy everything in the store. Will my opinion of this advertisement, of American Apparel's manipulation of my oh-so-innocent (well, not so innocent now that I'm in Media Criticism...) gaze, impact my purchasing decisions? We'll just have to see.
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