Not everything is as good as it looks — in fact, some things are actually worse.

   On Oct. 24, New Mexico media literacy expert Peter DeBenedittis paid a visit to Flathead High to inform sophomores about the great lengths companies will go to sell their products. He showed a series of commercials and provided statistics about advertisements and how they try to trick us through techniques such as:

   • Subliminal messaging It takes eight frames to show something you can consciously register; advertisers take advantage of this by shooting something in less than eight frames so that your eyes don’t see it, but it still has the intended effect on your brain. In one of the alcohol commercials he presented, there were three frames where a woman’s skirt flipped up and she wasn’t wearing any underwear. Advertisers don’t use sex appeal to sell everything, though it does seem to work quite often. There have to be some set standards on what can be allowed in advertisements.

   • False advertising Saying how unbelievably good this product will make you feel, although it will do just the opposite or make no difference at all. There is an old Winston commercial showing how smoking will make you look more rugged, when in actuality, the Winston Man later died because of emphysema. How is that for rugged?

   • Emotional Scenes -These scenes that make you feel emotional over what you are seeing. If you see a little girl crying over a broken toy, and somebody gives her a cookie, it makes her happy. So you feel that a cookie would make you happier. In a Little Debbie Delights advertisement a girl is chasing a duck down the street, then she spots the box of delicious delights and forgets the duck. Isn’t that the sweetest thing you’ve ever seen?

   DeBenedittis made a great point. The media attempts to drive you to purchase their product by any means necessary. They exaggerate what their product will do for you. The big corporations that make these advertisements may claim that they are not targeting teenagers, but they inevitably are.

   You learn to believe you want products when you’re young, and seeing these commercials etches into your brain that you want it. When you’re finally old enough to get the product, you’re likely already hooked.

   Beware of what you buy and why you’re buying it. Large corporations are just trying to hook you so they can make money. By buying the products you see from commercials, you’re aiding the greed of companies who put out those advertisements.

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