Abercrombie & Fitch catalog

[aunaturelone]

Has anyone seen the latest Abercrombie & Fitch catalog? (Not the one you get for free. The special quarterly one that is now more magazine than catalog. Costs like 10 bucks or thereabouts.) It's been all over Fox news.

Seems it's scanadlizing all the prudes at Fox because the models are mostly naked. The few pictures I saw didn't seem all that sexual and none of the models appeared "objectified" like they typically are in nudie mags. Earlier ones I've seen were positively naturist in apporach. But alas, they may have changed!

Without a copy, (and being unwilling to spend the bucks for something I'll never use) it's hard to tell whather we should be enthusiastic about it or down on it.

[aunaturelone]

Has anyone seen the latest Abercrombie & Fitch catalog? (Not the one you get for free. The special quarterly one that is now more magazine than catalog. Costs like 10 bucks or thereabouts.) It's been all over Fox news.

Seems it's scanadlizing all the prudes at Fox because the models are mostly naked. The few pictures I saw didn't seem all that sexual and none of the models appeared "objectified" like they typically are in nudie mags. Earlier ones I've seen were positively naturist in apporach. But alas, they may have changed!

Without a copy, (and being unwilling to spend the bucks for something I'll never use) it's hard to tell whather we should be enthusiastic about it or down on it.

[Fresh Air]

I don't think their is anything wrong with the nude body by itself. Mixing commercialism with nudity, though, can be an issue for me though.

I can't help but see that the only thing going on is A&F collects a bunch of nude photographs, knowing people want to see them (usually for non-innocent reasons) and sells them for increased profits. In this sense it can be viewed as pornography...or 'sex' for money. (remember the majority of consumers are not nudists and probobly have a differnt view on the nude body).

If society is reacting negatively, the it probobly is doing nothing positive except earning A&F more money.

There comes a point where wheather a product is innocent or not it can be exploited. For instance, try doing a search for "nudist" online. It is pretty hard to find a true nudist site, even though they are out there (good thing, that's how I found this site).

What's more common is sites selling memberships at a price to view nudist images. Are the images pornographic? Not necessarily, but the reaons why these sites exist (money) and the reason people pay for memberships (probobly sexual) unfortunately bring it into the realm of pornography.

So, wheather the pictures are innocent or not, I don't feel the A&F magazine is a good thing nor representative of what nudism is about.

Fresh Air

[Dave M.]

I feel A&F are trying to sell the idea the nude body is bad thing and should be covered up. How convenient the sell clothes- and can make lots of money!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• Than being the case the catalog has nothing to do with nudism[/list]
  
  
  
  • The catalog however does promote body shame! Cover-up wear clothes!![/list]
    
    
    
    • I will not spend money on this or any other catalog why do the charge you for something they produce to get you to spend even more money!!!!!!!!!!!![/list]
      
      
      
      • It's all about money--buy your clothes from us and make us lots of money.We will do anythng to make it --even use nudity! and promote body shame.[/list]
        They say money makes the world go round but this is may be at great cost to nudist/naturist

[Croydon]

quote:

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Originally posted by Dave M.:
[qb] I feel A&F are trying to sell the idea the nude body is bad thing and should be covered up. How convenient the sell clothes- and can make lots of money!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• Than being the case the catalog has nothing to do with nudism[/list]
  
  
  
  • The catalog however does promote body shame! Cover-up wear clothes!![/list]
    
    
    
    • I will not spend money on this or any other catalog why do the charge you for something they produce to get you to spend even more money!!!!!!!!!!!![/list]
      
      
      
      • It's all about money--buy your clothes from us and make us lots of money.We will do anythng to make it --even use nudity! and promote body shame.[/list]
        They say money makes the world go round but this is may be at great cost to nudist/naturist [/qb]

        ---

Have you actually seenn the magazine? Because I don't think you have. A&F is not here to promote nudism, that is not the point of the magazine. Your statement doesn't make sense at all. If they are selling the idea of body shame, THEN WHYY DO THE HAVE FULLY NUDE MODELS IN THE MAGAZINE? Furthermore, the clothes are the very last thing about the magazine. There are only a few pages dedicated to the clothes. Every business is here to make money,DUH, that is the purpose of it. Every business has a marketing campaign to draw attention to their product and for A&F it is its magazine and controversy. A&F isn't stupid. They know what they are doing. Every single time a new issue comes out, the news is speaking about it and conservatives are protesting. This is all free publicity for A&F. There's no such thing as negative publicity. A&F continues to push the enevelop and so far, it is working wonderfully for them.

I suggest you look at the magazine Dave b.c it is obvious you haven't. The nakedness in the magazine is quite innocent. It shows the moodels innocently naked and having fun. Also, it is innoocent nakedness such as shot of the butt or the breast. It isn't a nudist magazine nor it is around to promote nuidsm.

[aunaturelone]

quote:

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I feel A&F are trying to sell the idea the nude body is bad thing and should be covered up.

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I don't think so. I haven't seen this one but in the last one I saw the nudes were quite innocent. My favorite shot was the one with the nude woman scrubbing the back of an elephant with a very long handled brush. I guess the newest catalog has a couple shots of couples kissing and such but I figure that anything you can do with you clothes on is equally acceptable with your clothes off.

The nudity is a hook to bring in an audience for a commercial purpose but the 95% of the photos themselves aren't anything you wouldn't see on the clothesfree.com web site. If titilation were the objective the photo selection would be quite different, I suspect.

My take on the images is this: Abercrombie and Fitch are not trying to promote nudism. They are trying to promote Abercrombie and Fitch by associating their products with freedom, confidence and sophistication. They decided that the best way they could do this was to associate themselves with co-ed social nudity. I consider this a VERY good sign.

The message I get from their (previous) catalogs is that social nudity is young and hip, but since you can't be nude most of the time wear our (very expensive) young and hip clothing instead.

[FLslimguy]

The thing to keep in mind about commercialism is that it's all about money... any way you can get it. Rely on the youthful gaping at nude bodies...or the peer pressure of spending 248% more than you should for a t-shirt... it's all the same. $.
No different from promoting a carwash with a naked babe over a hood...er bonnet. And nothing to do with "nudism or anti-nudism" whatsoever.

[aunaturelone]

I think content matters.

Everything can be seen through the "prism" of how to make a buck. Every for-profit and many not-for-profit organizations have making money right at the top of the list of things to do today. Every novel ever published is there to make a buck as are most magazines, television shows and movies. Even the INA has to generate income in order to survive.

To be sure, the nudes are there to grab attention. The question for Abercrombie and Fitch is why they selected the photos they did. I haven't seen this year's catalog but I have seen several from a couple of years ago. At least in those catalogs, I believe they selected them because they want to project an image.

From what I have seen, the image projected seems very close to a young single naturist's ideal; i.e. lots of wholesome nudity and some romance. We see nudes playing football in the surf, swimming, diving, sunning themselves, hiking, washing an elephant. Some youthful romance but not a lot. None of the nudes are specifically put on sexual display, none of the models are engaged in explicit sexual activity or even romantic activity that the textile impaired would find objectionable if they had swim wear on.

I really do believe that 90% of the images would have been right at home on Clothesfree.com.

Obviously A&F isn't doing this to promote nudism. But I find it profoundly interesting they felt they could attract more attention with a naturist style of imagery than with images of buxom bikini clad beach babes or the starving waif look or the naughty but nice approach or the Playboy/girl approach. Nobody is being objectified, nobody is being eroticized.

OTOH, social nudity is presented in such a good light it can't help but be attractive to the young adults and older teens that A&E are targeting. This is something that the INA, the Naturists and any other future minded groups should take note of and possibly even take advantage of. Something doesn't have to be intended to benefit you for it to be beneficial.

What's really wierd is that you can view the pictures, read the content (There's a LOT of editorial content that is well written, informative and interesting.) and skip the clothing ads entirely. Probably 2/3 of the publication has nothing whatsoever to do with clothing. Very much more like an in-house magazine than a catalog that way.

I have yet to hear A&E's take on all this.

[Fresh Air]

I don't know that I see A&F as having good morals behind it. The 'mildness' of the nudity seems more like a cautious step back. I feel they would do alot more if they could and still get away with collecting the profits.

Here are some associated links:
Sex in Advertising
Idealization
An employee's perspective

The Media

A perspective from Cheef

It's easy as a nudist to take a nudist view and judge something like this through our nudist perspective. But, the nudist is not the target audience here. There is a different perspective out there on what "sexuality" is and for many sex equals skin. I find it difficult to not see sexuality as part of the A&F scheme.

Not that sexuality is always wrong and we all know that sex sells. But in relation to nudism, I don't see this as representative of it nor pro-nudism in nature.

Here are some examples:


Last time I checked XXX is not a symbol of clothes freedom




Beutiful girls and beautiful guys, but not wholesome advertising in my oppinion. The sexual undertones are obvious and the way women are portrayed I find repulsive and degrading. Maybe it's just me but I don't feel these thing represent what nudism is all about.

Fresh Air

[RIVERRAT]

quote:

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Originally posted by aunaturelone:
[qb]

quote:

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I feel A&F are trying to sell the idea the nude body is bad thing and should be covered up.

---

I don't think so. I haven't seen this one but in the last one I saw the nudes were quite innocent. My favorite shot was the one with the nude woman scrubbing the back of an elephant with a very long handled brush. I guess the newest catalog has a couple shots of couples kissing and such but I figure that anything you can do with you clothes on is equally acceptable with your clothes off.

The nudity is a hook to bring in an audience for a commercial purpose but the 95% of the photos themselves aren't anything you wouldn't see on the clothesfree.com web site. If titilation were the objective the photo selection would be quite different, I suspect.

My take on the images is this: Abercrombie and Fitch are not trying to promote nudism. They are trying to promote Abercrombie and Fitch by associating their products with freedom, confidence and sophistication. They decided that the best way they could do this was to associate themselves with co-ed social nudity. I consider this a VERY good sign.

The message I get from their (previous) catalogs is that social nudity is young and hip, but since you can't be nude most of the time wear our (very expensive) young and hip clothing instead. [/qb]

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I personelly think they aren't using nudity but sexual nudity, it's all sexuallity, I don't think I would buy a pair of jeans looking at a guy and girl going at it in a magazine, I personnaly don't think it's nudity but sex, all the same, I have no problem with the nudity but the sex, I have only seen it on FOX, so I don't really know, but naked people bumping and grinding isn't going to sell me clothes, I rarely wear the clothes I have now, but sex to me Isn't the nudist life style and thats what they would have you believe.

[Croydon]

quote:

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Originally posted by RIVERRAT:
[qb]

quote:

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Originally posted by aunaturelone:
[qb]

quote:

---

I feel A&F are trying to sell the idea the nude body is bad thing and should be covered up.

---

I don't think so. I haven't seen this one but in the last one I saw the nudes were quite innocent. My favorite shot was the one with the nude woman scrubbing the back of an elephant with a very long handled brush. I guess the newest catalog has a couple shots of couples kissing and such but I figure that anything you can do with you clothes on is equally acceptable with your clothes off.

The nudity is a hook to bring in an audience for a commercial purpose but the 95% of the photos themselves aren't anything you wouldn't see on the clothesfree.com web site. If titilation were the objective the photo selection would be quite different, I suspect.

My take on the images is this: Abercrombie and Fitch are not trying to promote nudism. They are trying to promote Abercrombie and Fitch by associating their products with freedom, confidence and sophistication. They decided that the best way they could do this was to associate themselves with co-ed social nudity. I consider this a VERY good sign.

The message I get from their (previous) catalogs is that social nudity is young and hip, but since you can't be nude most of the time wear our (very expensive) young and hip clothing instead. [/qb]

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I personelly think they aren't using nudity but sexual nudity, it's all sexuallity, I don't think I would buy a pair of jeans looking at a guy and girl going at it in a magazine, I personnaly don't think it's nudity but sex, all the same, I have no problem with the nudity but the sex, I have only seen it on FOX, so I don't really know, but naked people bumping and grinding isn't going to sell me clothes, I rarely wear the clothes I have now, but sex to me Isn't the nudist life style and thats what they would have you believe. [/qb]

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but you are not the target audience of A&F. A middle age man as yourself isn't the target market of A&F hence why you don't find the pictures/catalog of interest. The target market of A*F is preteens to those in early 20s and they respond to A&F advertising. I think A&F's advertising is great. They continue to push the enevelope and by doing so they get attention and so much publicity.

[Fresh Air]

Unbiasedly I agree, the marketing scheme is Genius. [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_cool.gif[/img]

[Dave M.]

• Croydon- From a marketing and puplicity point I agree with you. The A&F catalog is a home run from a marketing point of view. Nor do I object to nude models- but nude does not mean it's good for nudist or there way of life. You have to look at this from other from a marketing point of view and be objective about this. Others might not see this from a marketing point of view[/list]
  
  
  
  • I said- I feel A&F is trying to sell the idea the nude body is a bad thing and should be covered-up. I wish they would use AVERAGE people instead of beautiful people in the A&f catalog[/list]
    
    
    
    • Hope fully the only message they are sending -if you have to wear clothes wear A&F clothes[/list]
      
      
      
      • Bottom line it's about A&F promoting themselfs and money they will make in do the "nude" model catalogs![/list]

[Jochanaan]

Advertising is about creating desires, not promoting logical or reasonable thought. Therefore it's very unlikely that A&F is promoting the ideal of nudity, since if that ideal were widely accepted their business would go bankrupt. It's more likely that the catalog is an exercise in psychology.

[Stevedaoust]

I finally bought this issue and didn't think twice about it. The nudity was all quite innocent. Yah there was kissing scenes but that's being human. Nothing perverted. Just nude people having a good time outdoors.

Steve