I am so glad that sex does not sell*

Recently, while carrying out my normal morning routine, I came across this rather disturbing picture used to promote a rather mundane service. At first, I honestly thought it was another one of those promotions for finding "hot singles" in my area; so I ignored it. But when I took a second look, I saw that it was not soliciting hot singles in my area; it was (as you can see) an add for finding individuals to be "secret shoppers". Is the secret shopper industry in such a dire need that the marketers must resort to using such tactics to recruit new employees? Or is such an approach simply indicative of how marketers seek an audience with people within our society?

Exploitation of women for the sake of marketing a new product is a sad commentary for our society. (Please know that I am not relegating this problem only to the US; it is a global trend). This trend can be found when promoting all kinds of products--e.g., Mach-3 razors, Arby's 5-for-$5, etc. I am not quite sure, in light of this problem, which disturbs me more: that such tactics are "normal" (if not acceptable), or that women allow themselves to be exploited for such purposes. I am sure there is all kinds of rhetorical moves made when soliciting the help of young attractive women that make it seem as though they are being honored and performing a valuable service. But five minutes of reading between the lines would reveal the true rhetoric being presented. What can be found between the lines is anything but honorable and it quite insulting.

Marketers know that sex sells, and such a mentality pervades the vast majority of social life. This raises another question that ultimately disturbs me. What's worse: the fact that sex sells and marketers exploit that to the extreme, or that there is an underlying assumption that presupposes a lack of interest in a product (from the consumer) unless it is presented in a sexual way? In other words: is our society conditioned to desire things only when they are sexually alluring? Whatever happened to something being desirable simply based on the merits of the product itself?

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* Stated with the most sarcasm I can muster.