The Manipulation of Signs

In Baudrillard’s long article “The System of Objects,” he states that we
as a people and a culture consume products not because we are a passive
species hoping to absorb and assimilate into one giant uniform mass
audience; but we actively consume objects because they are a
manipulations of signs that our culture finds meaningful. If this is
true then the Romantic Comedy is just one manipulation that our culture
finds to be meaningful as applied to how our society should mate with
the opposite sex. Through McDonald's reasoning the romantic comedy genre
has been classified as a lighthearted expression of a couple falling in
love with each other, while battling or competing with one another in
order to successfully find their perfect mate. The Sex comedy like the
romantic comedy does place emphasis on competition for specific mates
but also expresses the former attitudes of society and how women were to
be the celestial virgins while men were allowed to be promiscuous with
their sexuality. One thing I found disturbing was the blatant shock
towards the Doctors studies of Women’s sexuality. How is it that in the
1950’s it was acceptable for men to sleep around, while all the women
were to be seen as virgins. They must have known that if the men were
loosing their virginity it was not amongst themselves, but with the
opposite sex. So why was it so shocking to them to find out that 50% of
women were not virgins. How else did they think men were getting
experienced? Another thing I found interesting is that if we as a mass
audience consumes the romcoms and the sex comedies are we actively
hoping our relationships are going to mirror what is seen on the screen?
If this is to be true we must wake up and realize life and relationships
are not meant to be lighthearted. I believe that the mass consumption of
romcoms is an escape from actually having to talk to one another while
in the courting phase of a relationship and is passive way to use the
romcom as a device or means to defer the situation at hand. We as a mass
audience watch these movies to feel better about our own relationships
or find comfort in the message the movie is trying to give us