It's the one that starts with the caption "First date". Very attractive women is being indecisive getting dressed, putting on spanx even though she is already thin, trying on umpteen outfits before finally answering the door to a not as attractive man. Then the caption comes up "Guaranteed second date" and I swore at the tv.
Has anyone else seen it?
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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions
That new M&S advert can bugger off
34 replies
GothAnneGeddes · 12/09/2011 23:26
OP posts:
Chocobo ·
13/09/2011 15:15
OP you are not wrong - there are so many adverts on at the moment make me angry. I am driving my husband mad by swearing at the telly each ad break. The worse one is that Boots headache one - 
dittany ·
13/09/2011 15:53
This reply has been deleted
Message withdrawn at poster's request.
GothAnneGeddes ·
13/09/2011 16:51
To be clear though, the advert would have still be just as annoying to me if the man was as good looking/better looking then her. It's the whole perpetuation of woman = desperate for a man that annoys me the most. Although it's worth noting that women in adverts are often far more stereotypically physically attractive then their male counterparts.
In contrast, has anyone seen the new advert for Sure Extracool for men? It's the one wear he ice skates through his day and ends up in bed alone (but not in a sad way, in a stretched out and happy way). Yes, not only does he not have a female love interest, there's no obvious heteronormativity in his life, he could be gay, it's left ambiguous. I couldn't believe there was a male product advert that didn't have a "woman as prize" in it.
Compare that with that heinous wearing jingly bells crap advert that Sure inflicts on women
OP posts:
Chocobo ·
13/09/2011 17:06
SinicalSal 
Yes GAG - I remember being a bit shocked (in a good way) the first time I saw that Sure advert because I was just expecting it to end up with him in bed with a woman. Found it quite refreshing when he did not.
Chocobo ·
13/09/2011 17:12
Can I just mention those WKD adverts too - especially the one where the man's wife phones him when he is in the pub and he pretends to still be in the office aided by the entire pub full of men (because women never go to pubs 
). I always think poor wife - waiting for him to come home, maybe she wants a bit of help with the kids or wants to go out herself (I do have a tendency to overthink things).
I do wonder what sort of customer base they are trying to attract because it appears to be twats.
KRICRI ·
13/09/2011 17:28
OMFG the M & S Adverts!
I don't have a sound card on the comp I'm using, but I don't think I missed much with just the images.
I'm wary of saying the "date" in the first clip is "out of her league," because well, looks do come down to individual taste. He was more appealing to me because he was cute without the Empire-catalogue-identikit-male-model look of the two actors in the second clip. I do think the male actor in the first clip was cast though because he didn't look "conventionally handsome," in the hopes that Joe Average watching the clip would identify with him.
The message of each was slightly different, but still from the same "stable" that starts from the point that a woman's greatest value, even only value is in her appearance. In the first, it was single, attractive 20-30 something female (so too long on the shelf!) must spend ages perfecting her appearance to stand any chance of getting a man to consider a relationship with her (and if the intention was to cast a non-conventionally handsome man, it underpins that she should be grateful for any man she can get.)
The second seemed to show that a middle age and then some woman must, whatever she does, not let herself go, or her attractive, same-age husband might lose interest in her. There's a nod to "making her husband jealous" as well, by catching the eye of the first man in the clip.
It's all about making yourself "beautiful" to meet some impossible ideal of femininity, to have any worth as a human being and to get and/or keep that all important man in your life.
(I think I want to puke now )
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