Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to be angry that Ann Summers has a real woman in underwear in their shop window?

309 replies

1eve · 13/02/2011 21:09

Walking down Market Street in Manchester on Friday I saw a couple of guys taking pictures with their phones at a shop window. When I turned to see what they were photographing I found that there was a woman posing in sexy underwear in a window display. The shop was Ann Summers, although it had changed its name to ManSummers as a publicity thing to get guys to come into the shop and buy valentine gifts for their girlfriends. Now women buying vibrators and dressing up if they want is not a problem for me, although Ann Summers has always leant towards getting women to please men in my view, but sexual desire is never pc anyway so its a tricky subject. But this felt like it crossed a line.
If I'd been walking through town (it was the middle of the day) with my 2 boys, age 4 and 6, that is not what I want them to see. That a woman's role is to be placed on show like a piece of meat while men leer at her? (a group of guys were standing in front of the window laughing and staring, making comments). Is it just me or is this bloody degrading?

OP posts:
LeninGrad · 14/02/2011 20:23

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Mumcentreplus · 14/02/2011 20:25

It's not even offensive apart from my sensibilites..I mean come on..use your brains..oh no lets just put some fit girls in underwear and call the shop Man Summers..because ultimately women only shop their to please their man and men only shop there to please themselves..sorry but pathetic and lazy

LeninGrad · 14/02/2011 20:26

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

chandellina · 14/02/2011 20:30

i don't want to see any human or animal needlessly exploited to titillate on the high street. This is up there with Hamley's wanting to bring in a bunch of penguins.

Mumcentreplus · 14/02/2011 20:33

Actually there are many boutique sex-shops who cater for women and men..(If thats your thing) AS is like the Tescos of sex shops..and I shop at Tescos occassionally ...good prices Wink

DrNortherner · 14/02/2011 20:34

I reckon those girls don't feel in the least expoloited.

Anyway, off to eat my dinner then strut around in my sexy undies Grin

Mumcentreplus · 14/02/2011 20:36

Lol...good for you DrN (hope she's not doing it in the gardenGrin)

SardineQueen · 14/02/2011 20:48

Gawd just go online eg lovehoney far better stuff. Anne summers stuff is shitto IME. If anne summers disappeared I don't think women would have trouble sourcing sex toys and saucy undies so that argument is a bit rubbish IMO.

I'm not sure what the point about it being nice that there is a sex shop on the high street for women is anyway. This advertising campaign wasn't aimed at women it was aimed at men. You are not going to persuade me that there aren't enough scantily clad women on the high street for men to look at and we desperately need more.

Oblomov · 14/02/2011 21:27

Sardine, Lovehoney and Anne Summers are supplied by the same company.

LeninGrad · 14/02/2011 21:28

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

squeakytoy · 14/02/2011 21:50

This advertising campaign wasn't aimed at women it was aimed at men

Not really.. the blokes go home, they say to their wives "cor, that ann summers place had a real woman in the window in some nice undies today... you would look lovely in them"

Wife then goes to ann summers and buys them...

Aitch · 14/02/2011 21:52

haven't read thread but was GOB-SMACKED to see this in Glasgow today. i would say the girl was not a model, looked like someone who worked in the shop. she was about 19 and not having fun.

LeninGrad · 14/02/2011 21:56

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Cloudbase · 14/02/2011 22:28

YADNBU.

This makes me so sad actually, because the proliferation of sex in advertising and the cementing of the idea that women are objects is becoming so normalised. The problem for me is that this window display and attendant 'admiring' men isn't taking place in a vacuum.

I believe that Feminism is about Liberation, and about being genuinely free to make choices (and yes, that choice would include dressing how you like, being as sexual as you like and even considering yourself 'weaker' than men if you wanted).

Yes, loads of young women now dress in extremely provocative clothing, but how much of a choice is it really, when the shops they go to are stocked full of these clothes and little else? When the fashion magazines and music videos aren't offering too much of an alternative? When (imvho) the cosmapharmaceutical industry has pulled the greatest con trick in decades with the whole anti-aging schtick. When the percentage of women having cosmetic surgery has skyrocketed to the point where it has become completely normalised? All because women nowadays seem to have absorbed the all pervasive message that age=unattractive and without youth, sex and beauty for as long as possible you are somehow less valuable.

And all this is taking place alongside a sea shift in the media, which itself has taken place alongside the growth of the internet and the proliferation of internet porn. In a society where 60% of teenage boys have apparantly viewed online porn, and our media slide words like 'post-feminist' into the canon (what exactly does that mean by the way???) to imply that we've all done jolly well really and we can all move on from that silly 70's nonsense, what hope do we have?

And to all the feminist baiters, can I genuinely ask this. What about the women in China who are being forcibly taken to abortion centres to have their second pregnancies terminated? The women living in the Middle East and parts of Africa under extreme Sharia Law who are being stoned to death for adultery and denied an education and the right to work, or even sit in a car with a man? What about forced Female Gental Mutilation?

Since when did Feminism become entirely about sexuality instead of Gender, and since when did it become entirely the preserve of the West? There is so much more to Feminism than just this thread!

troz · 14/02/2011 22:49

Have your kids never seen you in your underwear?!! What's the difference? I'm fat, have awful stretch marks and an enormous scar but my kids see me naked occasionally. 2 girls/2 boys, ages ranging from 10-21. If kids grow up seeing any state of undress as being something to make a fuss of, then they will regrdless of the situation. If they're taught it's no big deal then chances are, they'd barely notice a half naked woman in the window.

PaulaYatesbiggestfan · 14/02/2011 23:00

god help my daughter and sons for that matter - some of the responses on here

If my kids did NOT remark on some semi clad woman parading in a shop window whilst men leer and giggle outside then I really WOULD feel I had failed them

notjustapotforsoup · 14/02/2011 23:03

Applause for Cloudbase, SQ, LG et al

And why do I only ever hear the word "empowering" when it involves a woman getting her kit off?

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe2726 · 15/02/2011 09:23

notjustaspotforsoup... Perhaps it's the fora you frequent or the type of threads you read? I hear it more often in different context.

Cloudbase... I found your post very thought-provoking.

fatlazymummy · 15/02/2011 09:34

squeakytoy you would go and buy this underwear on the basis of this? Personally I would feel the exact opposite.I would find another shop to buy it from. I used to love wearing sexy underwear and turning my man on [bit old for it now] but I wouldn't feel good buying anything from this shop now.

AbsDuCroissant · 15/02/2011 09:40

On a point someone raised earlier about men's feelings on this - as I (very inarticulately said earlier) - when there was an advert with a buff man just in his pants, most of the males I knew felt very uncomfortable about it. One said:

  • it made him feel inadequate - that this is some standard of aesthetic ideal he could not live up to, and it made him feel crap
  • he thought it would give women unrealistic expectations of what a man's body should look like
Oh how I laughed, and pointed out the millions and millions of equivalent adverts featuring semi-naked women, and imagine how that feels? So yeah, men in an equivalent situation feel equally uncomfortable

Yes, it's her choice, it's her job. But I doubt any man looking at her thinks "wow, she must have a great sense of humour, and a wondrous mind". DOUBT IT. As I spend the majority of my time around men, their thoughts would be "I want to shag her".

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe2726 · 15/02/2011 09:47

AbsDuCroissant... Just wondering whether any man (or woman) would think that when they see anybody, fully dressed or not? Physical attributes seem to play a huge part in attraction.

Your post raises the point of 'inadequacy' that was mentioned earlier in the thread and was immediately dismissed by some as being 'rubbish'. It's interesting to read your post about the aesthetic ideal and how it can make some feel inadequate and it's quite difficult for some to admit it.

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe2726 · 15/02/2011 09:50

fatlazymummy... what a name, I bet you're not! Blush

I would buy the underwear from Anne Summers if I liked it (I don't). I'm not swayed either way by the model in the window. Although, saying that... if I were going to buy underwear or whatever from there, I would probably be put off by the crowds of men lurking outside.

AbsDuCroissant · 15/02/2011 09:55

There is that, but what I have found from many discussions with male friends (and it may just be mine), if they see/meet a girl who dresses in a very revealing way, they would only consider her for sex, not for a long term relationship (though obviously if they really got to know her they may change their mind, but otherwise, nope).

wellwisher · 15/02/2011 10:09

I went to House of Fraser yesterday and there was a La Perla model/assistant roaming the lingerie department in bra, pants, and satin dressing gown thing (untied to show bra and pants). She asked if I needed any help! The whole thing made me deeply uncomfortable and I fled to the frumpy end of the department to be served by a matronly lady in a suit. So this happens at the top end of the market too...

AbsDuCroissant · 15/02/2011 10:14

I was once in M&S and they were selling bra and camisole sets, and one of the (rather stout, middle aged) attendants was walking around with just the bra and cami set that on on her top half. I thought it was a rather "interesting" sales tactic Grin