Men Who Complain About Advertising

[NickAndNora]

After seeing yet another thread derailed by a dick-wielding troll complaining about the way men are portrayed in advertising I thought we should get this over and done with once and for all.

1 - If the biggest thing you have to complain about in life is advertising, or having to wear a tie to work, then you are really, really privileged and lucky. Sean Penn isn't going to star in a searing biopic articulating your struggle any time soon. You are not Spartacus. You are not Rosa Parks. Boo boo fucking hoo.

2 - Most advertising is sexist, manipulative and patronising towards women. Because you are not a woman this is invisible to you and you don't give two shits. You only see the minority of ads that sexualise or patronise men.

3 - The advertising you complain about is not made by feminists and probably not even made by women. It is made by the men who run advertising companies for the men who run companies that wish to advertise. If you don't like it tell them.

4 - The advertising you complain about does not espouse feminist ideology. Feminism is not an inversion of patriarchy, with the world existing as it does now except with women at the top. Feminism is about living under a completely different value system. The sexist fuckwits who make these adverts believe the way to appeal to women is to show women 'empowered' by behaving like sexist men. The men who make these adverts have no clue about women and no clue about feminism, hence the inverted sexism of the adverts.

Can we get back to discussing violence, the justice system, financial independence, the system of gender and other important stuff now or do we need to hold your hand while you cry into your wank-cloth about the Diet Coke ad for the hundredth time?

This annoys me. Yes, I'd rather there would be no sexual objectification, in a society where a lot of advertising is based around that. No. They are not facing the very real widespread, historic sexism against them which means babies are killed, domestic abuse is still so high (and mainly against women) and women can be blamed for being violently attacked because it's still okay to make rape the victims fault. It is like crying 'reverse racism' if you're white. The coke ad etc are really only a symptom of the patriarchy anyway- oh, a man can't use a dishwasher (how can someone not manage that?), ha ha ha, men brains are so different to women brains, aren't they?

Frequent fragrant farts

Tess, Yy. It's amazing how many of the "Diet Coke, GOTCHA!" Posters have never filed a complaint with the ASA...

Interesting about ironing and polishing in the army. Don't know much about the military, so if I'm talking out of turn I'm sure someone will let me know. But the military is hierarchal and you must know your place, which initially anyway, is at the bottom. Doing boring, mundane tasks and having to do them precisely correct, to demonstrate you know your place and that gets you approval. Interesting coincidence.

If you are going to eat crisps and biscuits in bed put a hooded dressing gown on back to front and use the hood to catch all the crumbs. I read this in the 'Readers' Tips' section of one of my mum's magazines once.

Great idea for a thread. The "but men are all shown as stupid in adverts" fallacy is on my Room 101 list. Women are shown as stupid in adverts but men don't even notice it - it's white noise. The Boots adverts are particularly heinous - the latest one featuring grown women gurning to crappy r'n'b because they've put on some lip gloss.

I actually long for the heyday of 70s and 80s advertising when at least women got to be glamorous and sophisticated while being objectified - Paula Hamilton for VW, Joan Collins for Cinzano, Sharon Maugham for Gold Blend. I much prefer the aspirational and airbrushed to the false matiness of 'hey girls, what are we like?!'

7Days... I know more about the military than I have any real wish to, and you're pretty much spot on.

Zazzles... DH has a fabulous Darth Vader dressing gown. It has a hood and he can pretend to be The Emperor whenever the mood takes him! thank goodness DH isn't a MNetter

Oooo, I'd quite fancy a Darth Vader dressing gown and emulating the Emperor. I have been quite the Star Wars fan in my yoof . BOOM!

I can find out where he got it, if you like. I'll even check they deliver down under.

My second favourite tip was to wrap your shoes in clingfilm every time you leave the house just in case you step in dog poo or chewing gum. Somebody somewhere is actually doing this.

(Derails own thread)

Flames time!!!

It does cut both ways though, but not evenly. For example the "frequent fragrant farts" ad, I can understand why you are pissed off. Can you understand why I get pissed off when I do most of the hoovering, cleaning etc.

Advertising in general is cack and so badly aimed (the advertising in womens magazine is bizarre, often more lads mag-ish in it's objectification of females), on the other hand they are billion pound/dollar/yen/rouble etc businesses who do focus groups, studies etc to hone in their stuff and if the objectification of women sells to othe women (being a given it'll sell to men) then win/win for them.

I blame Grange Hill. That age group (mid to late 40's now) are now in charge and were brought up on girls winning everything on that programme...football, roller hockey, cake baking, skateboarding, netball. No wonder 70's maledom grew up sexist!

No flames. However, you must have to spend huge amounts of time emailing the ASA to tell them about it all.

What does "flames time" mean?

Nick... some of those 'hot tips' things in magazines are frigging hilarious.

I refuse to buy them now, because they are full of either tripe or awful stories sensationalised to all hell, but you really do wonder about people sometimes!

Petula.... that we are all going to be mean to him.

Ah thanks

It's that "disarming" tactic I notice quite a lot of men (NAM) using in this section in that case. Where they start by saying "you're not going to like what I'm going to say but I'm going to say it anyway". Why not just say it without making assumptions about how readers are going to react? sets the tone for the whole post and it's off-putting

Nickandnora that's like an outdoor version of keeping the sofa plastic covers on! What did that person think shoes were for??!

The "flames time" comment was used because I realised what I was posting may be seen as contentious but wasn't meant as a troll/wind up type post.

No wonder 70's maledom grew up sexist!

So what age range are you in? Would you call yourself sexist?

So girls won everything in grange hill, and men are sexist (NAM) are sexist in some kind of revenge?

Were there lots of other media depictions then of girls and women being the protagonists and/or winning everything? Say, I dunno, Star Wars, or Doctor Who, or Back To The Future, or Bill n Ted, or The Goonies?

Myself, I recall Grange Hill as broadly balanced but we might have watched slightly different eras. But if you think back to all the TV and films you watched when younger, do you think more boys/men or more girls/women were the major, active characters?

I don,t actually remember Grange a hill as a pioneering outpost of feminism. I think the Head was a woman,,,,,is that what you mean?

As an aside- I hate to rain on people's parade, but the household hints being quoted are parodies from Viz Magazine. My personal favourite is "Why waste money on expensive binoculars? Just stand nearer to the object you wish to view"

For example the "frequent fragrant farts" ad, I can understand why you are pissed off. Can you understand why I get pissed off when I do most of the hoovering, cleaning etc

Well, of course, that is what we have all said. It's patronising and shit. Everyone here has already said it's crap

Hakluyt

Nope, the household hints were not from Viz but from my mum's Chat magazine. It was the only bit of the magazine that I read. I distinctly remember those two examples but it was always full of stuff like that.