Merinda B. sent in an interesting example of the use of gendered discourses in airline marketing. Last fall British Airways released “To Fly. To Serve,” a commercial touting the bravery and adventurousness of BA pilots. These pilots, who heroically pushed into the frontiers of air travel and now ensure the safety and comfort of their travelers, are presented as exclusively male:

Transcript:
Those first young men, the pioneers, the aviators. Building superhighways in an unknown sky. Leaving wives and children in their snug homes with just a kiss and a promise to return. Roaring into the clouds to battle wind and stars. Their safety system built of brain and heart. They landed where there were no lights. Transforming strange names from tall tales into pictures on postcards home. And those next young men, travelling further, faster, higher then any in history, are the ones that followed them. Who skimmed the edge of space, the edge of heaven, the edge of dreams. And we follow them up there, to live by an unbreakable promise. The same four words stitched into every uniform of every Captain that takes their command: To fly. To serve.
As Merinda pointed out, while the British Airways of 1920 presumably had all-male pilots, that’s certainly no longer true in 2011. BA hired its first female pilot in 1987; indeed, she flew the first flight to land at Heathrow airport’s recently-added Terminal 5 in 2008. As of 2008, BA had about 175 female pilots on staff. Yet the ad reserves the heroic pilot role only for men. Women appear in the role of worried wife, waiting at home while her brave husband is off to do “battle” (similar to imagery of wives waiting on the homefront while soldiers go off to war) or as passengers, safe in the hands of their trusty male pilots; even in the modern scenes, this romanticized pilot-as-soldier role is imagined as male-only.

In another example of gendered marketing, German airline Lufthansa recently mailed ads to male customers, encouraging them to sign up for a new credit card. Nothing particularly out of the ordinary there, but the ad campaign, sent to us by Katrin, drew a lot of attention — and criticism — because the credit card in question wasn’t for the men themselves, but for their female partners. The Women’s Special card was offered as an add-on to male frequent fliers who have a Lufthansa Miles-and-More account:

Written as a letter from a woman to her male partner, many felt the ad reinforced stereotypes of female dependence and consumerism. Katrin provided a translation:

Dear Honey,
The feeling that I am the most important thing in your life is wonderful for me. We are bound together by so many unforgettable moments. During which you again and again had a great feel for how to make me happy. Now I have a small plea: There is a Woman’s Special partner card to your Miles & More credit card which offers real benefits. With it I will even be invited to exclusive events and will take part in great surprise activities. And the best part: I’ll get a 2-year-subscription to VOGUE magazine, Myself  or to the Architectural Digest as a gift. You know how much I like browsing these kind of magazines… Of course I also want to collect miles with my credit card, just like you, which we can then redeem for a nice trip together- maybe to Paris! It would make me very happy if you could apply for this partner card for me: www.womans-card.de
Thousand times thank you,
 Your Special Woman
Part of the criticism sprang from the explicitly gendered program; the card, after all, isn’t called the Partner’s Special, or Spouse’s Special, but specifically the Woman’s Special. As The Local, a German English-language news site, reported, one German businesswoman, Anke Domscheit-Berg, Tweeted, “Will I be getting a letter from my sweetheart asking if he can have a partner credit card to go shopping with?” Presumably not — there is no equivalently-named (or even gender-neutral) option targeting the male partners of account holders.