In response to Gwen’s post on butts, I offer you crotches. We’re being super highbrow today.
The following not-safe-for-work ads place a product (or copy) at a woman’s crotch. Are they promising sexual access? Just trying to draw attention? Using shock tactics? I don’t know.
Taylor D. (of Thanks for Participating) sent in a link to The Assimilated Negro’s post of ads that use women’s ass-cracks prominently. Not safe for work, so after the jump:
An extended version of this post also appeared at Ms.
I’ve been taking photographs of breast-cancer-research-and-prevention-branded products for a few months now. I was first driven to do so when I saw this at the Million Aire (private plane terminal) at the Burbank airport:
That’s right. You are looking at pink chocolate chips cooked into cookies to signify a commitment to reducing breast cancer-related morbidity and mortality.
Anti-breast cancer messages are, I think inarguably, the most widely product-linked disease-related message ever. I am constantly shocked by how many products have a breast cancer version. Here are some pictures I’ve taken over the last few months.
Cream cheese:
Padlock:
Cat food:
Gum:
Golf balls and tees:
Pots and pans:
Steve W. sent in this picture of a pink “ladies night out” breast cancer-themed limo (note the pink ribbon hanging from the rear view mirror):
NEW (May ’10)! Renée Y. sent along this photo of breast cancer-awareness-themed grape tomatoes. I repeat: grape tomatoes.
We’ve discussed the commodification of activism extensively (see here, here, here, here, and here) and so I’m going to skip this point. Instead, I’d like the ask the following:
What does it mean when awareness of and funding for disease is subject to marketing? Is this really the most efficient or rational way to set health care priorities? I did a bit of research.
According to the CDC (2005 seems to be the latest available data), cancer is not the leading cause of death. Heart disease is the leading cause of death. Granted, cancer is a close second. In 2005, 652,091 people died of heart disease and 559,312 died of cancer. But not breast cancer, all cancers. In 2005, 49,491 people died of breast cancer. More than 10 times as many people died of heart disease.
And, if you want to prioritize cancers, more people are diagnosed with prostate cancer than breast cancer (source) and more people die from lung cancer (159,292), colon, rectal, or anal cancer (53,252), and lymphoid/hematopoietic cancers (55,028) (source).
So why such an emphasis on breast cancer? I’m not sure why. Certainly there is a massive social movement organization behind this anti-breast cancer marketing and people in charge have made a decision to take this approach. I think, also, the body parts and the presumed cause of disease matter. Do we have less sympathy (and would, therefore, a similar marketing campaign be less effective) for lung cancer because we think that lung cancer patients are to blame for their own disease? Would we find colo-rectal-anal cancer-themed cream cheese somehow less appetizing? Or prostate cancer-themed gum? Do lymphoid and hematopoietic cancers affect parts of the body that are simply less iconic?
“Save the lymph nodes” just doesn’t have quite the same ring?
I’m not trying to suggest that raising awareness of and funding research for breast cancer isn’t important, but I am interested in the strategies by which being “against” breast cancer is (literally) sold to us. And I’m curious about how this affects treatment and research funding, if at all, and the rationality of our resource distribution given the application of a marketing approach to (some) diseases (and not others). (Also in breast cancer marketing, see here, here, here, here, and here.)
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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.
Both Aani B. and Sarah F. sent in a link to a commercial for the new diet Pepsi (Pepsi Max, of course) being aimed at men.
Also don’t miss this commercial (embedding disabled) in which they describe the ingredients of Pepsi Max as the crushed bones of a Viking, the spit of a rapid Wolverine, pepper spray, and scorpion venom. The can? Made from the hull of a nuclear submarine. The crushing of cans on heads ensues.
Over at I Blame the Patriarchy, a reader named Kate sent in a snapshot of some advertising for the product at the intersection of 6th and Anza in San Francisco:
Slogans:
“The first diet cola for men.”
“Save the calories for bacon.”
“0 calories. Great taste. Welded together.”
“No gut. All glory.”
This is, of course, all in jest. Yet is still re-affirms the idea that being this way is the epitome of manhood, if taken to a ridiculous extreme. Eh, I’ll just let Twisty say it. As usual, she says it better than I:
What’s the big whoop? Well, you can’t have a “soda for men” unless “men” are considered a class unto themselves, defined in terms of the bacon-eating, welding, glorious nukular submarine-squashing aspirations that separate them from dainty vulnerable “women.” These ads are jokey, depicting average-looking dudes, but they tacitly allude to the noxious he-man/fragile damsel dichotomy that’s been chapping actual women’s hides lo these many millennia.
It also, of course, points to the fact that dieting really has been for women all along (see posts here and here for examples). In fact, it denies that diet-soda-for-men is about dieting at all: note the slogan “save the calories for bacon” and the name, Pepsi Max, which implies adding something to the beverage as opposed to taking something out.
See other examples of marketing for diet products aimed at men: Nutrisystem (“get ‘er done!”) and Weight Watchers.
As discussed on Salon.com and Jezebel today, Dell Computers has started to market directly to women with a new website, Della. Joshua and Frederick both told us about it. Here are some images from the site:
Apparently women shopping for computers care about (1) style– whether or not it matches their outfits, (2) how light it is to carry around when they hang out with equally-coordinated friends and their laptops, and (3) the ability to check movie times, and restaurant directions whenever you need to.
It takes 3 clicks to even get to anything about the actual computers’ processor speed, RAM, hard drive capacity etc. I don’t know about everyone else, but I’m a proud geek and I want to know all the technical computer specs.
So what is Dell really saying, here, about women’s computer needs? That women care more about the color of their computers than how well it is going to perform for them? That women won’t understand all the tech specs anyway, so why bother? That women don’t use their laptops for work— to run businesses, write papers, network with clients, or design websites?
Instead we get incredibly informative descriptions like “attractive, clean designs… with everything you want for your everyday needs.”
And content aside, I also take issue with the very existence of a separate website for women computer buyers. The not-so-subtle message is that the Dell website– with all the high speed (plain black) computers, business information, and detailed tech specs– is for men.
Oh, there are some tech tips on the Della site– about how to use your wicked cute laptop to keep in touch with friends and family and to exercise and eat better.
Elisabeth R. sent us this one-minute commercial. I’ll let you experience it as designed (it has a surprise ending) and include my comments below:
We might feel that feminism and gun ownership are incompatible. An argument could be made that (especially machine) gun ownership is anti-feminist, but it’s also true that we artificially cluster rather random, unconnected ideas into political ideologies that we then understand to be compatible by definition. For example, what does being anti-gay marriage and anti-taxes have to do with each other? Nothing.
For more on pro-gun propaganda, see this extensive set of really fascinating posters making feminist, anti-racist, and pro-gay arguments in favor of gun ownership.
For another example of an effort to bridge the political binary, see this post on pro-environment/anti-immigrant activism
In the wake of the embarassing incident where car company executives were called out for flying in private jets to beg Congress for money, Cessna, manufacturer of private jets, is fighting back. At their new website, www.cessnarise.com, they’re framing the attack as skeptical hyperbole that doesn’t take into account the facts and recommending that potential purchasers of private jets “rise” above it all. Some screenshots:
Notice that Cessna frames the resistance to private-jet-flying chastisement as a “challenge” that should be overcome.
I don’t know whether private jet ownership is, in fact, economically smart. I am rather sure that it depends on the company/person. I do, however, think it’s interesting the way that Cessna is framing a rejection of the point made by Congress (that it is, perhaps, indulgent to insist upon private jet travel) in moral terms. Customers should “rise” above, take on the “challenge,” fight the “naysayers,” beat the “skeptics.” Real economics, then, appear to take a backseat to resisting the accusation that some of us enjoy extreme class privilege that is not necessarily justified by the books.
Franklin suggested that we post about some points people are making about Dora the Explorer’s makeover. Originally drawn like this…
…Dora has been re-envisioned and now looks like this:
Wicked Anomie writes:
The producers insist that the new tween Dora will still be like the old one in personality and interests. Just more fashionable, with ballet flats, long hair, jewelry, and makeup. And she wears a dress. Not the choicest attire for galavanting in the woods going on adventures, but hey…
I asked my six-year old daughter what she thought of the new Dora. She likes her better. Why?
“Well, I like that her hair is longer, and she’s wearing a dress. And a necklace. And I like her shoes. And that other one, she’s fat in her belly and her clothes don’t fit right. I don’t like her shoes, either. And her hair’s all short and she doesn’t have a necklace.”
Gwen and I, however, are not surprised at this new feminized Dora. About a year ago we were in Toys ‘R Us in Henderson, NV, and were so struck by the Dora the Explorer toys that we took pictures of every single one of them. Almost all of them feature feminized activities such as cooking, taking care of babies, and fashion and accessories. There are 15 images so I’ve put them after the jump:
