I was watching the show House Hunters last night on HGTV and noticed that, even with such a neutral show, in the space of ten minutes I saw two commercials that were abusive to men. In one commercial, a woman was angry at a man at work and dumped a cup of coffee on him. In another, a man was in the grocery store aisle anxiously trying to decide whether his wife (or girlfriend) wanted the sweetener Stevia or real sugar. He was terrified that if he bought her sugar, she would be angry as she was off sugar that week, but he was also afraid that she would get mad if he bought her artificial sugar as she would think he thought she was fat.
Another commercial showed a woman powerfully riding around on a lawn mower. I wish I could just peacefully watch a show without the constant message that says men are wimps, perverts, idiots, or must live in constant fear of women and the simultaneous message that women are powerful. They climb big rocks while their boyfriend looks at them with admiration. Have you seen that Citi commercial? These commercials may seem cute to some but they are destructive when they treat men as accessories to women rather than as human beings. Why not treat both sexes as worthy of some dignity?
Do you have a least favorite of these “males are idiots, predators, or wimps” commercials? If so, drop it in the comments as I am working on a section for my upcoming book on why men are on strike in the U.S. and could use some tips.
Update: Listen to my discussion with radio host Brian Wilson on negative images of men in the media here.
I hate the tv show Big Bang Theory. It portrays men as completely inept with women while the woman is some goddess with secret knowledge of the universe she just isn’t sharing with us lesser men. It’s as if the show’s “comedy” comes from the question “how can even the smartest men can be so dumb?”
Gotta disagree w/ you re: Big Bang. They are focusing on a particular subset of men. And I know from experience (“ich bin ein nerd”), they’re a pretty accurate portrayal of the nerd subset. I was at WonderCon this weekend, talk about highly concentrated nerd. Leonard is competent and likable, but still lacks the social skills when push comes to shove. The rest are typically obsessed w/ their non-mainstream interests to the point of be oblivious to what creeps out the normals.
And the women? Amy is just as socially clueless and inappropriate as any of the boys. And *knock,knock,knock* Penny is pretty but a lush, a tramp and kinda stupid. Bernadette is the only one in the cast that could be called normal.
My only problem w/ the show is, like Gilligan, why they don’t kill Sheldon.
My father was Sheldon…he was so smart, he couldn’t deal with “normals.” Don’t believe me? Go the the Smithsonian Aero Space Museum…you’ll see life size cutouts of him in space suits he designed…
No, that makes your dad Wollowitz.
Sheldon is the most perverse, self obsessed character I have ever seen on TV. Why the other “friends” in this show do NOT Kill him with their “Steely Steely Knives,” I do not know. The episode that had Leonard looking for an apartment and the graffiti on the wall, in big red letters said DIE COOPER, DIE! Shows that at least some person with perspective had lived in that building…
Actually, it’s simpler than that: Sheldon has Aspberger’s syndrome. A version distorted for the sake of comedy, but easily recognizable to anyone familiar with the disorder. Most tellingly, Sheldon is the “figure in extremis” of the other characters; the obvious extension of the other characters’ unnatural intelligence and distinct lack of social skills. I’m not sure that it’s so much directed at men in particular as it’s acting as a reassurance to the audience “don’t worry that you aren’t super smart: people who are super smart in science are totally inept in every aspect that YOU care about: attracting the opposite sex, being socially accepted, and generally not being a dork for their entire lives. (Essentially it’s High School all over again.) Yes, several of them do find partners, but it’s presented as wildly/laugably improbable and infrequent. Penny’s fish-out-of-water aspect has little relevance as the guy’s intelligence only benefits them in geek pursuits (video games, comics), but Penny’s social aptitude (being a hot girl) usually benefits her in ways coded as more socially acceptable (dates, relationships, etc.)
It’s as if the show’s “comedy” comes from the question “how can even the smartest men can be so dumb?”
Go hang out in an engineering lab for a week: Big Bang Theory is a documentary. I’ve gone to school and worked with men like that for years. (I think a lot of them have some degree of Aspberger’s, and gravitate toward math-heavy fields because there’s not a lot of non-verbal skill necessary to successfully interpret an equation or a compiler directive, compared to a sales pitch or a conversation with a woman.) How does it benefit “men” to pretend that those men don’t exist by scrubbing them from television?
And when your knee is finished jerking, you may notice the character of Amy is just as awkward as Sheldon, and just as frequently schooled by the other female characters…the theme is not “men are dumb”, the theme is “nerds live in their own separate world.” And the real-life people who live in that world love the show.
Really? My cube farm is 2 men & 2 women. We are all engineers. Other guy is 20 something and brilliant. Young girl is same 20 something and same type of smart. Slightly older woman is married (she just started at our place recently as a transfer) and bright as hell. Me the old fart almost 60 experienced engineer. No one cuts the other. All have normal lives and can talk about anything. All are well read in many subjects.
You just betray you own prejudices.
Engineers are not scientists, engineers (as I understand it) make things work, as opposed to trying to figure out theories as to why they might or might not. I used to work for a scientist (in a non-scientific position; he also owned a retail business) and it was like I was visiting the dentist for 8 hours 5 days a week. He knew everything better than everyone else, constantly would follow people around badgering them about trivial matters that he should have been ignoring, was famous for being told something and answering “Is that true?”, and generally drove everyone who worked for him bonkers. He was obsessed with doing an inventory of the store we were working in, but never wanted to actually participate…he just wanted to supervise, and micromanage it, because he believed that if he controlled the last detail of it, it’d be perfect. It never was even close, because while he understood the theory of it, there were endless practicalities of which he had no knowledge, or for that matter interest.
I like the other person’s comment: Big Bang Theory isn’t a comedy, it’s a documentary.
As for TV commercials portraying men as stupid, my favorite is one for a local cable outlet out here (or maybe it’s national, I don’t know) where the guy is constantly asking stupid I-know-nothing-about-technology questions. His wife does an explanation of why this cable service is better, and then the daughter does a joke at her dad’s expense. It’s partly anti-male, but even though the wife knows everything too, there’s an aspect of ageism in it also…
In simple terms the difference between scientists and engineers is that scientists discover, engineers apply. Scientists determine something about the nature of the natural laws, and engineers try to make practical applications out of it. There is a LOT of overlap depending on the specific project.
I won’t argue that there’s some truth behind the complaints about scientists with odd social personality disorders, but it’s hardly universal. In my opinion, it’s grad school that does it: if there’s anything even slightly wrong with you mentally, grad school brings it out and makes it worse. In my run through that gauntlet I’ve seen different perfectly normal people become chronically depressed, neurotic, narcoleptic, bipolar, obsessive, PTSD, introverted, and develop addictive disorders.
R – your comment itself explained the difference. Engineers are “practical scientists” or those who work largely in the real world so as to have to have some interaction with the rest of the universe. The main Big Bang guys (other than Howard) are theoretical scientists. Big difference.
Scientists ask questions and try to figure out the answers (“Why is there air?”)
Engineers figure out how to apply the answers in the real world. Most (not all, but most) scientists don’t know a multimeter from a socket wrench, and you definitely don’t trust them to solder a circuit card. Just as a note: Doc Brown was an engineer, not a scientist. I never heard him try to explain why the flux-capacitor worked, just how much power it took.
I (Jenny) happen to see it your way. I really dig the geeks on that show and don’t see any of them as less manly necessarily. It’s truly fun espoused there – I believe.
Big Bag Theory differs from portrayals of males as slobs, rapists, and victims that can’t protect themselves or anybody else – drags on society who have no rights when they are (especially) trying to make things right, e.g. stand up for themselves or others and violence goes down. Men would lose their Security Clearance, followed by their job that needed a Security Clearance, followed by self-esteem for being jobless, followed by depression seeing the spouse and children unhappy. THAT’S discrimination – when men are in handcuffs at all times. Men cannot say a peep or advocate for themselves without both women and MALE wimps telling them to shut-up. THAT’S discrimination – to never be heard or able to speak or act in your own best interest.
I’ve veered from the original question again!
Jenny & Jeff – Siamese Twins?
The primary appeal of math to people with levels of Aspergers is that it’s logical. Most social interactions and non-verbal communications aren’t very logical at all. The rules that do exist for social interactions are frequently contrived and arbitrary, with no real basis for how they came to be. “So I bring a small gift if I’m invited to this type of thing, but not for that type of thing. Why?”
I see your point, but disagree. TBBT shows educated men with cool jobs and a nice apartment with awesome stuff in it.
And until last season when they gave everyone a girlfriend, it was absolutely hilarious. Trite sex jokes have replaced the genuinely funny nerd jokes.
All of Everybody loves Raymond.
I suspect that the full series of Everybody Loves Raymond is in constant rotation on big screen TV in the 9th Ring of Hell.
The only good thing about that show was Patricia Heaton.
AMEN! That show should be called “Everybody Hates their Husband”. As a matter of fact, can anyone out there name me one single solitary modern “family” sitcom in which the father is portrayed as a positive role model?
Yes, “The Middle”, a fantastic comedy about an intact family, starring Patricia Heaton.
Well The Simpsons, of course!!! I’m encouraged weekly by the uplifting portrayal of that heroic, studly, sober, fit, intelligent, loving and responsible father
The Middle
best dad ever
“Suck it up. Walk it off.”
According to Jim! I think that’s why the critics hated it so much. It usually showed the chubby, blue collar, construction worker, slightly chauvinist dad actually being right about stuff most of the time. And maybe Last Man Standing. This week’s episode showed Tim disliking his daughter’s obnoxious vegan boyfriend and his wife telling him to give the boy a chance – until he started knocking HER profession. Then he ended up breaking the girl’s heart.
This is why I liked Veronica Mars. It’s one of the few shows I ever saw in which the mother was the faithless drunk abusive thief and the father Keith Mars (Enrico Colantoni) had a stable mature relationship with a teenage daughter Veronica (Kristen Bell).
Favorite quote ->
Keith: I never want you to think that your mom is the villain in all of this.
Veronica: Isn’t she?
Keith: No, it’s not that simple…
Veronica: Yeah it is. The hero is the one that stays… and the villain is the one that splits.
Tim Allen’s new show is pretty good.
Bill Cosby was a competent dad and not a loser in The Cosby Show. But his wife was still smarter than he was.
Family Matter. Carl Winslow was awesome!
I vote for the Verizon commercial series featuring Suzie the lemonade entrepreneur. They would never make a commercial with a boy in the head position.
Actually, surprisingly they HAVE made commercials with a little boy as the CEO of a big firm. Haribo, makers of gummy candies like gummy bears, has a series of commercials centered around a boardroom of children, with a little boy as the “CEO” of the candy company.
http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/18/yummy-yummy-yummy-ive-got-bears-that-are-gummi/
I was quite surprised when I first saw it, and I’m surprised it hasn’t been yanked yet under pressure from NOW or some other idiot organization. It’s actually quite an effective commercial. I hate that my first thought when seeing it was, “Wow, how’d they get THIS past the feminist censors? And the boy is WHITE? Oh wow, someone’s having conniptions in leftist fantasy land right now!”
And leave us not forget the boy baby on the E-Trade commercials!
Great commercials, yet neither star is an adult male.
You brought up race. In the same vein as the brilliant dynamic women of ads come the brilliant socially adept successful African Americans, especially female. Think the Gerber life insurance commercial with the black couple prudently saving for their infant’s college contrasted with the irresponsible Caucasians.
And the one (some asthma medication) with the female trekking guide leading a guy across a swaying rope bridge. She moves confidently, he is unsteady and she says “watch your step!” He says “Thanks!” As though he couldn’t have thought of that one for himself.
Actually my overall pet peeve is the never-ending flood of quasi-anorexic babes being presented as “tough guys”. Cote de Pablo (Ziva), Kathryn Erbe (Eames) and Marissa Hargitay (Olivia) pull it off. The others? I can only laugh.
This one is on my all time worst list:
Fast forward today:
The house is $100k+ under water.
The couple is five months behind in payments.
She filed for divorce.
He is a broken man, both in finance and in spirit.
The kids hate both of them.
Watch any modern (1990′s + ) cartoon and you will get the same messages about males / men: That they are inferior to women. It is part of an overall plot ot weaken our society. Schools ingrain this same philosophy / message all day long, and on the weekends and after schools the television finishes the job.
I dunno… I’d agree that the vast majority of cartoons are like that, but Batman: The Animated Series certainly didn’t… or Superman, or Justice League, or most of the superhero type shows. But then, they’re superhero type shows. (Sure, they all had their girl-power episodes, but in the case of Batman: The Animated Series, the message was, “See? Women can be crazy sociopaths, too!”
IMO, the worst was that “PC-Matic” commercial where the wife told her dismayed, doofus husband all about the wonders PC-Matic can do to fix his PC before nabbing the car keys for a “girls’ night out.” The way she repeats “PC-Matic” so many times without ever using a pronoun is strange and serves to reinforce the impression that her husband, like Rick Santorum, is a clueless dolt with a room temperature IQ. I’m sure the goal is to implant the product’s name in the consumer’s head, but it still makes the dialogue awkward and annoying.
That said, as a man, I feel hypocritical complaining about advertising that denigrates men. There is plenty of content on television that treats women as sex objects, which is hardly one of my pet peeves. Intellectually, I know it’s offensive, but I’m as happy to look at an attractive woman in a bikini as the next guy…and she doesn’t need a genius-level IQ to impress me.
Don’t feel bad, DRay. Yes there’s plenty of content on TV and elsewhere that turns women into objects, but we’ve already got tons of organizations and advocacy groups in place that put up a stink about the more flagrant instances. But the denigration of MEN in commercials, TV, and film is like the taboo-that-must-not-speak-its-name in media today. It frustrates the heck out of me. And I’m a woman!
I honestly don’t mind if a gorgeous woman uses her sex appeal to sell a product to grown-ups. Heck, I wish I had the body to do it! But I DO mind that so many little boys and young men are being bombarded with negative images of grown men day after day after day, leaving them with the impression that they’re inferior to their female counterparts. And that little girls and young women are being given the same impression: that their gender somehow makes them superior to the boys and men in their lives! It makes me see red.
Misogyny is one of the world’s evils, but misandry is JUST. AS. BAD.
I say go ahead and enjoy the lovely ladies on your TV, but don’t be afraid to stick up for your own gender, too!
Stellar MWR.
Advertisers use a positive trait, a good figure, although sexist and fatiguing, especially for women who not looking the same, may perhaps feel they’ll be not appreciate by men (+other reasons), the denigration and not appreciation for any aspect of men is the crux. It hurts like hel**.
It really does extend to every argument and moment in a “natural” woman’s perspective of how to treat men. I say natural in that a woman must go out of her way to be decent, because her first reaction, as men have a first reaction/feeling of inferiority, is superiority, and hence the accompnaying violence, lack of empathy (or even listening) to those who are inferior. Man up and don’t trouble “strong” and uncaring women with nuisances like hurt feelings, shared perspectives, or God-forbid that the woman is in error this time.
My least favorites? The incessant groin injuries, jokes, and threats on every channel, at school, and at work – so basically everywhere one goes. The overwhelming sense of helplessness a man feels, non-defensible nature of this, and the non-punitive nature of this (in comparison) for messing up a male’s mind (usually just his mind, and the groin usually recovers) for the rest of his life regarding women – despite all men trying to laugh and downplay it – is IMO the most serious denigration of men. This absolutely creates mental pain in men. Numerous men with a single testicle feel a last chance to remain with a life they deserve and are accustomed to (no using testosterone patches, etc. – Normal!) and can never play along with female laughter and dumb males who would sink their own ship for female attention. Such physically arranged men get the absolute shakes and spke in blood pressure, and they suffer routinely, similarly as felt by female rape victims who viewed “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” – distraught, sweating, rage, and the like. For a protector – men’s inclination – to not want to protect, or become helpless as allowed by society, is wholly killing boys and men in their spirits – leading to fetishes among men no women wants for husbands. Simply because the truly off-limits area, the sexual areas, are men’s as well as women’s for protection and honoring, even in difficult circumstance, but certainly in everyday circumstances a man should not feel so unworthy he cannot get across how he will NOT function “normally” as feminists would have us believe, without honoring his uniquely male parts which include his mind and spirit (not his feminism-touted “egotism and evil nature”!).
I’ll relate an experience that happened to me when I was about 7 that I’ve never told anyone. My mom left me and my younger sister in the care of a baby sitter who then took us to her local gym where she was working while watching us. When we got to the front door she turned to my sister and said “Ok, this where we leave the boys – this is a girls-only day and boys aren’t allowed inside. Let’s go.” I had to sit in the lobby alone for about 4 hours wondering what exactly I’d done in life to deserve being treated like an orphan. When they finally came out, they were laughing about the great time they apparently had and just collected me like an umbrella they’d left in a stand. I’d like to say it’s no big deal, but when something like that happens to a 7 year old, it leaves an indelible impression on you. My mother was dominant in my family and clear up to my mid 20′s, my only bosses in the many jobs I held, primarily sales and retail, were female. I honestly grew up believing I was living in a female-dominated world. It wasn’t until I started traveling and living overseas that I realized how different America was from the rest of the world in this regard. I have a government job now where from my initial perspective, it appeared oddly male-dominated and very contrary to my expectations. In the 15 years since, I’ve realized that that really isn’t the case, it just seemed that way because it was the first time in my life that I experienced real gender neutrality.
Azkital, that was a DEEPLY sad story, you as an obedient 7 year old. Terrible! 4 hours in a lobby??!
My husband and I both have worked for the Government and I still do. It’s 70% women where I work in procurement (contracting). No obviously negative stuff against the guys, but they’re still rather marginalized despite our highest boss being male. I have 3 Supervisors, all female. I’m just not sure how men will be providing for families in a few years if we don’t teach “indoor” competitive skills and basic courage – high doses of this to our boys in school. More of the good and less of the bad – it can be done it’ll just take a LOT of commitment, starting with no more Women’s Day and talk of similar. It just doesn’t matter that much. I think we’ve made it as women, that we have risks still and yet men, IMO, have more risks. They must live in our society without supportive laws.
The law is where the rubber meets the road. Media portrayals and the law go hand-in-hand, but in response to legal changes, the media would respond with flavor-of-the-month, false empathy from news reporters, etc. and stop showing men in desperate, helpless situations, and laughed at. If Oprah were still on she would not aid in the empathy toward males and male victims at the hands of females movement, but others would.
The point is fake consideration in the media is a start in the right direction. Female actresses: refuse to kick a man in the groin for laughs. Do something else to make the movie work, stand your ground and tell the director. You won’t get fired. Support men.
That’s a real concern? Why would they? If you work your butt off at a job where your female boss thinks you’re a slug, to support a wife and children who think you’re a bothersome moron, where’s your motivation in life? With food stamps, birth control, abortion, video games, and porn, there’s a lot of market substitutes for raising a family that won’t appreciate being raised anyway. And why would the teachers (mostly women) teach their male students skills and courage? They’ll just reinstitute the patriarchy.
That’s awful, aztikal. What a terrible experience for a young boy. I wish I’d been there to harangue that babysitter until she felt about one inch tall and appropriately ashamed and chastened for her unacceptable behavior.
Thank you for sharing your story.
The Fiat 500 Aberth commercial. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAmE7n05vo8
Oh, c’mon — that’s a great ad, and it doesn’t humiliate men. Equating the car with a gorgeous, sexy Italian woman is EXACTLY what Fiat should have been doing from the start. It’s a much better ad than the JLo ads, where they photoshopped her into the Bronx.
The car itself isn’t supposed to be very good, but the ad is very well done.
They didn’t use photoshop, just selective editing. They also edited out the part where the car, driven by the body double and actually driving down the street in the Bronx, broke down.
Heh.
It says men deserve to be slapped for a biological instinct. In other words, men are bad, because they’re men.
Can’t stand the PC Matic guy. He can’t fix his computer and then the wife fixes it and roars off in their BMW for girls night out with him looking stupid saying honey.
Besides, with such an upscale house, you’d think they could get a SECOND CAR!
The PC-Matic commercial. Hands down one of the worst offenders. Not sure if you allow links, but here it is on youtube:
http://youtu.be/pMP4PF3DNg8
She fixes the PC alright, by downloading yet another bit of malware.
The Subaru commercials for the OUTBACK with the dimwit husband. Also, their we’re better than you “Share the Love” sales event where they donate $250 dollars to one of five charities they claim will help improve society. I’ve expressed my displeasure at these ads and would now consider buying another brand.
Except that the Subaru is the Official Beta Male Car of the Year…
I know it’s a good car. But when they market their product in a certain light, well….just sayin’.
You are right on the 2nd account and partially right on first. I have a Forrester, but couldn’t have a truck because I was a single dad and still driving kids around. If being a single dad with 100% custody makes me a beta, so be it.
Hmm.. PJmedia doesn’t allow youtube embeds.
Link to video
http://youtu.be/odQ7s85bk9s
While there are a ton of “stupid dad, smart-alack” kid commercials that grate, I especially despise 2 of the hoodie-wearing man-child vs. smartypants wife variety:
* Subaru commercial where a couple re-traces their day’s road trip stops to find his sunglasses only to discover they had fallen into his hood ; closes with wife giving him the kind of smile one gives to the mentally challenged.
*Car commercial where slacker husband (hoodie, unshaven) is demonstrating remote car start to friend by having wife start car from her smart phone as she is boarding a plane (it’s daytime, so is it safe to assume she’s the sole breadwinner?).
Honestly, I have trouble even watching TV anymore because the male bashing is so incessant. Pick a commercial, any commercial, and it’s clear as day they are marketing to women by berating men.
This is the whole reason I gave up on sitcoms. I am so sick of the “men are stupid, women are wonderful” meme. I was never a big fan of “Friends,” but at least the characters on that show, male and female alike, were all prone to being idiots who occasionally did smart things. Monica wasn’t always the sole voice of reason, and Joey wasn’t always the biggest imbecile.
Dr Helen, I think you are exactly right that there is a double standard that disfavors men. I remember when it was the opposite in the 60s. Women always seemed to be the butt of the joke then. There is a double standard with respect to race too. Would it be possible to remove current biases but not revert to old ones? Maybe libertarians and conservatives have to lead the way. The ugly left is not up to the challenge. They are driving the problem.
I think it’s entirely possible to find a happy medium between sexist-towards-women and sexist-towards-men commercials. Something non-sexist that actually reflects *GASP* the real world. The problem is that doing so would require ad agencies and insane progressive harpies to admit that:
A) There is such a thing as a difference between the sexes;
B) There is nothing WRONG with there being differences between the sexes;
C) Putting a woman behind the wheel of a pick-up truck isn’t going to make me any more or less inclined to buy that pick-up truck than if the driver was a man, and vice versa; and
D) Being beaten about the head with sexist messaging every time I turn on my TV makes me inclined to turn my TV off, not stick around to see what new and exciting politically correct (or incorrect) ad campaign the Suits in the advertising industry can come up with to tout breakfast cereal.
The problem is that feminism has been completely overrun by progressive leftists. It went from being a movement to give women equal rights and opportunities as men to being a movement determined to give women GREATER rights and opportunities than men. It’s no longer about equality; it’s about superiority. Any woman who claims to be a feminist automatically loses a healthy dose of my respect sight unseen, because she clearly either doesn’t know what she’s talking about or she’s a misandrist idiot.
In the past I’ve been asked if I’m a feminist — because I went to college, and according to college doctrine all women are supposed to be feminists for some inane reason — and I’d always say no. “I’m not a feminist. I’m an egalitarian.”
Nine times out of ten, whoever was asking the question would have no fricking clue what I was talking about. Ahh, academia.
Maybe I should care more about these things, but I don’t. Commercials are trying to sell a product, and they try to reach their consumer. There’s another, less obvious message. Women care about buying the right sweetener, for example. Men don’t, beyond caring that the woman in their life is happy. Is the message that women are concerned with the picayune, and men aren’t? Could be read that way.
Meanwhile, men dream of driving fast cars while hot, underdressed women smile at them (the Kia Dream Car ad is hilarious – http://vimeo.com/36089034).
The message I keep getting from these types of ads is that… women want to be like men. Men want to be like men, and dream about women who want to be women. I think that’s an unintended thing.
Unggghhh – Pam smart. Me impressed! Me think Pam on to something – maybe, lighten up everybody?
I gotta agree. I’m looking at these ads and shrugging — what’s the big deal? And as for the Citi commercial — have you *seen* that girl? If I were her boyfriend, I would *definitely* let her climb up ahead of me.
“Home Improvement,” OTOH, literally portrayed men as grunting chimps. That’s the sort of thing we should be directing out ire toward.
That has to be one of my favorite ads in recent memory. Aside from having a charming concept, it goes beyond the usual appeal to “things guys like” to show a man who’s actually dedicated to his wife. The shorter cuts of the commercial don’t do it justice.
If the purpose of advertising is to sell a product, what message are they sending to women by saying “Your husband is a dumbass” other than saying “You’re a dumbass for marrying him.”
A few years ago, Stihl, the chainsaw maker, released a line of easy-start products. Their commercials featured a man portrayed as too weak to get a facial tissue out of the box. That one made me see red. I can only imagine the sort of outrage it would have evoked had the central figure been a woman. But the universe had its way with them: Their sales plummeted, and only leveled off when they yanked the commercials.
When a commercial of that sort correlates to a perceptible change in sales rates, you have a fair idea who’s making the buying decisions for products of that type. That’s probably the only explanation required for such things.
UGH. The awful commercials are one of the reasons I rarely watch TV anymore, and when i do, I keep the volume turned down. It’s just ridiculous.
My LEAST favorite of the “men are stupid, women are awesome” commercials has got to be a commercial for DiGiorno’s Pizza. A man and his buddies are watching a sporting event on television and eating pizza. The man’s wife comes home and scolds him for tracking muddy footprints all over the carpet. The man blames the footprints on “the pizza guy.”
“You said you were going to have DiGiorno’s,” the wife protests, exasperated.
“But the pizza came with cheese breadsticks,” the man rejoinders. Everyone knows that you only get breadsticks with delivery pizza, right?
Cut to the end of the ad where the man and one of his buddies are on their hands and knees scrubbing the muddy footprints out of the carpet. “She saw the box,” the husband says.
“Maybe because you left it right on the counter,” his buddy gripes.
I cannot begin to tell you how much this ad irritates me. From the outset I want to scream. This man and his wife clearly live in a very nice home with light colored carpeting. Only a neanderthal would walk across that carpet in shoes that are muddy enough to leave a whole TRAIL of dark, muddy footprints. So from the beginning we’ve established that the guy is an imbecile with no common sense whatsoever, not to mention no manners. Or am I the only person whose parents would yell at me if I walked around on clean carpet in dirty shoes?
Maybe it wasn’t the husband, right? Maybe it was one of his friends. Well, that’s just as bad. It means the guy isn’t smart enough to tell his friends, “Hey, take your shoes off in the entryway, okay? Don’t tread mud into the carpet.” It also means the friends aren’t smart or thoughtful enough to do so of their own volition. They have no respect for their friend’s home, nor for their friend’s relationship with his wife.
The wife comes home, slender and pretty, dressed smartly in a clean blouse and slacks. She looks very professional and neat. The husband and his friends, meanwhile, are all “husky” and dressed in slovenly fashion (because they’re relaxing and watching a game on TV, so why would they dress in a 3-piece suit?). So here we have the dichotomy of the attractive, active housewife out getting things done — maybe socializing with her friends, shopping, running to the bank, getting the car washed, etc — while her lazy, chubby husband sits around at home goofing off and making a mess of the house. The presence of his friends indicates that their similarly long-suffering wives are out and about taking care of their responsibilities while their husbands are lolling around irresponsibly on their friend’s couch. At least THOSE wives won’t have to deal with a load of muddy footprints when they get home, though!
End of the commercial. The man and his friend are on their hands and knees with scrub brushes trying to clean the carpet because the wife got wise to her husband’s lie about the pizza guy. This demonstrates the following:
A) The husband has no problem lying to his wife.
B) The husband is stupid enough to tell a lie that is easily unmasked by the presence of irrefutable evidence (the DiGiorno box on the counter).
C) The husband’s friends — with the exception of one — all scattered to the four winds instead of hanging around to help him out. So either the friend who stayed is a really nice guy and the others are all craven jerks, or this friend is the one who marched the mud into the carpet in the first place. If the latter is the case then the guy has no right to be complaining that his friend left incriminating evidence in plain sight. He should be apologetic, not irritated and rude.
D) It’s not that expensive to rent or even buy a carpet cleaning machine. The fact that the wife has her husband AND his friend cleaning the carpet with scrub brushes demonstrates the husband’s utter subordination to his wife. It’s one of the ultimate positions of servitude, crawling around on one’s hands and knees to scrub the floor. It conjures up images of chambermaids in Victorian or Edwardian mansions, ceaselessly cleaning the floors to a high gloss lest they face the wrath of their employer. And those were WOODEN floors. This is carpet we’re talking about. Since the husband is clearly too stupid to look after the carpet in the first place, what makes the wife think that his ineffectual scrubbing will do anything but make the stains worse?
The wife woudl be smarter sending her husband to the grocery store to rent a Rug Doctor for a few hours. Or better yet, going out and renting it herself, then bringing it home, putting it down, and telling him, “You clean it up.” (Because it IS his mess, after all, and he should be the one to fix it. That’s the only point of the commercial that I actually agree with.) Instead, she sits off to the side drinking her tea or coffee and overseeing her husband’s penance.
I seriously. Cannot stand. This commercial.
If there was a central theme in the book “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus”, it is that women want to be cherished while men want to be respected. But they’re getting little respect in today’s culture, as seen through popular advertising. When portraying the two sexes, it is the woman who is smarter, more level-headed, the problem solver. The guy is usually portrayed as an uncultured man-child, lost without the woman’s help. The only exceptions, it seems, are those that portray men as the “new women” – as in the ad where the man tells his wife to “respect the roll” – the backup roll of *toilet paper*, which is to be dressed up and properly positioned. As if *any* self-respecting male obsesses about such things!
dude, that’s one bad book. never managed to read through all that crap. quoting mike rowe, hard working men with dirty jobs are portraied as especially stupid (compare that to a woman doing the same job?), when they are the happiest ppl as a group he knows. Maybe sort of OT, but maybe not,he’s got a point http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-udsIV4Hmc
I hate the JC Penny commercial from a couple of years ago. A guy is sitting in his kitchen being assaulted by a bunch of unruly brats, presumably his children. He looks into the camera with a deer-in-the-headlights expression and asks: “Where is your mother?” Cue the notification about a big weekend long sale.
The whole idea it is that men are incompetent as child care providers. As a single father I find it especially offensive.
You got even with them, though. You spelled their name wrong. You win.
Reruns of “Everybody Loves Raymond.” Raymond is pathetic, his big brother is neurotic, their father is despicable, and their mother is the power (and is somewhat evil). The wife is somewhat normal, except for the fact that she married such a wimp and stays with him even though he apparently can’t take up for his wife over his mother.
Are you kidding? She’s a harpy. Like I used to tell my daughter “A pretty bitch is still a bitch”.
In most of the episodes I saw, Raymond’s wife was an unreasonable shrew at least half the time. And then follow that up with no sex — the implication being no sex for him ever. As a woman, that annoyed me. I thought they made her into a hag on top of making him into a dunce.
The show was an assault on both genders.
Hello Dr. Helen,
The recent one that made me consciously turn the channel was for some kind of office printing machine or service. The male employee is nervously pitching his cost-saving idea to the powerful corporate executive woman who is reaching for one of several buttons to push to punish the underling if she doesn’t like what she hears. She chooses to blow confetti at him instead of (bullets?), which frightens him but relieves him. Totally powerless relief that communicates, ‘thanks for not smacking me around’ and means it.
I confess, it was getting grim after ’92, the year of the Wonder Woman, and it really went down hill when Patrician Ireland was doing all the non-stop bitching about the absence of women golfers at the Augusta Masters during the build up to the Iraq invasion without her even mentioning, even once, the dearth of female soldiers in the ranks, but it has improved since Keith Olbermann and John Edwards are no longer prime time; but there’s still that vapid Rachel Maddow. She could use some intense bayonet training, getting the point makes you humble after the rumble, and watching the simulation would probably make Chris Matthews’ legs tingle.
1990 saw more women running for higher office than in 1992. But most were Republicans and that didn’t fit the narrative so no “Year of the Woman” press adulation for them.
Misandry is endemic.
On TV, there are very few positive male role models
Bill Cosby’s Dr Huxtable was loving and well meaning, but totally inept, with Claire ever present to “save the day”.
Family Guy’s Peter has the judgement of a 7 year old, with Lois available to fix things
Even Robert Young’s Jim Anderson was generally clueless about females, while Margaret repaired the damage – even “Kitten” spouted pearls of wisdom
In real life, though, it’s far worse:
Men are presumed to be generally evil, domineering, and abusive
When Police are summoned on Domestic Violence complaints, invariably it is the male who is arrested – and convicted, regardless of evidence
Men who fail to pay child support, for whatever reason (illness, out of work, etc) are jailed, while females who fail to pay support far more often, VERY rarely go to jail.
As a single Dad, with legal custody of two for over 10 years, I’ve had Protective Services at my door on 5 separate occasions.
Though absolutely no violations were ever found, these visits are still on my record. The first contact with Protective Services was because a new neighbor “didn’t think it was right” for a single male to care for children. I finally eliminated Protective Services from my life by filing harassment charges against the County.
The woman next door has been busted for drug possession, weapons charges, has gone to jail, has numerous “boyfriends” about, and has had to answer to neglect charges, yet she still has full custody her kids. Even demanding Court ordered child support is an ordeal. Females are granted assistance with collecting support payments, automatically, but males are asked why they NEED support.
On the social level, when it comes to non-monetary support, (think babysitting, end-of-the-month groceries), women are viewed as “using their resources” when asking assistance from family, friends, and charitable organizations, while men are judged less than competent to parent.
PJ Media should publish a current list of misandrist products, complete with offending ads and numbers/people to call/email that produce/sell/advertise this rubbish.
It’s a great, productive way of putting that stress and/or PMS to good use!
A list of those that DON’T would be much shorter.
Great that this is finally getting looked at. I was blogging about it nearly a decade ago.
One of the most annoying to me was an ad where a four year old girl is lecturing Dad about the right way to do laundry and other housework (“That’s not the way Mommy does it.”), and he’s screwing it up (pouring a whole box of detergent in the washer, using the leaf blower indoors).
you blogging 10 years ago make you a beta-male.
I notice this kind of thing all the time. But I am particularly reminded of a TV show back in early ’90s, Dinosaurs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinosaurs_%28TV_series%29). My children were young at the time and initially it seemed like a cute and funny family show we could all watch together. After some time watching, and seeing the persistent unrelenting characterization of the father figure as a fat, lazy, idiot, barely able to find his dino-tail with both hands, I pulled the plug. I explained to my kids why, pointing out the blatant use of the father as a feminist punching bag. They seemed to understand and I was grateful as they all seemed to have turned out pretty good.
UGH. I HATED that show, and at the time I was in the age demographic that was supposed to like it. I thought the husband was an idiot and the baby was a brat who needed to be spanked repeatedly.
“Family Guy” is essentially the same show, just even more caustic and unappealing. But at least “Family Guy” doesn’t try to market itself as being family-friendly. A show where the baby is constantly trying to kill his seemingly clueless mother isn’t exactly “TGIF” material.
“HE went to Jared”
I refuse to buy products when I remember their adds and how stupid they make the man look.
The add where the woman is so snarky and tells her husband about the program that cleans up your computer and then takes the keys to the car and announces “girls night out”. I would never, ever buy that product. Now they have the husband helping his teen age daughter and I like it much better. I really do think along with being anti conserative, they are anti men.
Signed,
Woman, wife, mother, grandmother.
Of California, Crucifixions, and Cleopatra – California Teachers Unions decide they want to organize parents (so they can direct fundraising cash into union coffers) after I arrange for some non-PC programs (including a “Chivalry Today” program that appeals to boys). I also look at the plight of Egypt’s Christian community and update the status of Angelina Jolie’s Cleopatra
The Rent-A-Center ad where the husband wants to rent a flat screen and the wife says they ca’nt afford another credit card payment. It ends with hubby saying he’s never right and the wife agreeing with him that he’s never right. He’s totally whipped.
Here’s a variation on the same theme: white men and non white men on TV – who are always superior in intelligence/ Who are the law abiding and who are the villains? It’s so laughable as if they rest of us can’t see through the Svoiet propadanda and double think.
Ever listen to old-time radio? “Fibber McGee and Molly”, “Phil Harris and Alice Faye”, “Life with Riley” — same dynamic, to one degree or another. Fibber’s mildly incompetent, Phil was a boozing incompetent usually in trouble because of his outings with his friend Remley, and Riley was flat-out stupid. “Our Miss Brooks” had the same dynamic someone points out in “Big Bang Theory” — a supposedly intelligent man constantly acting stupid. Every character Red Skelton played was obnoxious or an idiot.
The *only* show I can think of that reversed this was Lucille Ball’s “My Favorite Husband”. “The Bickersons” avoided it only by making both characters annoying jerks; but the premise of that show was they constantly fought, so what do you expect?
I don’t think this is new; I think if anything, we’ve been trained to notice it.
But those were all comedies. There’s nothing wrong with comedies portraying various characters as buffoons. That’s been going on since time immemorial.
The thing that has really changed in recent years is that it’s now being done in advertisements, and the buffoons are almost exclusively white males.
As far as comedies go, there were plenty of good ones when I was growing up in the 60s. Among my favorites were The Andy Griffith Show and My Three Sons. In both of those cases, the white male lead characters were depicted as authority figures and founts of wisdom. They provided guidance and education for their children, much like fathers in real life. While they displayed a sense of humor when silly things happened, they were not the butt of jokes.
Dude. Their wives were dead.
I wouldn’t go public with that campaign just yet.
Scratch around, and you’ll find some socon critiques of Griffith: there was not a normal couple or family in all of Mayberry. Something to think about.
Know who was wise, caring, thoughtful, and took good care of his family?
Jed Clampett, that’s who. Another widower, though.
Message: men only appear human in the absence of a woman, kind’a like a flashlight appears bright only when the sun isn’t around.
Well, I do. When caught in the open anyhow… It’s normally call camouflage.
More recently, when I was grown up, I loved Married with Children. I thought it was hilarious. All of the characters were variously portrayed as stupid, venal, greedy, lazy, and/or slutty. They didn’t play favorites.
Culture dies when its based on lies.
What faster way to reshape civilization in the mold of progressivism that to minimize the male role, make them the weaker sex, feminize the boys? This isn’t by accident, and it’s not exclusively facilitated by feminists either. This is the Queer eye for the straight guy route…
This has been in the works by Hollywood and the rest of the limp-wristed ilk for at least 40 years.
I thought South Park did a good job of taking the Queer Eye phenomenon to it’s logical conclusion:
1. The town’s women, initially thrilled at their metrosexual husband’s natty appearances, become turned off by their prissiness.
2. The town burns down because none of the men want to risk damaging their clothes, hair, or manicures.
Anyone seen the Huggies commercial where diapers are tested to their limits because the infants are left alone with their football watching fathers, who apparently could care less about their kids?
Or the one (I forget, might have been a commercial for paper towels) where the father is too clueless to change a diaper and uses paper towels instead?
Helen:
Don’t watch TV anymore. Shameless to say the least, but in hopes of furthering the discussion on America’s sexual disorder, you might purchase “The Tinderbox How Politically Correct Ideology Destroyed the U.S. Forest Service,” issued March 6, 2012. Key in the title, Christopher Burchfield, and Stairway Press. Also available at Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.
What creeps me out worse than the male bashing is the recent emergence of commercials with really nasty women and overly patient, long suffering men. The men in these commercials are bashed by the women but not by the pitch itself. The McDonald’s shamrock shake commercial was the most recent example. The absolutely most offensive has to be the State Farm commercial with the 3 am phone call.
I worry sometimes that too many men under age 40 to 45 assume all women are like this until proven wrong.
I think that’s the natural progression of the buffoon man/competent woman meme they’ve been working with for so long. Now the women are just mean. I wonder if that’s some ad writers working out their office issues in their product.
Particularly irritating: A recent McDonald’s commercial where a young married couple are waiting to board a plane. He gets a text saying that the “McRib is back!!!” Depite wherever they’re going or how much they’ve spent for their trip, he excitedly says he can’t leave now because “McRib is back!!” He runs off, presumably to a McDonalds, while she says, “I married a 2-year-old!” Charming.
Also can’t stand the Hardees commercials from a few year ago that depicted stupid men unable to make toast or a bowl of cereal, with the tagline, “Without us, some men would starve.”
I cannot stand The Simpsons, The Family Guy, American Dad, Two & a Half Men and all other shows that continually portray dad as an idiot man-child, mom as the long-suffering smart feminist and the kids as wise beyond their years and smarter than dad and mom.
~SIGH~ That’s why I miss shows like Little House on the Prairie, featuring Charles Ingalls, one of the manliest characters to ever appear on TV.
“I cannot stand The Simpsons, The Family Guy, American Dad, Two & a Half Men and all other shows that continually portray dad as an idiot man-child, mom as the long-suffering smart feminist and the kids as wise beyond their years and smarter than dad and mom.”
Despite my own upbringing and experiences (see earlier post), I don’t actually find nefarious purposeness behind much of today’s misandry….It’s human nature to have one’s attention drawn to the unfamiliar. People by nature are curious about abnormalities (TLC and Bravo channels wouldn’t exist otherwise), and thus we are fascinated by seeing portrayals of other people with lives and experiences vastly different from their (by definition, average) own. Hence the shows about weak and imbecile men, which any average person knows is not the norm. If you watched cable all day and eroneously concluded this accurately represented America, you’d probably think that all Americans drink urine (My Strange Addiction – TLC), weighs 500 lbs (One Big Happy Family- TLC), lives in a pile of garbage (Hoarders – A&E) and gets boob jobs (Real housewives – Bravo).
That Carl’s Jr ad made me laugh. I know guys who are very close to that depiction in Carl’s Jr. Don’t cook. Can’t cook. Live off of fast food and take out. I know some girls like that too. whatever.
Dude, the Carls ad works because its true of a certain type of guy.
This is a commercial aired by the Southern Nevada Water Authority. Yes, a government entity. It has been aired scores, if not hundreds of times. I believe they are still airing it.
http://www.snwa.com/apps/video/index.cfml?cid=39&vid=93
There are others in the series. In every single one, the incompetent villianous main character is a white male.
If I had the resources, I’d bring a sexual harrassment suit.
For years, all the US DOE’s “Energy Hogs” on radio and TV were all male all the time too.
Your tax dollars at work.
Dr. Helen,
I taught child and family studies as a doctoral candidate at UT. One of the vivid learning points I used was “OB tampons are designed by women.” I asked my students (mostly females) what significance that message had. Usual answers. Then I asked so you would fell comfortable with any random woman designing tampons? When then had a guided discussion about the various team members that should be utilized in designing the product (gynecologist, materials expert, manufacturing consultant, various human subject testing experts, etc…). The point being that knowledge, training, and experience are necessary in bringing about a product (even a tampon).
But then we focused back on the “designed by women” issue. It began a discussion just like this thread. Why do men have to be incompetent to be protrayed on TV?
OB tampons were implicated in toxic shock syndrome. A number of women died. No word if any of them were the designer.
An Auto Insurance Commercial (I forget which one) shows a white male doofus calling his old insurer because he drove his car off and embankment and into a telephone pole. The female agent tells him over the phone that he’s out of luck since he dropped his old insurer for an online policy.
Of course the ad agency must show a white male doing something ridiculous since they are the only unprotected group. Imagine if it was an Asian or woman. No one is going to stick up for the white man thus he becomes the butt of all jokes in commercials.
Any of the Progressive commercials, which feature this god-like character “Flo” in a “heaven-like” setting. All the (white) men in those commercials are morons. If white men buy insurance from a company like Progressive, they truly must be morons.
Hands down, those have to be the worst of the bunch.
“Jerry, is your car up a pole again?”
“Waaahhhhh!!! I miss you, Jessica!”
If the incompetent buffoon was anything other than a white male, there would be outrage and calls for boycotts and firings.
I had the same thought: this particular commercial is State Farm Insurance that ridicules a male for being an exceptionally poor driver while the female is the sincere, reasonable agent who tries to coach him into getting better insurance. ALL insurance commercials routinely feature white males doing bozo things that cause property damage, why? Because they can get away with it. If State Farm had a black female driver with her car up the tree and a white male agent….Sharpton and Jesse Jackson would be calling for a boycott.
That insurance ad is tuned to repair a woman’s pride by buying the right insurance.
It is an analogous scenario where a decent woman is dumped romantically by a man for another woman (a hussy one presumes) only for the man to discover that the decent woman was far better. Think of it as the 3 am phone call to your ex-girlfriend – “I was soo stupid. I luvvv you! (burp)”
Most women wish that would happen and can fantasize of it during the commercial, creating a feeling of displaced empowerment.
Clever advertising.
However, the bigger question is why watch TV at all? There are so many better ways to spent one’s time, I guess, unless you’re a woman. Ratings support this as viewership is predominantly female.
Now that you mention it, State Farm is into the male-bashing a lot. I hate the commercial that has a guy walking down the street with a falcon he was able to afford because of his insurance premium savings. Meanwhile, his wife is rolling her eyes, and other idiot men are carrying useless things they’ve bought.
Another one has a father and his sons watching a baseball game, and you hear the announcers ask a trivia question. Before they can respond, the mother walks in front of them and says the answer.
Is there a consistent difference between ads for products selected by women and ads for products selected by men? I can certainly remember ads for household products showing wimpy, stupid and lazy men but all the ads for trucks show hardworking, successful men doing outdoor jobs. As Francis Porretto pointed out, Stihl’s male-bashing chainsaw ad was a marketing bomb. The only time I see a wimpy, stupid, lazy man in an ad for products men typically buy is when another man shows him up or explains the error of his ways in a “two guys in a garage” commercial. Since women make 70% of purchasing decisions some male-bashing ads are inevitable but you’d better not try to sell motor oil or car wax that way.
This is the logical result of what I saw subtly encroaching on the tube 30 years ago — and part of why I stopped watching TV at that time.
I . am . not . surprised.
As a culture, we have sown the wind. We are reaping the whirlwind in our younger generations.
Consider how soon it will, or will not, go away.
I too, as a policy of mental hygiene, watch absolutely no TV and started that at about the same time (though I’m at the end of the demographic boomers like Obama).
Seriously, if you’re not willing to wade in a sewer because you’ll get physically ill, why are you willing to do the same with TV and your mind?
Up all night. Hubby and wife are pretty equal, though he quit his lawyer gig to care of the baby.
I’ve never watched this show but I caught the very end of an episode just recently and it was a really amusing scene where the man took control and “won”. It was refreshing. I’m going to try to catch it from now on.
This one takes the cake. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RdYY9aDPns
Watch this wretched scenario, then imagine what the “wife’s” perspective is: hubby walks out of house, but immediately runs back in, bolts upstairs, and starts repeatedly flushing the toilet. She probably had already called 911 before checking on him, only to find he’s pouring dog food down the toilet.
You know, the commercial would almost be charming in a “bachelor desperate to find a date” way if the wife didn’t appear at the end. That just made it creepy as hell.
Dr. Helen,
I’m glad you’re at this new venue. I, as a general rule, refuse to register anyplace to make comments, so I’m happy to see you in a forum where it isn’t necessary.
Yes, the incessant male bashing is disgusting and hateful. However, if women are stupid enough to fall for it, they deserve what they get. What lots of them aren’t getting is married, and a lot of that is because more and more men are seeing the truth about women’s part in the society surrounding us. The Futurist’s “The Misandry Bubble” is a real stunner to a lot of guys who finally see exactly how the game is rigged against them.
Long story short, women have much more to fear in a world where men not only don’t respect them but actually dislike them. It’s coming to that, and the women have only themselves to blame. Young girls today are going to live in a much harder world because of the choices their mothers and sisters made in the last 30 years.
I am glad someone else sees this number that is being fostered on women. 20 years a go I drove the bus that hauled my sons basketball team around. grade 9 and 10 boys. Overall these were the nice kids in the school. I listened to the kids yakking and over all the opinion of females was pretty low. The boys were confused, the messages they were getting from the gals and the tv was making them angry.
ya’ll keep mentioning not watching TV shows? um.
We buy video series. Right now we’re watching Quantum Leap, which has Scott Bakula mentioning ” The Guy Upstairs”- God- and making life better. His sidekick is a colorful, louche military POW survivor. We’ll cycle through Magnum PI next.
Psych has two twenty-something friends who run a PI business together. One guy has a very grouchy, very competent father. The writers aren’t afraid to mention God, either. My kids are trying to dress up like the two main characters- one kid likes tee-shirts and work jackets, and the other kid wants a suit.
He checks it for cleanness, but the kids have seen some of Mad Men- the guys are competent and hard-working. He’ll fast-forward through the messy personal life stuff, and let them see the guys negotiating business, and giving presentations.
I think cable is spawning a great many man- positive shows. History and architecture shows are all very man- positive, since, well, guys build stuff. and conquer stuff. Danny —can’t think of his name, from Build it Bigger- is always- always- careful to get each guy’s full name, and he’s careful to show how good he is at his job. There’s a lot of respect and appreciation, without being a dorky, girly, Hallmark Card. The men get to be rough, tough, hard men.
no clue about commercials- we fast forward all but the Doritoes baby and the Allstate Mayhem guy ones. My husband is pretty hardcore about men not getting disrespected on TV. I know the church around the corner has had sermons and sunday school lessons about television disrespecting fathers. The audience is picking up and leaving, quietly. I don’t think this is the only big church to give this lesson.
I do not think it is such a big deal. As long as I can remember on TV the character of the bumbling but good hearted husband and the competent wife who loves him has always been around. Remember The Honeymooners and the cartoon knockoff The Flintstones?
That worked because is was funny. The guy was still hardworking with a somewhat manly job. In ads sometimes it does not work but still there are plenty of Ford Tough macho ads out there directed at men.
I would take a scientific approach Dr Helen. Take a sampling of ads or shows over time and analyze that.
I certainly do not feel victimized by portrayal of men on TV. I can watch Raymond or 24 and enjoy both for what they are. I know women like a guy who is a little rough around the edges, who stands up for himself and still remember to bring home the fat free yogurt instead of the other kind because that makes her happy.
Anyway a guy who is worried because some TV ad made the other guy look stupid has issues.
Male bashing on TV shows and especially commercials is one of my biggest pet peeves.
One recent one is the “thanks for the falcon” commercial from State Farm.
According to the ad, men will purchase stupid things with the money they save with State Farm. The wives are not happy with their doofus husbands.
I hope that you investigate The Ad Council. I detest most of their ads. Talk about propaganda! They are heavy into “diversity” which is like a cancer in this Country now. It’s infiltrated every aspect of our American life. The two most heavily infiltrated are public education and human resources departments. I don’t think we need to list the companies that are guilty of making men look stupid. 99% of the companies’ advertising portrays men as stupid. ESPECIALLY WHITE MEN. There, I’ve said it. I’m a 65 year old white woman who has seen this phenomena develop in the past 40 years; since the kick off of radical feminism. It’s no coincidence. The advertising industry is the worst offender. The very worst. All ads make White men look stupid compared to either White women, African American men and women, Hispanic men and women, Asian men and women, OR, and this is the really sad part…..the ads make White men look stupid compared to children of any race or culture in the ads. Oh yeah, and the ads make White men look stupid compared to their dogs and cats for the ultimate insult. The advertising departments must be full of White people inflicted with self loathing. It is one of the most pathetic developments in our Country. I hope your book is a best seller. Someone needs to stand up and speak truth to this pervasive evil in our Country. It is so very destructive to our way of life. I call it REVERSE RACISM.
1) Father and little girl at the beach, “Daddy, why is the sky blue?” He answers “To match your pretty eyes”, then she responds with a parroted science lecture about nitrogen scattering the blue wavelengths more. “Where’d you learn that?”
“Mommy”
2) “You don’t have to be perfect to be a great parent” campaign to get people to become foster parents — the man is always the idiot.
GEICO Friday afternoon ad where the three white guys look like idiots while the wise black woman looks on in disbelief.
ING investment ad where the wise black man with a solid retirement plan is stunned by the dimwitted white guy who needs a “gazillion” to retire
It’s hard to take the OP seriously since he evidently didn’t bother to read the link he posted about the Citi commercial. That ad wasn’t a set-up to make men look bad–Katie Brown really is that good! I doubt she even broke a sweat on that little pinnacle. (Her partner is no slouch either.) He’d probably have a kitten if he knew about some of the cave dives that Jill Heinerth has done.
It’s hard to take you seriously since you don’t know the OP is a woman.
I’m not offended by that commercial either. The guy is right up there close to her, and I don’t think two can fit at the top of that peak. My assumption is always that they flipped a coin to see who got to go first but that they would both get a chance to do it.
And people ask incredulously why I completely stopped watching TV a few years ago. Too much trash, too much inanity, too insulting. Goodbye. Don’t miss it a bit and save $100/month. Win-win!
Yes, I am astonished that anyone pays for that rot.
At least, like the maker of the now-banned “Death” brand cigarettes, Hulu’s ads are honest about what they’re peddling.
There are two matters which should concern us. First, there is a society-wide movement to destroy the supposed over-arching patriarchy by any means necessary. It is very much akin to Marxist attempts to subvert capitalism in favor of the working class. It is also akin to the critical race theorists desire to totally overturn the supposed mastery of the white Anglo-Saxon Protestant class. And it is akin to attempts over the last several decades to destroy the family unit and its independence from government support, and its hand-maiden, government intrusion. All of these “progressive” movements are nihilistic in nature.
The other matter is that Hollywood in its desire to change our culture by controlling the narrative of our stories seeks to destroy, also. God, forbid that a drama having an evil character be portrayed as a woman, although occasionally one is. God forbid that an evil person in a drama be portrayed as a Muslim. The evil murderers in so much of Hollywood fare is a white male and a business owner to boot.
Think of it, portray an evil woman and you get any number of women’s groups organizing boycotts against a network. Portray a Muslim as a murderous radical Muslim, and somebody connected with the network or the movie studio is likely to be killed by, you guessed it, a murderous radical muslim. The same is true for any other group.
In contrast to this, portray a man as evil or as a dork, there is no group of men that will rise up in arms, real or rhetorical, to object to the dramatic mistreatment or stereotyping. Because of this lack of male organization in opposition to Hollywood propagandizing, the male will be denigrated and destroyed in the popular media.
Stand aside Jim Anderson of Father Knows Best. Get out of the way Ward Cleaver of Leave it to Beaver. Let them be replaced on the TV tube and in real life with a Schlmiel, a dork, or maybe just a donated sperm sample in a frozen test tube.
I have long held a very low opinion of these so-called sitcoms that routinely portray men as being gutless, spineless, brainless dolts. It goes back to The Cosby Show, and was furthered perpetuated by the likes of Home Improvement and perhaps the worst offender of them all, Everybody Loves Raymond (or as it should have been more appropriately entitled, Everyone Gets To Listen to Debra Whine and Moan and Complain Every Week).
I must say, though, that the current State Farm ad about Jake is a jab in the other direction. The husband in the spot is completely unconcerned about his wife’s attitude over a 3:00 AM phone call regarding insurance. He even displays a brief smirk when she takes the phone from him. That is classic, as it portrays a woman in a negative way (paranoid, insecure, and suspicious).
That commercial annoys the heck out of me because it makes no sense whatsoever. Unless their house is on fire or they’ve just been in a car accident, why on earth would anyone be calling their insurance agent at three in the morning? I realize that that’s the whole premise of the commercial, but it’s such a nonsensical premise that I always forget what on earth they’re advertising (even though they say “State Farm” at least three or four times).
Don’t dis’ the Coz. I don’t remember that about the Cosby show. I watched each week. He showed an involved smart black man providing for and raising his smart children.
Well…yeah…except if you listen carefully he sounds like a heavy breather when he’s talking to “Jake”. “Breathe, breathe…you’d do that for me?…breathe, breathe”
Have you ever watched Spanish language television? Women there, in all their supersized, glorious, and abundantly displayed feminity are absolute masters of the universe, while the real boobs are the men who either play the role of clown or are absolutely quiet and respectful.
I can’t say I have ever noticed that. I was too busy looking at the women. So let me get this straight: you’re saying there are men on those shows, as well?
It’s from the Bible. Women are evil: “Hey, I just doomed myself by eating this apple. You want to have some, too, Adam?” Men are stupid: “Sure. Looks delicious.”
LOL!
Okay, that made me laugh. Thumbs up.
Touche.
Well done sir.
Or Adam, in his love for Eve and not wanting her to be alone in her punishment, knowingly ate the fruit and gave up perfection and paradise to stay with her. Far more likely considering what some men will do for love.
Sure, but also consider that getting a replacement mate involves God cracking his chest to get another rib out…
Thanks for pointing that out, Dave.
Would that more men wake up to the truth.
The ATT ad with the harpy in her greenhouse that says “I should have married John Clark”.
And every episode of Modern Family.
It’s gotten so bad that the commercials where the men look good are the ones that stand out. There was one recently in which the wife was watering some plants and her husband said he upgraded their cable/phone package. So she talks right over him and rips into him for spending too much. After her tirade is done, he just looks at her and says “But I saved money.” She has a look that says, “Boy, am I a beyotch.” Because she is. The husband was still a little wimpy, but at least he was right.
I was surprised that one made it through the PC filter. Wish I could remember which company that was, but we don’t get most of them out here in the boonies so it didn’t really stick.
@ Dr. Helen Smith
“..drop it in the comments as I am working on a section for my upcoming book on why men are on strike in the U.S. and could use some tips.”
Interestingly my aunts and sister broached the topic about the denegration of men on TV several years ago, as they all have sons, and asked what I thought. I really couldn’t help them as I stopped watching most commercial television (occassionally watch local news, some collegiate football games and historical documentaries), a long time ago. I’ve found a lot of men have done so for the same reason I did. We couldn’t relate to any of the male characters continuosly portrayed and simply walked away to persue other hobbies.
I have not watched a sitcom in yrs. & have no clue what is currently on TV. 99% of it is all krap always & completely demeans men, Christians & conservatives. I’ll go for sports, Fox News & a good movie.
Men are hated by the Hollywood crowd. Naturally, most are depicted as fools & lazy oafs in movies, TV, commercials & anything else. I’ve seen girls running around in “Girls rule, boys drool” shirts. Just imagine if a boy wore a “Boys rule girls drool” shirt to class. You know what would happen.
Boys & men are discriminated against in school because of their gender. Caucasian males are even more discriminated against.
Just check out the books that have been written about the war on boys & men. It is true. We live in a world where men are looked at as worthless fools & women smart wise people. Liberalism & women’s lib has had everything to do with this. A pox on both of ‘em!
I’m with you–when my son was little (a dozen years or so ago), I remember seeing those little four-or-five-year-old girls with “boys drool, girls rule” messages on their designer tops (this was at a park in suburban Washington, we were visiting relatives at the time), and wondering how it would look to have the slogan “girls suck” on a little boy’s shirt!!
I was thinking that a lot of people would find that offensive!!!
It struck me that it shows the perceived weakness of girls, rather than the opposite, to make up these silly slogans–haven’t you also seen the Jeeps with “girls kick butt” stickers on them? (Sure they do, but probably not when playing against men.) It’s still the noblesse oblige role being forced on the men–let the girls say “they’re better,” because no one really believes it.
I’ve never seen Ms. Jeep-Driver rescue a fellow motorist stranded on the side of the highway, or offer a jump-start in the mall parking lot to someone who’d left the headlights on – man or woman.
Why? Because no matter what she drives, she’s a princess and princesses don’t do rescues. That’s a man’s job.
Thanks for pointing this out Dr. Helen. This campaign has been going on for a very long time and is ingrained in the American psyche now. I fear, permanently. So much so that one wonders if art imitates life (reflecting the metrosexual, liberal, male hating mindset that has produced such gender bias and affirmative action bias against males for most of my lifetime, all the time screaming about unfairness and glass ceilings) or life is imitating art (since we have certainly produced several generations of these boobs), including fearless leader Obummer, cry baby Boehner, the reverse ticket in 2008 that should have been Palin- (anybody but)McCain, not other way around. The list would be endless applied to many of our nations males in high places.
Oddly enough, I find that I prefer Korean and Japanese television programming these days. Despite the fact that both cultures are still significantly UNequal in regards to their view of male and female gender roles, their television programming is remarkably egalitarian. Not perfect by any stretch, but still a pleasant change from the hard-edge of most American programming.
In the case of Korean television (particularly the rom-coms), you almost always have the plucky heroine and the dour, angst-ridden young man who find each other and make each other’s lives better (or end up dying of cancer, because Korea is big on making you bawl your eyes out). Even though you can figure out what’s going to happen in the final episode before the end of the first episode, it’s just nice. I don’t feel like I have to be on edge waiting for the next jab at my politics or my ideology. It’s refreshing.
The commercial that gets me very angry is the AT&T commercial where the husband asks where his cable is for his wireless computer. Both his daughter and wife are aware the family has AT&T wireless but somehow he doesn’t. I understand the advertising executive responsible for this is a female, no doubt hates men.
It is not only on television but also in movies. I occasionally get the privilege of taking my grandsons to see the most recent animated feature. The degrading of men in these movies is by omission. None of the Toy Story movies or the most recent The Lorax has a Father in the cast. All of the Toy Story movies have, what I guess is, a single Mom and The Lorax has a single Mom and a Grandmother, no Father or Grandfather.
What you say about the “Toy Story” trilogy is true. But give Pixar some credit; some of its films DO have positive father figures.
What about “The Incredibles”? The main character is a husband and father — adored by his wife, respected and admired by his children. And he’s a hero not because he happens to have super powers, but because his moral character does not permit him to ignore people in trouble. He MUST help them, even if it costs him dearly.
And don’t forget “Finding Nemo”, which is about a widowed father who risks everything to find and save his son.
“Monsters Inc.” doesn’t show any parents, but the two male protagonists are motivated entirely by their affection for a little girl, whom they want to protect from harm. Sulley and Mike act as surrogate fathers in the same way that Ripley takes on the role of surrogate mother in “Aliens”, and the movie portrays them as heroes for doing so.
In “Up”, Russell’s father is absent, but Carl Fredricksen ends up embracing the role of surrogate grandfather, and he’s obviously a very good one.
http://goodmenproject.com/about/
“Guys today are neither the mindless, sex-obsessed buffoons nor the stoic automatons our culture so often makes them out to be. Our community is smart, compassionate, curious, and open-minded; they strive to be good fathers and husbands, citizens and friends, to lead by example at home and in the workplace, and to understand their role in a changing world. The Good Men Project is a place where that happens. We’re glad to have you along for the ride.”
Thanks, Helen. This is very much appreciated. What you probably don’t know is that men won’t defend themselves against women because it’s not chivalrous. So it’s nice to hear the ladies standing up for them.
May personal favorites are the many movies and TV shows with strong women beating up men. I think this fantasizing does a disservice to both sexes, since it sets impossible expectations for women. And of course it does a disservice to verisimilitude.
Meanwhile here in the corporation, affirmative action is alive and well. The advancement of women is not always what it seems.
The comparison commercials are the worst. In various situations one consumer uses the “right” product as opposed to the other using the wrong Brand X. I have noticed a hierarchy in the winners vs. losers:
Winner Loser
Black Female Any Male
White Female White Male
Black male White Male
I have never seen any comparison commercial where a While Male is using a product superior to the one a Black Female is using. Or any male over any woman in any comparison
This is one of the “push” reasons I left America; I was sick of being blamed for my skin color and my sex. I was also sick of being blamed for being gay.
In America — in San Francisco — I had to deal, on an almost daily basis, with the fact that blacks hated me. If it was not outright mugging or robbery, it was extremely annoying behavior on the public bus system which was obviously designed to “get whitey.” I also had to deal with young feminists who were trying to be boys, producing a fun-house mirror image of teenage boys. If I turned on the TV (a rare event) I might see some fundamentalist nutball telling me that homosexuals were going to hell.
This, like it or not, was my American reality. It was full of hate, and blame, and at the top stood that “rainbow flag.” One day, quite late, I saw that the “rainbow flag” had not one stripe which was white.
I have been living in Thailand for 10-20 years now, and it is quite amazing how good life becomes when you don’t have these hopped-up people constantly in your face.
Advertising is now a 100% chick business, with all of them living on the Upper West Side and hating men.
Have been noticing this for years now. Also, not to start a ‘race’ thing, but that too is repeated time after time after tiem. White men, bumbling, inadequate, timid and so on. Gets really fatiguing. I pay little attention to it and take it only on a superficial level, but then again, that is how the silent majority is now in danger of losing the country. So, I will view with a little more interest now, and will be glad to pass along my viewpoint. Semper Fi.
The answer is that Modern Feminists are really sexist supremacists. Denigrating men and shaming them into compliance is always allowed, while women are to be free from societal restraints so that they can become “empowered”. Which usually means that the men are to do what the women want, always. Because shutup.
Paleo-feminists were the same.
Contrary to myth, feminism never changed. Go read Elizabeth Cady Stanton, feminism has always sold the “women are slaves, men – eeeevil men – are slaveowners” line. What changed? Feminists. Instead of sipping the Kool-Aid of feminism, they now guzzle it.
So now we need tips from a chick on how to reclaim our right to disproportionate responsibility and financial contribution. I suggest you start suggesting women stop regarding men as financial prizes that they can parade around as proof of their womanhood and instead marry men they can support.
My all time favorite is the Verizon commercial with the group of guys exchanging bad ideas including using household bleach as a tooth whitener, making the kids hitchhike to school to save on gas and not lifting with one’s knees, using one’s back instead. Other commercials can be just as offensive, but this one doesn’t even pretend to depict men as anything but stupid.
There are so many stupid commercials making men look effeminate and the week that it’s been a long time since I’ve watched television. We need to get some John Wayne types, Clint Eastwood types, and Arnold Schwarzenegger role models out there again. The world sees American men on television as a bunch of weak types and that’s not good
For me, pretty much ANY Hardee’s commercial fits the bill. It’s either pandering to adolescent fantasies, or showing how a grown man can’t make a cup of coffee.
Why I like Harry’s Law, Bones, Finder. There’s some balance in the characters Some of the reality shows I like present all the participants in a realiatic mosaic. Commercials? Do I care how dumb the guy looks when the gal is a looker? Nah. Am I influenced. C’mon. Its TV, pretend. If the audience is so weak headed that they fall prey to the sterotypes, nothing we can say will help. They prolly can’t read, for one thing.
Then I turn the durn thing off and the real life sterotypes are more or less reversed. So why should I, a man, worry?
Why, Mike M?
Because one day you may have sons, I they need to have not just your support, but the standards and mores of a rational society in order to grow up to be responsible, intelligent, competent adult MEN.
(with all due respect, Mike)
I have an endless supply of the negative stereotypes for menwith which I am sure you are familiar.
One point that also might be included in the book is the recognition the the first reaction to your request was the many justifications of the stereotype.
Like Chrisitans and conservatives, they are the acceptable fodder for the “comedy” of the left. To describe or depict a woman or any miniority in the same vein as is currently acceptable with the above, is to bring instant condemnation as “intolerant” “___phobic,” etc., etc.
It is not only on television but also in movies. I occasionally get the privilege of taking m grandsons to see the most recent animated feature. The degrading of men in these movies is by omission. None of the Toy Story movies or the most recent The Lorax has a father in the cast. Toy Stories has series has a single mom and the Lorax has a single mom and a grandmother, no father or grandfather.
I hate all the ads for PCmatic.com
Here’s one of their ads:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMP4PF3DNg8
I cancelled my satellite service 6 months ago. There is nothing, NOTHING, worth watching on what could have been the most brilliant educational, informative, and inspiring device invented since the written word.
Your average beer commercial portrays men as immature children who have to sneak away from their girlfriends or wives to have fun with the guys.
Imagine Andy Rooney saying…Have you ever noticed that men never win at sports on TV. It’s not like they are letting the women win. They try hard and lose. How often does this happen in real life?
The entire Relic Hunter series.
The citi ad is an outlier. That’s no stunt. The climber is real, usually climbs without safety ropes, and there is a youtube video showing her climbing that peak and then base jumping off of it. She is the real deal.
For TV, I do sports, Military channel, science, history and political channels. plus some cooking shows. I am with you. Smarmy soft core shows showing inept men don’t attract me any more than black folks would be attracted to Amos and Andy.
I quit watching commercial TV long ago.
Not a commercial, but are you aware of the children’s book series the Berenstain Bears? (http://www.berenstainbears.com)
I refused to read them to my kids because the always depict papa bear as a bumbling fool.
Disney’s been at this for years. Just think about the parents in Disney movies. Idiots, ineffectual, non-existent, dopes, that’s the dad. Shrewish, screeching or dull as dishwater washrag that’s the mom. Oh and don’t forget the grandparents Tweedle dim and Tweedle dumb.
Then there’s what passes for animated adult fare. Simpsons, Family guy and the rest of that drek. If you want a front seat in the war on families, men, women and children pull up a chair. The next time you decry the coarseness of our society, the war on decency and the complete lack of any kind of manners, or decent behavior go over and turn on the cable/dish and troll through the sludge.
As long as we accept what they feed us, we’ll get the dregs. Opt out. Tell the companies that show this stuff you don’t buy their products any more. It’s the only thing they understand. Drive them into the ground, it’s only fair. They’ve been doing it to the US for years.
Advertising is generally a young person’s job. Burn out is high.
This latest generation of advertising people (creative dept., copywriters, etc.) are all sons and daughters of a high-divorce period. They were also influenced by government policy that put incentives in place for women to be single parents.
Many of the people in advertising (and other professions, obviously) didn’t have a strong male in their lives. The wise, strong person was the female — mom and grandmom. In fact, this generation (both genders) probably harbors a grudge against men because they were abandoned, shunned or never even identified. (“Who’s my dad?”)
Humans develop their personalities in first grade. The bashing of white men in ads is just a manifestation of the questions that were never answered then and the lack of a good male role model throughout childhood.
I’m not a psychologist, I just play one (poorly) on the Internet.
The Fiber One commercials – ugh.
They used to have commercials where a male spokesman was highlighting the cereal and bars. Now the commercials have superior wives and stupid husbands. “Fiber makes me sad…”
Hey! How about us bald guys ? If I wasn’t an insensitive, clueless white (bald) guy, I’d be insulted by how we’re portrayed. (this comment typed on my slow, low grade computer, wearing my dingy grey white t- shirt, while my wife is out doing science)
The problem arises from the fact of who creates the commercials. Women, gays
and Metrosexual men populate the advertising field. The people who pay for
these ads are the same. Mad Men is a half century ago. Mostly men who fought the wars and built this country. The next thing you’ll see at the higher education level is STEM degrees that don’t require math or science to allow
more women into the field.
Dr. Helen,
Did you touch a nerve or what?
My two cents: The Van Dyk Restorers cmmcl in which a svelte, well dressed woman is showing her friend how they rehabbed their new old home. The last Door she opens shows her overweight husband on a treadmill in a sweat suit with sweat stains. She closes the door quickly and says “he’s still a work in progress.”
I actually wrote to the company on that one and asked them if they’d be willing to show an overweight woman with sweat stains on a treadmill and claim “SHE was a work in progress.” I received no response.
The other recently run cmmcl is the Vonage ad which shows an (East Indian couple with Grandma on the phone presumably talking to India. The man asks her “Do you know how much these calls cost?” and takes the phone from her, The svelte, calm, well-dressed wife notes that it’s no probloem because she recently changed their phone service to Vonage. Grandma is then shown on a cell speaking to India when the wife evem pre-empts husbands complaint: “Don’t worry, you can call from your cell, too.” This particualr commercial bothers me because as you watch it, the husband is treated as a cartoon. One can almost hear the stage direction saying, over-act when you do this.
The Man-is-inept pattern goes way back, but got its foothold with The Bickersons, The Life of Riley, and I Love Lucy. At least in those days there were plenty of alternates, in the hero [Sgt. Preston, Lone Ranger] and family [Father Knows Best, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, Andy Griffith]. Now… not so much.
I never felt like “I Love Lucy” showed the man as being inept. The man wasn’t the star, but I’ve got no problem with that. Ricky was always having to pull Lucy out of scraps. I think that show was actually pretty even-handed at dishing out the slapstick to both sides but showing a fully capable and reliable man.
I hate the commercial where the woman is talking in loving tones about how her husband got life insurance and she couldn’t put their son through college without and how if she could see him she would say… Then her husband walks in and her entire countenance changes and she says hello to her husband in an annoyed fashion. The whole thing implies that we should only be grateful to our husbands if they are dead. I yell at the TV every time, much to the amusement of my husband.
I also hate when, on house search shows, the woman automatically claims the entire closet or deigns to give a small portion to her husband. His suits and such take up much more room than my smaller clothes even if I do have twice as many.
The AT&T commercial about the home wireless and public 4g plan, where the teenage daughter (with Mom’s glowing pride) is all up on and knowledgeable about the product and technology, and the dad is shown to be just a bumbling stupid idiot. The contempt shown by the teenage daughter to her father who doesn’t get all the details of the service is in insufferable.
Do you think the success of The Sopranos and MadMen is a reaction to the anti-male trend on TV?
Windows 7 ad where the wife won’t let the husband play golf on Sundays.
The best summary of where male/female relationships are today is here: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/03/07/subtle-sexism-common-at-work-experts-say/. We’re told that men who harass women are harassers. And men who are kind to women are harassers.
This is why I’m turning into a full blown misogynist. Sure, I’m kind to women, and I treat them equally at work.
But I know damn well, and I’m teaching my young son, that as a class they must be presumed to be irrational and posessed of a damaging agenda in politics, education and life. Women who prove otherwise should be prized, but otherwise men need to be aware that we’re in the gunsights.
Viagara adds irritate me. They sell their product as a cure for a man’s disability. I think it should be sold as a cure for unattractive women!
Yet another Verizon ad (they seem to be a serial offender) is the current one for home monitoring and control. Man asleep in bed while wife sits next to him explaining how “I can lock the doors remotely if this idiot here forgot”. (The particular demeaning term used wasn’t actually “idiot” but that’s how it comes across.) The idiot then rolls over and mumbles something about whether he remembered to lock the doors, so she reassures him in a tone that sounds like she’s talking to a 2-year old.
I hate that State Farm commercial where “Jerry” appears incapable of driving without putting his car vertically up a pole then cries to the female agent and excuses his tears by saying he bit his tongue. That’s what a feminist looks like.
It’s not just the commercials and it’s not just adult shows. One of the very worst is The Berenstain Bears on PBS. The Father Bear is consistently portrayed as stupid, bumbling, forgetful, dim, inept and so on. Can’t find his car in the parking lot, can’t catch a fish for dinner without it turning into a disaster, etc. And of course, Mother Bear comes to the rescue and titters with the kids about how daft and silly their father is. Great message–Mom encouraging kids to have a laugh at Dad’s expense.
After about three episodes, I banned it from my house. Books too.
I had forgotten all about this appalling little series of books. We had a few when my kids were little, but after three or four it was obvious that ‘mama bear saves the day after stupid papa bear screws up’ was the theme of ALL of their books. Dumped the few we had after that. Good riddance to bad garbage.
Folks, it’s just marketing. Don’t have a conniption. The advertiser-desirable female 25-55 demographic is what they TV commercial writers want. They are pitching to employed women in that age group, because they are perceived to have the largest amount of discretionary spending capacity IN STORES. The products that are pitched are over-the-counter drugs, cosmetics, baby stuff, pre-cooked meals, and fast food emporiums, all patronized by working moms and single women. The commercial writers believe (wrongly) that patronizing attitudes towards men attract these women. Until the commercial writers change their view, this will go on. And the best way to do that is to slam the advertisers with boycotts and product substitutions. All Hail the MahaRushi!
I’ve always thought the purpose of advertising was to help sell a product. Silly me. Insulting men isn’t likely to make them want to buy the product. Insulting women’s husbands or sons will turn a lot of them off, too. I guess I just don’t understand advertising any more.
It’s been interesting scrolling through the comments. The first thing I’ll say, is nailing down misandry in culture is pretty tough or pretty easy, depending on your perspective. I haven’t watched TV in over a decade, and have totally missed out on the sitcoms referenced here, as well as many of the commercials. I catch them on YouTube every now and then. Sometimes the misandry is very obvious and in your face.
Be that as it may, I would be interested in how you and the commenters here would interpret this commercial:
Guinness St. Patrick’s Day Commercial
I seriously bust a gut laughing at it. I don’t see misandry here at all, but some of my friends did. Most of them, however had no clue about the culture of sheepdog trials in the UK (and here in the Piedmont of Virginia). The number of stereotypes collected in this commercial was astounding, but I never took offense.
Look, guys will be guys. And the commercial reinforces that. I don’t see that the reinforcement is negative. In fact, the ending is quite positive, with all the “mates” gathered in a pub, raising their glasses in manly fellowship!
In other words, I thought it was perfectly done. It poked fun at men’s culture without being mocking and humiliating. That’s fine with me.
That should also help define the metric: Where do you draw the line at poking fun and misandry?
The only sitcom I watch is “Community”. Every single character (male and female) is a raving lunatic.
When the show first started the liberal female character (Britta) was the “voice of reason”. I thought “Here we go AGAIN”. But as the show progressed it started to beat up on her ,as it did the other characters, and make fun of her ultra-liberal personality.
It’s also the funniest best written show on TV. Six seasons and a movie!!
I know this is about commercials, but I usually fast-forward through them.
What I’d like to see is some focus on children’s television. Men are portrayed horribly in those shows. Sometimes the mom’s are idiots, too, but you can count on the dad’s being useless morons.
I agree. Grown men can just roll their eyes at this stuff, but I think it can have a very negative affect on children (both boys and girls)
I think that is where the real concern should be.
Images of men as either wimps or brutes are the order of the day in movies and television. Remember “Cold Mountain”?
Here’s a more recent example: I watched only the original (Swedish) version of “The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo.” It included not one but two sexually abusive fathers, a probation officer who sexually exploited his female “cases,” and a serial murderer who tortured his female victims before cutting them up into pieces. The eponymous “girl” was a super-woman, a motorcycle-riding, bisexual computer whiz who as a little girl had dowsed her abusive father with gasoline. The probation officer gets his comeuppance at her hands; she rescues a wimpish man who was about to be killed by the serial murderer, who also gets his comeuppance while fleeing from her. But this is not all. The wimp was a journalist who had been sentenced to jail for defaming an arms merchant. The “girl” not only saved his life but cracked a murder mystery he had been hired to solve and hands him information he needed to prove his case against the arms merchant. And there’s more: the “girl” managed to enrich herself by hacking into one of the bank accounts of the arms merchant.
So there you have it. Men are wimps or brutes, and women either victims of brutes, or knight-errants who slay the brutes, rescue the wimps, and deliver rough justice.
One of the great satisfactions for me in the “Song of Ice and Fire” books and “A Game of Thrones” HBO series is the almost complete absence of “woman smart and good; man dumb and bad” messaging. Some characters are much more admirable than others, but that’s not linked to gender at all.
Yes, I like many of the HBO series for that reason. Also Boardwalk Empire, the Sopranos, and Entourage. Hung too, although silly, has male and female characters in various degrees of imperfection. Ironic, given how HBO is also the home of ueber leftist Bill Maher.
I haven’t watched TV in 10 years. Don’t miss it. Have so much more time to do more important things.
One of the best breakout characters and downright funny males portrayed right now is Ron swanson on NBC’s “Parks and Recreation”.
He’s a man’s man and does not tolerate idiocy or suffer fools well while being genuinely likeable and just funny as heck.
There was one commercial a few months back that was so over the top I said something out loud during a pre-wedding beers @ a bar in vegas with friends who were getting married. Bridezilla loudly proclaimed I was ruining her wedding, making a huge scene and stomped off because I said that woman was a complete *****.
Not her. The incredibly insulting charicature hawking some crap that no one needs. Once she finished her drama scene and left the table I looked at my wife and said “And her, too.”
I felt so sorry for the poor guy getting married. She acts like that towards me a lot, and I avoid her like the plague. She’s a **** on wheels and has no qualms about it. Acts like shes proud of it.
I don’t like her and make sure she’s well aware that I only tolerate her presence because my wife likes her and even then, with very little patience.
So much fake crap and insincere effort and energy wasted on bulls***.
**** you, feminists.
curmudgeoninchief: “Folks, it’s just marketing. Don’t have a conniption.”
Gee, no condescension there… “Just marketing”? Uh, no. The plot lines of many movies, TV programs and books these days rely on portraying men as knuckle-dragging brainless miscreants, inferior to women, and pretty much useless – except for sexually satisfying the woman-superior on demand or opening a tight jar lid or lifting heavy objects.
Further, academia has built massive rationales and created entire “environments” that communicate and foster the same message.. to the Nth power.
“Just marketing” to weak-minded women by telling them men are their inferiors to be used and barely tolerated is no better than marketing to weak-minded men by telling them women are their inferiors.
The real issue though is that in our culture, the faux woman-as-superior mindset has come to define the baseline for behaviors portrayed throughout our media, in the operation of government and academia.
Young girls and young boys are (unfortunately) learning from it all. And the effects on our society for this neo-inequality of the sexes is not good.
Good one. I think I pretty much handled the commercials-as-male-bashing-exercises, but if you disagree, that’s OK too. Moving along, TV programs on commercial TV are worse examples of male-bashing, as you point out. It is hard to find a refuge from men-as-defective-humans portrayals by TV actors, at the behest of the writers. Since TV programs are used to drive audiences, they have to carry the meme to get that desirable demographic. #106 is right about “Girl With a Dead Man Draggin’ “, it is a terrible exercise in female empowerment. The protagonist is a psychotic monster turned into a hero. #107 is right about “Game of Thrones”, which is why I downloaded and watched all 10 episodes over Thanksgiving weekend. And check out “Fringe” for a little balance. And thank goodness for Dr. Helen, who I would marry if she wasn’t already married. And I wasn’t married.
There’s a good slide show today on National Review on the Mad Men product of the sixties. I like the Schlitz ad where hubby is back from the office only to find lil wifey beside herself over a burnt dinner. And He says” at least you didn’t burn the beer.”
As a mom, I can’t stand the Berenstain Bear books that make dad out to be a doofus and mom the only smart one! These books are read by millions of kids in those years when they need to look up to dad as their hero.
As far as commercials go, there’s one for yogurt where the lady calls her husband “babe”. I don’t even know which brand, but it is just another thing that portrarys dad as being clueless and foolish.
How about the smarmy lil bugger who says something inappropriate, then tries to take it back. How many times have you have him chip away at civility say geico.
Carnival cruise, couple trapped in vehicle by bears. Never find me on carnival.
Look at any given gaggle of young men at Clark and Addison. Hat’s on backwards and he is wearing the flip flop sandal that we called thongs.
That Verizon commercial,(I think it’s them) where the husband chimes in that he’s gotten the family an ‘unliited’ data plan & text along with more minutes. The wife (working in a greenhouse) chimes in ” …how are gonna afford that?! I sould have married so & so…”
The husband comes back weakly & hurt like about how the “plan is for the same rate or less…”. It just pisses me off.
The misandry of network television is a reason why the History Channel and Military Channel are so popular among men. On sitcoms and ads, men are portrayed as weak and stupid while women, children, and minorities are portrayed as smart and strong. However, on the History Channel and military shows, men are heroes saving their civilizations.
Man-bashing is not limited to ads and TV, but is part of a larger sea of political correctness which demonizes men, particularly white men. I recall watching a mandatory online presentation about ethics for my company at the time. It presented the lessons in a series of video scenarios where actors played out common business scenarios that challenged ethics. In every case, the white guy was the ethical villian while the ethical hero was a woman, a minority, or a minority woman.
This demonization of men has real consequences. The HR departments of most companies maximize complaints against men while minimizing complaints against women. Most HR departments, usually run by women, process five to ten times the number of complaints against men as women.
It’s bigger than just man-bashing ads. It’s a man-bashing culture.
The Pudding Face commercial is outrageous. Dad looks like a retarded sex offender, while angry daughter interrogates him as if prelude to a beat-down.
These comments are a goldmine! This must be what feminists in the 60′s felt like!
State Farm with Jerry the hapless idiot is a classic. I’ll never buy from them.
Flo and the nerdy losers is another.
Perhaps the worst was the Citi ad from 2006. “The Debate,” where the testy wife is losing it with her obviously slow and stupid husband who is obviously not smart enough to “know” they should stretch to buy a bigger house …and the woman broker on the speakerphone is urging him to buy the bigger house…his reluctance to buy is obviously just because he’s slow and stupid (although a year or two later, perhaps not).
But I like the Citi rock climbing ad…I don’t see it as anti-male. It celebrates the woman involved and good for her (she’s hot too). It has no snarky remarks or put downs. I have 2 daughters and that’s a good ad.
The one that is my absolute favorite hypocritical “woman’s” commercial has been running for Netflix for at least 6 months. In it, this woman is “in” the movie that she’s going to be viewing and it is apparently some sort of romance movie (and she talks with some hunky Fabio-type movie character with whom she interacts.)
The commercial starts off with her making the comment “Oooo, you ARE little biscuit, aren’t you?” as she moves toward him and he stands up. She “introduces” herself and says that she’s going to be watching his movie with her girlfriends then she suddenly stops. “You have a skinny dipping scene, right?” she asks huskily, then adds, “Don’t talk,” and something tantamount to just take your clothes off. The commercial ends with her making some sort of wantonly double entendre as the male character begins to walk out of a pool of water.
Sheeyeesh. Seriously, if the roles were reversed, I can only imagine the howling that would’ve come from the feminists. But hey, it’s okay: it’s a MAN that’s treated as a mere sex object.
Verizon Wireless had a commercial a while back that had a husband/father looking out the window at his two children shoveling the drive. Wife comes up and wants to know how he got them to do that. He replies that he promised them they could text all they wanted. Wife replies that the current family plan allows unlimited texts. Hubby replies, “yeah, but they don’t know that.” I LOVE this commercial. Father outsmarts kids about technology. Gets his kids to do a chore. Wife is impressed with hubby’s parenting skills. This is why I chose Verizon Wireless. And I am a woman.
For a show which continually portrayed the Married White Male as a completely whipped idiot, I nominate Malcolm in the Middle.
This was a PSA on KQED, the PBS Affiliate in San Francisco. It showed two girls sitting across from each in a coffee shop: It went something like this:
Girl # 1: Hey sis, I just met a guy who would be perfect for you. He’s smart, professional and good looking.
Girl #2: That’ wonderful. Tell me more.
Girl # 1: Well, he’s agressive and controlling and when he gets too much to drink in him, he’ll slap you around!
Girl #2: Great! Just like dad!!
I kid you not. This was from the Domestic Violence Awareness & Prevention Television Messages Program out of the San Diengo PBS Affiliate.
I complained bitterly to KQED and was engaged in an interesing dialogue with them about it. They said they would not stop playing the pieces (there were 4) but I never saw them again (this was six years ago) and I don’t watch PBS anymore.
They actually sent me the CD which I still have (though haven’t watched it in many years).
The second spot had to do with a father convincing his son to help him cover up the violence. It was gut wrenchingly disgusting.
Dr. Helen, if you would be interested in seeing this I could make you a copy (you have my e-mail – just let me know)
Jim
Dr Helen,
This is a pretty long thread. Where does it rank since you have been writing on PJ Media? Seems to have touched a nerve.
Yes, there are a lot of good comments and interest in this topic. Nowhere near the comment thread I once got on a post, “Can a man be raped by a woman?” which got nearly 600 comments!
When men speak out, the get that demeaning advertising pulled. See http://www.examiner.com/advertising-in-richmond/angry-dads-outrage-gets-huggies-ad-campaign-pulled-from-television
And the funny thing is, most women agree with them. See http://www.examiner.com/advertising-in-richmond/women-join-angry-dads-pooping-on-huggies-tv-ad-campaign
Correction: It’s predominantly white men who are depicted as idiots.
This kind of crap makes me glad I live in SE Asia where men aren’t fodder for the misandry that is so prevalent in the US.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYTBumQ7dR0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYTBumQ7dR0
Her fiance was too “dumb” to go to the crappy jewelry exchange store so he “deserves” getting blasted with water by this princess. I hate this commercial. It’s supposed to be humorous but it makes me want to punch that woman in the face.
How ’bout the Progressive insurance add, with the chubby hubby who’s wife got him a “European Handbag” and has cowed him into bringing it along on their shopping outing. Flo unleashes comedic innuendo about his manliness, or lack their of. Braisen commentary in how far men “should” go along to get along.
All of the Progressive commercials have the same theme….. Flo is smart and all those men have no clue how to buy, think about or even talk about insurance, she “saves” them every time.
I hadn’t seen the one with a male handbag. And I always liked Flo – quite a bit!
I recall a Stars and Stripes newspaper article written by a woman trying to tell “a larger audience” about unemployed men learning to take care of their homes.
Apparently certain unemployed men were followed around and interviewed. When their military commander wives returned home from high levels of pressure and authority at work, they were ever so thankful and told by their men to stay out of the kitchen and refrigerator for fear of something being moved around. There was a discussion of men’s choice of diaper bag color being a “manlier” gray color, and that men felt stronger just by calling the diaper bag a man-bag. I’m not kidding.
Quite obvious and sickening was the female staff writer’s attempt at humor, condescension, and (unable to help herself) attempts to influence (manipulate) men through the stupidest of compliments – utterly amazing!
As a man I’d be glad to be the best I could be, if I were at home due to unemployment. I would need no compliments from useless, snickering, “complimentary,” employed females writers looking to find humor in my circumstances and choices about how I handle events. In case women didn’t know, men don’t like to be laughed at/with/around/on when fired and doing the best they can. I’d care for my children well and take great pride in it. I’d do so despise faux compliments from such women who in their deepest conscience are happy about my circumstances, while on the way to their Federal Women’s Program weekly to discuss the gap of 0.5% fewer female managers to the overall percentage of female employees.
My right-thinking and sturdy wife who would tell those women to get bent of they bothered me. That’s the kind of power I like. My wife respecting and protecting me whenever the time is right. Exact same as I’d do for her.
I don’t get it. In this day of set-top boxes with built-in DVRs, why does anyone watch commercials at all, let alone complain about them?
It’s not just the commercials. What shows do you watch? Does a music video with the man tied to a chair while the female country singer threatens him in a “fun” way count – instead of him sitting their of his own free will and perhaps feeling guilty for something? How about a movie. Will Smith’s ”
Hitch,” in which his ~love~ interest is willing to injure a man’s genitals because she felt like it and for the movie-goers’ enjoyment. This sexual violation always and only happens to a men and is to the point in huge #’s of women’s minds as no big deal, nothing serious, it’s not as bad as cramps or life-giving child-birth, and so on. This disastrous violation occurs by supposedly smart and strong women, with a resulting proud facial expression. Girls and women cheer or smile in the theater. Stupid men smile because they don’t know how to act. There was no set-up for humor – only shock and bad women’s enjoyment. The attempted enjoyment of one male via close realism of a romantic comedy becomes instead Will Smith falling in love with a misandric sow who’ll resort to assaulting Will SMith’s groin should the good times stop rolling.
Misandry doesn’t only occur in the commercials. Within 10 minutes something similar is occurring on most channels.
I personally can not stand that curly headed idiot that’s on the Toyota line of commercials. Always grinning like a total moron, and doing dumb stuff to always enthusiastically promote whatever flavor of toyota is currently being advertised.
As an aside, I feel like there’s a push by the media/ad execs/whomever to marginalize men, but I find that out in life things are much different. Women seem to like polite men, being addressed respectfully as Mrs/Ms/Miss, having the car door held for them, or the gas pumped. I don’t think that the man’s role as the protector and provider is gone, it’s just under heavy assault, and here’s my reasoning why. All the shows above, who makes the money? Who is out of the house providing for their families? Not the strong domineering women.
The other thing that bugles my mind is that all the STEM jobs that the hardcore feminists seem to want to push women into are traditionally male fields, and that’s fine. What what about the other male dominated fields like law enforcement, or the combat arms branches of the military, or fire and EMS? What about oil field workers, linemen or coal miners? Why is it ok for men to die in the line of duty doing hard unpleasant jobs in dangerous places?
Answer: This faction, whatever they are called, wants the recognition for being ‘equal’ without actual equality. There will always be gender inequalities due to physiology.
Anyway, there’s my Sunday morning rant. Back to my coffee, before leaving for my dangerous job while my beautiful, lovely well educated wife sleeps until her pagers start going off to take her to work too. Cheers everyone. Be safe out there.
The second layer of Flo’s comments, in the above Progressive insurance commercial, is that women are trending toward Metrosexuals overs Hetrosexuals, which ends up at Adam Carolla’s book….”In Fifty Years We’ll All Be Chick’s”, a line of thinking that I give merit.
I have been saying for 15+ years now that TV shows and commercials portray men as idiots, morons, objects of ridicule and humiliation, etc. The commercials are created by, primarily, single white women and gay white males between the ages of 21 and 35. They are largely to blame for what has happened to TV commercials. Prior to women entering the work force in large numbers, you didn’t see really any commercials trashing men. I’m old enough to remember. I don’t recall really any commercials or shows that did that, and also none that trashed women. For over a decade now it’s just a tsunami of male bashing and male hatred in the media. It would seem that the only thing these single white women can create for ad content are situations involving some type of relationship between men and women, and then invariabily it is the male who gets trashed in the interplay between the two. Feminism has destroyed women’s views of men and it has provided them the social cover to do whatever they want to their male counterparts. This is great achievement for feminism and was laid out as a top goal for the movement back in the early days (60s, 70s, and 80s), since the hard core policymakers looked (and still do) at men as born oppressors and batterers of women. For gays it’s similar: they look at straight, single, males as their oppressors, so they are happy to trash them as well. And it’s not only in commercials and shows; it’s everywhere. Think about all the abusive, hate filled articles entitled like, “Who needs men?”, “Women make better managers than men”, “The end of men”, “Men can’t do anyting around the house”, “Women make better soliders”, Women are better astronauts”, “The end of the male chromosone”, just to name a handful I recall. This is total bigotry and brainwashing of women to hate men.
As the author of the article states, I’m on strike and have been for years now. Women are so full of hatred and disdain for me, and they have been bred with this idea that they are “empowered” to rule over us in every way. Family law has done the same; completely stacked against men and gives women total power over relationships and family. It simply doesn’t make sense anymore to connect with women on a long term basis; and forget about marriage. With feminism inculcating the idea that women should rule and dominate men (by trashing them in ads and shows, and elsewhere) it is an absolute danger for a man to get married. The modern American women does not make for a secure relationship; it is fraught with nothing but risk and you are basically walking on eggshells throughout it all. There is just way too much emotional, psychological, financial, and gender risk at stake for the man. Women are infused with a sense of power over men and entitlement that should not exist. If you go against the feminist ideas with which they have been bred, you are simply dead in the water…and you become nothing more than a proof point for all the negative things feminism taught them.
Also, why would you want to get married and have children? Would you want your son or daughter to learn that all men are objects of derison, ridicule, humiliation? That they are fat, bumbling, stupid, idiotic jerks? That women are the strong, smart, visionary, logical, problem solving, sensible, good natured, great looking, healthy ones? That’s what they will learn, plain and simple. Even if there’s a pre-nup regarding the assets, the other risks are are just too great for a guy since money is only one aspect of a relationship that can go bad.
I forsee a nation of primarily single people by the latter half of the century, driven by the feminist movement and the obsessive focus to “empower” women over men. The data is certainly pointing to that, as fewer people get married. Note how the rallying cry for women is not “equality” anymore (as it was in the early days of feminism) but “empowerment”…that is: to gain as much power as they can, particularly over the people who kept them down from time immemorial, the male. Notice how women, and the myriad institutions supporting them, will never talk about having attained “power”; they are always in the process of gaining it, that is, “empowering” or “being empowered”. It is softer than saying “we are powerful” or “we have power”. The “empowering” messaging allows the feminist movement to convey that women are still weak, still down-trodden, still victims…and to continue its onslaught against men.
I guess Gloria Steiman was right: A woman without a man is like fish without a bicycle. They don’t need men for anything except to trash us, which I’ve come to conclude is a primary form of their empowerment.
I will admit this: the feminists have won.
Good luck gals.
Good post about female gains not mentioned by feminists. It’s not like they’ll scale back should there be harm to men.
I disagree heavily with your assertion feminists have won. To say it, is to lose. They’ve done irreparable damage and more than they helped, since I as a man was well into helping and trusting and learning from women already. Not understanding the majority men like me, feminists ruined men’s lives that will not be repaired in millions of cases, since we only get one run through this life.
But you CANNOT ever give up standing up for yourself, and hoping and praying that the good conscience of both genders will surface and stay awhile. Of course it can ONLY happen if women and imbecile men recognize a hurt and offended man is a hurt man – and he counts as much as one woman. As much. AS MUCH.
No question we are at a terrible point. Never before have I been so disappointed to realize I have no protection under the law, and if I were to be seriosuly assaulted by a female I’d have to take matters into my own hands, due to no legal recourse of consequence. That’s very sad state of affairs and a sad necessary mindset for survival and pride as a human being. Very sad. The laws dictate people’s boundaries, females specifically. It’s extremely easy to harm men if one is female, and this should never be the case. ANY sexual violation leading to injury must be punished as severely. Nothing else can possibly balance relations as well, and lead to actions within boundaries. Then a return to sanity between genders may begin. Balanced, supportive laws and no fault (truly no fault) divorces without alimony if someone is in that much of a need out.
Finally, in accidental pregnancies among unmarried couples, both parents sign documents to bring the child into the world. End the battle of our mistake, my body, my extra privileges and my decision only.
Good point. The feminists have not won. Men are waking up to what is going on around them and starting to fight back or opt out. Both strategies will, in the long run, possibly turn the tide back to justice for both sexes.
How Many Negative Images of Men Do You See on TV in 10 Minutes?
Should have read ” How many negative images of white guys do you see 10 minutes”
cant possibly show a black or latino as an idiot, the racism screed would start post haste but its perfectly ok to make white guys look stupid.
Its a matter of time before this group consistantly attacked in commercials retaliates and stop spending the money. Starve the companies to death.
Another poster made a comment about the Ad Council and how their public service announcement commercials are biased against white males. I couldn’t agree more. A few years ago I got so angry at all their commercials where a white guy or white boy were the morons/nasty ones (there were none where a female or a non-white was cast as the evil one) that I wrote an email to a bunch of them (got their email addreseses from their website) and said that if I continued to see ads where only the white males were made to look like the bad guys I was going to write a letter to congress and to their funders and demand that they stop funding the organization. If I recall, all the people who were in the executive and middle mgt that were on the webiste were all women. Interestingly, the next new commercial I saw from them actually had a black woman in the nasty role, where she squashes a ping pong ball that went off the table from a game that a group of “diverse” kids were playing. I was really happy about that. I haven’t seen many Ad Council commercials these days; perhaps the Great Recession has resulted in their funders pulling the plug on their donations…thankfully!!
The best commercials ran in the 1980s and ’90s. They had such great drama in 30 seconds. It was a continuing series with British actors for an instant gourmet coffee. Lady meets handsome man and romance sparkles in their eyes. The male actor is currently seen as a teacher in a kids’ program. TVCs are not what they use to be, and neither are we. Before, the sets looked realistic, like people really lived there. Now, if the product doesn’t interest you, you look at the set and wonder why anybody would buy that ugly furniture. There are also characters we would not like to know in real life, not want to be seen with, as the actor nor his or her character. Most TVCs are shot using Northern actors Southern viewers don’t identify with. They don’t live nor act like real people. Especially if they become famous. And most agencies are now run by women. What? You weren’t surprised to learn that People magazine has a female CEO and staff?
Progressive commercial with Flo ridiculing a man for carrying a “man purse” that his domineering wife gave to him.
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