The conflicting teen sex messages of Candie's

Creepy much? Via Hollywood Life

Teen fashion brand Candie's seems to want it both ways. On one hand, they sell the idea that teens can look sexy in their clothes, featuring provocative images using young spokespeople like 16-year-old Disney Channel actress Bella Thorne, above.

At the same time, their Corporate Social Responsibility arm, Candie's Foundation, is an organization that seeks to prevent teen pregnancy by preaching abstinence. They've also been heavily criticized for using celebrities to shame teen mothers.

In fact, their whole plan is to instil a fear of pregnancy in teens. From their web site:

Our campaigns are making a difference. Research has shown that teen girls who have been exposed to the foundation and its messages are more likely to view teen pregnancy and parenthood as stressful and negative, and they are more likely to be skeptical of the media's portrayal of teen pregnancy and parenting. They also think teens should wait longer to have sex than girls who are not aware of the foundation and its messages.

There's something quintessentially American about a brand that sexualizes young girls, then tells them to suppress their sexuality or risk ruining their lives.

Interestingly, even the right-wing blowhards at Fox News see an issue with this.

Fox 411 quotes Katie Yoder, of the socially conservative (read: Fundamentalist Christian and anti-choice) Culture and Media Institute:

Candie's isn't selling clothes, it's selling sex and teaching young girls to act seductively. Thorne sends the message that being feminine has nothing to do with being genuine and that confidence means popping your hips and shaking your butt.

When both bleeding hearts like me and the One Million Moms brigade actually agree, you know there's a problem. Although I doubt we see it the same way.

I have nothing against teens expressing their sexuality among their peers. I just think they need the right information and support to do it safely, to avoid exploitation, unplanned pregnancy, regret, and the threat of rape. Candies wants girls to feel like sexual objects by buying their clothes, but also wants to terrify them out of actually acting on that agency by threatening grave consequences.

This is no way to raise a generation of women.

Dear Brands: please stop appropriating terrorism

Never Forget pic.twitter.com/74Br2rBL3A
— AT&T (@ATT) September 11, 2013

Update: They apologized and the embedded Tweet was removed.

Here's a screencap.

It was a terrible thing. It killed a lot of people. It started wars. It forced us to give up a lot of freedoms.

But one thing is for sure: It did not happen so that brands could borrow interest from death.

I'm only picking on AT&T because it just showed up in my feed. Please share any others you see at the contact form below.

PETA is sexually exploiting 16-year-olds now

Via PETA

That's 16-year-old Samia Finnerty, musician and daughter of actress Kathy Najimy, posing provocatively with another dumb double-entendre.

PETA calls her their "youngest pinup" and states:

PETA normally waits until people turn 18 before asking them to star in a "provocative" campaign, but not this time. Sixteen-year-old singer-songwriter Samia Najimy Finnerty stars in our new "Vegans Go All the Way" ad. 

Classy. I also question the social marketing strategy of dissing vegetarians as being some kind of lesser vegans. Way to alienate a large proportion of your base, PETA!

Simple, smart, and effective

I love the power of a single-minded idea:



This ad, by Rethink for Canada's own Predator Watch (site "under construction" ?!?) turns the tables — almost literally — on anonymous perverts looking to exploit minors on the Internet. (via @AdFreak)



What I like about this ad is its simplicity. The pure idea, grounded in reality, allows the spot to build a proper story and hit home with a punch.

I also love the casting of the predator as just an ordinary guy, husband —and even father. After all, the hardcore creeps living in vans down by the river are not going to be affected by social marketing, while the opportunistic skeevos doing "research" could be scared off by the idea that they are essentially cruising schoolyards in public. And they have a lot to lose.

The only thing that disappoints me about this campaign (besides the Web site fail) is the print. That stuff is just plain creepy:



Should I mention one more time that the call-to-action goes to an "under construction" page? Kind of undermines the whole "we're omnipresent on the Internet" thing. (The client, Children of the Street Society, should've just sent people straight to their homepage.) Oh well, I still love the spot.