Ads about periods too much for MTA

I don't really like these ads much, but I don't see anything offensive about them. The media agency for Metropolitan Transportation Authority (NYC) however, has issues with the imagery, and even the word "period." (MTA itself was not involved in the decision.)

From mic.com:

According to Veronica del Rosario, Thinx's director of marketing, the representative was concerned that children would see the word "period" in the ad and ask their parents what it meant. When Thinx later submitted the ad with the word "period" in the copy, the agency told them they could not run the copy "as is." 

"I stated [to an Outfront rep] that it was extremely disheartening that [certain other ads] could fly, but something for women that speaks directly to women isn't OK by them," del Rosario told Mic. "He replied, 'This is not a women's issue. Don't try to make it a women's rights thing.'"

Apparently, they were also concerned with the amount of skin showing in the Thinx ads, as well as the  cheeky use of a grapefruit and the contents of an egg.

MTA has run some rather obnoxious breast augmentation ads before, but apparently children are going to be more traumatized by being reminded of the very organs that made them.

Bic South Africa fails hard for women's day

Via Twitter

August 9 was National Women's Day in South Africa, and Bic SA's social media team tried to share an empowering captioned image. The only problem was, it wasn't really empowering at all.

Reaction was swift and sharp, including this hack:

Twitter

The problem is obvious. "Think like a man" is hardly celebrating women's equality.

I'll hand it to Bic, however. They did take it down and issue a proper apology.

From Facebook:

Hi everyone. Let’s start out by saying we’re incredibly sorry for offending everybody - that was never our intention, but we completely understand where we’ve gone wrong. This post should never have gone out. The feedback you have given us will help us ensure that something like this will never happen again, and we appreciate that.

It still shouldn't have happened in the first place, but at least it opens a helpful conversation. Especially for an international brand with a bad history of gender stereotyping.

Apparently, this Indian ad showing a woman remarrying is a big deal

Buzzfeed's Rega Jha shared this ad by Tansishq, an Indian jewellery brand. She explains that while marriage is a common theme for these types of ads, the idea of showing the second marriage of a woman with a child is unusual:

"This is remarkable for a nation where widow remarriage, although legal, is still not completely accepted, and divorce and remarriage, while on the rise, are still highly stigmatized."

Ms. Jha says that at the end, the girl asks her new stepfather if she can call him "daddy".

The ad is pretty over-the-top in its sentimentalism to Western eyes, but the Twitter comments gathered in the post congratulate the advertiser for showing a "dusky" bride (played by Priyanka Bose) who "isn't stick skinny" and who has a child.

Low-fat cheese brand makes fun of diet industry clichés aimed at women

More and more brands are realizing that the best way to reach women is to make fun of the way everyone else tries to reach women.

The menstruation products industry has been doing this for years. Fashion, too. So low-cal foods might as well get into the action. And who knows cheese better than a cheese manufacturer?



Adfreak's Rebecca Cullers writes,

...the truly subversive content is in the jingle which asks, "How many clichés are we gonna stand?" There is more than a passing jibe toward Special K, whose red and white color pallet and blue-jean obsession is mocked. And the spot ends with a furious montage of women measuring and weighing themselves as the jingle sings, "They know they bring us down, but it's for our own good, cause we gotta keep you girls all feeling bad about food."

You can follow the campaign on Facebook, where you can make your own "bad ad".

Billboard celebrating "remarkable women" shows only men

According to Halifax's Chronicle Herald:

The billboard promotes a Mount Saint Vincent University campaign for its Women’s Wall of Honour project, a tribute that will be erected outside the new Margaret Norrie McCain Centre for Teaching, Learning and Research when it opens in December 2014. 

For a donation of $1,200, honourees’ names will be included in the Wall of Honour and their stories will be shared on an associated website.

The men are all donors to the campaign. Which is great. And the campaign itself is a good one. But the paternalism of the billboard, even if unintentional, is baffling.

"My Vagina, My Rules" poster is too cool for school

This may be The Year of the Vagina throughout much of the United States, but not at Brooklyn Technical High School.

Animal New York reports that the poster (above), advertising the school’s Progressive Student Awareness club, was swiftly banned after being posted around campus.

Student Brianna Payne was shocked by the censorship, since she had had the posters pre-approved by her teacher, Joseph Kaelin. “He told me that the principal and a couple of the assistant principals saw the posters and they were like, ‘We don’t like them. They’re inappropriate,’” Payne told Animal NY's Andy Cush. “He told me that he agreed with us, and he thought what we were doing was correct, but he couldn’t do anything about it.”

Laura Marquez, Brooklyn Tech's Assistant Principal of Parent and Student Engagement, claims the poster was sensationalist and lacking in useful information. “The poster was passed around to a room of about a dozen administrators, and no person said, ‘Well, you know, lets give them a shot,’" she explained. "Everybody was shaking their heads, or various degrees of annoyed and offended.”

Because "vagina" is a dirty, dirty word. Especially in the context of sexual rights. I can't believe we trust teenage girls to go running around with those things between their legs. Won't someone PLEASE think about the children?

Campaign to ban lifejackets: Great concept, poor execution

Via Buzzfeed

While this poster tries a little too hard, the concept is a good one: what if right wing politicians treated every safety device the way they treat birth control?

I think where this gag petition goes wrong is when it changes mid-stream from making fun on abstinence-only education and attempted healthcare exclusions (and even bans) on birth control  to wade into the murk of Rep. Todd Akin's biologically-questionable "legitimate rape" comment:

“It seems to be, first of all, from what I understand from doctors, it’s really rare. If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut the whole thing down.”

Not that Rep. Akin doesn't deserve the full might of the snarky internet against him. It's just that every professional communicator knows that you have to focus your message. The Akin thing is about abortion, not contraception, and the life jacket metaphor isn't nearly as strong.

Empowering or offensive?

Via Ads of The World

This ad was created by an all-male creative team over at MacLaren McCann, Toronto.

Clever visual concept, nice art direction... but is it good advertising?

On the one hand, it is lighthearted and speaks to a third-wave type of sexy empowerment. On the other, it could be seen as demeaning the athleticism of women golfers by representing them with an object that has nothing to do with their sport, and is more about their sexuality.

Yeah, I know I'm over-thinking it. That's just what I do.

But what do you think?

Strip club industry to Canadians: "We are coming for your daughters!"

Via Wikimedia Commons

The Adult Entertainment Association of Canada recently announced a "six-point action plan" to fight against the federal government's new moratorium on issuing visas or extensions for foreign exotic dancers working in Canada's "ballet" clubs. They plan on organizing the dancers; seeking Canadian husbands to marry those whose visas are expiring; filing refugee claims, and working with civil servants. (What?)

But another point in the plan  is the one that may get the most attention from average Canadians: If they can't bring in foreigners, they will invite your daughters to do the job.

Association director Tim Lambrinos told QMI Agency that recruiters from strip clubs will try to attract students by attending job fairs at high schools, colleges and universities in Toronto and surrounding areas. "We are already doing some outreach work in some areas," he said. "We will be taking a strippers' dance pole with us to the schools."

I have been trying to track down what QMI claims is a draft copy of the flyer that AEAC is planning to woo the teens with, but to no avail. Here's how they describe it:

QMI Agency has obtained a draft copy of the flyer to be circulated to high school students. It advises them that they can earn tuition fees while working as an "exotic dance entertainer" and that no sex with customers is permitted. 

"If you are visually appealing and comfortable with your naked body and are comfortable about taking all your clothes off," the flyer states. "You can be working right now as an exotic dancer and earn your tuition fees for university or college." 

Students are told they must be "comfortable ... onstage at a club and disrobing," and are guaranteed that "no actual sex or sex acts (will) occur." 

It warns them that they will have to provide private dances, or table dances, in dark lounge areas and part-time, full-time or seasonal jobs are available.

While it is unlikely that Mr. Lambrinos and his stripper pole will be attending career day in your child's school anytime soon, this obvious PR move might backfire as it makes people think of how women are treated in the legal sex industry.

Timea Nagy (via CNEWS)

The visa ban is a result of increasing public unease with the spectre of human trafficking. Hungarian immigrant Timea Nagy, at age 19, was tricked into entering a life of stripping and prostitution in Canada. She was abducted and abused before escaping. She later founded the human trafficking rescue organization, Walk With Me. She applauded the visa ban as a way to get women out of the life.

Caroline and Nicola (via Canoe)

On the other side, QMI interviewed two women from Hungary who are currently working in strip clubs, and feel betrayed by the change in their status.  "I am very disappointed and afraid of what may happen to me in the future," said 28-year-old Caroline. Nicola, 25, added "My visa is almost expired and I am very scared. I am very shattered that I may no longer be able to work and help my family back home."

And here's the problem: we created the demand for these performers, and in many cases turned a blind eye to how they got here and what they endure behind closed doors. But once confronted with the problem, we take it out on those same performers by kicking them out of the country. Either way, we as a society are treating foreign women as disposable commodities.

Which leads back to the "we are coming for your daughters" ploy. Ironically, it reminds me of the "Somebody's Daughter" Christian anti-porn campaign from a few years ago. I wonder if it will make people think more about the women onstage and in the champagne rooms as actual people deserving of empathy and respect, not just paid-for boobs and pudenda. But my more cynical side tells me that people will opt for the more convenient route of just sending the foreigners home and forgetting about the whole thing.

Related: Exotic Dancing Industry in Ontario: Health and Safety (pdf)

2012 will be remembered as the Year of The Vagina

Via Strong Intelligent Women Choosing Equality & Freedom Instead Of Religion

Vagina, vagina, vagina. Rhymes with "Regina". Comes from the Latin word for "sheath". And it has become the defining word of the partisan split over women's health rights in the United States.

The word, both naughty and deeply personal, has been enjoying a renaissance of late, as advertisers have used it as the final frontier of sexuality in advertising. But surprisingly, it isn't usually aimed at men. Thanks to 16 years of The Vagina Monologues, the word has become an empowering shibboleth for women, inevitably being exploited to sell feminine hygiene products. Even cynically so.

But now it's political. With the "War on Women" being a defining issue in the 2012 US Presidential Election, "Vagina" is everywhere. In February, Oklahoma Sen. Judy McIntyre (D) protested the intrusiveness of that state's pending "Personhood" bill with a sign that read "If I wanted the government in my womb, I'd fuck a Senator." In May, a woman wearing that slogan on a tee shirt was refused boarding by American Airlines.

It seems that "vagina" is now symbolic of the divide between those who believe that human rights begin at conception, and trump the adult woman's, and those who think the opposite.

It has led to some really ridiculous scenes. This month, Michigan Rep. Lisa Brown (D) was officially banned from speaking on the house floor after stating (in response to a debate on restricting access to emergency contraception) "I'm flattered you're all so interested in my vagina. But no means no."

Republican Rep. Mike Callton, The Week reports, said Brown's choice of words "was so offensive, I don't even want to say it in front of women. I would not say that in mixed company."

Vagina. (Just needed to get that out of my system.)

In retaliation, a number of women State Representatives joined Vagina Monologues author Eve Ensler for a command performance of her groundbreaking play about women's sexuality.

Via CTV

As well, the incident has inspired some empathetic men to join in on the fun, via YouTube:





I am enjoying the mockery. Hopefully, it will motivate those who are already predisposed to this side of the issue to get more politically active, via groups like Rock The Slut Vote. Because it sure won't change the mind of anyone on the opposite side. When you're dealing with religious convictions, mockery only makes them stronger by validating their own fears of religious persecution.

This is going to be an interesting year in the United States. A year in the hands of people who have vaginas. And I wish them the best of luck. Not only because I support them politically, but also because they are reclaiming the true meaning of the word "vagina" — that is, the internal organ.

As a word man, I wince whenever people misuse the word when they mean to say "vulva"...

Are t-shirts protected speech?

The shirt in question is pretty hardcore. Too hardcore for American Airlines, who booted an unnamed passenger off a connecting flight for wearing it, according to Think Progress.

Interestingly, the post points out, the phrase was coined by an actual Senator, Oklahoma District 11 State Senator Judy Eason McIntyre, who Jezebel says showed up with it at an Oklahoma rally against the (since-struck down) "Personhood bill".

Via Jez

And that raises interesting questions about the evolution of everyday language. On its own, I'm not surprised a shirt that said "fuck" in big letters rattled the staff at American Airlines. They're scared of fretful parents causing a fuckstorm of bad press.

But when a democratically elected Senator has used the same words in a political statement, does the "fuck" become part of a protected right to free expression? If the dreaded F-bomb is now so commonplace in the conversation of educated and mature people, can we really claim a right to protect our children from it?

Things are getting passionate down there, while the election heats up. I expect to see and hear many more fucks to come.

You can read the original (second-hand) story at RH Reality Check.

Rebel propaganda from the US #waronwomen

by "Rain L." Source

MoveOn.org calls it, "The Most Disturbing Way To Encourage People To Vote That We've Seen This Year."

I think it's awesome.

As fringe American conservatives continue to restrict women's reproductive rights in the United States, this poster is an iconic reminder of the bad old days of back-alley abortions.

Mexican politician channels FEMEN on campaign billboard

According to Jezebel, Natalia Juarez is a 34-year-old philosophy professor running for Congress as a member of the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution.  The headline reads, "I dare you to build a new project for a nation with no prejudices." The other women are also PDR candidates.

Jezebel's Erin Gloria Ryan is a little cynical about the use of "boobies" to get attention, but I applaud any effort in which women take back ownership of their bodies by using our primal fascination to deliver messages of solidarity for social change.

Here's another one of her party's ads, via The Greenwich Diva:

""It's better for one thousand of us to take a step forward than for one leader to take one thousand steps for us."

Ms. Juarez told CNN, "Society is lethargic. We don't seem to be aware of our role. We need to get energized. We need to tell people, 'Hey, wake up because if you don't, sharks are going to eat you up. Wake up, you citizen and politician'" 

Mexico will hold presidential and congressional elections on July 1.

Canadian Parliament to face the "personhood" debate

Sharable ad from the "Not Yet Born" blog,
linked from Stephen Woodworth's official site.

If there's one issue Canada's majority Conservative government would rather not talk about, it's abortion. Not covered by any specific legislation since 1988, the deeply divisive medical procedure is something many Canadians, regardless of their personal beliefs, just don't feel comfortable talking about in public.

That may soon change, however, as Kitchener's Conservative MP, backbencher Stephen Woodworth, has convinced his party to let him have an hour of Parliament's time to discuss Motion 312, his request that "a special committee of the House be appointed and directed to review the declaration in Subsection 223(1) of the Criminal Code of Canada which states that a child becomes a human being only at the moment of complete birth and to answer the questions hereinafter set forth."

The Honourable Member has positioned himself as the Canadian champion of this cause, similar to the American anti-abortion Personhood movement.

In his own words:

“Canada’s 400 year old definition of human being says children are not human beings until the moment of complete birth”, he said.  “I’ve concluded that modern medical science will inform us that children are in reality human beings at some point before the moment of complete birth.  Canadians need to know there’s no human rights for children before complete birth.
...
A respectful dialogue to update a 400 year old definition of human being with the aid of twenty-first century information will benefit everyone. Whatever view one has about other issues, does it make medical sense in the twenty-first century to say that a child is not a human being until the moment of complete birth?  Members of Parliament have a duty not to accept any law that says some human beings are not human.”

The complication, of course, comes when we try to determine what makes a developing human a "person".

In the United States, the debate is a religious one:

"Personhood is a movement working to respect the God-given right to life by recognizing all human beings as persons who are 'created in the image of God' from the beginning of their biological development, without exceptions."

 This has resulted in attempts to overthrow the legality of abortion in some states, such as Mississippi (where the failed "personhood amendment"would have given full legal rights to a fertilized egg) and Ohio (where the "heartbeat bill" pending debate would ban abortions at the first recordable sign of cardiovascular activity around 9+ weeks).

Mr. Woodworth is proposing a "scientific" approach to determining what makes  human a "person" under the law. But such definitions will by their very nature be philosophical, since the definition must be clarified to be tested: does a heartbeat make us fully human? Reaction to outside stimulus? Observable brain activity? The ability to survive outside the womb? Or simply having been fertilized, and therefore having become genetically distinct from the mother?

This is a classic "slippery slope", an it slides in two opposite directions. On one end is the total ban on abortion from the moment of conception. On the other is the ability to terminally abort a healthy full-term baby. (Nobody really wants the latter, but it's what Mr. Woodworth is implying as the problem.)

In the end, it will come to the same argument about whose rights triumph: a self-aware pregnant woman's control over her own body versus the state's power to compel her to carry the developing human inside her to term. And it will be ugly.

How can a woman make more than a man in the same career?

Just ask Sasha Grey:





This PSA from Belgium's Equal Pay Day movement is an interesting one. The message, "Porn is about the only way for women to make more than men" highlights the problem of women being valued more for the sexual pleasure they can give to men (either directly or voyeuristically) than for non-sexualized accomplishments.

From the cause site:

On average, women still earn 22% less than men. One of the main reasons this issue still exists is that too often young women make career choices led by general expectations. Equal Pay Day however wants to motivate them to think about these expectations, and not just follow them blindly. Sasha Grey wants to as well, and to help spark the debate, she's agreed to share the story about her short but demanding career in adult entertainment.

At the same time, Ms. Grey is an unashamed and defiantly un-regretful case study in life after porn. She has managed to cross over, perhaps more than any hard core female "adult" performer before her, even though her reputation occasionally gets in the way of her trying to be an average citizen.

Does her refusal to vilify the industry that is being used as the extreme example of sexist attitudes in the workplace help or hinder the message?

Via Illegal Advertising

MILFs for sale #FdAdFriday

Ads of the World featured this interesting guerilla campaign by O&M Buenos Aires for womwn's organization AMMAR.

Apparently, 93% of the country's sex workers are mothers trying to make ends meet. The campaign aims to raise awareness for the need to protect these women with more progressive prostitution laws.

At first blush, however, the campaign seems like more of a way to scare clients away. Argentina's callgirls advertise using business cards left in public places. O&M created surprise fold-outs that showed the maternal reality behind the sexy promotion.

I'm not sure targeting clients is the best direct strategy, but of course these days innovative campaigns are all about indirect reach through PR and social media.

Egyptian blogger exposes herself for freedom (nudity)

We are used to seeing all kinds of nudity in the West. But in the Muslim world, it is much different. Even fairly secular countries censor nudes in art as well as advertising.

20-year-old Egyptian blogger Aliaa Magda Elmahdy wants to change that. Last month, she started a new Google blog, called "Nude Art" which features full-frontal nudes of herself and an unidentified male, as well as a cat and some artsy underwear and embrace shots.

They're not great art shots. They look like 1940s amateur pornography. But like that, what they do have is a certain authentic and defiant naïveté from someone who wants to own her own body in a culture than denies that freedom.  The most political of the pictures features self-censorship: “The yellow rectangles on my eyes, mouth and sex organ resemble the censoring of our knowledge, expression and sexuality,” she explained.

“I have the right to live freely in any place… I feel happy and self satisfied when I feel that I’m really free,” she said.

Nothing particularly shocking to jaded Western internet eyes. But in Egypt, where the post-Tahir atmosphere is one of increasingly conservative religious influence, this is practically treason.

The responses on the blog on Twitter (#nudephotorevolutionary) are in both English and Arabic. One negative comment is translated as “a desperate act of social political suicide by a young woman”. And another: “We are defending secularism from innuendos & then we get this #NudePhotoRevolutionary Stop shocking people to the point of repulsion.”

But the comments also show that there is a new generation, globally informed, who want more than an end to political oppression. They want total freedom. Said one English commenter:

"I'm very impressed and inspired by your courage. The revolution in Egypt needs to be a catalyst for greater freedom of expression. If somebody wants to wear a hijab they should be free to do so without facing discrimination but you must also be able to express yourself any way you choose without fear. It's your body and it's entirely up to you how you choose to express yourself."

Is this how a sexual revolution begins?

Link and Arabic translations via Almasri Ayoum
Tip via FEMEN

FEMEN take on the Pope (nudity)

Not quite as outrageous as Sinead's attack, but still newsworthy.



According to their Livejournal (via Google Translate):

"Alexandra Shevchenko, past the police and security services, made ​​her way into the center of the Vatican in St. Peter's Square and staged topless just share during Sunday Mass under the balcony of the Pope, deploying a banner reading 'Freedom for women.'

In this way, activists protested the papal patriarchal propaganda manipulated by the medieval idea of a woman's social and cultural mission. Condemnation of the use of contraceptives, the international ban on the abortion lobby, the correction of clothing and appearance of women, the ban on women in the ordained - a fetid belch a witch hunt. Sexist policies Vatican has its downside in the form of a wave of sexual crimes committed by clergy against children and women. The women's movement FEMEN favor of a free woman, devoid of prejudice, despising all forms of patriarchal slavery, blatant of which was and remains a church!  

FEMEN  caused panic among Vatican intelligence. Journalists were brutally dispersed, the Italian journalists dutifully adopted a ban on shooting, and were not only arrested the activist movement FEMEN, but also a journalist from Australia. The promoters of the movement had more than four hours in the Roman police, and only under pressure from the media escaped deportation."

 Originally from Ukraine, FEMEN are on a tour of Europe to promote women's rights and stick it to the man.

How would ad agencies prefer to depict women's body issues?

Copyranter shared a link about a challenge South Africa's Marie Claire put out to agencies there:

"We asked six advertising agencies to design posters that challenge our perceptions on what the perfect body is. Would any of  these campaigns alter the way you feel about your body? ‘We don’t all have the same body type but, regardless of this, we are all perfect. So, what is it going to take for you to love your body?’ says ed Aspasia Karras. What are your thoughts on the various campaigns?"

Here are mine:

This one by Jupiter Drawing Room is pretty good.

This other one by Jupiter seems a little weak.

TBWA's seems like I've seen it on a T-shirt or video a poster or something

Jesus, TBWA. Come up with something new already.

Not bad, Canvas Lifestyle. Not groundbreaking, but at least it tells a story.
(Fun fact: I did not know Barbie had pink permapanties)

Cool one from King James RSVP. Very Dovesque, but I like the copy.

Morbid and uncalled for, M&C Saatchi

Ogilvy, meanwhile, let a Client Services intern write and design their entry.

Which ones do you like? Which ones do you hate? And has any of these agencies come up with a new insight?

Casting without seeing

Here's an interesting marketing stunt: BareEscentuals, a premium cosmetics company, cast its latest campaign by evaluating models from an open call based first on their written words, then by their voices and interview responses. The client and agency never saw a face until they made their final selections.



Here are the winners:

What, you expected them not to be this beautiful? Perhaps a little older, in some cases, than the average cosmetics models. Perhaps brainer. (Andrea is an environmental scientist and entrepreneur, Melanie has an engineering degree, and all are very accomplished.) But wouldn't you have expected a "blind" casting call to have at least turned up someone more average looking? Or older? Or larger?

Only the client, or perhaps TBWA\Chiat\Day, LA can answer those questions.

Nevertheless, a good marketing tactic. I'll bet Dove wishes they had thought of it first.

Via IBIA