In a Long History of Sexist Ads and Outrage, It’s the Apology That’s New

Advertisers began asking, “Are we appealing to their instincts and desires in a temporary fashion, or are we trying to engage them in a narrative about their own life and how we as a company can fit into their own life?” he said.

Many commercials moved toward absurdist humor — as with many of Geico’s ads — or appeals to family, like a 2016 ad for Honda in which a man gets home safely to his young wife and baby thanks to the reliable emergency brake system.

That commercial was a far cry from “Man’s Last Stand,” a 2010 Dodge ad that showed beaten-down men defiantly telling the women in their lives that if they have to comply with chores and other demands, they will buy whatever car they want.

The social media era

Outcry over objectification may be swifter and louder, but men are still more represented in commercials than women, according to a 2019 analysis by the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, a nonprofit started by the Oscar-winning actor.

Researchers for the organization looked at 2.7 million YouTube videos uploaded by advertisers and found that while there was some improvement in gender representation over a five-year period, male characters were seen 56 percent of the time, while female characters were seen 44 percent of the time. Male characters were also heard one and a half times more than female characters.

In Australia, the criticism against KFC itself drew abusive blowback, said Melinda Liszewski, a spokeswoman for Collective Shout, a grass-roots organization that campaigns against the objectification of women.

“I was surprised that our commentary on the KFC ad would elicit such vile, sexually explicit and misogynistic abuse,” she said. “Myself and my colleagues spent a number of hours removing comments and men from our social media pages.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/01/us/kfc-commercial-sexist.html?emc=rss&partner=rss