Treating men like idiots is now an absolute staple for TV advertising. It's so prevalent that The Now Show on BBC Radio 4 even did a sketch on it this week.
I thought I'd try to blog about every blatantly anti-male ad I see so that the feminists can see that women are not the only one who have to face sexist advertising.
Today's "Biggest Bigots in Advertising" award goes to Vaillant heating systems, whose current TV ad ends with the line
"So simple even dad understands it"
So this company thinks it will actually curry favour with its customers by claiming that in all families, dad is the thick one. And presumably they'll have done their research, meaning they're probably right! So it's not just that the ad is sexist - it's that their research shows a large part of their potential customer base (namely the entire United Kingdom) probably is as well.
Saturday 13 March 2010
Sunday 31 January 2010
Men's health in the media
I must have posted this link before, discussing the fact that treatment of male-specific cancers loses out in the appropriation of both public and private funding in the UK.
Now, I've just finished reading an article about suicide in the Daily Mail (which seems to be becoming the most vociferously man-hating newspaper in the UK, which is saying a lot). The article points out that men kill themselves at more than three times the rate of women, and that the gender suicide gap widened further over the year under review. Yet they make no comment whatsover on this and it is mentioned only in passing.
If women killed themselves at 3 times the rate of men, can we really believe we would just ignore the issue like this?
It's also pretty striking that the article is illustrated by two different pictures of women. Like men are irrelevant in an issue that overwhelmingly affects them.
I posted on the subject on the Femail boards at the Mail online and the post was removed. I have yet to find out why. I was very polite, but I think some people dislike discussing the male side of gender issues on that board, since it is officially a baord for women.
But guess what - surprise surprise, there is no board for men!
On reflection I thought the health boards would be a better place for my comment. Once there, I noticed that although there is a dedicated section for Women's Health, there is (of course) no section for men's health. There is even a dedicated section for 'Cosmetic Surgery'... but the planet's 3 billion men are deemed less important than this vital issue, it seems.
This truly sums up the attitude of the UK media to men, men's issues and men's wellbeing. They're just not worthy of the space.
Now, I've just finished reading an article about suicide in the Daily Mail (which seems to be becoming the most vociferously man-hating newspaper in the UK, which is saying a lot). The article points out that men kill themselves at more than three times the rate of women, and that the gender suicide gap widened further over the year under review. Yet they make no comment whatsover on this and it is mentioned only in passing.
If women killed themselves at 3 times the rate of men, can we really believe we would just ignore the issue like this?
It's also pretty striking that the article is illustrated by two different pictures of women. Like men are irrelevant in an issue that overwhelmingly affects them.
I posted on the subject on the Femail boards at the Mail online and the post was removed. I have yet to find out why. I was very polite, but I think some people dislike discussing the male side of gender issues on that board, since it is officially a baord for women.
But guess what - surprise surprise, there is no board for men!
On reflection I thought the health boards would be a better place for my comment. Once there, I noticed that although there is a dedicated section for Women's Health, there is (of course) no section for men's health. There is even a dedicated section for 'Cosmetic Surgery'... but the planet's 3 billion men are deemed less important than this vital issue, it seems.
This truly sums up the attitude of the UK media to men, men's issues and men's wellbeing. They're just not worthy of the space.
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