Locally we have an advert for a certain insurance company which I will not name. Of course, if you live locally, you will soon be able to work out exactly which company I am referring to, but I will ask that you not say the name :-) After all, I have no desire to be sued. However, I don't have a comment about them specifically, but rather, I am going to use this advert as an example of a point I'd like to make.
The premise of this series of adverts is that the husband and wife in question do not insure with this company, but really should. In all the adverts, the husband is portrayed as somehow "less". He is physically small and looks timid. He cowers before his wife who is portrayed as a loud, large and aggressive woman. The actors are physically representative of their characters and the man is the embodiment of a doormat. The ultimate terrified "yes dear" guy. So what is my problem? Well, let us examine the imagery created by these commercials (both print and TV... possibly radio but I don't listen).
Most people chuckle at the adverts, but imagine for a moment that the roles were reversed. Imagine that the wife was portrayed as a thin, small, timid, scared woman. Now imagine her husband portrayed as a large, loud, aggressive man. Not so funny any more is it? You see, if the advert had been set up that way, it would remind us too clearly of the abusive nature of relationships and all the "anti-woman abuse" activists would be up in arms at the glorification of the abuse of women. There would be complaints on every level and the company and ad agency would have had to retract the ad probably within a day or two of it starting to air. After all, heaven forbid that we appear to be in favour of abusing women either verbally or physically or psychologically!
Still don't see what my issue is?? Well, what are we saying about the men in our lives? By portraying them as weak, terrified of us, verbally abused by their wives, what lessons are we teaching our youth? What message are we sending to our men? That we want them to be weak and sad? I certainly don't want a man like that. Why is no-one upset about this advert portraying abuse of men in a pseudo-positive light? Ok. So I admit that I may be barking up the wrong tree here, but I have fairly strong opinions. You see, I HATE the word "chairperson" or "the chair". It is the chairman. God is not a "she" or a "they" to placate your delicate sensibilities, he is a He. So why aren't we portraying men and women equally without issue? After all, if we cannot portray the abuse of women (quite rightly), why is the abuse of men considered funny?
I'm not trying to undo all the work of passionate women's libbers or anything, but I feel quite strongly that I don't need a word to be changed so that I can feel secure. I feel just as powerful as a man when I am chairman of a committee, in fact I feel somehow less empowered by being called "the chair". Women have come so far over the past century and more and yet we still feel threatened by the silliest things - we get wrapped up in these little things instead of celebrating the power we have. You cannot expect the world to bend it's entire will to yours just because you have boobs and then still expect a man to open all your doors and pull your chair out for you. It's a double standard. Like the ad.
Women have reached the top in so many fields - industry, military, arts, etc - and yet we still feel threatened by the emptiness of the names that things have. We insist on labels which are gender non-specific or feminine and what we fail to realise is that by doing this, we draw more attention to our differences rather than to our similarities.
It's a situation that makes me chuckle even as it frustrates and annoys me.
Until next time...
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