Background: TV often portrays men and fathers as idiots--to watch some videos of "dad as idiot" TV commercials, click here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, or here. As Bill Maher says, "Look at television...the wife is always brilliant and ethereal and right about everything and the husband is always just a dumb jerk who's lucky to have found her."

We've done two campaigns against these types of commercials--to learn more, click here and here.

The National Organization for Women/NOW Foundation has launched a new campaign around ads which they label "Offensive to Women." The campaign involved Love Your Body Day 2007, which was October 18. In this series, I'm reprinting some of the ads which NOW tells us are "Offensive to Women," giving my own humble opinion on the matter and soliciting yours.

Maker's Mark is a handcrafted small batch type of bourbon whisky distilled in Loretto, Kentucky. NOW is criticizing the Maker's Mark ad pictured. They explain:

"What is it about selling alcohol that makes advertisers want to belittle and insult women...does it really make men feel more powerful?"

In this case, I'm inclined to agree with NOW. In fact, the ad pictured is a pretty good example of the way advertising routinely treats men and fathers, with the genders switched. Gratuitous insults for the other gender, often delivered with a kind of breezy contempt. So NOW starts at 1 for 1, in my book.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 25th, 2007 at 1:13 pm and is filed under Feminism/NOW, Advertising, TV, Movies & Gender. You can trackback from your own site.