New Column--Advertisers: Men Are Not Idiots
April 14th, 2008 by Glenn Sacks, MA for Fathers & Families
"The way the advertising industry portrays men has drawn increasing scrutiny in both the trade press and the mainstream media. Defenders of the status quo -- in which men are depicted as irresponsible fathers and lazy, foolish husbands -- are starting to feel outnumbered. It's an understandable feeling...
"The evidence is clear: 'Man as idiot' isn't going over very well these days."
My new column, Attention Ad Execs: Media Criticism of Anti-Male Ads Is Mounting (Advertising Age, 4/14/08), co-authored with Richard Smaglick of www.fathersandhusbands.org, appeared today in Advertising Age, one of the largest advertising industry publications. To write a Letter to the Editor, click on editor@adage.com.
The piece is part of Advertising Age's "CMO Strategy" section--a section directed towards marketing and advertising executives [Chief Marketing Officers]. Our column there is an opportunity to, as they say, "Speak truth to power."
In the column, we gave three specific suggestions for the advertising industry:
"Create more ads that are father-positive. Some recent examples include AT&T's touching father-daughter ad 'Monkey'; First Choice Holidays' 'Slow-Motion Hugs'; and Ford's father-son ad 'We Know.'
"As we consider whether it's wise to make men the butt of every joke, we should also consider the joke itself. Many see the 1960s as the golden age of advertising. Those who crafted the ads of that era created work of superb quality, seldom if ever resorting to the contempt, shame and aggressive ridicule of today's ads.
"When an ad does need to poke fun at somebody, stop automatically defaulting to men as fools."
"));
19 queries. 0.341 seconds.
April 14th, 2008 at 2:49 pm
Glenn, your efforts in this area are having an effect and making a difference.
Sometimes it seems that the task of "speaking truth to power" is just too vast to accomplish, but we have to remember that it is the "tipping point" that will make the difference -- where no further external force is required for momentum to increase. As I explain to my students when teaching soft, circular blocking techniques, it takes a lot of force -- too much, really -- to stop a locomotive. It takes only a relatively small force, properly applied, to misdirect the locomotive and cause it to derail. You are helping to "derail" misandry in advertising -- mostly by dragging it out into the sunshine and proclaiming that it exists and WON"T be ignored any longer.
Keep up the good work.
April 14th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Great article. I pray the industry hears the message and acts on it.
April 14th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
As men are remaining single, their dollar's will no longer ,somehow migrate into the realm of "womens purchasing power".
As that happens, advertising will fallow..
April 14th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
I have written my letters to the editors and been published. How nice to be heard. Glenn, your work is noble and you have made great strides. I for one can see the tide beginning to turn. Good work and thank you! I may be late but I finally have made it to the march for equality!
April 14th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
I just saw an ad for something-or-another the other day that involved a father trying to catch a baseball and ending up elbowing his son in the eye. It's really sad how men are the only group that still gets mocked this way in advertising.
April 14th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Nicely done. The "man as idiot" no longer plays in Peoria. And the beauty of it all is that the coming changes will reflect the reality of dual-earner couples...Dad handling diaper duties while Mom gets dinner.
April 14th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
@Annie
How interesting what you say about dual earning couples. I am a proud father and I am happy to the point of demanding to do more of the domestic role. I enjoy every minute I get to spend with my son be it cleaning his diaper, feeding, bathing or just playing.
My point being that I am not alone in this. There is most definitely a new breed of men in America who do cherish their families and have no problem with domestic chore inclusion. Regardless of this truth the mentality of advertising and much of America seems to still in pre-1960 mode. To the point where they actually push men to stay in this role of being the domestic-husband-father moron. I for one take offense to any suggestion that my family based mentality is in any way short of masculine. I am more a man for it, not less.
April 14th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
Absolutely. We live in rural podunk, and the message is getting here, albeit slowly. I think it is tougher on young men who have been raised in an environment where more traditional gender roles still prevail...
But again, the reality of people's lives are giving these young men a better sense of their own desires, despite the still existing (but diminishing) pressures to dismiss involved fatherhood/domesticity as unmanly. Change is slow, but it is coming, and families will be the stronger for it.
April 14th, 2008 at 4:25 pm
Peter,
I don't think this is a "new" breed of men. I come from a family full of men and they are/were all very comfotable around babies. I think perhaps there was a period in suburbanite america where men had less direct contact with the kids than previously due to the industrial revolution and the way it changed how we earn a living. I honestly believe if we were to look back at the "common" or average man in the history of america, boys would have been very young when they started following thier fathers around the farm or workshop, store or whatever. I think having a 5 year old follow you around day in and day out would have been normal and probably counted as "child rearing" then, even though now we would call it abuse or some nonsense.
April 14th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Way to go, Glenn.
April 14th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
Men make most of the money- quite rightly as they work longer hours- yet they stupidly allow women to spend most of the money they make! Spend your own money and soon the jackasses in ads will be women.
April 14th, 2008 at 7:10 pm
...that column rules. It points out all the stats - girls doing much much better than boys in school, men comprising the homeless, suicide victims, etc - that the mainstream media feels it can ignore because, well, it believes males don't count...
April 14th, 2008 at 9:45 pm
Great progress, Glenn.
April 14th, 2008 at 11:23 pm
Nicely done (again). It's no wonder so many of your critics rail against you so vehemently (albeit unfairly): it's because you're so effective.
April 15th, 2008 at 12:50 am
Yay Glenn,
I used to subscribe to Advertising Age, it's a great publication. I'm glad the message is getting out there that we need to respect fathers in advertising. Well done.
April 15th, 2008 at 1:09 am
My brother is recently separated with his wife and he says his wife and daughters watch the show "Reba" all the time and it makes him sick b/c it is such fantasy and it's like they don't need the dad.
I observed though that the man in that show is made to look like an idiot all the time while Reba is the so-called "survivor" (of the divorce, I guess).
And the ex-husband is depicted as the perpetrator of the affair and divorce, which is not consistent with reality either.
I used to like that Reba show, but Glenn Sacks and my brother's divorce has opened my eyes and now I see it as very distasteful. I also wondered when I watched that show what Reba's job was b/c she is always home in the big house with the kids.
April 15th, 2008 at 1:39 am
Peter,
I've got to agree with ed: the "new breed of men" has always existed, especially before the industrial revolution of the late 1800's and most of the 1900's. During those times, though women performed most of the domestic work, men were rarely, if ever, given credit for the work they also did around the house after their work shift ended.
I love Jay R's analogy of a locomotive: stopping it is nearly impossible, derailing it requires more brains and less force.
Thanks to Glenn and all of the others. Our efforts are beginning to sprout results. Let's keep up the momentum and become the locomotive......for good, as opposed to evil.
April 15th, 2008 at 2:49 am
As one raised in a rural environment I would just like to chime in and add to those who have asserted that men/fathers have been very involved domestically is an accurate reflection of my experience. A rural geography demands input from all family members- chores on a ranch know no gender, they just better get done before sundown.
April 15th, 2008 at 7:55 am
If a company's ad shows a man chastised by his daughter, disrespected by his family, shown as ignorant or the like, I'm not giving that company my money and I'm letting them know it. If an ad was anti-woman, would a woman allow family money to go to that company? Rightly, no. Then why should a man allow family money to go to a company that is anti-family, making men look foolish?
April 15th, 2008 at 10:19 am
One of the reasons that the "man as idiot" ads are so prolific is because it doesn't take a lot of talent to come up with ads like that. In the "golden age" the marketing teams had to be more intelligent with their creativity. Men are such easy targets and one of the only targets who don't usually complain about their portrayal. If women were portrayed as being the idiot as frequently as men are, or if any ethnic type were singled out repeatedly to be the idiot, you can bet that there would be organized groups making a big fuss about it. But men, as a group, are not organized, we don't speak up very often, and we have absolutely no policitical clout. Perhaps the tide is changing, and I would love to see more ads which show men in a good light. I, too, am so tired of the ads where women and children are the smart ones in the family, and men are a nuisance to be endured.
April 15th, 2008 at 10:48 am
ed:
I think having a 5 year old follow you around day in and day out would have been normal and probably counted as "child rearing" then, even though now we would call it abuse or some nonsense.
Correct. Teaching that five year old how to be an adult is an important lesson. It's a shame that a mother's care is regarded as vital (and it is) and a father's care is regarded as abuse, sexist, or whatever.
Peter:
There is most definitely a new breed of men in America who do cherish their families and have no problem with domestic chore inclusion.
I wouldn't say its a new breed but more like such men are tired of having their contributions ignored. Think about the Pre-Industrial Revolution period (before railroads and only way to get to the west was by horse and carriage) that alphacat mentions. More than likely women maintained the home but who built that home? Women more than likely did the majority of the cooking for the family but who was bringing home the food they were cooking (and since supermarkets hadn't quite caught on yet how do you think most of the food was obtained?) Women more than likely stayed indoors when the house or town was attacked by bandits but who was outside putting their lives on the line to make sure the bandits didn't make it inside to the women and children?
I think what happened is that what was traditionally known as "woman's work" has stayed the same while "man's work" has changed. That home that was built by the pioneering man is now built by a hired construction company. The food that the pioneering man hunted and harvested is now bought at the store where someone else has done the hunting and harvesting. Home security is easier with alarm systems and other measures. But the thing that gets left out of the equation (and this leads to the accusation that men don't do any domestic chores) is the fact that in order to get those things done (i.e. money) those men are working constant to borderline insane hours outside the home.
But back to the main topic. Anti-male ads are starting to get on my nerves. And the scary thing isn't they effect they have on me (a grown man). But what is little Billy thinking when he is bombarded with commercials and shows that tell him men are idiots that can't do right and women are goddesses that can't do wrong. And what is little Sue thinking as she is bombarded with ads and shows and ads telling her its okay to treat the men in her life like bafoons while treating the women in her life like they are better than men. Not good lessons to teach.
April 15th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
There is a difference between chore inclusion and being PW.
April 15th, 2008 at 4:30 pm
Only very stupid marketers would destroy brand equity with one group in the process of using negative advertising to make a quick, and questionable "connect" with another group.
And that group being alienated is the entire male population of a country, well, that meets my definition of extremely stupid marketers.
Are there such idiots working in the ad world?
Absolutely.
Do they get penalized for long term losses of brand equity of their clients?
Rarely. The individuals in an ad team are almost always on to the next client, and firms are rotated with considerable frequency.
Yep, just like some other professionals who can make lots of money in the short run while screwing their clients for life, some folks in the ad world certainly damage their ad clients tremendously in their quest for billings.
April 15th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
Not only are anti-male ads not good, but also ads for shampoo that only feature women washing their hair, or women advertising for hair colour.
That is also anti-male.
After all,all boys and men must wash their hair at some point. And some of us colour our hair to cover up the grays.
I know it was not always like this. As far back as the 1970s and 1980s there were ads for shampoo and stuff that gets out the gray (Grecian?).
Sometimes on ad breaks you'll see two or three "lifestyle" products being advertised... all featuring women. No men are even on camera.
It's like the women directing the ads, don't want to even want to acknowledge that men exist.
April 15th, 2008 at 10:42 pm
I am respectfully requesting all advertisements undermining men stop. Pointing to the the Social Learning Theory. (Weiten, p. 675) The theory outlines how an indiviual is influenced from early life on. Classical conditioning
follows, and leads to emotional responses.
Warm regards,
Mark Bogan
Yellowknife, NT
X1A 2K2
Canada
Source: Weiten, W. (2002) Psychology themes & variations (5th ed.) Santa Clara University: Wadworth Thompson Learning.
April 15th, 2008 at 11:38 pm
Bob W.,
I too refuse to give my hard earned money to the company's that show us as bufoons. E.g., I will never, never, ever, ever buy so much as a nail at Home Depot. After they showed a wife being assisted by a sales clerk, while the husband was sticking a toilet to his forehead, I wrote to Home Depot and complained. The ads changed a little, but occasionally, I still their men-as-idiots ads. To Lowe's credit, their ads have been neutral, if not complimentary to us. I've also written to Lowe's, received a nice response letter and will continue to give them my business.
There are many companies like this, and I try like hell to let them know if they will or will not get my money. I then write down in my daily business binder the good guys and the bad guys. My money is tiny in the whole scheme of things, but Glenn started as a small guy. We can make a difference. The really great news is that some women friends are beginning to agree with me and going along with me. Paternal grandmothers are some of the most powerful women on our side.
Don't let up, lads. Things are slowly changing.
April 16th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Hello Glenn,
Interesting article. You've touched on a nerve -- everyone wants to be treated with respect. It's one of the cornerstones of Responsible Marketing, and I'm glad to see you taking this and running with it. Bully to you.
Patrick Byers
The Responsible Marketing Blog
http://responsiblemarketing.com
April 16th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
The impact of this sort of change cannot be overestimated.
April 17th, 2008 at 6:59 am
Until the average male becoms a bit more assertive regarding his rights and image, this type of
abuse will continue unabated. Portrayal of men as objects to be laughed at is no different from
portrayal of women as sexual objects, Jews as drinkers of Christian kids blood, and calling an
afro-american a "nigger".
April 27th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
I can take a joke pretty well; however, when the joke is always on the white male, it gets old. The book, "Spreading Misandry," really helped put the male bashing in perspective for me. I just decided to vote with my wallet, so I simply make a note of the male bashing advertisers, email the company from their website, and offer my opinion that I do not appreciate their sense of humor, and will never buy another product from their company.