The Gillette ad popped up fairly promptly in my orbit via an online women's group I follow. It received mostly favourable commentary in response, though some women thought it didn't go far enough to address men's 'unmanly' behaviour, and a few thought it as well a shameless attempt to jump on the bandwagon of the Me Too movement and make some money - probably for men - same as it ever was. And as it got me and other women in the group and no doubt other groups besides to watch an ad that we would have otherwise steered well clear of, then share it, discuss it and even blog about it, there can be no doubt that the ad worked to extend Gillette's market reach, which does stink a bit of the appropriation and exploitation of politics and pain - women's pain - for commercial (probably men's) gain.
Then again the old problem of gender politics being sidelined and trivialised as a 'women's issue' was not going away on its own without men stepping up, with whatever ulterior motive got them to do that if that's what it took, to own the challenges of gender politics as theirs too, and I think for that reason the ad, for its definite weaknesses, does quite well. At least it's a start as far as the world of advertising goes, which is a pretty big and historically far from feminist-friendly world.
However I do have one concern about the ad, I regret that its main message, the call to arms for men to step up and be better in their behaviour towards women was diluted and distracted by the inclusion of a segment on very young boys play fighting and their fighting being broken up by a gently-spoken man. In my experience having raised two boys and seen many more raised, play fighting amongst boys is natural and has nothing to do with boys developing toxic attitudes in adulthood about male superiority and the entitlement to dominate, demean and abuse women, a connection that is implied in the ad. And if the main issue is fudged in this way it not only lessens its political potential to actually change minds and behaviour for good, but it is likely to aggravate those men who are most reluctant to accept that change is needed, as indeed it appears to have done in this case.
If we are serious about challenging toxic masculinity and creating a more gender just world, as increasing numbers of people are, the focus needs to be on changing what boys are taught about girls and women through the role-modelling of their fathers and other men they know and see on their screens, teaching that to date, sadly, has been generally encouraging of sexist attitudes and behaviours, with females consistently treated and represented as sexy and or stupid and invariably secondary to men. And the ad fails a little here too, because women are hardly in it.
Still, it's a start and it gets more right than wrong, which in the fraught world of gender politics is to be commended. And therein is my two-cents worth. Now I'm off to shave my chin.
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