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Saturday, October 10, 2009

Want to illustrate the disposability of women?

It works best if you compare them to disposable snot rags.

I couldn't find the tv commercial to embed, but you can check it out at the above link and click for films (the as seen on tv icon).

A cursory glance at their channel imparts a few things:

  • Moms come 8 varieties: resourceful mom, Southern old timey mom, spicy Latina mom, hippie mom, strict older mom, BFF mom, do everything cuz she loves her babies so much mom, and the tough love mom.  
  • Mom varieties seem to have been yanked out of popular dudebro movies.
  • Moms can be cool and like sports (but mostly it's to impress the men they care for).
  • Moms love to tell other moms what to do.
  • Moms are apparently not exempt from racial stereotypes.
Don't like your mom?  That's okay, because now you can choose the perfect mom for you.  It's okay if you're a douchebag man-child.  There's a mom who will love you anyway.  And if you get sick of her too, just get a knew one.  Moms are tissues, I guess.

Update: I just thought of something else that bothers me about this stupid campaign: the whole mom identity.  Once a woman becomes a mom, the mom identity overshadows everything else.  Often in movies, tv shows, and even ads we see moms being moms, and any other identity is secondary to the mom identity.  Kleenex has cashed in on the mom identity.  These created moms are super awesome because their identities as moms seems to be of utmost importance in their limited characterization.

And it's like a pageant, where they're acting out skits and scenarios, and then encouraging the viewer to pick them.  Weird.

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

how about the disdainful looks which he casts upon several of the moms?? I was seething when I first saw this stinky commercial. I just fired off an email to kleenex. This ad is typical on so many levels of the entitled White male that is prevalent in media (*particularly movies, ahem).

Enough already. Disrespectful on soooo many levels I cannot even deal.