Oh, I hate to write about that ad and give it any more oxygen than it deserves. But I’m seeing discussions about it flooding all of my social media accounts, so I will take some time and complain about it too.
First up, I think this guy did a fine job breaking down everything that’s wrong with the ad itself.
It’s not that I disagree with the message that men shouldn’t be assholes. That’s pretty much the philosophical basis for the great religions of the world.
What triggers me is that this is yet another example of corporate America taking it upon itself to lecture and preach at me. If your core fucking reason for existing is to sell environmentally-unfriendly disposable razor cartridges, I don’t care at all what you have to say on any social topic, ever. This goes for all of these “socially conscious businesses” in all industries honestly. Sell your products or fuck yourself with them. I don’t care.
What is it about this stupid decade that people think they have the right to incessantly preach their own bizarre and divisive morality at every turn and that it’s a great idea for businesses to do it to their core demographic at the expense of running their business?
Honestly, this practice is so self-destructive and yet so prevalent that I have to wonder if it isn’t being coordinated somehow for some evil purpose by some unseen forces. If corporate entities were actively sowing social chaos for the sake of profits, that’d be one thing. This? It’s senseless.
I really just want Gillette and other companies that think it’s their role to harangue me into
Think I’m being too harsh? I’m not. This is the result of years of being told in media what a terrible person I am and I’m truly sick of it. They’ve made it personal and I’m returning the ill-will.
I certainly don’t have to take this shit from companies like Gillette, whose parent company (Procter and Gamble)
Quit lecturing me with your vapid hatemongering and execute any member of your marketing team who even breathes Culture War expressions like “MeToo” within the walls of your office buildings. This goes for all businesses regardless of
Belated disclaimer: I’m not calling for acts of violence against any individuals or business. I’m merely calling upon the Old Gods and the New to unleash a divine sort of punishment upon them for annoying the hell out of me.
On the topic of corporations destroying their brands by senselessly engaging in identity politics, we’re now the top Google search result for “lando fucked his droid”.
https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=-HE_XMmtNoGzswHnray4BQ&q=lando+fucked+his+droid&btnK=Google+Search&oq=lando+fucked+his+droid&gs_l=psy-ab.3…906.4405..4690…0.0..0.686.6029.2-22j5-1……0….1..gws-wiz…..0..0j0i131j0i10j0i22i30.r6_qni-1Ro4
This is inventive. Someone set up a livestream of deleted comments under the Gillette YouTube ad. Most are pretty innocuous.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKg0RNTSClc
I switched to a DE safety razor last year. I was already never planning on going back to cartridge razors, this cements that if I do, it will never be a Gillette razor again.
DE safety is the way to go, honestly. Even that dollar shave club can’t compare with the cost of razor blades in packs of 100. I’d recommend it even if not for Gillette’s social justice retardation.
This is the best summary I’ve seen:
And any of these would have been productive if Gillette absolutely felt like it had to virtue signal. At minimum, they wouldn’t have lost a single customer for it.
I saw this ad on a news site, played it…. and thought to myself, “What the fuck does this have to do with shaving?”
Another YouTuber pointed that the insanity of the ad including purported Armenian Genocide Denier Ana “Women Who Voted For Trump Are Idiots” Kasparian within the video (00:40 in the commercial). This is her:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBquRAun1RE
This wasn’t mere corporate pandering. Whoever put this ad together and approved it BELIEVES in what they were doing.
Nothing to do with shaving.
It’s all about “having a discussion”. Except, you know, that they delete the comments of anyone who disagrees with their decision to wade into divisive identity politics thus rendering a discussion impossible.
A off topic question:
This whole shutdown situation is being drug out by the democrats.
Let me explain why i think that.
I can recall at least 3 times in the last 25 30 years that money has been appropriated for construction of fences barricades walls and such alone the us Mexican border. I also recall that nearly every time that construction has started it was stopped early by a avalanche of lawsuits,court orders, and congressional actions.
The Democrats in power have to know that every anti trump nutter with a few lawyers to rub together is gonna file lawsuits, get court orders, demand strongly worded letters from the UN to stop any construction. should it be for human rights , Social justice, animal rights, Environmentalists fears, ect ect ect.
Point being that just because money is appropriated for a project doesn’t mean that it will go through, Congress can kill any project that they fund, at a later date, or the courts can stop them.
Nancy and Chuck have to know this….if they really wanted to end the pain that these government workers are sufffering , then give trump what he wants, and then in a few weeks defund it or just watch the 5th circus bog it up in the courts for a decade or two….
or am i wrong?>
Hmm. A lot to unpack here.
My theory is that Schumer and Pelosi are pretty much doing the same thing as Gillette. They are so busy putting out the political message they want that it’s ruining their purpose of serving their actual ends.
A good example is the Gorsuch nomination. At the time it was going on, I remarked on how stupid it was for Schumer to have refused to relent at all on allowing the nomination to go forward for the sake of #Resistance. In the end, Gorsuch was confirmed and the judicial filibuster was eliminated. Had Schumer been rational and not simply making pointless demonstrations, he might have had some ability to influence future judicial nominations and maybe persuade the GOP to only invoke cloture on moderate candidates.
Instead, the Democrats got nothing and had to go to the most obscene measures possible to fight Kavanaugh. They’ll have even less to work with when the next SCOTUS justice is nominated since the scorched earth tactics they used against Kavanaugh may have animated disgusted GOP voters enough to strengthen GOP control of the Senate.
Nothing they’re doing with regard to immigration makes any sense. They’ve completely conceded the center on this issue for the sake of the lunatic fringe of their own party who wants anything Trump favors killed no matter how mainstream it was five years ago. What I said here applies:
http://www.ridiculousvikingstuff.com/2019/01/11/hey-mr-dj-the-wall-edition/
The Democratic Party has lost its mind. It isn’t capable of behaving rationally even in its own interest. There are plenty of examples that support this view. It’s why I keep saying that they should not have won control of the House. They’ll prove why very quickly.
Then there’s this from Egard Watches. Nothing to do with selling watches, but at least it doesn’t antagonize the people it’s supposed to be selling watches to or engage in any other divisive messaging.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=108&v=x_HL0wiK4Zc
https://townhall.com/columnists/kurtschlichter/2019/01/17/we-need-to-retoxify-masculinity-n2539123
Quitcher cryin’ and listen to some Clutch:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4ABpbxIPFI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Sj76eCy6ag
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4WlqxPzQ28
And just like that….dj thread.
OT: But the escalating slap-fight between Trump and Pelosi with regard to SOTU invitation and flying on military planes is absolutely hilarious. It’s almost like “War of the Roses” or “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels” in terms of wondering what outrageous shit they’ll do next to outdo the other.
Whatever happened to the days when advertisers just sold their clients’ products? Also it looks like The Rat might have tried to bribe the Drudge Report, or something.
I mentioned in this week’s DJ post that much of the Trump presidency is straight out of a Hiassen novel, specifically the ones with “Skink”, a former Governor of Florida.
As for the Gillette ad, most people seem to be missing the point. You can make the case that Gillette has overstepped I guess, but there is a big difference between normal levels of masculinity and being an asshole. I grew up with bullying and catcalling and I can report back that it is not something that most women like to experience constantly. When I was in high school if I missed my bus I had to walk a mile to school past a greasy mechanic shop and this guy never failed to harass me every time. I could also expect catcalling from several truckloads of men on their way to their job sites. It got a bit scary, TBH. Relief only came when I got my driver’s license and could drive to school late in my junior year.
To be clear, it is sometimes flattering when a guy appreciates your looks and smiles and tries to approach. It is not so flattering when you show your wedding ring and he says “I don’t mind that you’re married”. Approaching a stranger as they are walking down the street can cause a number of reactions from fear to flattery. You have no idea how many guys have “appreciated her beauty” that day. A trip to the manicurist should not be a gauntlet of assholes.
“Because most people aren’t good enough to be our customers”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=193&v=jZqOpmO3EdM
The simple distinction which could be found nowhere in that ad, missed point indeed.
Everything in that dopey ad; bullying, sexual harassment, treating women like sex objects, that is not manliness, it just the opposite. True masculine manliness respects women, they cherish, uplift and protect women. They recognize the differences between the sexes, both in biology and societal obligations.
I too have had some uncomfortable episodes in the past workplace where women have, probably innocuously, touched my shoulder, arm, straitened my tie or my shirt collar without permission. Not once did I think ,”Gee, maybe Maybelline or Kotex needs to make a commercial telling women to keep their hands to themselves, to earn respect by deeds and not play the victim card whenever advantageous, or don’t lie about being raped and ruining a man’s life, not cool”.
This ad was the brainchild of a far far left radical feminist named Kim Gehrig, you can find several other man hating “woke” ads she made on youtube. Here is one she did for Uber;
https://vimeo.com/221730241
Yep, men are stupid, especially white men, they are clueless, needy, and really just not that fun to be around. Radical feminist agitprop, right out of the can.
Years ago a reporter asked Michael Jordan why he was not more political, he replied that Republicans buy sneakers to. I hope Gillette gets hurt financially by buying into this feminist nonsense, maybe next time they will think twice about using an Oberline College gender studies professor to lecture men about how awful they are.
No, we’re not. Sure, some men are cruel to women and each other. And this is also true of women as the above parody video demonstrates.
I mean, can you imagine a Playtex commercial that decided to raise awareness for the men victimized by women who fabricate allegations of sexual assault and harassment? It’d be the same thing.
The radical feminists who wrote this ad are at war with masculinity itself. They don’t mean masculinity that’s toxic is the problem. They mean masculinity is toxic. This is the shit we’ve been hearing for years from activists and it’s brought about a society where men are now reluctant to marry or even hire and mentor women. We’ve been driven to walk on eggshells at all times, fearful that we’ll say something to trigger the most histrionic woman in the room. We all now have to play by the rules of the most easily offended and brittle people.
It has had a devastating psychological effect on boys as well.
Identity politics, such as those Gillette has embraced, are themselves toxic and any corporation that poisons society with them must be punished. It drives people apart and makes us all afraid.
Point absolutely taken, Rich. Subscribe to any decent looking male celebrity’s Facebook page and see the comments. I am pretty immune to “offense” but I admit the comments get pretty creepy if you imagine a man openly putting them on a female celeb’s page. I don’t necessarily think that the ad was necessary or Gillette’s responsibility, I am trying to give the female perspective here. I seem to be the only one remaining here 🙂 …
Edited to add: Your point is taken, too, Thrill. Women wouldn’t appreciate it in the reverse. Not a chance!
The hell we are. The “point” is so damned obvious and blatant that one would have to have an IQ of 6 to not get it. Either that or be physically blind and deaf.
No, being an asshole applies to both sexes, not just men. Being an asshole ain’t just some level of degree of masculinity. Being an asshole is not identical to being extremely masculine . That’s the real point.
I understand, and no doubt all those incidences with the cat calls when you were growing up were humiliating, but real men, like the type of man you are raising your son to be, they knew that already.
No doubt you would like your son to have every opportunity growing up to be successful, to achieve all his life goals and be happy in life. Here is the ugly unvarnished truth; our society as it is today stacks the deck squarely against white males. Radical feminists, LGBTQ proponents,identity politickers and anti Christian leftists set the agenda. Males will be disciplined early in life for nothing more than acting like males, They will be diagnosed and medicated for learning or attention disorders at over twice the level of females. Males female peers will be encouraged at every level of the educational process, they will be given grants and awards and a leg up to get into STEM fields and when they apply for those jobs they will get preference over the males just because they are girls. Once at college, males will be told they are predators in waiting, they will all walk around with the scarlet letter on their chests because women must be believed in all circumstances. When males do graduate they will enter a jobs market that is not merit based, bowing to the political pressure of affirmative action, quotas and identity politics (I’m sure you heard about the latest leftist requirement mandating all publicly traded companies having women on their corporate boards?). Once a job is secured males risk having their reputation and livelihood destroyed forever by any unsubstantiated remark, gesture or action that somehow offends a woman. In short, that idyllic Utopian dream of equality of the sexes has been overshot by a mile.
Regarding the shutdown, this popped up on my “Memories” on Facebook this morning:
Apparently the parties have flipped again just a year later.