Top 10 Worst Commercials For and About Women

Posted at 5:00 AM Jul 30, 2008

By Andrea Grimes

Over here at HD HQ, when we're not sampling new tampons and talking about the pros and cons of hormone-based contraception, we like to set our bras on fire and create "Fuck The Patriarchy" dart games. So I don't know how we find the time to actually make posts, let alone watch 10 femmed-out commercials that piss us off, especially since we have all that Simone de Beauvoir to finish.

Even with all that work to do, we couldn't ignore the Guinness spec ad that's been making the rounds over at Broadsheet and Feministing, wherein a woman takes what Beavis and Butthead would refer to as "it," up to three ways while the guys enjoy a Guinness together. And so it got us to thinking about all the fun ways in which women are pandered, talked down and plain-old marketed to that get everything all wrong.

10. The aforementioned Guinness spec ad. The men share a drink, the men share a woman. Women, like Guinness, are to be enjoyed and thrown out (hey, even recycled!) once they're spent. And honestly, this girl would rather be a bottle of Bushmill's any day -- it's richer, fuller bodied, and lasts all night long.

9. Shift Into Glide! This pukey pink spot (hah!) for Playtex Gentle Glide tampons gives us the willies, what with it basically being a 30-second reminder that your gaping hoo-hah needs the kind of maximum pluggage only Playtex can provide. Stop 'er up, skipper!

8. Every Activia ad ever. Founded on the perennial advertising concept that ladies are delicate in all ways and must be carefully nurtured less something go horribly awry, Activia's marketing campaign wrangles in a genuinely cool Jamie Lee Curtis to talk to us about our diarrheal and constipatory issues. Isn't poo cute?

7. Let's keep those sluts off Mirena. Can't find any YouTubery for this one, but the Mirena miracle IUD ads kill us: you better already have a baby and a husband if you want Mirena, young lady, because those single girls are too slutty to be trusted with an IUD. (The website sums it up nicely.) Someone remind me again how getting married has ever prevented anyone -- male or female -- from sleeping around?

6. Women! On the road! Alone! Alert the authorities! "When a woman's at the wheel, Polyglas means more than miles." She might run into red lights, detours, crosswalks and all manner of other road hazards that might muddle her lil' brainy-brain. Good thing the lady at the end of this commercial scoots over to let her businessman husband drive. To and from the airport in one day would just be too much.

5. It was hard to narrow it all down to just one Axe Body Spray commercial, but we think this one's a good candidate for worst ever due to its sheer dedication to quantity vs. quality in stupid stereotypes. Not content to merely portray women as just nags or just prudish or just marriage-obsessed or just sports-ignorant, the Axe folks roll up all the ways that women annoy men into one TV spot!

4. What would you do for a Klondike bar? Jump off a cliff? Be mauled by a shark? OR .... listen to your significant other when she talks, if you dare.

3. Women love chocolate! And how! Again, it was hard to narrow this down to just one chocolate-themed commercial that shows just how wacky those gals are when it comes to chocolate. I like this one because it shows how women use chocolate to stifle the overpowering emotions they ought to keep to themselves. Look, I don't even freaking LIKE chocolate. I realize that some people -- yes, people, men and women -- think it's tasty. Whatever. When will come the day when you people can all embrace your choco love?

2. Beer, beer, beer and more beer. It's like chocolate and mens' body spray, where do we start? Forget the usual tits and ass of your typical beer commercial and move on to one with no nudity, but all the condescension. It's not the silly premise--that giving a girl a Bud Light will assuage her anger, 'cause this girl's been on the receiving end of that deal and she's here to tell you that every little bit helps -- it's the overplayed stereotypes that make this one ridiculous. Men do things wrong, and women don't! Men are bumbling fools, and women their willing accomplices!

1. DeBeers: a diamond is all it takes to keep those money-grubbing girls on a short leash, ya heard? I don't even know what I would do if a man bought me a diamond. Laugh, cry, wonder where he stole it, maybe. But I know what I wouldn't do: immediately default to being his forever. I believe this is one of those cases where we can all agree: if what happens in this commercial is what will happen in real life, chances are you don't want the thing in the first place.