Well, everybody’s now heard of Protein World. One successful ad campaign.
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Sounds right up my alley!
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So this is problematic definitely. Arguably sexist (kind of depends the scope of the ads and if they were only targeted at women). In need of attacking? Sure.
Unrealistic body standards is what (although it’s worth pointing out that should never mean unreal as plenty of people do look like this, particularly at the end of a photo shoot prep and taken in a studio so I dislike the term. Equally I have friends who are so naturally skinny that would get called unrealistic
However i’d argue it’s not objectification unless you want to make the category so wide as to be pointless. It’s an ad aimed at women (presumably), the person isn’t an object for people to usd but rather a symbol of aspiration of the stated aims of the product, a use this and look like this. That very much does not make that person an object in the way that ads like the lynx/axe ads which are horrifically sexist.
Then again I think there is a big issue with the term objectification and often enough it’s incorrectly used or used to such a wide and cover all degree that the very concept can be problematic.
I also think their response that it’s a commonly used phrase and concept was not wrong either and something the people complaining about did wilfully ignore.
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You have a point.
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Cornwall.
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The poor girl don’t look healthy, she look starving…
This has all generated massive exposure for the company. The CEO claims sales have tripled.
It’s an anti-campaign. They’re doing it, as such, brilliantly. It was self-evident what the reaction would be. I don’t like it, but you’re now even talking about it in the USA.
The image is no worse than many exploitative images.
One thing I’m interested in - the male audience angle. The challenge ‘are you beach body ready?’ is aimed not only at women, but men. Consider the mildly unfit youngish batchelor heading out for summer. The insidious indication is that they will not succeed in their fantasies of attracting a partner with a ‘beach body’ like Renee Somerwhatsit.
It’s awful. But for the company, it has worked. How unfortunate for us all that human nature led us to this position.
A few things worth noting.
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The ASA only said it could not appear again in its current form, due to health claims being made. They did not order the ads taken down (I think as the ad run was ending shortly anyway). They have made no ruling on the bikini/beach body aspect.
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Protein world appear to have made a financial killing as a result of the protests. ‘Beach body ready’ ad banned from returning to tube, watchdog rules | Advertising Standards Authority | The Guardian I think we can look forward to more campaigns deliberately trying to provoke such a reaction.
It’s interesting the furor that this particular advert has caused, when so many adverts contained undermining and gendered subtext. I mean PowWow ran a whole host of misogynistic ads (one so bad that I defaced it on a packed train whilst traveling to see a client) but there was nothing in the way of broad protest or condemnation of it. And as someone more observant than I pointed out, Dove runs ads that say ‘love your body the way it is’ while selling a host of products marketed at making your body the way it isn’t. So what makes this ad different?
I think that there are a few factors that feed into the targeting of this particular ad. Firstly, there is an exposed female body of an idealised kind, which ticks enough objectification boxes to legitimise criticism from a feminist perspective, and it is perfectly true of this ad, although no more true than it is of, say, the tiny-buttock-fixated ad campaign Nivea are currently running. As others have pointed out, given the purpose of the product, the slender female form seems like a fairly reasonable way of marketing it. I don’t think that the ad is particularly sexualising, (unlike the perfume ads that run on this site) for example - although perhaps that’s just a reflection of personal preference.
Secondly I think that the advert highlights insecurities about bodies, and people deal with that in rather contrasting ways. I have really poor self-image because I was skinny and got picked on at school. I understand that it’s irrational because I can see that I am no longer very skinny, but I am fitter and less fat than about 70% of the men I meet; on an emotional level, however, it’s not what I want for myself. However when I see an image or a person that makes me feel conscious of the way I feel about my body, I usually find it motivating (although not always) to work more towards my body ideal, whereas other people seem to think that such an image or the embodied set of values a fitter person has are an attack upon them and get disproportionately angry. I certainly felt more like that when I was younger, understood diet less well and where gaining weight and muscle mass seemed impossible. I also ought to acknowledge that female and male ideals are construed differently and not perfectly analogous so I’m willing to accept that there are gaps in my understanding and that the whole campaign is worthy of discussion and criticism. I’m also certainly not saying that ‘oh, only fatties get pissed off by this sort of thing’ because that would be crass and untrue. I think the problem is that images like these highlight to people how much they share values that they would prefer not to.
So the ad itself is one where I actually find it quite surprising that it has attracted the level of condemnation that it has, in comparison to a huge number of ads which are more directly sexualised, objectifying and misogynistic which may attract feminist criticism, but not this groundswell of widespread and popular condemnation.
I also think that while the response to the ad alone seems to me to be excessive, the interactions on Twitter are totally abysmal and I’m utterly stunned that the guys running that company and their social media consider their responses to be appropriate. They really seem to have doubled down on bad attitudes towards people critical of their values. Maybe if you spend a lot of time in the gym and tanning, and then someone a bit chubby and pasty says “Hey, you’re setting a bad example/impossible standards for other people” it feels like a mean spirited and envy-motivated complaint (after all a certain amount of narcissism is probably a component of gym-bunny-dom), particularly as an acute awareness of the benefits of exercise combined with a ‘more=better’ attitude probably seems like a fairly compelling argument for your own rectitude (“Research shows I’ll live longer, be smarter, be more successful and happier than my non-fitness freak alternative self, so it stands to reason that I’m better than this miserable angry person!”) But all that wondering about their mental state and attitude notwithstanding, fuck me if they aren’t conducting themselves like arseholes. Pretty on the outside doesn’t mean you’re pretty on the inside, guys. However staff working for Protein World say they have been receiving death threats, which isn’t very pretty either - so when you see the ‘terrorist’ claims made by their CEO, shorn of context to maximise their apparent absurdity, bear that in mind.
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Only according to the standards by which you’re judging her. The model clearly has subcutaneous fat stores. Starving looks very different; I’d illustrate this with an image but it would be grotesque and no doubt some people would find it upsetting.
Adopting an alternative or opposing set of physical values by which to judge people is hardly better than being judgemental and conventional.
And as a general observation - the overall trend in our society is not to wasting away or thin-ness at any cost, but to an unhealthy level of over-consumption, inactivity, and unhealthy weight gain. We have come to normalise weight gain and underestimate our size and the amount we eat. That is, I see a lot of fat people seeking to justify and rationalise their unwillingness to rein in excessive consumption.
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Sir, I am as dedicated to tweed as I believe a man can possibly be, and even I relent and turn to seersucker on the beach in sunnier climes. Do I take it that you have a tartan blanket for your elephant, since your beach sojourns are clearly limited to the months between October and March?
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Well, sorry, I was just giving my grandma’s opinion here.
Did you notice how the light is set to accentuate her cheekbones and orbits ? You can actually use it for an horror movie poster…
Doubling down on judgement, I see. Is your grandma a big horror movie fan too?
I find that the classic ‘horror movie’ lighting is from below. Clearly the model’s neck is in shadow, and the lighting from above.
What are these ‘sunnier climes’ you refer to, good sir? Blackpool? (Gasp). Vancouver? Dare I suggest Dover? (Runs away screaming).
No good chap. Taking the maritime airs shall not be done at any latitude south of Fort William (for the sake of description, it is obviously near a sea if a different sort). And if there is not a single selkie in attendance you must cover your head with an old dish towel and sing the shanties of the Aran Islands.
…
GOOD DAY SIR!!
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I notice you didn’t mention the bomb and death threats leveled at the company or the reactions of the model, Renee Somerfield, to all of this.
There are plenty of olympic athletes that look like her and I’m sure they eat.
Colour me: meh. It’s called marketing people, and most of you obviously suck at understanding it.
If you are offended by this ad you are almost certainly not their target market and they couldn’t care less what you think. There are plenty enough people who are their target market who will not think twice about this ad, other than making a mental note to buy product x.
If you are offended by this and are making a stink about it, congratulations! As many others have noted your rage has resulted in this ad getting in front of many more eyes at no cost to the company. Apply the above described principle again (the people you show this to who would be offended aren’t their target market, and the exposure you’ve given it may have put the product in front of people who may buy it but would’ve not otherwise seen the ad) and it becomes obvious why sometimes it’s counterproductive to make the interwebs blow up over an ad you dislike.
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Dafuq… I thought I’d go read what else this person has to say. According to her Twitter info she works in advertising and apparently has no problem with this ad that she tweeted 2 weeks before showing us all her strong stance on the objectification of women.
This is the ad she “loves”:
What a fucking attention seeker.
Edit - found a new gem:
Apparently, objectification of women: bad
objectification of men: moar plz!
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I don’t think people are offended by this ad in particular, I think they are offended by the really strong standard of beauty that kind of ad promote. Not everybody is an athlete.
So why vandalize this one ? Because a lot of empty space.
Solution ? Make five or four ads with different models and different bodies !
Don’t take my “she need to eat” comment so seriously, it was just dumb, being myself skinny it’s a thing I eared a lot, I suppose that kind of comment is more funny with a gif ?
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