Friday, September 05, 2008

"EU wants to ban sexist advertising"

At first, I thought the headline said "EU wants to ban sexiest advertising." Given what most of the EU officials look like, that made sense.

But the idea that we can determine just what advertising is "sexist" in legislation- before we even see it- and then apply that definition to all of the cultures in the European Union? How does that work?
They are defining "sexist" as advertising that portrays women (but not men) as "sex objects" (as opposed to sexual beings?), and anything that portrays "gender stereotypes" (which are never fixed). So no more ads with Mom cooking while Dad works on the car. And won't legislating against one set of stereotypes just create new stereotypes? In twenty years, won't the eurocrats just be creating laws about ads that show Mom working on the car while Dad cooks dinner?

Or is all of this basically hopeless? As culture seems to be created through the sum total of billions of individual decisions, isn't it impossible to legislate it? Shouldn't the EU be, instead, spending the money to flood the market with images that they approve of, and hope that tastes change over time?

I would, however, be okay with banning this kinda creepy Orangina commercial that was shown everywhere I went in France.

9 comments:

Holly said...

We're OK with banning this, too. 'cause..... goddamn that's spooky.

Anonymous said...

Well, you know, I like to think of myself as open-minded... But, nope, I don't know what to make of the CGI animal strip club at all.

SecondComingOfBast said...

The more I read about the EU's antics the more I wish Putin would just sweep through the continent and take it over.

SecondComingOfBast said...

Did you see some of those other videos? Did you see the one with that married couple sitting in the woods talking about their miniature stallion? Wow!

Rufus said...

Patrick, what will happen with the EU is what happens with most large bureaucratic governing bodies- namely, most people will just ignore them and drag their feet as much as possible. This is why you can still do your business in francs in many places in France.

Rufus said...

I did not see the stallion couple until you mentioned it and I just went to look. Now I think I will never forget that...

Anonymous said...

Lets hope this results in men being portrayed more as sex objects in the media. mmmmmmmm.

Rufus said...

I can get behind that: "More hot men! Less hot animals!"

Greg von Winckel said...

I think we can all agree that we don't need pro-furry commercials.