Catpaw - diary of an angry cat

I thought we had left behind the world of the portrayal of woman as being mindless drones living solely to make the men in their lives happy. Someone needs to let Proctor & Gamble know this. They are currently running a series of commercials, here in Canada, called Home Made Simple. Now I have nothing against the basic idea of this advertising campaign. It’s designed around the notion of making housekeeping simpler and efficient. Nice idea.

But what did the public get?

A bunch of women who appear to be brain washed into believing the only thing important in their lives is how to be totally obsessed with keeping the “Perfect” home. My skin crawls every-time the commercial comes on. I have reacted so strongly to it, I actually wrote P&G and gave them a list of products I will no longer be purchasing from them.

What is the problem with the commercial? It focuses on a group of young women sitting around a couch with plastered on grins (I swear to god I thought this was a spoof of the Stepford Wives the first time I saw it) talking about how important it is for their families that they (the collected women) keep the home spotless and clean. If it is so important, then tell your lazy ass children and hubby to get off their collective backsides and lend a hand. A clean home is important, but it is not a reason for living.

The spot that drove me over the edge was the one where two of the women talk about their boys - one states with a giggle and smile “They are little dribble factories” in the bathroom. The women in the ad all nodded in unison as thought this were perfectly normal. EXCUSE ME? Tell the little wankers to clean up after themselves AND to be polite and aim properly. Are they this sloppy when they visit friends? I hope not. Don’t sit on the couch and smile blankly as if this is cute and acceptable. The other woman, with the same scary blank smile, talks about how her boys love to give the toilet paper role a good hard spin and unravel most of the the toilet paper onto the floor. She has come up with a helpful hint on how to stop this - not the logical “Cut the nonsense out boys” but squish the roll so it won’t spin. This is not a solution lady! This is allowing unacceptable behaviour to go unchecked.

All the commercials are like this. They scare me. The women come off as though they were cloned at the back lot of the Stepford Wives movie. There is only one thing that is important and that is a home kept in pristine condition and the family members will only be content if wifey does this. This is crap. I’m still having flashbacks to an era when this really was all there was to the lives of suburban wives. A lot of women worked very hard to break out of this stereotype and P&G is driving them right back.

And while I’m on this rant - let’s include Electrolux in the same vein. They are currently running a similar Stepford Wives commercial for their kitchen appliances. Now out of the two commercials, I think this one gets under my skin a bit deeper. The commercial stars someone called Kelly Ripa. Sorry, I don’t recognize the name and I apologize if I offend one of her fans. But seriously, I have no idea who she is - except she has the perfect Stepford Wives act going. The commercial has the theme to Bewitched playing in the background, here’s the transcript:

Thank you so much (clapping as she rushes out of a packed room).
How do I entertain a packed house? With my new Electrolux appliances.
Now I can cook the roast for the dinner party and the mac and cheese for the sleep over. Simmer the chocolate sauce, toss Chuck his toy (Chuck’s a dog), serve the gummie bears (3 healthy looking young girls sitting on a couch with their hands out for room service), then the apple juice at the perfect temperature (for god sake’s, it’s flipping apple juice not an expensive white wine, get a grip - perfect temperature? What? Do your kids sit around with a thermometer in hand to make sure you don’t screw up?), be the charming co-host (and just where is hubby in all of this? Shouldn’t he be lending a hand – the lazy sod), clean the stemware perfectly and end the night looking for monsters under the bed….

You get the idea? Perfect, perfectly? Sounds like the previous commercial, doesn’t it? Mindless drone who has to make sure she never, ever makes a mistake or she isn’t all woman and the perfect mother. It’s time we stood up to the marketing companies and demand they stop this asinine marketing. I would not have gotten so hot under the collar if the words perfection were not used so often. It’s insidious and pushes an idea of unattainable perfection. It’s also extremely annoying. I’m tired of having this tripe foisted onto us. Perhaps these companies should trash their existing marketing companies and hire someone with a bit of humour and a dose of reality.

Oh and anyone out there who is the mother of any of these marketing folks - cuff the buggers on the back of the head for me. Tell them you don’t need to be told you aren’t fullfilling your duties if you aren’t perfect.

Stumble it!