Is it me, or do people really get upset about this https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-49332640 (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-49332640) I have seen both ads and can honestly say they have not adversely affected me in any way shape or form.
Maybe i'm just thick :confused1:
It seems to me in a lot of cases, that the people complaining about 'stereotypes' or whatever, are not the 'stereotype' being depicted - they are complaining on behalf of the 'stereotype'. Why can they not mind their own business or complain about something worth complaining about, like levels of crime, or hospital waiting lists? I am sure if the 'stereotype' felt offended, they could complain themselves.
Maybe I am as thick as you Phillip. :)
Totally agree, it seems utterly ridiculous frankly! I imagine VW read the judgement with raised eyebrows!
This is a political minefield.
Society* is not equal. Society cannot begin to become equal until and unless it recognises the inequalities and moves to remove the tropes that portray inequality as the norm.
* I refer to society in the UK. I'd love to hear of a society that is truly equal, but I don't believe any exist.
good to know that the government has time to spend on these matters, and parliament time to pass such laws, pity though they don't seem to have time to deal with things like crime / NHS/ etc.
Iknow, go and stand in the corner, trouble maker :-[
Quote from: dannyboy on August 14, 2019, 09:30:12 AM
It seems to me in a lot of cases, that the people complaining about 'stereotypes' or whatever, are not the 'stereotype' being depicted - they are complaining on behalf of the 'stereotype'.
That's because communicating productively with the media, and even more so, embarking on legal challenges, require particular skill sets and deep pockets. 90% of the population wouldn't know where to start in either case, so there have to be groups dedicated to anti-discrimination and/or civil liberties causes. These will have their own funding and recruit people able to communicate with the media and politicians.
Hope that clears things up.
As an aside, don't forget that, for example, the groups agitating in the 1900s for women's suffrage weren't necessarily the ones with the worst lives within Victorian and Edwardian society. Likewise slavery wasn't abolished because the slaves complained, but because other people took it upon themselves to fight in the name of the slaves.
Virtually all of us have civil rights and freedoms that we didn't win, but we inherited from others who fought on our behalf.
Cheers, NeMo
Just an observation......
The profile options in this Forum appear to be Binary
i.e. Male or Female
In our Brave New World is this still appropriate?
Asking for a friend! :hmmm:
I've often asked this question of myself :goggleeyes:
Too many people in society live to be offended.
It seems you can poke fun at men, but not women.
You can have a sexy male peeling off layers in a Coke commercial, but not a woman.
You can't have men only golf clubs, but you can have women only gymns.
You can have women only swim sessions, but not men only.
Sections of society, call them the 'woke' brigade if you will, just seem to spend their days looking for perceived offence, it usually has nothing to do with themselves, they just want to be noticed in Social Media for pointing things out and feigning offence.
I've been discriminated against as a bloke, but gymn owners, leisure centre operators, to name the two main occasions couldn't understand why I could possibly be offended.
As an educated, western, white, heterosexual male I accept I make up part of the most elite social/economic groups on the planet. I will have an easier life than any of my friends and family that fall outside those labels.
This is clearly wrong and society has to change - and that includes depictions of people in adverts (although neither offended me). Had the Philadelphia been one of a pair/trio with different genders but with the same joke then there wouldn't have been a problem. Similarly, if the VW add had featured a more balanced range of people doing the adventurous activities then there wouldn't have been an issue.
Like it or not, if you're not white and male then you stand less chance of getting ahead in life. We should be living in a country where adverts like these don't offend anyone. However, that's unlikely to happen until we life in a country (or on a planet) where everyone is treated equally regardless of age, race, skin colour, sexual orientation and gender.
Steven B.
The ASA's rulings seem pretty straightforward and explanatory to me - the question is not whether you were offended but whether there was potentially harmful* gender stereotypes (which there clearly was in both ads).
* no need to argue with me about whether something is harmful - like Steven I know that society is stacked in my favour (and even where I don't have access to certain things that doesn't mean per se that I'm being unfairly discriminated against).
I found myself nodding sagely at Steven's post, before I noticed that I replied to the thread 2 years ago when it was posted. I certainly don't find myself offended by either, but absolutely can't argue with either Steven or Mike's posts.
Sometimes it is about perceptions - some viewers may interpret in a way that was never intended and not even considered by the writer/creator.
What more recent rulings appear to do, is shift the focus from Intent to Perception, and it needs only one person to perceive offence to trigger an investigation; and as pointed out above there are a small minority who deliberately go out of their way to look for offence...
Gender stereotyping is a very serious issue. Just look at the latest figures on pension differences between men and women, the pink and blue aisles in toy shops and the glass ceilings in various industries. We are affected by what we see and hear at a sub-conscious level, just note the amount of money spent on various political campaigns combined with the use of social media data. There is also the affect of drip feeding of misinformation by the media. Especially with respect to trying to discredit campaigns that would reduce inequalities.
Rant over can we go back to n gauge model railways. :)
From a well known on-line source:
In recent years, some societies have begun to legally recognize non-binary, genderqueer, or third gender identities. Some non-western societies have long recognized transgender people as a third gender, though this may not (or may only recently) include formal legal recognition. Among western nations, Australia may have been the first to recognize a third classification, following recognition of Alex MacFarlane as having indeterminate sex, reported in 2003. Transgender advocate Norrie May-Welby was recognized as having unspecified status in 2014. In 2016, an Oregon circuit court ruled that Jamie Shupe could legally change gender to non-binary.