International Women’s Day, WIZO lists most sexist TV advertisements from the past year.
By LIDAR GRAVÉ-LAZIBar Refaeli in a commerical for the Hoodies chain(photo credit: screenshot)
The Women’s International Zionist Organization named a television commercial for Elite’s Turkish coffee the most sexist advertisement of 2014, earning the Mark of Shame on Wednesday.The Elite campaign shows two women interviewing a potential male roommate. The man orders the women to make him Turkish coffee, which causes the roommates to disqualify him. Just then the male presenter appears and explains to the women why they should immediately accept him as their roommate. The male applicant is seen performing a series of “masculine” tasks including protecting the girls from an intruder and catching fish only to remind them that he likes his cooked without cilantro. The women are seen pining over him and want to accept him as their roommate immediately.“The commercial embodies old-fashioned power relations between men and women. We call on all commercial companies to adopt the principles of respect and fair advertising against women,” Gila Oshrat, chairwoman of WIZO Israel, said.This is the seventh year that WIZO has named television and print advertisements that depict women in a demeaning or derogatory fashion. The Mark of Shame campaign’s aim is to lead to a change in the presentation of the female figure in advertising and to raise awareness of the social damage advertisements can cause when exploiting the female body image.The winning ad was chosen by a jury of gender and communications experts, female academics, journalists and legal experts.Israeli supermodel Bar Refaeli starred in two of the four runner- up commercials. Hoodies clothing company nabbed second place for its commercial featuring Refaeli as a male puppet’s fantasy. Third place went to sunglasses brand Carolina Lemke Berlin in which Refaeli is seen pole dancing in the brand’s glasses.Fourth place was awarded to the Castro clothing company for its commercial depicting women playing tennis in bathing suits.Closing out the top five was a commercial for April Cosmetics Company depicting two women applying nail polish in a sexualized manner.“The impact of advertisements is not just about our spending habits, but also on thought patterns, norms of behavior and self-esteem.Commercials negatively abusing the woman’s body image permeate into the minds of our children and distort reality,” Oshrat said. “[Companies] can make use of sexual motifs and simultaneously maintain a realistic and respectful depiction of women,” she said.
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