You’d think by now that tired old sexist stereotypes would have died a well overdue death. After all, no one benefitted from them – the well worn route of wife/girlfriend as ball and chain was offensive to women and patronising to any self-respecting male with a modicum of intelligence. In the 90s (the era of lads’ mags and cheap lager) the marketing ideal seemed to be geared towards some sort of loveless existence where the very sight of your other half had you reaching for the cyanide. Women were inadequate versions of men, and the only appropriate response was to mock or have sex with them. But apparently this neanderthal view still has life in it if the new Fosters ad is anything to go by.
There are some ads that make you wish you could erase the memory from your brain the moment you’ve finished watching. This one falls squarely into that category as a whiney girlfriend rings the Fosters lad helpline to complain that her boyfriend never listens to her, bang on cue the “lads” give her some vague platitudes and leave her to gripe on the other side of the telephone as they continue with the important task of chugging down can after can of the brown watery stuff – necessary because this lager is so weak it would take a gallon and multiple trips to the bathroom before you started to feel even mildly woozy. She is satisfied with this diluted advice, because she is a silly woman, and ends the call sighing something along the lines of: “I wish my boyfriend was as good a listener as you boys”. Bam, fooled her, stupid women!
In the world this ad has created no one is a winner. Woman is stupid and neglected, man is bored and boorish. And both will sit at the dinner table dissatisfied and frustrated – in ad world, the battle of the sexes is raging.
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