Here’s the Motorola Droid phone.

And here’s the Palm Pre.

Keep those images in mind.

But first… it has been a long break since my last post (November?). There’s a reason, and it’s not laziness. I genuinely do try to keep a close eye on the television and seek out examples of Manvertising, and the last couple months have, frankly, not offered much. Keep in mind this blog is not a catch-all for the anxieties related to gender in advertising; that would basically mean I’d have to be posting all day and night.

This blog is for a specific type of anxiety in advertising, the kind related to men ages 18 to 35, and typically involves the defense of very traditional masculinities in the bodies of stereotypically UN-masculine men through the use of humor. The ads I’m looking at in this post do not necessarily conform to that description overtly, but since they involve technology (a primary object of the demographic I typically examine) I think they offer some interesting examples.

That all leads me back to this latest post.

Many thanks to my friend Shayne, who alerted me to this Engagdet post. I saw these two commercials within the last day or so for the first time and was stuck, of course, by rule #1 about advertising: women do not appear in ads for products aimed at men unless they are depicted as objects of potential sexual ownership. When this is absent, the product is typically aimed at women. So here are the two ads for the Palm Pre:

The first ad has a multitude of small details swirling around:

1. The hyper-organized mother from the 1980s evokes a very specific moment in feminist history: the moment when the liberal feminists believed they could “have it all” and be both professional and keeper of the family. I can’t help but think of “Baby Boom” when I watch this commercial, and the way culture attempted to squeeze women back into their “proper” roles as family caretaker. But more on that in a moment…

2. “Pink is for piano lessons…” Well, of course it is! Everyone knows only girls like the piano, right? I’m not sure when the piano became a gendered object (that’s a serious question; I’d love to see some work done on that) but it definitely has. I will point to this moment in NFL history as evidence.

3. “… except when it’s for pot roast. G is for groceries, or girls’ night out.” Activities for women in this universe include cooking food or gathering food. Punctuated by the occasional opportunity for women to get together as a group and literally leave the domestic space… but only temporarily.

4. The voice-over is performed by a woman. (Thanks, Demi Moore! Remember how I praised you all those years ago for appearing in G.I. Jane? I’m taking it back.) If all the alarm bells weren’t going off before this, they should be now: women do not do voice-overs for commercials aimed at men. I challenge you, faithful readers, to submit a single example to this blog of a commercial made in last five years that contradicts this maxim: women’s voices appear in ads aimed at women. The usual exception of women as sexual objects does not count.

4. Then the final hard-sell happens: what is the fancy technology that this phone can do that should convince the (female) viewer to buy it? It has a calendar… that tracks Dad’s and (son) Timmy’s activities! Do I even need to bring up how insulting and literally patriarchal it is for a women to have a calendar referencing her spouse as “Dad”?

The second ad is much the same: it paints the past as anachronistic, suggests the new technology has made women’s lives easier, and then offers no substantial difference.

It seems to me that Verizon did an amazing job of taking all the patriarchal ideology of the 1980s and simply transferring it into a digital object. What is supposed to be a clip all about modernization is really anything but… Mom, this ad suggests, is still worrying about piano lessons, pot roasts, and girls’ nights out. Ironically, then, they are doing exactly the same things that were happening in the 1980s: postfeminism made as a feminist argument but in reality masking a deeply regressive and disturbing ideology.

And, since it must diligently be said every time this subject comes up, there’s no reason whatsoever these same concerns couldn’t be marketed to men. They have children, they need to eat, they need to have recreational time. But how is another Verizon phone marketed to men?

As alien technology, of course! From its name (Droid) to the campaign (is it attacking us? are we all going to die? why is the military launching it at us??), there’s a sense of mystery and danger for the boy’s phone. But wait, how do we know it’s a boy’s phone? I’m not going to get all crazy academic here and start referencing Foucault (not the purpose of this blog, after all) but I will say that the very clever marketeers out there know that this culture has been so inculcated with gendered associations that the second you see that shot of the fighter jet taking off it’s completely clear who this ad is for: boys. The hint of rock music, the association with weapons, the long takes of outdoor spaces… these are not incidental images. They are part of a gendered package aimed squarely at men. No children, no domestic duties, just amazing bang-up fireworks and shit. Robots and missiles, dude!

What’s perfect about this ad is that it’s pre-advertising designed to prime the interest of the target audience. Here’s the ad campaign that came later:

I actually don’t even think it’s necessary to say another word except to point out that there’s a double attack happening here: it’s not just women who are the targets of all the twisted rage happening here, it’s also queer men who have excessive interest in their bodies and appearances. I’m not sure I’ve seen an angrier example of manvertising in quite some time — this isn’t the humor and deflection typical to the genre, this is almost a return to the late 1990s misogyny and vitriol, the Fight Club-esque resentment of women and all they represent.

“It’s not a princess, it’s a robot.”

Indeed, look again at those two images (both from the official sites for each phone). I’m not suggesting the Pre is a princess, but it sure as hell ain’t the eye from the Terminator. Looking at those images, I’d even say it’s safe to point to to the gendered associations across the devices.

Is manvertising changing? Is it a coincidence that the harder I look for the examples of the humorous defense of masculinity the less I find them? And then, just in the midst of the confusion, this ad pops up? Or is this just indicative of how technology is marketed? I will say this: the holy grail of all manvertising days is two days away: the Super Bowl. Needless to say, I will be watching closely to see if this pattern is becoming a norm.

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