The Sydney Morning Herald http://www.smh.com.au/news/0011/23/text/features7.html What's Big Kahuna got to do with booze and prehistoric sexism? Date: 23/11/2000 It is hard to believe the universe was created by a leering git upstairs for the pleasure of other leering gits in the gutter, opines Maggie Alderson. Angry, of Edgecliff, here again. So angry, indeed, about an advertising poster plastered all over Sydney that, for the first time in my life, I have written to the Advertising Standards Bureau, rather than just thinking about it. It was either write to them or risk prosecution for defacing the poster with a can of spray paint, so it seemed the wiser option. The ad that spurred me into action is the campaign for a brand of whisky* strongly associated with regular patrons of lap-dancing parlours. Well, you assume that's the market they're going for if this is the kind of thing they think will speak to their customers. Have you seen it? It's all over the city and it's hard to miss because it features a headless woman. She's headless, this "chick" (not actually decapitated, it's just deliberately out of the frame), but she does have bosoms - lovely bosoms, all pushed up and round and squishy looking - and legs. Lots of legs, long and shapely and apparently on the verge of opening as she alights from a car in a very short skirt. The copy line accompanying this headless woman is: "Yes, God is a man." I was so amazed when I first saw this poster, I wondered if I had accidentally slipped through a wrinkle in time and was back in 1972. It's that long since I have seen anything so Neanderthal outside the pages of one of those awful men's "lifestyle" magazines. But I have a choice whether I look at those or not - and I don't - but this poster is all over Sydney and very hard to avoid. Every time I see it I feel a bit sick. I hate the thought of young girls seeing it and feeling judged entirely for their bodies. I hate the thought of old ladies seeing it and feeling embarrassed. I hate the thought of anyone with a strong religious commitment seeing it and being deeply offended. I really hate the idea that advertising copywriters thought that such a concept was acceptable in the public domain in 2000 and that the client agreed. It offends me on so many levels, I hardly know where to begin, although the absence of a head is as good a place as any. That seems to me to be the visual portrayal of the attitude that informs that horrid joke about the ideal woman - you know, she's three feet tall, has a flat head you can put your beer on, and turns into a pizza at midnight. (Think about the height part, because I'm certainly not going to explain it.) By deliberately excluding her head from the photograph, this advertisement turns the model into nothing more than an object, with no identity and no personality. Just a collection of body parts. It is the very definition of the term "sex object" - she's a blow-up doll with a pulse. Using an attractive creature - be it man, woman, child or animal - to promote a product is not the problem. It can be quite delightful; it's the manner in which this particular woman is portrayed that makes it so offensive. Then there is the God part of the package. My religious beliefs are a little free form, but specific faiths are irrelevant in this instance. Whatever you want to call the Big Kahuna up there, I have a big problem with the idea that the universe has been created by a sexist git entirely for the pleasure of other sexist gits. I know I'm not alone in being offended by this advertisement, as several acquaintances have brought it up in conversation and a spokesperson for the Australian Advertising Standards Bureau confirmed that it received various complaints about the poster. It's too early to say whether it will ask that the campaign be withdrawn, but even if it does, the damage has been done. It's out there. The only way this brand of whisky could possibly redeem itself would be to issue a follow-up campaign featuring a headless man with rippling pecs and a bulging crotch, with the line, "Yes, God is a woman." Except that just bringing women down to the same level as (some) men has never been the point of sexual equality; it's about raising the level of mutual respect between the sexes, not discarding it all together. So maybe I'll just go back to my original plan and take to the streets with a can of paint. A cartoon penis and the words, "No, she's not" in large letters should make the point. *Chivas Regal is the brand. I mention it only so it may be boycotted. 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