France: Wake up and smell the statistics

A new campaign from Lejaby Lingerie stirred the French a little too much it seems, the Guardian smells an end of sexist advertising in France.

The campaign - which you can view in all its glory if you click read more - shows left lovers sniffing the lingerie from their former girls with the headline that reads "Remember me".

The Guardian reports that french feminists have seen a lot worse that this, Audi once ran an ad with the headline: "He has the money, he has the car and he'll have the woman"

Lejabys website says the campaign "speaks about sensuality without showing naked women, abandons porno-chic stereotypes and demeaning attitudes for women, drops the concept of woman as sex object, and appeals to the senses and especially to feelings ...It reflects the playful approach of the love affairs of modern men and women"

Nonetheless, the French industry's self-regulatory watchdog, the Association of Advertisers for Responsible Advertising, ruled that the posters breached the business's recently toughened guidelines, which ban images that are "an affront to human dignity and decency".

After the outcry over the Sloggi poledancing ad last year the French are a bit fed up with ads that are in bad taste, they don't object to nudity but to "violence, submission, routine humiliation, the kind of campaign that embodies and transmits an image of the woman as object" according to a report made last year. The same report noted that 48% of the French population were 'often upset' by the way women were presented in advertising campaigns, and 70% thought images were more degrading today than five years ago - a whopping 69% of the males and females in the survey would like an opportunity to protest about them.

Without further ado, here is the campaign that made that might make the French adpeople wake up and smell the coffee. They managed to upset people without showing any half-naked women at all! Kudos! I've tried my darndest but I can't be offended by these. Your milage may vary.

As an aside, remember when "campaign" meant three (or more) posters on the same proposition and not three variations of the same visual? Ah, those were the days aye?

Hat tip to deep.ed

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caffeinegoddess's picture

I don't know what I think of these. If you didn't know Lejaby sold lingerie, I don't know that you'd get it. Of course, in France it could be a well known brand - or elsewhere for that matter. But the point of a campain not equaling three variations of the same visual is spot on.

AnonymousCoward's picture

Talk about getting your panties in a bunch....

Is it just me or do these ads look amateurish? (If those are accurate representations of the ads.)

CopyWhore's picture

Don't you just love advertising ideas based on human truths? Had a girlfriend once called Ceclia, a Swede. She used to use a certain Bulgari perfume, which clung to her clothes. And mine. And when she left me, all she left me was her scent.

Nice idea. But I'm not sure I see where the sexism comes in... And the type could be finessed a bit. (What font is that?)

Quite frankly, I'm suprised the French got all hot 'n bothered by this... They're French, for chrissake! They're supposed to get off on this sort of thing! Ah, mais c'est ca... Les gens francais toujours me laissent confuse' a partir des attitudes culturelles

Neo's picture

Had the men not been such hunks it could have easily fallen into the "ew, creepy" category. I agree that this is not the most sexist ad in France though, I'm failing to see where this one is sexist at all actually... Kinda kinky sure... ? Maybe it was the last drop, runneth over, and so on since they've been barraged with much worse for years.