Shoes

[slemslempike]

The F Word just linked to this Harvey Nicks ad. It is obviously vile in many ways. It plays to a very specific discourse of femininity, it makes the men into headless pieces of meat, the sole black man is second from last desirable, the shoes are UGLY...

But the part that really annoys me is that THERE IS NO LINE. We are meant to infer that it goes up to the right, but really, it could be opposite, or squiggly or zig-zag, or any such scientific term. But it is not showing us anything. And people are goig to use this to say "oh, silly women, you're getting all het up over nothing, the ad isn't saying that trainers make you undesirable or that fat men are automatically ugly, you're making it say that with your own silly stereotypes! You're the baddy here!"

I hate them.

Though it has reminded me that I wanted to post pictures of my new boots. I love them.

Comments

[spiralsheep.livejournal.com]

So... if the missing line went from bottom left to top right then that'd mean that gay men who spend a lot of time in the gym are also keen drag queens in their spare time? Whereas less fit transvestites prefer comfy slippers?

(If I stopped laughing I'd start crying.)

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

That is too small for me to see what's going on properly, which would probably have been good for my blood pressure if I hadn't clicked through links until I found a bigger version.

I am profoundly uninterested in shoes and I prefer men with heads. I do not shop at Harvey Nichols. There is probably a correlation somewhere.

[teenagelogic.livejournal.com]

That is the most ridiculous advert I have ever seen. Things like this make me sick...

[owl]

Buy a pair of Harvey Nicks shoes and get a headless bilateral amputee for free!

[ex-rita.livejournal.com]

All I see in that hierarchy of shoes is most comfortable to least comfortable. The higher up the shoe, the less likely you are able to escape from headless zombie men.