In the pages of GQ or Maxim, you wouldn’t think twice about the above ad, which is for Jiwani, a tailor specializing in custom-made suits. But place the ad in Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly and you’ve got a controversy on your hands.
Slate examines the controversy:
Evidently, at least two-dozen readers of Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly were infuriated by the ad’s placement in a legal publication; law being that rare profession in which “women struggle mightily to achieve the same respect and status as men.”
So, setting aside the fact that the ad isn’t really all that creative or original, can the media placement of an ad render the ad inappropriate?
Hm. A decidedly sex-focused, hetero, male-centered ad placed in a blue-state publication for professionals of — shall we say — a particularly opinionated bent. And the message that male lawyers (even in Massachusetts) love getting their share of female tail? What a radical concept. No wonder there was an outcry. It would have had a different reaction in Texas Lawyers Weekly. Still, I’d love to see the response the clothier got. I wager it was pretty good.
It’s a cheesy ad that anyone with taste would flip right past.
The fact that a lawyer would spend a minute writing someone about it is quite ironic, especially given the current state of the legal industry and it’s injustices (which totally outstrip [pun intended] any sexism in the ad biz.)
And there certainly are professions in which men have to “struggle mightily” to keep up with women. Exotic dancing comes to mind.
I know I know I’m a sarcastic ad guy not an uptight lawyer, but beleive it or not Sarcasm is also a “natural aphrodisiac” – at least that is what David Spade told me.
Not necessarily. How often does one see a sexed-up, scantily clothed, attractive woman in a dry, stodgy legal trade pub? I bet it was a smart media buy.