The outrageously politically incorrect adverts from the time equality forgot

Daily Mail ^ | 11/28/07

[LibWhacker]

The outrageously politically incorrect adverts from the time equality forgot

Last updated at 14:47pm on 28th November 2007

Comments (27) In a politically correct age, they seem like outrageous anachronisms.

And there is no doubt these adverts - many taken from the first half of the last century - reveal just how much women used to be caricatured as downtrodden housewives or hair-brained office girls.

Now, a new book - You Mean A Woman Can Open It?: The Woman's Place In The Classic Age Of Advertising - brings together images which would surely cause a howl of protest if they were released today.

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1961: When you can't wait for your dinner, give her a Kenwood Chef food mixer and let her have some fun preparing your favourite dish

1970: Your wife won't be able to stall the car or grind the gears - and there's even one pedal fewer to confuse her with the Mini Automatic

1952: Is your coffee pressure packed for extra freshness? If hubby can tell you're not making Chase & Sanborn coffee for him, well, you've been warned...

1946: Women are seen as indecisive, trying to squeeze into something too small, worried someone else is wearing the same dress and then taking it back to the shop. Men need only one look at the Pacific label to know it suits you, sir

1953: You don't need a knife, a bottle opener or even your husband to unscrew the cap of this bottle - just a little twist of the Alcoa HyTop Closure, made of pure aluminium, and that ketchup is ready to pour

1930s: You do all the houshold chores - and still look fresher every day, darling. What's your secret? A bowl of Kellogg's PEP vitamin cereal for breakfast, naturally

1921: If you can answer YES to the question, you are obviously using pure mild Palmolive soap that will leave your skin radiant

1953: Husband furious because you've missed the post? The Pitney-Bowes Postage Meter prints the stamp and seals the envelope all in one go.

[ASOC]

OH, and the “Won’t you spend a dime on me?”

Ya, I am that old......

I can remember the Gillette ads just before the fights came on the toob.

[x]

They forgot the one where the woman can’t pronounce “Martini & Rossi Asti Spumanti.” That way the man gets to say it over and over till you’re ready to throw the radio.

Wow! That goes way back! Was it Stiller and Meara (Ben's parents). I know they did Blue Nun ads.

Of course, all these women-bashing ads have a counterpart in today's men-bashing ads directed at women.

And a selection of those ads alone gives a skewed view of the state of advertising at any given time.

But it's strange how things have changed.

I saw the "If your husband ever finds out you're not "store-testing" for fresher coffee" ad with the woman being spanked and didn't think it was her husband punishing her.

I assumed she was having some kinky relationship on the side when she said she was going shopping.

[ansel12]

[Impugn]

The commercial I always hated was the one where a women is showing off her new watch her husband gave her, where she says, “it’s nice, but I was hoping for a Longines.” What a bitch!

Heh...very similar to Jonah Goldberg's objection to the Kay Jewelers series of commercials. Every kiss begins with Kay - I.O.W. you will only get some if you give her a shiny bauble.

Isn't that the definition of prostitution?

[dfwgator]

Noxema - Take it off, Take it all off

[dfwgator]

I.O.W. you will only get some if you give her a shiny bauble.

Yeah right, my wife would just scream, "HOW MUCH DID THIS COST?"

[Borges]

There’s some ambiguity about NW isn’t there? Some people think he was just lighting a cigarette.

[najida]

Oh goody!
More woman bashing from conservative males!

Thank you....I’m gonna bookmark this.

[southernnorthcarolina]

And there is no doubt these adverts - many taken from the first half of the last century - reveal just how much women used to be caricatured as downtrodden housewives or hair-brained office girls.

Was this article written by a woman? Whoever the author was should be told that the word is harebrained (with or without a hyphen). The refererence is to the small brain of a hare, not to a hair.

[Spok]

“nobody has talked to our criminal element about the “evils” and “ineffectiveness” of profiling.”

My son wanted me to catch a snake for him as a pet. The first snake I found was a diamondback rattler. I was going to ‘pass’ on him, but then it dawned on me that that would be profiling, which is wrong.

[Centurion2000]

bump

[VOA]

Some good ones from long-ago in a place far, far away called Oklahoma...

from my vague childhood memory of the early 1960s...a large sign
painted on building of a car dealer:

"Bring in your wife and title
and let's trade cars!"

AND

The sewing-machine seller in Tulsa that would include a new shotgun
when you got the little lady a new sewing machine.

It was another world. And it existed here in The USA!

[donna]

LOL! Not a Dr. Laura moment.

[VOA]

some dolt uses cash and crashes the well-oiled machine.

Those adverts should result in a HUGH fine for fraud.
Whether I've been in California, Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Illinois,
Maine, Massachussetts...
if there is some TRUE DOLT that will cause the line at the cash register
to grind to a halt...
it's some moneyed MORON that acts as though the idea of swiping
a credit card and signing an electronic screen just arrived
from outer space.

[VOA]

“I tried treating the women in my office as equals and ended up
in sensitivity training.”

Everything I needed to know about “sensitivity training”...
I learned by observing gay guys and “fag-hags” in high school!

[Sunshine Sister]

And there is no way in hell any of us would be doing housework in heels!

[Adder]

Sure are...is there some problem with them?

[Impugn]

This was from a commercial in the Philadelphia area during the early 1970's (was embarrassingly enough played well into the 1989's)...absolute classic song for Ideal Manufacturing (clothing) Company - (audio link). Here is their website: http://mcnally.cc/ideal.htm.

As for the flat-out most sexist commercials in the history of television, nothing beats Philadelphia's Krass Brothers ("Store of the Stars"). You can actually SEE the women get increasingly degraded over the span of the very short commercials.

For example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gu56WdkNNF0

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIBdNZAPA-U

There are several more of them posted on YouTube...usually 12 seconds or less.

[wjcsux]

Great ad!

[VOA]

Another ad that would be banned these days:
“Should a gentleman offer a Tiparillo to a lady?”
http://www.vintageadsandstuff.com/viewcigar37.jpeg

I was a young boy during the day of that advert...and even then I
knew there was something naughty about it!