Only In A Woman's World

Perhaps some of you have seen the Sex and the City type animated commercials put out by Frito Lay. When I first noticed one of these commercials I enjoyed the animation right away and found it mildly amusing.

I recently found out that these commercials are entitled Only In A Woman's World and are posted as webisodes. I watched a few and found that they are pretty stereotypical and generalize the experience of women. The women talk about "women's issues" such as men and weight loss.

<a href="http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-us&playlist=videoByUuids:uuids:f9ebc4d8-81fe-4ee5-8132-6ecadf5cc9a4&showPlaylist=true" target="_new" title="Only in a Woman's World Trailer">Video: Only in a Woman's World Trailer</a>
Teaser Trailer for Only In A Woman's World

Supposedly the webisodes/commericals are based on true stories submitted by consumers. Perhaps some women do behave in the ways that women in these animations do. However, the title "Only In A Woman's World" suggests that they speak to all women. These episodes seem to tell us that all women become angry with men when they are not happy with their weight, or that all we do is gossip gossip gossip, or that women are always competing with each other.

These videos may seem inoffensive and relatively harmless to some. And really, when I watched these I wasn't hopping mad. I pretty much just thought...eh...that's not me. I even found a couple lines to be humorous. But then I took a moment to ask myself if the message behind these videos are doing more harm than good.
It's obviously a marketing move to attract female consumers to the Frito Lay brand. So, what is the gimmic exactly? Use humor and sterotypical attitudes of women to draw in more women? The women who relate to these videos are most likely the women who are going to pay attention. So, does that suggest that women are indeed representative of the women featured in the videos? I'd say no. I think men and women alike often embrace stereotypes as a way to deny responsibility to larger issues.

Sure, there is no harm in reaching out to comedy as a way to comfort ourselves or find something to relate to. Stand up comics attempt to master the art of catering to this. However, there is a difference between suggesting to an audience that sometimes circumstances occur that are stereotypical and blatantly putting out the message that this IS how things are for a certain group of people.

If the commercials offered stereotypes of various races I doubt so many would be inclined to watch the videos.

Just something to think about.


Only In A Woman's World - "Jeans"