J'Adore Dior, II

What was I saying about more elegance? I defy you not to love the latest high-profile ad by Dior, with Natalie Portman directed, apparently, by Sofia Coppola. Take a look here: Miss Dior.

We all aspire, but we are often lost as to what exactly we aspire to. Dior gives us a fantasy of elegance that directs our aspirations. What sort of man is the lucky tyke in this film? He’d have to be intelligent, of impeccable taste, a professional, and a lover. The details you may fill in for yourself. Bravo.

Ad Nauseam: Miller Lite

The phrase ‘Man up’ is a noxious one at best. But it risks losing all meaning if it is continually employed for trivialities. A man struggling to find courage in the face of adversity, or blighted by prevarication when action is due, might benefit from the imperative, presuming it was delivered by an appropriate source. Another – a better – man is really the only acceptable giver of the exhortation to ‘man up’, and it is an exhortation to be used sparingly.

It’s not difficult, bearing this in mind, to see what’s so wrong with the latest Miller Lite commercial. For starters, all light beer should be stricken from the earth. There is really no point in claiming that one light beer is more masculine than another, for it is all abominable. If you are watching your weight, don’t drink beer. It’s that simple. Don’t doubly emasculate yourself by publicly announcing that you diet as you order your calorie-controlled weasel urine.



Second, this man clearly has no need of diet, so his choices are reducible to his general lack of taste. It is quite audacious here to have portrayed the righteous barmaid without a shred of irony. She knows taste. She knows the right light beer for real men. But she does not, I aver, for it does not exist.

The man is justly criticised for his choice in bag, but the issue is surely its cheap vinyl quality, not its denomination. Men carry stuff. There’s no getting around it. But it is possible to choose a bag of some distinction, made of leather; something that will wear and, with you, garner its own biography. This man is cheap and tasteless. His critic operates within the same sphere of cheap tastelessness. The ad overall can be reduced to the same assessment. The next time some company tells us to ‘man up’, it had better be a call to arms.

Ad Nauseam: Old Spice

Time was when Old Spice only needed a man on a surfboard and a chorus from Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana to let the world know that this was a smell for seriously rugged men. I’m not sure there was ever any truth in that, but I had no objection to the way it was being pitched. Things have taken a crass turn.

The latest ad, aimed jointly at women who have complete control over the grooming of their men and at men who quiver at the sight of a superior musculature, demands that women make frequent comparisons to the men in their lives and the loosely towelled jock on the screen. Assuring women that they may justifiably give up hope that reality will ever compare favourably to his robust frame, the actor suggests that at least a real man does not have to smell like a woman, or worse. I have previously stated my opinions about the importance of the olfactory sense (Firing up the Ol’ Factory), but I don’t much care for it being sold in this way.

For starters, the appeal to women relies on an extension of the derisory stereotype put forward by the good people at Dodge (Ad Nauseum: Dodge Charger). Women will be wowed by such simple fripperies as tickets to a show (exactly what show is irrelevant because men don’t care about such things, as long as you’re happy and prepared to have sex afterward), diamonds, strutting about on the deck of a yacht, and the sexual connotations of horses. There is no substance in any of this, to the point that women are supposed not to notice that the man here is portrayed as arrogant, narcissistic and conceited. A pleasant aroma will take care of any and all the defects of character, it seems.

Second, are men thought so utterly hopeless that a direct appeal to them is futile? Surely a call to their self-respect and dignity would be better. As I mentioned previously, a man’s smell should be based on the reflection, ‘what does my smell say about me?’ If the answer to that question is simply ‘I do not make choices for myself’ then that is a shame.

Ad Nauseam: Dodge Charger

A few television commercials which purport to know something about manliness have been getting my goat recently. I hereby offer a transcript of the Dodge Charger effort, as well as the ad itself:

I will get up and walk the dog at 6:30 a.m. I will eat fruit as part of my breakfast. I will shave; I will clean the sink after I shave. I will be at work by 8 a.m. I will sit through two-hour meetings. I will say ‘yes’ when you want me to say ‘yes’. I will be quiet when you don’t want to hear me say ‘no’. I will take your call. I will listen to your opinion of my friends. I will listen to your friends’ opinions of my friends. I will be civil to your mother. I will put the seat down. I will separate the recycling. I will carry your lip balm. I will watch your vampire T.V. shows with you. I will take my socks off before getting into bed. I will put my underwear in the basket. And because I do this, I will drive the car I want to drive. Dodge Charger: a man’s last stand.

I really thought we were beyond all this nonsense. If I were to nitpick, in a missing-the-point kind of way, I would observe that any man who really felt this whipped by his work and his wife would scarcely have the temerity to dig in his heels about a second-rate muscle car. And if this really were a man’s last stand, what a feeble whimper it would be to signal the end of masculinity! I have no life, no dignity, no self-respect, no courage, no volition, no conviction and no taste, but at least I have $26,000 worth of metal to hide in! To all the knuckleheads out there nodding along to this trash, allow me to enlighten you.

If your work is so benumbing that the best you can do is ‘sit through it’, I suggest you are in the wrong job. A little imagination will sort that out. Since you’re already in a job, a position of strength, getting another – a better – one shouldn’t be too daunting a task. If it’s broke, fix it. And if the person you claim to love is as absolutely horrible to you as the archetype of woman in this ad, might I suggest that you take matters in hand and bring the relationship to a conclusion. Of course, the real issue is with the advertiser’s notion of woman as a hen-pecking, nagging, domineering malignancy. Does it really need to be said that women are not actually like this? And if yours is, either take it on trust that you have not done well in the sexual selection stakes, and that you can do better, or take a long hard look at yourself. What are you doing to make her so miserable that she is after you all the time? No doubt being an absolute wimp who blows his salary on a Dodge Charger. Try a bit harder and you will find a pleasant change in her demeanour.

Footnote: at the point in the ad where the car appears, note the small print: ‘Do not attempt. Professional driver on a closed course’. If you’re looking for a domineering malignancy, look no further than the litigation averse political correctness of companies that do not actually have a shred of the conviction they purport to sell.