Q: When is a chip like a bicycle?

February 6, 2018 at 5:10 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

You read the thing about Doritos, right? Lady chips?! Eeeesh! Soooooo insulting! Like, is this the 1950s?! I’m a woman, and I like crunchy crisps! What’s so weird about that? And remember that Pinarello e-bike ad? Slow ladies keeping up with their menfolk?! Eeeesh! Soooooo insulting! Like, is this the 1950s?! I’m a woman, and I ride bikes fast! What’s so weird about that?

Are you seeing some kind of pattern, here? Right this minute, all over the place, people are having this meeting:

Sales dude: Damn, we need to shift more chips/ pens/ bicycles!

Design dude: Shall we make the product better? I have some ideas…

Finance dude [cutting him off]: No way, mate. That stuff costs money.

Marketing dude: I know! Let’s do something really obviously offensive, so we get in all the papers! Then when everyone’s talking about how awful we are, we can issue one of those apolothingies, you know, where we say it’s…

Finance dude: …the work of an intern which does not align with our company values?

Marketing dude: Yes! Genius.

Sales dude: And then everyone’s suddenly, like, “oh! So weird, but I really feel like some chips/ pens/ bicycles!”

Marketing dude: I LOVE MY JOB.

I know there’s that stuff about all publicity is good publicity, and the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about, and advertising’s really just being about grabbing every opportunity to go DORITOS! DORITOS! DORITOS! DORITOS! at everyone until we all crack and buy some. But it would be nice if, oh, I dunno, we could do that without the casual, idiotic sexism, without the feeling that we’re being prodded into outraged retaliation while a bunch of bros sit about going, ‘See? I TOLD YOU THAT WOULD HAPPEN! Women, huh!’ and high-fiving each other. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got better things to waste my time on.

https://twitter.com/ClintFalin/status/960259108808118272