Let's Write Better Women In Adverts

Earth women are a gaggle of calorie-counting, giggling girlfriends who serve each other versatile rye-bread snacks at home in the middle of the afternoon. Sometimes when they’re alone, they wear silk and eat single squares of chocolate with their eyes closed for sexual pleasure. This appears to make them all suffer from bloating.

They all do yoga - all of them, every single one - even though they find it intimidating because they believe every other woman to be better at it than them. When they are not believing themselves to be bad at yoga, they are determined to not let their blue menstrual cycles stop them from screaming their way down zip wires or being goalkeepers.

Women love smells. LOVE them. The smell of clean laundry makes their ovaries hard. They breathe plug-in air freshener as though it were purest oxygen. But the greatest of all smells appears to be cheap deodorant for boys, which whips them into a wild frenzy of jiggling mammary glands and desperation.

The entirety of womankind is white, except for six black women and three Asian women. There are no Muslim women. There are only two women over the age of sixty; one of which they call ‘Jane Fonda’. The other is a dinner lady.  

Many Earth women are at home, moving their offspring on from breast milk. The rest work in an office, where they are either too busy being “bubbly” to do any work, or are drooling over a man who has lost his shirt. Sometimes women can be found in hotel rooms opening curtains dramatically. They will bounce on the bed if it’s a really good one.

Oh, and the youngest and most symmetrical women find all men really funny, even when the joke is at their expense, or is a terrible, awful joke. A wink is all it takes, and everything is forgiven. 

*** REPORT ENDS *** 

Advertising creates a two-dimensional portrait of the world - it has to - we only have 30 seconds, or the space of a poster to show you yourself. As a creative, I understand the challenges; all I ask is that we just think about this world a bit harder. Reach a little further with our stereotypes.

Maybe we could see a female politician? Or a group of black female friends? All of them, not a token one. Could we have a dad performing baby care duties? Maybe there’s ONE woman who doesn’t do yoga? Maybe a woman is dating a younger man, and we don’t make a big thing of it?

It’s important that we reappraise how we speak to women, not just when the voice is coming from a female-focused brand. Because at the moment, we’re not great at it.

Let’s write better women.