Collective Shout hijacks Schick for Men campaign to protest against objectification of women
The Collective Shout is hijacking a Schick for Men shaver claiming it is objectifying women by using their bodies as a canvas.
Schick is asking people to upload their photo to be featured on a T-shirt with the aim of winning 1 in 20 personalised t-shirts and Schick grooming kits. Users are also able to select which model their mock-up of the t-shirt will be featured on.
The Collective Shout, which describes itself as a grassroots campaigning movement against the objectification of women in media, advertising and popular culture, is encouraging its followers to upload a photo featuring a message against sexism.
Cailtin Roper, Collective Shout WA state coordinator said: “One of our supporters alerted us to Schick’s new ad campaign and their competition. So what we’ve encouraged our supporters to do is to hijack the campaign a little bit and subvert Shick’s sexist and objectifying message about women.
The campaign features a woman wearing several layers of the shirts which she rips off as the ad progresses, before she pulls the final shirt up with a message appearing prompting viewers to click here to see what happens next.
Viewers who have clicked on the prompt are taken to the next video which is a behind the scene look at what happened when the ad completed shooting.
“People have a bit of fun with it, it’s just an easy way for people to get involved. A lot of time people see things like this and think I don’t like that but that’s the way women are depicted. This is just a small way they can get involved and turn that message around and show Schick they don’t appreciate being objectified in such a way,” said Roper of the various entries from the group’s supporters.
On the goal of the campaign Roper said while they hope advertisers and marketers will run campaigns that “don’t objective and sexualise women or depict them as commodities or objects”, at this point Collective Shout is focussed on communicating their message that advertising and promotions such as this aren’t acceptable.
“We’re just trying to get our message out and hope that Schick and other people and brands are made aware of this sort of treatment of women and how normalised it is and that it’s not ok and a lot of people do have a problem with it,” she added.
It’s not the first time the organisation has run campaigns such as this, with it involved with the #NextTopPredator campaign to counter Australia’s Next Top Model selfie campaign.
Miranda Ward
Linkedin