I have seen thousands of advertisements in my lifetime. How could I not? They’re anywhere and everywhere. Even though they can be annoying or tedious at times, my favorite ad of all time is actually a TV ad that aired during the Super Bowl in 2015. The campaign is called “Like a Girl” for the feminine product company Always.
This was an advertisement made to raise awareness of women’s health as well as women’s strength. It comes from the idea of people saying things such as “you throw like a girl” or “you run like a girl” or do anything else “like a girl” as an insult or with a negative connotation. It took the idea that this saying is meant to be disparaging and used it as a way to prove doing things “like a girl” can mean strength and power, rather than fragility and weakness. In order to do this the advertisement shows several people of varying ages, genders and backgrounds, and asked them to show what it looks like to “run like a girl” or to “throw like a girl”. All of the people pretended to run really strange, or to barely throw something it all. Essentially portraying a lack of coordination, strength or composure. Then the advertisement showed several young girls of different ages, body types and ethnicities to show what it looks like to run, throw, or fight “like a girl”. All of these little girls showed the complete opposite of the first group. They didn’t fake anything, or frolic, or play with their hair like the first group had portrayed, but they ran with power and strength. They threw their phantom ball with the same coordination anyone else would. If anything, they just did things normal. No more or no less than what a boy would have done.
The overall message of this ad revolved around the fact that, in most cases, a girls confidence plummets in puberty and that “like a girl” shouldn’t be held under such a negative connotation because it is simply not true, and it tears down young girls in their most critical years of life.This was something extremely powerful to me because I had never seen anything like it. At the time the ad was released I would have been around 13 years old and in peak puberty, but also in the dawn of my athletic career. I was lucky enough to not be the victim of this joke too many times, but it was because I was infuriated by it. Anytime we were in a P.E. class, or at recess, I remember always trying my hardest to prove I was just as athletic as the boys so I wouldn’t be the one getting made fun of. I was also lucky enough to be blessed with the genetics of two collegiate athletes, but I saw a lot of other girls who weren’t. Girls who got made fun of for apparently fitting into the “like a girl” stereotype. It was a terrible thing to see, but I didn’t even realize that it could be anything other than negative. It was always just something that they boys said, or sometimes girls said it to other girls who they felt weren’t as good as them at something. Overall I just felt like this advertisement was addressing such a crucial problem in our society I didn’t even realize we had until attention was brought to it.
To learn more about the “Like a girl” campaign by Always visit this hyperlink for more information.
Comments by Hollie Perdue