Women's Clothing Brand Takes Page Out of Bud Light's Marketing Plan with New Ad
There was a time, not that long ago, where men dressing in women’s clothes was a punchline and nothing more.
There’s a reason “Mrs. Doubtfire” was presented as a comedy. There’s a reason mid-90s sitcoms all featured an episode with at least one main male character in drag (and inevitably cuing a raucous laugh track). There’s a reason Norman Bates was portrayed as mentally disturbed when dressing up like his mother.
That reason? Men are men, and women are women.
To imply that a man being a woman is anything more than a joke or psychotic episode is to directly spit on God’s natural order of creation.
People, understandably, don’t like that.
Women’s apparel brand Anthropologie is learning that lesson in real time after posting an ill-advised video of a male model dancing around in various dresses and other articles of clothing explicitly meant for women.
You can take a gander for yourself below, but it’s as disturbing as it sounds.
WARNING: The following Instagram post includes content that the viewer may find disturbing
View this post on Instagram
Once your lunch has re-settled after viewing that video, you may have noticed something curious about the above Instagram post — where are the comments?
According to Evie Magazine, Anthropologie responded to overwhelming negative backlash by disabling and deleting all comments on the post.
The apparel company obviously wouldn’t delete and disable glowing comments, so it stands to reason that just the backlash on Instagram alone caused them to disable the comments.
Author Gina Bontempo took to Twitter to share that furious Anthropologie customers were leaving angry comments on the company’s other posts.
Women are commenting on other Anthropologie posts to let them know they’re not interested in seeing dudes in dresses. pic.twitter.com/G9QJgsplb7
— Gina Bontempo (@FlorioGina) May 4, 2023
“So you hired the patriarchy to sell women’s clothing then turned the comments off when we all weren’t jumping up & down in pigtails like Dylan Mulvaney over it? ITS DONE. STOP ERASING WOMEN. Fire the art director & marketing team. Save yourselves,” one fired up social media user responded.
“Seriously?” asked another Instagram user. “I don’t want to see a man’s bulge as he’s twirling in a dress. This is not the way to go Anthropologie. Looks like my recent purchases are going back to the store.”
“Taking bets on how many times @anthropologie can silence women in one evening,” another social media user added. “First with the ad, and next disabling comments. You may not hear us, but we’ve certainly gotten your message loud & clear.”
But perhaps the most poignant observation came from one social media user Bontempo quoted, noting that Anthropologie appears to have learned nothing from the ongoing Bud Light debacle.
“Later Anthro,” the comment read. “You should’ve learned from Budweiser.”
Indeed, Anthropologie’s bungle is arguably made worse by the fact that there was a cultural parable sitting right there ready to teach them what not to do.
Bud Light and Belgian parent company Anheuser-Busch have been in the crosshairs of an effective boycott campaign after they worked with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. Anecdotally and fiscally, the companies have been struggling since working with Mulvaney and the influencer’s particular brand of obnoxious flamboyance.
One potential difference between the two situations worth pointing out: What Anthropologie did might actually even be worse than what Bud Light did.
Bud Light, for all the scorn it rightfully deserves, is part of a multi-billion dollar conglomerate. You almost expect those companies to break woke at some point or another, especially in 2023.
Anthropologie, however, is a much smaller outfit. And it’s a much smaller organization that specifically caters to women. A simple glance at their web page confirms that.
And yet, when you go to the company’s “Our Story,” nary will you find a mention of “woman” (or “womxn” or “wxmxn” or whatever other leftist gibberish being pushed at the moment).
In other words, Anthropologie wants women’s money, while actively trying to erase womanhood by tacitly acknowledging that men can, apparently, model women’s clothes better than women could.
If that’s not the very definition of diabolically anti-female, what is?
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