by Matt B. Simon

The most fundamental of stereotypes is the man versus woman meme. It transcends white versus black, Jewish versus Catholic, and gay versus straight. As you know, women can’t drive, men can’t listen, women can cook, and men can break things really well. Advertisers know this, so they play to our expectations, and in the process try to define us as the typical man or woman. It works.

The greatest offender may be Axe Body Spray, whose greatest creative achievement is a one-minute spot in which their deodorant turns the male antagonist into a walking chocolate man, who is consequently attacked by hordes of sexy women. Women fucking love chocolate. Even my ex-girlfriend, who was deathly allergic to chocolate, ate it until she went into shock because women love chocolate.

Now, according to Dodge, if you’re a man, you love a good, strong engine and explosions (bonus if the engine runs so hard it blows up). This is why they created the Dodge Ram Challenge, so the manliest of men, those soldiers, firefighters, contractors, and cowboys, have a way to release some adrenaline before they’re forced to pump iron and get their shirts all sweaty. See it in its masculine glory at ramchallenge.com.

These ads don’t offend me in and of themselves, mostly because I don’t give a crap. But what angers me is their unmitigated pimping of American standards of masculinity and femininity. In their perfect world, we men could settle our differences by climbing into big trucks and running over minorities (they were probably terrorists anyway), while we shut our women up with crates of Hershey’s bars. I may be wrong, but I think we’re better than that. But thank you, shameless capitalism, for the offer.