Tide, I think we get that you’re trying to be hip and cool with your newest commercial about a mother borrowing her daughter’s lime green shirt to go out on the town with her friends.

It’s nice to give a nod to mothers, I agree, and to suggest that they, too, deserve a social life filled with fun. Having recently had an “adult” party with several friends—and my child and husband notably absent—I can vouch for how much fun it is to remember that you’re a grownup, and how important it is to have a night out with your “girls.”

But then we get to the part of your commercial where the mother lies to her teenage daughter about borrowing her “missing” top—recollecting that she had, in fact, stained it while out on the town, after which she buried it in the clothes hamper—you pretty much miss the mark. Instead of making it a conversation piece between mother and daughter—acknowledging the mother’s presence as, yes, a person in need of recreation as well—you keep her a matronly caregiver, complete with bathrobe, who claims to be clueless about the location of said shirt. This would have been the opportunity to establish Mom’s real personality and humanness—but instead you stick with the whole idea that mothers are not humans, but on a separate plane from their children—void of personality, of needs, and definitely of errors. Of course, it’s really her “little secret,” which might have been designed for mystery rather than light misogyny; the design, however, failed.

Not only is this problematic, but so is the idea that it’s perfectly okay to lie to your children. Instead of owning up to borrowing the shirt—which, of course, is usually the other way around in most portrayals of daughter-mother relationships—and admitting, again, to being human, the mother puts on a perplexed expression, feigning cluelessness. This is supposed to be charming; instead it perpetuates the idea that it’s perfectly okay to be dishonest with children, even though we expect them to be honest with us.

Overall, the commercial failed to make me want your glorified, likely environmentally harmful product, Tide. Even if I were a Tide buyer, this ad would not prompt me to seek out your supposedly miraculous elixir; instead, it makes me question just what your company believes about mothers and families, as well as ethics—particularly honesty—in general.