Women beware: Madison Avenue is targeting YOU this month of May: you like pink, you count calories, yet you obviously need to pleasure yourself with more than just chocolate.
First, we hear about the new pastel laptop called Della, which is somehow specially designed for the woman who wants to count calories or find recipes–unlike “regular” laptops, I presume. Like some of those responding to Jill at Feministe, I actually like the idea of a pink or purple laptop (my current steel-gray Dell is serviceable, but hey, it doesn’t really make me smile in the morning), but it’s the marketing to women as ditzy-broads who don’t worry their silly little heads about actual working on a computer that is the horror of the whole campaign.
Then there’s the new Fling candy bar, marketed to women: it’s wrapped in hot pink and shaped, get this, like a finger, so, well, you know, women can USE it. The tag lines in the ad include “Pleasure yourself” and “Naughty, but not that naughty.”
Again, I adore most chocolate, hot pink wrappers don’t bug me, and I suppose MOST candy bars have a long shape (Reeses Peanut Butter cups excluded–though I suppose we can sexualize those yummy, creamy cups, too), and I’m looking forward to actually tasting this new candy since I, like the Bow Wow Wows, want candy (and what fun to test if it lives up to its promise). Actually, as a woman I prefer the blatant appeal to my desire for hot sex than an appeal to my somewhat less passionate desire to collect recipes.
But really, what’s going on here?
Update: Bitch Magazine has more info on Fling, including a link to the ad.
From the Mixed Up Bloggings of Annie Em 
Nice Bow Wow Wows reference there! And I, too, would like a purple laptop.
Otherwise, I’m indignant right along with you. It seems so transparent: one campaign targets “tracking calories” and the other one promotes chocolate-as-pleasure. Hello, paradox! Lots of money to be made in the diet industry there…
Oooh, yes, that is an interesting paradox, though I’m thinking that the “Fling” ad isn’t really selling us chocolate per se;-)
I listened to “I Want Candy” on my run this morning…what a fun song!
Does chocolate-as-self-love work as well in the paradox? Hmmmm. And egads: there’s a sentence I never thought I’d type.
The Fling bars are pretty yummy, but someone in their marketing department needs to wake the hell up. They were giving them away in LA when I was on vacation this March. At that point, they were marketing them with little fake tabloids that said something like “Flings are the new trend!” and had a fake article about a fake celebrity that “had a Fling.”
I’m pretty pumped they went beyond the test marketing phase because they are darn tasty, but *facepalm* NEW ADS, PLZ!
You’ve tasted one? Flings are the “new” trend? Really? How fun that you were on the cutting edge, Alexis;-) Thanks for sharing that tidbit in Fling history!
Bitch Magazine has the link to the ad: http://bitchmagazine.org/post/sexual-euphemism-now-in-convenient-chocolate-form
Just the name “Flings” makes me think of that Josie and the Pussycats movie, for some reason.
Before anyone sneers, may I suggest that it actually had quite the astute satirical take on trends…and it had Parker Posey and Alan Cumming, two of my faves.
No sneers from me! And yes, Parker Posey–famous for playing Long Islanders–love her.