As a non-binary person, I never see myself represented in advertisements – and I'd like it to stay that way

If your gender is never represented in advertising at all, there can be no ‘advertising stereotypes’ about it. And for me that’s really one of the only liberating things about being non-binary – there is no ‘ideal’ to aspire to

Kaan K
Thursday 20 July 2017 10:24 BST
Comments
A still from a video-on-demand ad for Femfresh bikini line shaving products featuring several women wearing briefs and swimwear while dancing
A still from a video-on-demand ad for Femfresh bikini line shaving products featuring several women wearing briefs and swimwear while dancing

As a feminist, I was pretty pleased to read this week that advertising watchdog ASA is going to “crack down” on gender stereotyping in advertisements. And it’s about time. I hope to never see a repeat of Protein World’s “beach body ready” campaign or BMW replacing a woman’s face with a picture of a car ever again.

Nevertheless, as a non-binary person, it also got me thinking about how I’m never represented in advertisements at all. And rather than being pissed off at that lack of representation, I actually feel incredibly lucky that I’ve in part escaped the toxic claws of capitalist ad culture.

Advertising culture is more often than not dangerous. It capitalises on our insecurities to sell us things, it represents unrealistic “ideals” that we’re supposed to aspire to, and ultimately it has the interests of big business at heart. In a society where we see thousands of ads every day, I feel pretty happy that no one is targeting them at me.

In the past few years, businesses have been jumping on the bandwagon of “liberal” politics, working hard to seem edgy and “woke” when it comes to LGBTQ+ rights. From global brands like Coca Cola and Google featuring LGBTQ+ people in their ads, to the corporate takeover of Pride, pink capitalism is growing, and you would think from this that big business is embracing the queer community with open arms.

Audi advert compares women to used cars

But as seen in this Absolut ad, LGBTQ+ people are often still used in ads for the cisgender gaze. And as shown in the recent Heineken and Pepsi ads, capitalists are all too happy for people’s identities and politics to be used as a tool to boost their sales and their PR.

Even though this Robert Dyas ad did make me chuckle (and I’ve watched it about 20 times), I still feel that my identity should not be used as a commodity for companies to sell their products or to appear edgy and trendy.

The big problem is that when advertisers do represent us, it’s on their terms rather than our own. Ads are renowned for reinforcing stereotypes and portraying idealistic and unrealistic expectations. It’s why the sexist ad crackdown is happening, and although ASA have chosen to target ads with a gender bias this time around, there are plenty of ads out there that reinforce biases and ideals about the queer community too.

Take the aforementioned Google and Coca Cola ads as examples – both feature stereotypically good-looking, young, cisgender, white gay men. The first even features a gay nuclear family. No queer people of colour, no drag kings, no polyamorous relationships.

And then there’s the pressure that comes with being the target audience of an ad campaign. When advertisers are presenting the LGBTQ+ community in this very narrow, whitewashed, heteronormative way, it’s damaging – to our self-esteem, to our subcultures and to our identities.

Femfresh advert banned for objectifying women

As long as the LGBTQ+ community are represented in mainstream culture, we will be represented in a way that is easily digestible for the straight, cisgender gaze. But whilst some of us are easily digestible to straight, cisgender people, many of us aren’t. And when it’s hard enough to get people to call me by the correct pronouns, I don’t need the added pressure of being told by big business what I should ideally look like, what clothes I should wear, what I should smell like, if I should buy this car, and so on and so on.

If your gender is never represented in advertising at all, there can be no “advertising stereotypes” about it. And for me that’s really one of the only liberating things about being non-binary – there is no “ideal” to aspire to.

Then there’s the problem of intent. Unfortunately, the same businesses that claim to push our “rights” in their ads also fail to stand up for their LGBTQ+ employees. Take P&G, for example, who last year voted against opposing North Carolina’s transphobic bathroom policies. Just a month later, the same company released an ad celebrating a trans woman’s right to use the ladies’ room.

The problem with big companies is that they are happy to use LGBTQ+ people’s identities to sell their products, but so few of them actually genuinely stand up for queer or trans people’s rights.

Advertisers have done a rubbish job, both at representing us and standing up for our rights, and I don’t trust them to get any better. But if this trendy liberal “support” for LGBTQ+ rights continues to make money, maybe in 30 years’ time we will see a new “crackdown” from ASA on depicting queer and trans people in a stereotypical way.

Personally, however, I hope they leave us out of their ads altogether.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in