Women empowerment, Arse if!

Nirma detergent's TVC shows the lead ladies getting their hands dirty while pushing out an ambulance stuck in a pit - as the men watch.

An ambulance stuck in a pit. Men watching -- some of them taking photographs and some disgusted at the sight of the filth. Four women 'knights', the all-too-familiar Hema, Rekha, Jaya and Sushma - in immaculate, crisp and clean attire - step into the pit to push the ambulance out. The famous jingle lingers in the air.


Is this really women empowerment?

Nirma has come out with a new advertisement, which has been labeled as ‘empowering women’. Sure the women, Hema, Rekha, Jaya and Sushma, are not afraid of getting into the dirt and do the ‘masculine job’ of moving a vehicle.

If we see closely, this advertisement has portrayed women to be free in their movement. Why is it so? Because the women know there is a product called ‘Nirma Washing powder’ and the stains will easily wash off.

Why are men disgusted?

This knowledge seems to be lacking in any man present at the scene in the advertisement and they do not move the vehicle that is stuck. Men are even disgusted at the sight of the mud pool. Hence, once again this advertisement has established who does the washing and who is aware of it. Men are not aware of this product in this advertisement; they don’t bother with such products. It is the woman’s task to keep a tab of these things.

Glorifying minor changes in popular gender roles:

Some of the men show in this advertisement also start clicking pictures of these women. It may seem that women here are being glorified but the truth is these men have never seen anything like this. This is why they are clicking pictures. It is not in the nature of a lady to push a vehicle and if she does so it is strange, heroic and something to be captured. Here again the advertisement is dividing gender roles. A little breach in these roles is glorified and the whole ad is tagged as ‘empowering women’.

Disguise:

Nirma ads have changed over the period of time and have become more damaging than they were before. The ads that used to come clearly showed how washing is a woman’s task. Though this new ad which proclaims to be empowering women has disguised itself in a way that modern educated upper class can fall for it.

Earlier we could still see that this ad is clearly sexist and point it out. The new ads, which in reality are sexist, but proclaim to be empowering are more dangerous.