I just blogged about this b/c I just saw it and it was SO FUCKING ENRAGING, but I think it should go here too. (I hope this is coherent, I’m v angry)
Apparently this jewelry store thinks that domestic violence against men is hilarious (massive DV trigger warning)
The ad itself is here in case the post is removed without an apology or something (again massive DV trigger warning)
WHAT THE FUCK. Seriously… I have no other words but… WHAT THE FUCK! Who the hell thought this was a good idea? Haha, see it’s an abused husband! Reversal of narratives! Um… no… fuck no. This is not fucking funny, it’s domestic violence and it’s WRONG.
Luckily, they provided us w/ contact info!
Annapolis Zachary’s Jewelers
100 Main St.
Annapolis, MD 21401
410-266-5555
sales@zacharysjewelers.com
http://www.zacharysjewelers.com/guysonly
http://www.twitter.com/keithzacharys
There’s the site, and their twitter and email. Tweet them or email them and let them know domestic abuse is not funny, it is not some gimmick to help them sell jewelry, it is not okay just because it features a man in the ad, and that they’re making light of survivors of domestic violence and normalizing all sorts of shitty narratives about how abuse of husbands is okay, or understandable. >:O
This is NOT OKAY.
Let them know.
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kaija24
2020
noahbrand
Cliff Pervocracy
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John Hawkins
No, Seriously, What About Teh Menz? 
Christ on a cracker. That would be despicably offensive even if the product it were selling weren’t intrinsically fucked-up and awful, which it is.
Well-spotted, Ami. These jerks deserve to take some heat over this.
So the hair salon that had the male-on-female DV themed ad got vandalized, as well as picketed, etc…
Want to bet the reaction on the sum total of the feminist blogosphere will be somewhat less outraged this time ’round?
(And again, there be good feminists here. Just like there are conservatives, like me, who don’t use the word as short hand for right wing, there are feminists, like me, who don’t use the word as short hand for misandry… my misandry is purely recreational and has nothing to do with my feminism. o_Q)
Yeah, it really, really is (trigger warning for torture and sexual violence).
I’m speechless….wow 😦 so many levels of wrong…. be assured they’ll be hearing from me and my friends.
Meh, Bling is for overly rich idiots anyhow. This is just one more reason not to buy jewellery. Not that I’m anyplace near Maryland USA (Apparently they make good cookies), mind you. But yeah, This is BAD, they are BAD, and the whole thing is Badness. Local Masculists and Masculist Sympathisers, Placards at the ready… aaaaaaannnnnnnddd PICKET!!! 😉
And, of course, women demand their boyfriends buy the expensive rings from fancy places. And if their boyfriends don’t comply the women get violent. This suggests women are shallow. demanding, and mean.
Anyway the ad, IMO, is just bad. It reads as if their place is why the women is angry.
(and as an aside, and on a personal level, both me and my wife think jewelry is stupid. We don’t even have wedding rings.)
I wrote to them and got the following response a few minutes ago:
Greetings,
We have put the request in to our marketing agency to change the ads in our “bathroom campaigns”. Starting September the ad will cease to run.
Thank you for your thoughts and we have decided to pull all ads with this campaign.
Keith
Zachary’s Jewelers
“Good Afternoon,
We have asked our advertising agency to remove this ad and all others in this campaign by the end business today.
I have been assured by our agency that all ads will be removed by tomorrow.
Regards,
Keith
Zachary’s Jewelers”
I hear they’ve already agreed to pull it, but I sent them a quiet message anyways, telling them that type of ad was repulsive and insulting to both men and women. That kind of message does NOT put me in the mood for getting engaged!
I was NOT prepared for how graphic that image is. Holy shit.
what marketing agency is that? I think we should complain also to them….
Idle Time Contact Info
PHONE (410) 268-1599
TOLL FREE 1-866-435-IDLE
FAX (410) 280-0667
LOCATION Annapolis, MD
EMAIL info@idletimeads.com
Contact info for the add agency responsible. Give ’em hell from us, peeves!
WTF are these ad agencies thinking? First that stupid salon photo and then “black and blue” barbie shots with the girl from Glee…now this? How does this ever pass the first go-round?
Emailed them, but I don’t know if it’s feeding the “any news is good news” factory.
“And, of course, women demand their boyfriends buy the expensive rings from fancy places. And if their boyfriends don’t comply the women get violent. This suggests women are shallow. demanding, and mean.”
Exactly.
This ad is the worst. I cannot fathom how they think this would make someone laugh. It’s very hard just to look at it.
Apparently there is another ad that does this with the sexes reversed:
http://www.thefrisky.com/post/246-hair-salon-defends-domestic-violence-y-ad/
@ unreal man
“Apparently there is another ad that does this with the sexes reversed:”
Not quite. This ad is ambiguous. And if it does depict DV it’s not heavily implying that the woman deserved it for upsetting the man or that DV against women is funny/okay.
Plus it had an immediate _local_ reaction against it.
@unreal man
Are you KIDDING me!? That is horrendous. They’re both horrendous. The things people will do to try and be “edgy”.
The weirdest and/or worst thing about the ad is that it’s *not even a joke*. At least, not that I can discern. It’s just a very realistic picture of someone who has been beaten. Er, I’m waiting for the punchline? It’s fucking creepy.
Even solely from a business perspective, I don’t understand how a company could think this was a good idea. It kind of made me ill.
Are we talking about the ad with the woman with very poofy-hair?
I really think it’s ambiguous. Maybe she’s a jewel thief who got injured and the guy is just her accomplice(he doesn’t look particularly anything, maybe slightly confused or constipated). That makes more sense in the context of the other pieces which are all about edgy chicks doing edgy things.
We’re not.
I don’t know why feminists wouldn’t get upset about this one, since it implies that women are shallow, selfish, violence-prone bitches who have to be appeased with offerings. Ugh. This is just horrible all around.
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@MRAL Yeah I completely agree -_- It’s NOT funny…. and that’s what’s so disturbing about this ad and others that use DV to sell things… it’s so close to the real thing, or it’s just an image of the real thing… >:|
Yeah, nobody I’ve talked to or shown the thing to have understood how that sells products either or is good for business -_-;;
There’s another one of these things going on for some actress where she poses with a black eye while pressing a presumably hot iron into a man’s groin while smiling from ear to ear. The funny part is that in all of the negative reactions, people are clamoring about how violence against women isn’t funny…
@dungone,
Is this the one with the blonde actress from that peculiar TV show Glee? This sort of analysis I saw with this clip from The Young Turks:
It’s another one of Cenk Uygur’s frequent egalitarianism fails.
UYGUR: “[picture of grinning woman with black eye ironing man’s balls] represents her striking back…”
No, it doesn’t. For all we know, in this twisted little “narrative” portrayed in the photos, this is what begins the abuse. Nor does being abused excuse abusing someone else, such as to the point of severely harming their genitals. I’m all for protecting people from domestic abuse, and I’m all for dissing those who use domestic abuse situations for softcore porn, but it gets really irritating when certain otherwise good-intentioned “alpha dawgs” can’t see the forest for the trees.
EDIT: I just noticed the woman’s black eye as she irons the man’s groin, so this “narrative” evidently doesn’t begin with this action. My bad…
However, I don’t see how tying the hands of the (alleged) abuser with a wire and causing grievous bodily harm is proportionate retribution.
And I say “alleged” because it’s interesting how people immediately assume that this is unidirectional abuse.
I really don’t care “who started it,” because it’s fiction… My problem isn’t that some provocative work of art portrays DV in an off-kilter way, it’s how people have reacted to it. The art shows both the man and woman getting abused and makes light of both situations to have its provocative effect. It’s the fact that people can look at a woman who happily poses with a black eye and then presses a hot iron into a tied-up man’s groin and the only thing they can take away from it is that the photo shoot might trigger the female victims of DV to feel bad about themselves, that is my problem. The reactions all say “we’ve never heard of male DV victims.” If you’re going to condone it, don’t make yourself sound like a complete idiot who gets offended by things you don’t even understand to begin with… it really sends but one message to any artists. As Voltaire once said, “I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: “O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.””
condone should have said condemn…
@dungone
I don’t get your meaning about “condon[ing]” the portrayal of the violence. I don’t think anyone is condoning this. However, as you said, they’re taking the wrong message away from how vile it is.
It’s problem that people *don’t* say this: “Damn, DV is horrendous and this photoshoot portrays it positively with that photo of the man getting his groin attacked by a woman who’s smiling about it.”
Instead, in this clip from a popular, supposedly progressive online news-commentary show, the host is saying somewhat offhand that this most heinous example of DV (with the victim actually showing pain on his face) is an example of the *abuser* in this scenario “striking back”.
Invisibility of male victims is the result…
EDIT: Saw your correction.
It seems we mean the same thing.
Congratulations on a successful egalitarian initiative, NSWATMers! Ozy, I think you should set up a blog page for these kinds of masculist egalitarian campaigns … this one and the one to prompt Sharon Osbourne to leave The View are good starts.
And Fathers and Families, due to me sending this webpage to them, has now written what they think on this: http://www.fathersandfamilies.org/?p=19151
(Yet what a shame of them not to have published a link to this page, as I originally sent.)
Ugh. Am less than impressed by the Fathers and Families take on things. Not only does the article use mental gymnastics in order to find that the hairdressing advert does not glorify domestic violence, but it then engages in the sort of finger-pointing oppression olympics that is so poisonous to the MRA movement.
Men’s and women’s rights are not zero-sum, people, and bickering competitiveness does not improve either side’s argument. And on domestic violence the message should very, very simple: it’s wrong, in all cases.
Darn right, Spud. I can’t stand when criticizing bad media imagery turns into people trying to win points for an imagined team.
Though speaking of winning points, I do think we should all be glad that the jeweler that had the ad in the OP has retracted it with an apology. It would have been better that it never saw the light of day in the first place, but hey, maybe they’ve learned something.
What mental gymnastics, Spud? Let’s put aside our sexist bias against men for one second and look at the hairdressing ad without any preconceived notions of what might have happened. I looked at the ad and it shows a woman with a black eye, gorgeous hair, and a well-dressed man giving her a necklace. The caption says “Look good in all you do.”
Poor taste? Certainly! But why? What about that ad really says Domestic Violence and nothing else? Having dated a female athlete, I’ve experienced the stigma of walking into a restaurant with a girl with a bruise on her face and having everyone there give me dirty looks even though she had gotten hit in the face with a softball. And guess what – when she had that bruise, I got her a gift to make her feel better. It could have been that scene in this ad. But I swore the waitress spit in my food that night. If anyone was doing mental gymnastics that night, it was all the people who gave me dirty looks! So while the ad is in poor taste, it’s because they should have known how people make the worst possible assumptions whenever they see an injured woman in a relationship.
Before you accuse FF of mental gymnastics, imagine if it had been an ad for a suit and the guy had the black eye. Perhaps he fought defending her honor, right? Or maybe he just fell off a ladder. Or maybe he plays hockey? I think FF took the time to actually look at the ad without bias and preconceived notions and asked themselves if there was enough information there for the rest of us to infer that the advertiser’s motive was to exploit domestic violence. I would expect nothing less from an advocacy group that does legal work on behalf of men. In the end they acknowledged that it was poor taste and that it might as well have been DV, but their point was very clear and very pertinent. The jewelry ad left nothing to the imagination – it was DV against men, no ifs, ands, or buts. And their argument was that of the domestic violence advocacy groups that stepped up to condemn the hairdressing ad, few if any stepped up against the jewelry ad. That’s not Oppression Olympics, that’s outright hypocrisy on the part of organizations that claim to stand up against all forms of domestic violence. They made two very compelling points, one about the stereotypes of domestic violence and, two, about the invisibility of male victims.
dungone: if you click-through to The Star article, the salon owner is quoted as saying “Is it intended to be a satirical look at real life situations that ignites conversation and debate? Of course.”
Translation: it is indeed intended to be read as a domestic violence situation.
Both ads are horrible, both trivialise domestic violence in order to sell a product, and we should be criticising both. And okay, you may argue that domestic violence advocacy groups ignore female-on-male abuse; I could easily believe that. But can we argue that point in a way that does not rubbish or play down the equally real problem of male-on-female abuse?
The salon ad theoretically could have had some big point like “The hell? Why are you assuming bruise=violence? What are women too dainty to play things like sports?”, or “So normal glorification of violence is okay (see tons of other adds), but if its against women it suddenly becomes super-evil-bad, and I can’t use it in my ads? There a reason for that double standard?”, but… I think he would have pointed that out when he was interviewed if that was the point. So really he was just using domestic violence to sell something. Although I do question the standard of violence against women suddenly becoming not-okay to use in ads, but normal violence just peachy.
The FF article… going in completely the opposite direction of the right way with the final thrust. Seemed to me like they were anti-DV programs/services instead of being pro-inclusive DV programs/services. The answer is not “undo the progress made.” Its “include services for males.” (Okay there are a few bad laws, but still…)
@ Lamech
“So really he was just using domestic violence to sell something.”
She. And she did apologize if abused women thought their situation was reflected in the ad.
@ Lamech
“The FF article… going in completely the opposite direction of the right way with the final thrust. Seemed to me like they were anti-DV programs/services instead of being pro-inclusive DV programs/services. The answer is not “undo the progress made.” Its “include services for males.” (Okay there are a few bad laws, but still…)”
Could you quote exactly what gave you that impression? Because the impression I got was that f & f was criticizing the zero-sum attitude of many current DV advocates and shelters, ie. giving services to male victims takes away services(and money) from female victims.
Lamech:
Seemed to me like they were anti-DV programs/services instead of being pro-inclusive DV programs/services. The answer is not “undo the progress made.” Its “include services for males.” (Okay there are a few bad laws, but still…)
Unfortunately what must be undone is the so called “progress” that has led to the toxic thinking (and judicial and legislative procedures that run on that toxic thinking) that prevails in the current domestic violence discourse. Near the end Franklin gives a bit of what (he thinks) would happen if male victims were to be acknowledged on a larger scale than what they are now. And as far as I can tell there’s no mention of removing those programs, just what would happen if they were inclusive.
typhonblue: “Could you quote exactly what gave you that impression?”
Nothing explicitly stated, or strongly implied*, just the feeling I got from what he said. But he mentions “DV establishment”, a “proper” training for judges will let them conclude 80% of claims are false, “flood tide of money” and such. Those things give me the impression that the writer doesn’t like any DV groups, and doesn’t think they should get money, and opposed to them on general principal, not simply opposed to the sexism they have.
And the writer is right that some more evidence is needed. In fact, I remember an article on Feminsting that very nicely illustrated the problems with taking someone at their word sans evidence. Those safe guards for the innocent are important, and all, but the impression I got was a general disregard and distaste for DV claims, and domestic abuse shelters.
Of course, I could be completely and totally wrong.
P.S. I’ll be more careful to not use pronouns without checking the gender of people.
noahbrand: Perhaps you blogger’s have seen something I haven’t seen, but I can’t see that the jeweler who had the ad in the OP has apologized in any way.
“But he mentions “DV establishment”, a “proper” training for judges will let them conclude 80% of claims are false”
He really said that 50% to 80% of claims of DV *in custody proceedings following a divorce* are false, often on the counsel of a lawyer.
@ Lamech
I’m guessing the following paragraphs you’re finding problematic:
“The first is the flood tide of money to DV shelters and other entities purporting to provide services to victims and perpetrators. Since the vast majority of those offer no services to male victims or female perpetrators, federal and state funding would likely become contingent on changing those policies.”
If a gender neutral approach to DV was put into law then shelters would have to make accommodations to male victims and female perpetrators. I imagine the resistance to this among the DV orthodoxy is one part inertia to two parts dogma.
I don’t think f & f is saying that *they* think either men or women can be served, but that the current DV orthodoxy thinks that either men or women can be served.
The second problematic paragraph you summarized as:
“But he mentions “DV establishment”, a “proper” training for judges will let them conclude 80% of claims are false, “flood tide of money” and such.”
This was the actual paragraph:
“Second is the radical shift that might occur in family courts. As one recent study revealed, more than any other single factor, it’s claims of abuse that serve to deny fathers access to their children. Now, a study of mediators showed that those who don’t characterize themselves as feminists, see anywhere from half to 80% of the claims as false. Moreover, judges who were educated about the reality of DV instead of the fictional narrative written by the DV establishment, would surely begin to scrutinize claims more carefully and perhaps even demand hard evidence before cutting dads out of their children’s lives.”
He doesn’t say that judges would find 80% of DV claims false if they were educated about the reality of domestic violence (ie. all the studies that show parity), he says that of non-feminist mediators (feminists being more likely, on the whole, to believe in the patriarchal-power theory of domestic violence and an overwhelming asymmetry in perpetration between men and women) see that anywhere from 50% to 80% of claims of DV are false.
It’s interesting that the reverse proposition, that men are willing to make false claims of DV is actually accepted among some of the woman’s groups. Even though they reject the idea that women might do the same.
Here’s a link to one:
“And in another whole set of cases, there are indications that domestic violence perpetrators themselves have gotten increasingly sophisticated at turning the law on women by doing such things as calling 911 themselves or by purposely injuring themselves before police arrive.”
http://www.justicewomen.com/tips_dv_victims.html
Those safe guards for the innocent are important, and all, but the impression I got was a general disregard and distaste for DV claims, and domestic abuse shelters.
Perhaps you are sensing a disregard and distaste for DV claims and shelters as they are now rather than in general?
Danny: “Perhaps you are sensing a disregard and distaste for DV claims and shelters as they are now rather than in general?” Indeed, that is another distinct possibility. Like I said, I could be completely and totally wrong.
@typhonblue: The link is particularly ironic, when you here all the victim’s advocate groups say that low prosecution/conviction rates = police don’t care. Also ironic, is it effectively states, that formal probation=easy-to-get-crap-arrests. I suppose this group opposes formal probation then? And apparently harassment= attempts to get custody of the children and a restraining order. Opposed to restraining orders and awarding custody on the basis of DV claims that can’t meet the burden of proof for a criminal trial? And so forth.
@ Lamech
“The link is particularly ironic, when you here all the victim’s advocate groups say that low prosecution/conviction rates = police don’t care.”
Yeah… I think it’s interesting that a ‘6%’* conviction rate for rape is seen as bias against female victims(completely ignoring male victims) and a 6% conviction rate for female perpetrators of domestic violence is an obvious indication that the vast majority of DV charges against women are false.
* In quotes due to Ozy’s excellent send up of this stat.
@ Lamech
Also, Robert Franklin is usually posting something once a day on that blog. He probably has a day job so I imagine a lot of the writing is rushed and sometimes has a problem with clarity and/or tone.
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