“The One Drop Rule (Or how the insecurity of the modern woman makes you cash money but don’t call it feminism because that’s a <i>very</i> strong word and we don’t know if that represents our brand identity.)”
If you’re a double jepardy minority like me and decently aware of how if effects how the world perceives you, you can pretty easily sniff out what I like to call “Social Justice for the modern republican.” That basically means that companies who don’t give half a damn about you or your struggles realize that they still need to make money from exploiting you so they take the most palatable, least offensive part of your struggle to support to try and siphon more money out of you while not alienating their more conservative customers who historically have always had more money and will always be more important.
This phenomenon is particularly prominent in the world of advertising and marketing. Modern America is filled to the brim with millions upon millions of different brands to give your money to. However, modern America is only has about 5 companies that no matter what you buy, the money goes back to them anyways. A good example of a monopolizing company like that is Unilever. Their logo is this:
<img class=”alignnone” src=”https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/473412614387535872/anW5fha_.jpeg” alt=”” width=”161″ height=”144″ />
What? You say you’ve never heard of this company and have never bought anything from them?
Lies. Go to church, do not pass go, do not collect 200$.
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Picture this, my feminist friends armed to the nads with Bell Hooks literature. You see this Axe commercial on TV:
Its a travesty against modern women (and advertising. Men’s products use topless women to draw in customers?: Ground breaking). And like an intelligent adult you decide to not purchase anything from Axe because money makes the world go round and sooner or later everyone will see the light and they’ll have to change their ways. You know, like Dove:
Doesn’t it just bring tears to your eyes that Dove is recognized feminism and that beauty can’t be bought and is within you? It shouldn’t. Axe and Dove are owned by Unilver, no matter how fiercely you think they believe in your feelings (what? feelings? how many dollars make up an emotion?), companies like this don’t care. They care about money. People who care about money notice trends and right now pretending like you care about women’s self esteem is hot. Its trendy and trending. Look at how many views that Dove video had. Do you know how many media impressions that advertising campaign probably had? Millions. Do you know how much money you put into a company that also thinks of you as nothing but tits and ass, depending on the brand? Billions, probably.
Take the time to notice how absent the word feminism is from campaigns like these. Don’t look at the articles hailing videos like this for its feminist idea, look at the campaign case study, look at the little blurb under the video, look at the brand statement. If a campaign is too scared to say the simple sentence “yeah, as proud feminists we encourage the individuality of beauty through the use of our products”, they don’t care about you. They care about their brand. And big corps will always take lining their pockets over something as silly as women’s rights (how much is that worth again?)
Fashioning Sociology 
